What a man, what a man, what a mighty Good Man!

It's been quite a while since I've last posted. Sorry about that.



Here are a couple things that have been going on while I've been away from the blog:



Karli and I went to a girl scout event and when I came home, this is what I found
Jon had built a table for my sewing machine and installed a shelf with buckets for my sewing supplies. All his own idea!! Well, I knew he was putting a shelf up so we can hang the clean laundry. He made the table from scraps of wood hanging around. What a guy!!



Then, he worked two days about 8 to 10 hours each to do this:
The tiles are gorgeous. I helped paint the walls, but he did everything else and put all the wall decorations back up. What a guy!

How did I get so lucky??????? Love you!

Holy Communion Batman!

Karli completed her first communion last weekend. I worked for a couple months on making her dress. It turned out very cute. She loved it!
There were about 15 other kids at the same Mass. They processed into church.

They got to carry up the gifts (bread & wine & offering basket).

Fr. Paul usually kneels down after the offertory basket has been passed so the kids can come up to him and put their envelope in the basket in a fun way. He recently had knee surgery so it's hard for him to kneel. This was the second time he had called Megan over to him in the middle of Mass. She gets to sit in the huge chair next to Father while the other stuff is going on and then she gets to kneel down with the basket for all of the little kids to come forward. It was so cute! She enjoyed it.

My cousin's daughter was with us in church - also a cutie and so well behaved. Our three and my brother's three just love Veronica to pieces and keep her very entertained.

After communion, the whole group of first-timers stood on the steps of the altar and sang a song with hand actions - You prepare a table before us. How good of you, Lord. The kids did a nice job but it was hard to hear them singing.

After church we took some family pictures and of course Opa had to be silly.

We ate spaghetti for supper and had cheesecake from Mr. Delicious - ooh it WAS delicious!

All Grown Up

Our furniture has finally arrived! Jon, Karli & Nate picked it up Friday afternoon. All we had to do was unwrap the plastic and twist in the legs. It looks so grown up and pretty. I've added some pictures, but I'm not sure it does it justice.


We also added a cornice board that Jon made. I only had to sew one seam at each end and he did the rest. The lamp came with the couch and chair deal. I wanted to skip the lamps (2) and get another hundred dollars off the price, but Brandi said it just couldn't happen. The original lamps with the deal were ugly, so we searched the store and found this cute little number. It has the wrought iron look that matches our entertainment center and a simple white shade (which is actually pale green - not white - who knew?). We already had two lamps with built in magazine racks/end tables, so we didn't really need new lamps. Long story longer, Brandi calls me on Easter Monday, and our conversation went something like this:

Brandi: Remember how when you asked about these lamps, there was only one in our store but one in Minot?

Me: Um, yeah?

B: Well, it is on their inventory list but it's just not anywhere in their store, I guess.

Me: Oh, so now what do we do? (thinking: cool, now can I get my $100 off since I didn't want the things in the first place?)

B: Well, if you want to come down to the store, you could pick out a different set of lamps...

Me: ummmm

B: ... or we DO have a floor lamp that is the same style as the one we have that you chose. It is actually more expensive, but I could give it to you at the same price since it ...

Me: (cutting her off) great! That would be fine.

So when Jon went in to settle up with the gal (not Brandi - this time it was Heather), they tried to charge him an extra $52!! Thankfully I had our original receipt and the check already written out that he took along with him. Heather heard the whole story of what Brandi told me and assured Jon that she would fix it and just took the check with the first amount.

Oh, so now I have a floor lamp and an extra table lamp that I'm not sure what to do with them. Jon came up with this plan:

And we think it looks pretty cool. The floor lamp is setting by the piano for now. We'll see if it stays there or finds a home at Oma's cottage.

And this is the look with the roller blind closed. What a great interior decorator I have. Heesss name eesss Juan. Heee eees a cussin to Raul, dee pool boy, and Fifi zee Frrrrrench maid. :)

We've been in this house for almost three years and we finally have a gorgeous, grown up living room! Ooooh, and the couch is so soft - it's like buttah! Stop by and check us out!