Kindergarten Graduation

Yes, we have officially graduated one child! A had his Kindergarten graduation this week and it proved to be a tear jerker. Why would one become emotional over something so silly. I blame it on the fact that they played the "graduation march" (you know daa, da-da-da, daa, da) as the kids walked into the church. Then they had the kids sing "What a Wonderful World." It was very cool. Though as usual it only lasted about 20 minutes and we arrived 40 minuets early to get a good seat. Oh well, it was a great thing! I am sad to think A is already done with this first very important year of school. It seemed to go by very fast. Everyone says "Kids will be grown and gone before you know it." I guess that will seem true someday.









The Graduate

















Class of 2016!!

A's teacher (aka Mrs. Halloween!)

Wedding fun

Congratulations to two of my very good friends, Cassie and Maria. Maria was married last weekend and Cassie tied the knot last night. Maria's wedding was here in town. We had a wonderful time, not only at the wedding, but the whole weekend was great. My parents offered to take the kids up to the lake, so we had the whole weekend alone. We got more accomplished in those days than we have done in weeks! Maria's family is Greek, so the festivities were very My Big Fat Greek Wedding esque. It was very cool. We also really enjoyed spending time with all of my high school friends who are now spread across the country from LA to KC to Chicago to New York, Boston, and Philly. Here are some pictures from the weekend.

Cassie got married last night in Mexico. Because of the timing so close to Maria's wedding, we were not able to make it to the wedding and we are very bummed about that! We wish Cassie and Gary the best!! Here is a picture of Cassie, but that's not her new hubby...that one of our friends Danny.

Cute kids

A and F hanging out.

Besement project

After 3 delays, our basement refinish is set to begin tomorrow. We are very excited and very ready to have this started (and completed!). This was originally to have started 2 weeks ago, but because of all the rain we have had around here, other projects have not been completed and our contractors are playing catch-up. Hopefully they will show up tomorrow and we will be on our way. They promised us that once they start, they will work daily until it is completed (no breaks). It should take about 6 weeks, but we are planning on 8 weeks, so we don't get too disappointed when they are not done in time.

Here is the plan:

1. Tear out the back window and create an egress window into the new bedroom.

2. Tear out the floor and drop in down 7 inches and pour a new floor.

3. Add full bath

4. Bedroom

5. Play room

6. Laundry area

7. Add sump pump and tile drain system to keep the whole basement dry.

It should be very nice. The worst part of the whole experience is that we will be without laundry during the renovation. Thankfully it is lakehouse time and we will be up at the lake most weekends and can take our laundry. Here are some before pictures...

This area will be the bedroom. It will have the egress window and a closet.

This will be the full bath.

This will be a small storage area with the laundry in front of it.

This will be the play room. All those nasty windows will also be changed out for new ones.

Cold Spring

Growing up we vacationed at a resort in Minnesota called Cold Springs Resort. I am thinking of that place often lately, not because it was truly cold there, but because it is so cold here, now!! This Spring has not been a pleasant one. I have been a horrible blogger lately. Not much to talk about I guess. The kids have all taken their turns with a feverish virus this weekend, which has kept us cooped up in the house. Susie is also not feeling great. We were able to get out on Friday night and enjoy an Elder's concert up at the kid's school. That was great, as expected! I was also on call this weekend which is typically awful, but this weekend hasn't been too bad. Only about 7 calls so far! Here are some pics of the kids from the past month or so.

St. Patrick's Day 2008

What a wet and rainy day! Yuck! We did enjoy a wonderful Irish breakfast at our friend's house this morning, but that was the only good thing about today. We had a great time this past Saturday at our neighborhood parade and our pre-parade party. The day started with snow and that had us all worried, but it stopped snowing and raining about 1 hr before party time. We were able to get tents to cover our deck and some heaters for the back patio and that solved all our worries. I was very nervous some people would ditch out (and they did!), but we still had around 120 people show up. I think that is pretty good for a cold, snowy day! Thank goodness they don't all come at once, but it did get pretty crowded in the house at one point. Many of those people are children and it becomes a bit of a madhouse, but a fun one and I love it! I don't love cleaning up afterward, but it is all worth it. It is weird having Easter so close to St. Pat's this year. We already took down all of our St. Patty's Day stuff yesterday and put up all of the Easter decorations.
Nothing else exciting has been happening lately. We did get two new birds to replace Oswald. Both of them are blue (Oswald was green/yellow). A named his "Oscar" and C named his "Blue." They are far less tame than Oswald was, so we really need to work with them to get them used to people. Okay that is all for now.

We have a Parakeet down!!

Oswald died last night. It was the most dramatic death I have ever witnessed--not that I have seen many deaths, but it was very movie-like. Susie and I were sitting in the living room, watching TV when all of the sudden, Oswald fell off his perch and started wheezing. It was awful sounding. We ran over to him and he was struggling to take these very painful sounding breaths. Then he raised his head up and took one long last breath and dropped his head to the floor. Susie picked him up and tried to open his beak and see what happening, but there was nothing obvious to see. It was so sad. We were very worried about the kids and what they would think when they woke up and saw that he was dead. We told both A and C separately and both had lots of questions about why it happened. They both wanted to know immediately if we could get another bird (obvious attachment disorder there!). I talk to a lady at work whose brother raises birds and she said parakeets are known for just dropping dead. Apparently they do not show signs of illness and just fall over and die. That is very disturbing. I feel awful for poor Ozzie!! We will miss him.