Playing "Catch Up"

(...ie- a smorgasbord of our lives will now be blogged)

First of all, for those who have asked me for a picture of our home... voila! There is our backyard too, filled with all kinds of "weeds" as my husband would call them. I think it is beautiful randomness that reminds me as though I was in a field of wildflowers :) I'm still holding off taking pictures of the interior of the home though, because there is still boxes and clutter everywhere. It is amazing how much "junk" we accumulate in our lives, and yet we can't take it with us when we leave this earthly abode. It almost makes me want to start over every time we move- and yet, we kind of did when we left since most all our furniture was on loan from the villas, but oh how much more we accumulated from the previous owners and other wonderful church people upon our arrival!



I do have the start of a lovely herb garden, which I am excited for and already taken partial advantage of (I say this because really I've only used the oregano and parsley, as well as my indoor basil. If anyone has any wonderful EASY recipes that include chives, lavender or rosemary- I may have more, but those are the only ones I can recognize- feel free to share them with me :) I'm already looking forward to the spring, when maybe I will finally have my first REAL garden- it might actually be a good thing that I don't have one yet, because what would a garden be without tomatoes... and I've learned Liam can't take them full force. :(


NANA'S VISIT

So my mom came to visit me a couple of weeks ago, to help me with the transition process of my husband entering residency. We had lots of fun together, although my husband put her to work (sorry, Mom)-- the payoff for visiting us just a few days after we moved in! We were able to talk Joel into taking us down to the farmer's market though on Saturday afternoon.
She was really a jack-of-all trades person though, as I never knew what job she would be doing next to help out! I was so grateful for her help though, and adult company to talk with when Joel would be away. We didn't really get to leave the house much since my car was in the shop (more on THAT later), but there's only so much you can do here, right?! So we will save it for next time...

Nana the "Nanny". She definitely knew how to get Liam to relax!

Nana the Remodeler. My kitchen cupboards aren't anything to brag about, but Joel bought me some rubber liner and my mom cut them to size.

Nana the Landscaper. Joel wanted to mow the lawn, so my mom and I helped weed it to help him out.

Nana the "Plumber". So we discovered mildew/mold growing on the grout in the master shower. My mom didn't want me breathing in the fumes since there wasn't good ventilation (more on that later) and so she cleaned up the grout so Joel could recaulk where necessary.


If you come visit us, we won't (necessarily) make you work, so don't let that stop you :)

4th of JULY

So you all are probably wondering what we did with our 3-day weekend my husband was so generously given. We were going to head up to his grandparents cottage in Linwood for a pseudo bed & bfast getaway, but when we found out that we had the opportunity to go to Marty & Lavila Langhofers' fireworks shindig, we opted for that instead!


...Plus who wouldn't want to surprise visit Natalie and see the new baby Cosette!!

There were a ton of people at the Langhofers', and it was wonderful seeing Bill's family, as well as Dad and Mom Virkler, Ruth, Tim, and Craig and Rachel. We even got to see Janessa and Serena who came up from Lafayette! What a blessing!!
The afternoon and evening was filled with horseback riding, a giant homemade slip-n-slide, LOTS of food, skeet shooting, volleyball playing, rafting and the biggest homemade fireworks show I have ever seen (also one of the only ones I have ever seen, hehe). Marty shot off hundreds of fireworks. It was amazing. Truly spectacular. I've never been so close (I was "burned" a couple of times!), and it was a different experience to have tons of smoke fill the fields. Liam was pretty indifferent to it though. ;) As we were driving back to Nate and Natalie's that night, it was fun seeing all the different firework displays go off across the cornfields simultaneously.

Liam's first horseback ride (we received plenty of raised eyebrows for this one)

Enjoying the fireworks with Grandma.

The next morning, we didn't quite make it back in time for church in Detroit (we had purposely not brought church clothes so that Joel wouldn't be tempted to stay too long, since he had reading to do), but we would both agree that it was truly a blessing to have our own worship service by enjoy a call-in service in our car, while sharing headphones (the speaker didn't work loud enough) and singing praise songs together.



CHERRY PITTING

Thus begins my first experience as a "midwestern wife" ;)

Don't become too hopeful yet though, because I didn't pick the cherries myself (although maybe I will soon with Amy :) ...It's called Meijers. $1.77/lb. Sherice said it was a good deal, and since both of our husbands love fruit and love smoothies, we decided to pit them together so that we could freeze them. Since pitting cherries can be kind of messy (Mike says that it looks like the Passover has taken place), we opted for my backyard. This also meant that I had to invest in a cherry pitter. Since the "fancy" one only costed a few dollars more, it was a no-brainer to go for the deluxe-pit 4 cherries at once- while catchin most of the juices and pits in a convenient tray- cherry pitter. All I have to say is VERY COOL. :)
After we were done, Erica enjoyed watering my back porch to clean up our mess. She also watered the rest of the plants, which may be the only reason they are still green.



By the way, for those who were wondering... residency has begun. I hear it still gets worse, but I'm starting to see those days that I had prepared myself for. He has still been coming home at decent times MOST evenings, and has remarkably yet to miss a dinner (although dinner has been later then 10pm sometimes), but I have stumbled across a passed out husband in various locations of the house. :)