Baking Day

What a full day!

It started really early - 4:30 to be exact - with a phone call from our niece, Hannah. Her mom and brother needed a ride to the airport, and needed to be there by 5:15!
Dan went and got them and took them to the airport. I couldn't sleep while he was gone, so I got my little notebook and as things came to mind that needed to be done today I wrote them down. Dan returned about 5:45. We did go back to sleep for awhile, but had to get up for his 9:00 appointment at the Eye Mart. He got new glasses today...Kayla and I helped him choose his new frames.




Then he went to work at the house. Hank arrived before him and together they mudded walls again.








Kayla and I headed over to Mindi's house and started in with the baking right away. We made cakes, brownies, cookies and Rice Krispy treats. Mindi thinks it won't be enough....I'm not sure. I don't know how to estimate for 40 people with 10-15 of those being children.

It wasn't all work tho'...we had to force the girls to eat cookie dough!






Balloon entertainment




Rayna taking it all in





Nate was told to get the dice out of his mouth



Stinker!




Then we got a fashion show.







Kayla was in charge of the wardrobe and hairdressing.





Levi and myself the other day in our red shirts.



Dave and Kayla rough-housing




Love the hair!




Tomorrow family starts arriving. We've been gearing up for this for months - hard to believe it is already here. We plan to enjoy every minute! I'll try to remember to take pictures of everyone and share them with you!

Mr. Potato Head

They are off....at 9:00 tonight....to St. Louis.....will be back tomorrow night.
Gina, Dave, Levi and Gideon left tonight and will drive all night to get to St. Louis. They are purchasing a Chevy Express van and are going to pick it up.
They got someone to drive the van and meet them half way!
Kayla decided she didn't want to ride that long. Plus, she promised to help do the baking at Mindi's tomorrow for the family reunion. (They're gonna be tired by Thursday morning, don't you think?!)

Dan and Hank worked together today. Well, according to this picture, looks like there was some "tom-foolery" going on!



They got another coat of "mud" on the drywall. Tomorrow Dan thinks he will get a coat of "top coat" put on. That is the last coat, then you sand it, then you prime it, then you paint it. Could I possibly be painting by the weekend? Well, I can't really paint with family in town. They would probably frown on my disappearing to paint when they drove 14 hours to see us! But by Monday maybe I can!?

Tomorrow morning Dan has an appointment at 9:00 a.m. to have his eyes examined, then he'll pick out new glasses. He's put up with the ones he's wearing for a couple years. They are so scratched he constantly complains about them. I guess he finally got fed up enough to make an appointment. We'll be sure to show you a picture of him sporting his new glasses.

Then, Kayla and I are heading over to Mindi's house to help her get the baking done. We will be making brownies, cupcakes, Rice Krispy treats....and who knows what else we'll come up with. Will depend on how hot it gets most likely!

So, off to bed we go. Kayla has already turned in. She was getting ready for bed and stopped in our room. I have a box of books by the bed. She saw one with her name sticking out of it and asked if she could pull it out of the box. When she did, I told her it was a book of all the funny things the grandkids have said....plus some pictures they've drawn for me, etc. We spent a little while reading them and looking at the pictures....got a few good laughs.

Here is the latest one from Levi. He says Mr. Potato Head as "Mr. Ta-bud-head". We love the way it sounds so we're constantly trying to get him to say it!

Til tomorrow...

ARKANSAS??!!!

There was no plan for me to go to the house today. So Dan got up early and headed out without so much as eating or grabbing coffee....although I'm sure he did on his way out to the house!

I saw Dave outside cleaning stuff out of his truck after Dan left, I thought he had a job to go to today. But it wasn't until late morning that Gina told me he had gone out to the house to help Dan!

They spent the day putting drywall compound on the walls. We call it "mudding the walls". Here is a sample (Dan was in charge of pictures today, I had the camera, all he had was his phone camera!)

Dave on the scaffold spreading the "mud"





The master bathroom with the mud already spread on the green board.



Closer up of master bathroom walls.




I hear Hank showed up first thing this morning also and helped all day. They said he assisted them but also did "cleaning". Wonder if he's for hire once we move in?!




I spent the day working on family reunion details. I went to both Cosco and Gordon Food Service and compared prices on the food we will need. I was surprised to see G.F.S. had better prices across the board. They had more of what we will need too. So, I see a shopping trip to GFS in my future. Plus, you have to have a membership to shop at Cosco...which we do not have. Gina has one, so we could go with her if necessary.

We spent some time with Dan's family this evening. They will be going back to CA early Wednesday morning. It's been nice having them here an extended amount of time. We've been able to spend some additional time with his neice and nephew - been very pleasurable to get to know them better.

Then we had a curve ball thrown at us this evening when we returned from Dan's mom's house. Gina met us in the driveway and told us that they are buying a van (we knew they had been looking for one) and they need to go pick it up - in ARKANSAS! Long story, you can ask them the next time you see them! But they will be leaving in the morning and coming back Wednesday night. So, they won't be here to help prep the food like we'd planned. Any volunteers? Just kidding. Mindi and I talked and decided we didn't need to do that much. She'll stay home and do all the baking, and I'll buy as much precut, ready-to-serve food as I can find!

We go check out the rental house on Wednesday night, then have access Thursday. Family starts coming in Thursday, so it is working out well.

Gotta go finish my list for tomorrow. Have a pleasant night!

Catch Up

Sunday has come and gone....went to church, went out to Dan's mom's to help fix a leak and spent a couple hours visiting with his sister and her kids. Then I sat out on the patio and enjoyed the beautiful day while making lists and plans for this week.

So, I promised you a few extra pictures from the week, so here we go....

At the Conklin family reunion. Dan and his siblings.
Dan, his brother Ben
Brenda and Ottilie



The whole clan.




Levi and Nate sitting under the desk!



Ottilie's family



Ben's family




Brenda and her two kids, Nathan and Hannah





Dan and Hilma and their family





Rayna's birthday party....the birthday girl herself.




Nate making full use of Rayna's toy box we made her.



Rayna in her sunglasses




Her birthday cake.





Experiencing her birthday cake




Then to the 22nd of July....we had gone to Menard's first thing in the morning and gotten drywall.







25lbs. of drywall screws





We start hanging the drywall




"Dead man" helping us hold the drywall up in place until it is screwed up/down/in place!




Hank arrived to help









Marie stopped by to check out the progress




She was such a big helper!




Altogether a very productive week. Three rooms are drywalled and the hallway ceiling has been started. This week as Dan has help, he will hang more drywall and in the meantime, if he is alone, he will start taping and mudding the walls.

At this point, I don't plan to go over the next day or two at least. I want to make sure I am ready for my family to arrive on Thursday and Friday. So many little details, I don't want to forget anything. If we get it all ready, maybe I'll go over later in the week. Who knows!?

Hope you have a great, awesome, wonderful, blessed week!

Turtle Sundaes

Another week has passed...it has been so busy it's been a bit of a blur.

We looked forward to this week with great anticipation. It wasn't disappointing, but I'm learning as an adult that anticipating something is usually more intense than the actual thing or event you were looking forward to. I'm trying to learn to enjoy the journey or in this case the whole process so I don't experience a huge let down once it is over and we are actually living in the house.

We had a mixed bag with family this week. We were so happy to see relatives we hadn't seen in years, then very sobered with the realization of Dan's mom's condition.

This coming week I took off of work so I could focus all week on getting ready for family coming in and the actual event on Saturday. Again, a big build up for a fun event. I'm going to attempt to enjoy every moment.

Back to the house. The day started out with the boys...

I was reminded how much I enjoyed their little voices first thing in the morning.



I had "helped" Levi put his pajama shirt on his legs!


Gideon - Don't you love those eyes?! And that smile....



When Dan and I got to the house we started in the second bedroom. They had gotten the ceiling started yesterday, so we continued in there.








Gina came in (left Dave in the car with the sleeping boys) just after Brenda, Nathan and Janet arrived.







Then the boys woke up and Dave brought them in.



Levi went to work right away!




Brenda brought Nathan over so he could see how drywall is hung....here he is learning.






Here he is doing....while some others stand and watch what he is doing!



The front of the second bedroom closet.



Not only did we have Nathan help screw in drywall screws, we asked him to nail wiring into studs and nail loose nails and staples in the floor boards all over the house. He willingly agreed to do them.



Then Mindi and Jazmyn arrived.




After that, we finished up the second bedroom and tackled the landing ceiling.
Beautiful, drywalled ceiling, isn't it?!



Gideon decided to jump in and help a bit.





Jazmyn being her useful self. She was my "sweeper" the last couple days. She loves using the shop vac.




Like all of us, just happy to be here.



We called it day about 5:00 or 5:30, cleaned up, closed windows and headed back to Gina's. We took Nathan there where Brenda picked him up.

Tomorrow, a day of rest (a badly needed one). We'll plan out the rest of the week. We have several things we have to accomplish between Dan's family leaving and my family coming, getting the rental house, making food, too much fun to think about tonight or I won't be able to sleep.

I think I hear Dan returning with the makings for turtle sundaes....gotta go!