For once I am not the lazy (read as sleep the latest) one in the house. Madison has decided she doesn’t want to get out of bed in the mornings. She always gets in the bed with me when Wade leaves for work and now stays even after I get up. Today she came downstairs at 11:45 – what a lazy dog I have.
Milwaukee weather is surprising – it warmed up. When the weatherman predicted a high of 60 degrees, everyone wanted to be outside. Maren called and asked if I’d like to join her for a walk. We ventured out by the lake and had a great time. Elise stayed warm and shaded while we did all the work!
The 2008 ADRL racing season is over and Dad won the pro mod division. Way to go!
They (the weather people) predicted light snow mixed with rain and I didn’t believe them. I was wrong. I am sitting at my desk looking out my newly painted windows and seeing a little white stuff in with the rain. Since the temperature is in the low 40s I know nothing will stick, but it still puts a smile on my face!
We had visitors tonight! Christin and Kyle brought dinner (lasagna) and their English Mastiff puppy, Fred, over to visit. Fred is only 6 months old (I think) and weighs 110+ pounds. The first time he and Madison met they were the same size. Now there is a noticable difference and Madison is very perturbed not to be dominating. We laughed at the dogs antics and enjoyed the lasagna dinner.
Wade is definitely improving and trying to slowly wean himself off pain medicine. We were invited across the street for board games and gladly accepted. I had met Amber and Nick, but Wade had only heard about them. We did a lot of talking and played a new game (to us) “Apples to Apples” before Wade’s knee screamed for ice and medicine.
Wade had his ACL surgery today. His surgery time was 7:30 am so we had to be there by 6 am – very early for me these days. He was joking and happy before the needles started:
I would have taken a picture of the groggy Wade, but I wasn’t sure he would like that. He had a lot of trouble waking up, but we eventually got him home and into bed. The doctor said everything went well and to keep him on the pain medication at least until tomorrow.
One of Wade’s favorite holidays is Halloween – mostly because he can carve pumpkins. This is the first year we ventured out to a pumpkin patch. I think I was most excited to find a carmel apple.
Although it was fairly late when we got home from dinner we all carved pumpkins at Wade’s insistence and had a great time.
Wade’s parents came to visit for the weekend and wanted to help us with projects. How wonderful! We spent Friday and Saturday working and I now have all the trim in the hallway, the window frames in my bedroom, and all the trim in the nursery painted. I couldn’t believe how much quicker the painting went with help!
Hallway (balcony door and window frame):
Nursery (all trim – still need to find a wall color):
Master Bedroom (window trim):
It took me almost a month of working pretty much every day, but the sunroom is stripped, sanded, and painted. I am so glad there are no more windows to paint. I think I would have to put them off till next year!
Before:
After:
Boy! We had our ultrasound this afternoon. After confirming the baby was healthy and developing on schedule the technician informed us we were having a boy.
Wade finished one of the closet doors! Now hopefully the next one will be done this week.
Maren and Elise came by for a little while and we were playing in the living room when Wade got home. He had fun showing Elise how to play with my iphone.
I again worked all day on the sunroom windows – this is a bigger project than I thought. When Wade got home from work I wanted to go to Kenosha (an hour south) and look at a dining room table a man was selling on craig’s list. It was mission style and supposedly in perfect condition for a not so bad price. Wade decided if we were going that far we should drive further down to IKEA in Chicago to look for shelving for a closet in the nursery. The table was not solid wood, which the man had thought. For most people this might not be a big deal. Wade and I are hard on furniture and would like the option of refinishing a table top. It took much longer than anticipated to reach IKEA and then we realized they were closed – an hour earlier than we thought. It was a long night with nothing productive accomplished at the end. I did finish my book with all the car time.
I have heard it said that if TV were used in campaigns like today that FDR would never have been elected. I can see how that is very true. I just got around to watching the Vice Presidential Debate last night and the latest Presidential Debate this morning. I’m not much for posting on politics and don’t plan to. However by watching the debates and ignoring the discussion on issues, I have to say some of the candidates come across noticeably better. It’s amazing how much a joke that falls flat, or a goofy grin at the wrong time can help you to form an opinion. Strictly off the personality criteria I’d have to say my two favorites are Obama and Palin. They just seem much more personable, with-it (age does seem to matter), engaging, and a little less “me, me, me”. I liked that Palin agreed with Biden when appropriate or included him in her comment about they do both know what the role of Vice President entails. I didn’t like how McCain tried to make a joke about how he would actually answer a question or insert a comment about how Obama still hadn’t specified the health care fines. The points he was trying to make were fine, it was the way he said them. What annoyed me is that I would find myself paying less attention to their actual words (on the issues) and more on how they were delivered. Maybe I can get a transcript of the debates somewhere and just read their responses.
Curtis has been installing our new windows. He worked a couple of days and got all the vinyl windows installed and most of the exterior aluminum wrap done. We are still waiting for the wood windows to come in. Our house is going to look funny for the winter, but the white aluminum wrap should make painting the house next spring much easier.
I’ll get pictures of the windows from the inside after I get the woodwork around them painted – they all look a little odd right now.
Melissa and Chris have adopted a new dog – Bailey. She is a 7 year old cocker spaniel mix.
I was taking a break from working on my windows today and decided to watch a little TV. I happened upon a show focusing on the deconstruction of a house (with no cable we only get about 8 channels). They pointed out a pneumatic nail remover, which I thought was super cool. I called Wade to tell him I wanted one and before he even really knew what it was he said, “No”. I can’t really blame him, but how cool would it be to have one?!?
Wade and I both spent the day working on our projects. His goal is to get the closet doors finished and mounted before his surgery. I am trying to get the sunroom done before our next visitors arrive. We’ve both learned we work much better with a goal. I was getting hungry for lunch and opened the refrigerator doors to this:
I think we have as many paint rollers and paint brushes (in the ziploc bags) as we do food. That’s normal right?
I took the week off work and have been working to get all the trim, and windows in the sunroom painted (or this week I worked on three windows and the two front doors). Wade and I had plans to go to a high school football game – something he has wanted to do for a while. I rushed to shower and when I came downstairs, Wade and Madison were curled up in front of a fire. Wade evidently decided it was a night to stay in, build a fire, pop popcorn, and watch a movie. I couldn’t have agreed more.
Wade and I joined the young couples at our church for a night of games. After dinner of pizza and salad, the boys disappeared into the living room to play the newly repaired Xbox (game of choice – Rock Band). The other three girls and I sat around the table and talked. It turns out Wade is an awesome singer or maybe it’s that he was so bad at playing the instruments. No one specified. Regardless, we both had a great time and ended up staying so late that no more projects were done that night.