There's Nutmeg Involved!

I had a pretty relaxing, but fun, weekend. I spent it with my friend, Julie's, family. We went to the Iowa Game on Saturday and since we were leaving at 6am I spent the night on Friday night. The game was fun, even though Iowa lost. And I got a little sunburn! Here are some pics…


It's part of the "Home Game Ritual" to stop here and get some cheese curds. The sun didn't allow for a very good picture...


The infamous bag of cheese curds. For the record...I tried 'em and didn't like 'em. They squeak when you eat them.


Getting set up for the tailgate. Notice the first thing out were those darn cheese curds!


Here come the Hawks!


Herky the Hawk


Herky starting to get the crowd excited.




Jan trying out her "Gansta" look...

After the game we hung out at their house and fell asleep on the couch, chair, and floor watching football. Sunday after church we went to the mall for lunch and so the kids could play for a bit at the playland. Then back to their house for more hanging out. Julie decided to make breakfast for dinner and wanted to make French toast. We were talking about it when she said she needed to find the recipe. I said, “It’s basically just eggs.” To which she replied, “Oh no, there’s nutmeg involved!” Too funny! But I’ve learned to never doubt her recipes and this was no exception. Great French toast! Even though Ryan ate the last piece that she wanted…

Yesterday we decided to paint the last of her kids rooms before I had to go to work at 5:30pm. We got both colors painted and tomorrow we’ll put the border on. Then we’ll be all finished with all 4 kids rooms! Wow…what a project but it really was fun. The best part about it wasn’t so much the actual painting but the time spent with a good friend laughing, singing, and just chatting. I’ll try to remember to take some pics of the finished rooms so you can see our handiwork. Maybe you’d like to hire a support-raising missionary to paint for you! ☺

A Wedding and George Jones?

Yesterday was my niece's wedding. It was a beautiful affair and we all had a great time. I almost lost it when Andi (my niece) was walking down the aisle. I love to watch the groom as he watches the bride coming down the aisle and Josh (the groom) was crying yesterday. And nothing makes me cry on the spot more than seeing a guy cry. Especially as he watches his bride. It was so cool! After the wedding I headed to the reception with my sister and brother-in-law. The reception was at a hotel in Davenport and I noticed a tour bus in the parking lot when we pulled in. I didn't mention it at the time but whenever I see a bus like that (fancy with no writing on the side) I always wonder if it's someone famous. Well this time it was! Apparently George Jones had a concert that night at the Adler Theatre and he was staying at that hotel. My sister-in-law walked past him and his entourage in the hallway but didn't realize who he was until later when someone said he was staying at that hotel. Well, my sister is a huge George Jones fan and I did grow up listening to country music through high school so I am pretty familiar with that "era" of country music and seeing George Jones at your hotel would be a pretty cool thing! So all throughout the reception my sister, Jan, and I attempted to "meet up" with Mr. Jones in the hallway somewhere. We tried to think what time his show would be over and what time that would put him back at the hotel and we kept walking to the lobby and around the outside of the hotel to check for his bus. And never did meet up with him. We left the reception around 11:30pm and the bus wasn't even back at the hotel yet. But we had a good time in our efforts!!

During the father/daughter dance I sang "In My Daughter's Eyes" by Martina McBride (I want her hair!) while my nephew, Drew (he's the guitar player in the forefront), accompanied me on the guitar. It was pretty cool and my niece told me she cried...

All in all it was a good weekend. All my siblings were there and 10 out of the 15 nieces/nephews. It's nearly impossible to get us all together at the same time anymore but we did pretty good this weekend!

"Thou shalt not steal..."

This morning as I left for work about 5:40am I was shocked and surprised to discover that someone had taken one of the tires of my car off and had set my car on it. I couldn't see much as it was dark out so I waited until my brother and sister-in-law got back from running to consult them. They said I should call the police and so I did. Pretty soon a patrol car pulled up and he started asking questions to write up his report. Then he said he could help us get the tire back on. So we jacked up my car and as we're trying to put the tire back we realize it's too small and then it hits. This is not even my tire. I had just bought new tires back in January and this was not one of them. So now the police report turns into a stolen property report. We get my spare tire back on and the officer says he needs to take the tire they left for evidence. Then he has me sign a piece of paper stating he took the tire. As he hands me my copy he says that I can have that tire back after 31 days. As politely as I can I say, "No thanks." And off he goes.

My next trip was to Tires Plus to get a new tire. I walk in and tell the guy my saga and he says, as politely as he can, "Do you have the rim?" Another realization for me. No tire...no rim. I just sigh and ask him how much that will cost. He says a new one from Toyota is over $100 but he will call around to some junk yards to see if he can find one for me. And he'll call me. So I leave Tires Plus with no tire but the time and money to deal with this scenario is mounting! And I go to work. I didn't really want to but I need a distraction and work was it.

On the way to work I call my mom...who use to work at an insurance company and she encourages me to call my insurance to see if, by chance, this kind of thing is covered. So when I get to work I sit in the parking lot and make that call. Turns out it is covered! And all I have to pay is my deductible. I give the agent my info and the police report info and he says an adjuster will be in touch.

To sum it all up...by the time I got home from work at 3pm today I had a check in my hand from the insurance company and the guy at Tires Plus had already ordered the rim from the Toyota dealer. And he called back about 15 minutes ago and said they just brought the rim and if I come in before they close at 8pm they can get this all taken care of for me.

I'm thankful that it was only a tire and not my car. And that everything worked out how it did today. One thing that made me chuckle through this situation today was that someone actually asked me it was stolen right off my car. I guess that would be opposed to them stealing one of the extra car tires I keep laying around.) :-

So, if you're reading this and you took my tire, BRING IT BACK! I need to add it to my extra car tire pile...

Great Day!

Tyler got his braces off today! He's happy and he told me he gets his retainer next week. He chose to have it done in Hawkeye colors. Interesting...

Random Weekend Stuff

My parents were here this weekend. They arrived Thursday afternoon and left this morning. They came to have a "yard work" weekend and boy did we ever do some yard work! All day Friday and all day Saturday...but we got a lot accomplished and I got to use an axe!

On Friday afternoon I took Tyler to soccer practice and Lucas wanted to play on the playground a little bit and we had some time so off we went. Why is it that little boys always want to climb on stuff and then jump off?











On this jump, after the 3rd time when he cracked his chin on his knee, he came over for some consolation...trying to act all tough. As I gave him a hug he said, "Maybe I'll wait and do that when I'm older. Like when I'm a teenager." Good advice...

I also discovered that one of my cats, Koda, found a new preferred place to sleep...



Fine with me but I think Fuzzy wants a piece of the action!!

Weekend

Friday evening I headed to Julie and Ryan's house for the evening, which turned into the weekend. Julie and I had a movie night, which we haven't had in a little while and then she introduced me to this show called "The Upside Down Show". I didn't let on too much Friday night but I did find it pretty amusing! Anyway, I spent the night there b/c we were going to the Iowa game on Saturday and we needed to leave around 6am. Yes, that's right...the OTHER 6:00 in a day. The one that I never see. And now I know why I don't see it. Because it's very difficult to see when it's still dark outside! But I managed and we got underway with Ryan's parents. After a few stops along the way we arrived in "Hawkeye City", got parked, and got set up for to tailgate. Since it was an 11am game we brought along sandwiches and chips and stuff. Ryan says they usually grill out when the games have a later start time. Anyway, it was a great day and a good time had by all!




I ended up spending the night again on Saturday night and celebrated their oldest sons 7th birthday with them. We grilled out and played (inside and outside) and then went for a bike ride. After a lengthy prep time of getting the bikes ready we were off! We rode out to Pickard Park in Indianola so the kids could play on the playground equipment there and I think it was uphill both ways. I don't think it would have been so bad but I was hauling both their girls in the bike trailer thingy they have. And boy is my bunda (portuguese for butt) sore today!! But we spent the day (and the weekend for that matter) laughing and it was so great!

After the bide ride we ate cake and ice cream. I use the term "cake" lightly b/c Julie had some trouble making the originally planned pirate ship cake and we ended up with a pieced together pirate hat cake. It was still very cool but she had to use 4 containers of frosting to fix it! As you can hopefully see from this picture, the piece I had was literally all frosting. There was a piece of cake about the size of a the bottom a spoon in the whole thing! We had a good laugh about the cake flavored frosting that he got for his birthday!



Then we had some fun with the King Fu Panda birthday masks and the eyes that you have to pop out to use the masks....




Good times...