The Basement is as finished as it's going to get!

We worked hard to finish by the time they got married, but we managed to finish by this morning. We were frantically cleaning and grouting last night and I scrubbed the floor this morning. They are home and ready to start their lives in their brand new apartment. The only thing not knew is the kitchen cabinets. We are glad to be finished. We do not have any trim up but they can wait awhile for that. Enjoy the pics. It helps to go back and look at what it looked like before this.

Kanga

The Wedding Is Over!

Here are a few pics from the wedding. The cake turned out beautiful and the bride and groom looked great. The girls were cute in their dresses and full of spunk. Christopher looked good as the best man too. Pooh had a blast being the flower girl and Eyore carried honey bee down the isle. It turned out so much better than we ever dreamed of for such a short notice. We did all this in two weeks. My wonderful church ladies, whom are my friends did the decorating. They put in so much time and effort and were awesome. I think we pulled it all off for about 700.00. HoneyBee is with the brides mom and of course the dad walking the bride down the isle was precious. All was good but were glad it's over.

Can A Person Be Too Tired?

I feel bone weary now. We have been working on our basement remodel for 2 weeks now, nonstop. We work every evening and then on the week-ends. It feels like we should have been done but there just seems to be more to do. We have finally sheetrocked the bathroom, sheetrocked the kitchen and hallway, put up mud and tape, finished the mud and taping in the bathroom, textured the bathroom and put in one new countertop in the kitchen. We have painted the girls room, painted part of the kitchen, put in new lights in the kitchen, added new plug ins in the kitchen, new wiring and plumbing in the bathroom. Doesn't that seem like we should be done? No way.

We still have the tiling to do. If I wasn't so tired I would take a picture so you could see where I am at with it. About half of the bathroom floor is done and the shower still needs done. Then we must grout. We also need to finish mudding in the kitchen, sand, then texture. After that we can begin painting. We have to put down primer because it's new sheetrock, then the actual paint. We can then put back the cabinets (mismatching of course). The second countertop still needs installed and the kitchen sink. After that we need to put up one door, finish painting a couple of spots of sheetrock in the bedroom, and touch up the ceiling in the kitchen. Oh, and we need to paint the bathroom too.

Then begins the tedious work of taking all the tools out of the basement, vacuuming, cleaning, setting up, ect. This all needs to be done by Sunday at the latest. So, maybe a little prayer for us?

I can hardly move by 11:00 o'clock because I'm stiff. I feel better in the morning, but then I must do wedding stuff. In the afternoon is when we start working on the basement.

I think the wedding is going to be beautiful but there are so many last minute preperations.
Oh, the rush of things!!!

Kanga

Wonderful Church!

Pics of our ladies retreat.

There doesn't seem to be enough words to express our thankfulness for our new church. We
started going there a couple of months ago and I can't believe the realness of the people there. We went to a ladies retreat at the beach last week-end and I was blown away by the closeness of these ladies and how real they are with their faith. We were really able to retreat but we did have times at night that we talked and learned a little more about our faith and each other. We were all challenged with "what fills our our cup" and "how can we be more accountable to each other". Are we being real about our relationship with Christ? Are we being real about our personal relationships? Are we willing to let others be real? It was so inspiring. We have all decided to keep a journal and bring it with us on Sunday mornings so we can share what we are learning. We can share our hurts and dissapointments. We can share our struggless. We can share our lives, the ones we don't generally show other people. I can't wait for Sunday morning.

On another note, the ladies have taken my new dauther-in-law to be under their wings. She is new to our church and she comes from a very different background. With a wedding in a hurry we didn't have any decorations and they have went to town on decorating with what they have. Now, they have a lot. WE are ending up with 3 pillars on each side, Tuling around them all with twinkiling lights and rose pedals. Then the reception will be wonderfully decorated with ladies doing glass, candles, roses, and such. They have enough for the chairs and the stage. It is going to be wonderful and we are so bleesed to have people show her how Christ's love can be. My daughter-in-law has never seen so many people willing to help her and it makes her more determined to come to church. I can't say enough about how wonderful our church and the people in it are. I love my church.

Kanga

Our New Granddaughter

Here is a picture of our beautiful granddaughter that is being added to our family on November 23rd, 2008 at 4:00 p.m. She was born one hour before my other granddaughter so we can just say it's twins!!!! We will call her piglet. She is so different from honeybee but they are both adorable. They absolutely love each other. We take both of them to church and they play in the playpen together. It's quite comical to have both of them together but we wouldn't trade it for a moment. I'll post more of the babies when I get them up on the computer.

Kanga

The Pumkin Olympics

The cool thing about our fired up youth is that we still have lots of fun. We don't worry about having a party on October 31st, we just worry about having a fun party. We had the olympic games as our theme and what fun we had! The younger kids got to play some games too. Here you see Roo in the darker picture and her friends in the other. We were able to have it at someones very nice, large, and roomy barn. We must have had over a hundred of us there. What a great time. The food was abundant and the company great. Two of my good friends were there plus many other friends. We had a great time watching the kids enjoy the games and each other. They even made a pumkin piniata. The kids had so much fun and it took a little longer for them to get it open so all the kids got a chance.

I couldn't help but write about our fired up youth. This is one of the most awesome things we have ever encountered. If anyone was looking for a way to grow your teen, then this would be it. We are pretty conservative yet all the youth there want to be there. We now have over a hundred youth and parents come and sit on the outside too. You don't have to but we do have a mom's group and a dad's group too. Almost all of these teens are making their mark for Christ. They are reading their Bible faithfully, memorizing verses weekly, and getting out in the community witnessing. We have something called the Bible Bus that goes around to different apartment complexes and does a Bible Club. We have several teens going on missions trips monthly. We also have small group leaders that are led by the young adults that have "graduated" from the youth group. These kids are on fire for God. Anyone looking for Christ should come and see this group!

Remodel Nightmare!

We begin again to remodel our basement, which we have started over and over again. Usually we run out of mone, time, or expertise. Sometimes we run out of patience. This project has been dear to my heart though because it involves a bathroom downstairs. I used to sleep down there and you have to go from one end of our basement, up the stairs, around the corner, and across the house to get to a bathroom. Having a bathroom down there will be wonderful. The problem is, it has been expensive and difficult. The plumbing in this house is terrible and has been done wrong.

Rick has been working hard on the basement all week and week-end though, repairing and replacing. I am amazed at how hard he has worked even through misshaps. He has had to take out our main line to the sewer and replace it. Apparently there was some pressure build up in one of the pipes. They had a bucket under it but the pipe exploded and WOW! I could not believe that Peter did not get really upset. That was the most amazing and sick smelling stuff I had ever encountered. It was all over the room and hubby and Christopher. We were airing out the basement all day and night. Then I had to go and scrub it with disinfectant to make sure it was all out of there. We were able to hose it down since it isn't finished but I don't ever want to repeat that again!

Even with our bad experience Wise Owl rose above it and has most of the plumbing and electrical done, with our last framing wall done. We are ready for sheetrock, then mudding and taping, sanding, then skimcoating the floor, then tiling.

I will post a few pics in progress. It really is getting better. I'll post cleaner pictures next time. The first plumbing picture is before most of the new stuff is done. The second one is of the new plumbing against the wall and behind our new existing frame work.

The reason we are working hard is because my son is getting married on the 23rd of this month and is renting our apartment down there. So, we must work ourselves hard to accomplish the remainding things that need done.

Kanga

The Days Are Changing Fast

Ummm, the pictures came up first so.... I can't figure out how to change it.

It's fall and I haven't even had time to plan things for winter yet. We are onto other projects inside and it seems overwhelming to look outside. The leaves are so many and they are covering over half the yard. It's beautiful right now but I don't relish cleaning it up, and clean it up we must. We are having an appraisel done on Monday Morning!!!!!!

We desperately need a new roof, siding, and paint but we need the appraiser not to notice that all that needs done. Please pray that all will go through and we can refinance our house and fix a few things.

We are in the process of remodeling the downstairs into an apartment. We are in a hurry because our son is getting married and they are going to rent the apartment from us. It will be pretty comfortable but the kitchen will be small.

I'll post a few pics for you all to see.

Kanga