Our Deck

We had gotten our deck put together about 2 weeks ago or so. Jim replaced all of the bad boards and applied a solid stain to the floor. My Dad gifted us most of the money for our patio furniture for our birthdays and early anniversary gift because he knew we really wanted it. We got it all put up and given the intense increase of mosquitoes we decided to add the tiki torches which are pretty cool.

Shaun and Sara's Wedding...Finally!

Well as some of you know I shot my first wedding a couple of weeks ago for my cousin Shaun and his new bride, Sara. I have had the pictures sifted through and the dvds sent out for a bit but I hadn't gotten the montage done yet. Well, it is done now and uploaded onto my photography site. For those who are interested you can check it out.

www.mandolinphotography.com

Water Water Everywhere

Well I am sure that anyone who watches the news is aware of the intense flooding happening in Iowa right now. While Jim and I were out of town this past weekend (will post on that soon!) we received a phone call from Emily that water was pooring into our basement. After many frantic calls we determined it was coming in through the old well line that had not been capped off. We hurried home Sunday through tornado warnings and ominous skies to begin work on our basement. To cut a long story short, we got the line redirected to the drain eventually, and we got the carpet cleaned and dried and some was garbage, we had two spots where it was coming in on the wall that we have controlled and as of now it is pretty much dry. Let me tell you it was a ton of sweat and tears to get here.

The rest of Des Moines is still in rough shape. Thank goodness they made improvements after the flood of 1993 because it is truly saving their butts. Other areas of Iowa have not been so lucky. Here are some pictures I took last night downtown, and this is not even nearly as bad as it is supposed to get, this is them being prepared only.

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And a Pinch To Grow an Inch

Five fives, two dimes and a nickel, a mere quarter of a century....that's right folks, I am 25 years old. Today I not only celebrated my birthday, but the last day of school for our kids. I don't know which was harder, being as much mid-twenties as I can ever be, or saying goodbye to the kids at work....oh ok, it was saying good bye to the kids. Although our program does run through summer my school loses a fair amount of kids that do not come to the summer program and that will be going to different schools next year. We lose all of our 3rd graders since the school only goes to 3rd grade and we lose an awful lot of kindergarteners who open enroll at our school for the full day kindergarten.

To celebrate the 3rd graders last time with us we go out for pizza, to a movie, and to Dairy Queen. We had our annual night out last Friday. We saw Chronichles of Narnia: Prince Caspian and it was very good. It was a long movie however, we didn't drop off the last kids until 11pm! They thought that was pretty cool, I was a bit tired at my meeting on Saturday but it was worth it. We certainly will miss them!

As far as my birthday goes, I worked...a lot, closing up and packing up for summer! Jim did surprise me at work this evening, he brought me 24 roses, one for each year I had been alive and then a card that played my favorite band, Rascal Flatts, to kick off my 25th year he said! I thought it was sweet, nothing like walking out the door to see your husband standing with a ton of flowers!

Well, here's to kicking off year 25 and a rockin good summer!

How Ironic!

Well, here I was just bragging about how rockin' awesome our yard is when we get a knock at the door confirming that inded, our yard is amazing. We were just sitting here relaxing when a representative from the Downtown Urbandale Neighborhood Association came to announce that we had won the Lawn of the Month Award! How Awesome!!!

The Blooming Creation We Call Our Yard

One of the coolest things Jim and I have experienced this spring is the total transformation of our yard. We knew landscaping was here but when we moved in it was covered with snow. This spring we cleaned out all of last fall's gross-ness and got everything trimmed and ready for growth. Since then, everyday has been a surprise!

This is how the yard looked after we got it all cleaned out (April 6th)



Here is is just a couple of days later, you can see the green sprouts!(April 10th)



Here it is a couple of weeks later (April 23rd-30th). You can really see the early spring blooms, the crocuses, tulips, and daffodils.






My favorite this spring were these mini daffofils


This one was taken May 4th


May 7th-more beautiful flowers





It was about this time that I decided to start mulching, so these next are of a half mulched yard. I have about 2/3 done now and if it would ever stop raining when I had free time I could finish the rest! These were taken May 15th RIGHT after I got that mulch down. You can see how much the plants have grown though.





And in a culmination, this is our yard today. Quite beautiful if I say so myself. The flowers in front would now cover Jim's face if we were sitting like in our picture above. The grass picture is where our grass meets the neighbors grass and I like how ours is darker (pretty sure its Kentucky Blue Grass right Dad?)

Jim's Job

Well again Jim's job has changed a bit and again the responsibility has also increased. Jim was a division conroller in charge of the Cessford plant that his company aquired and lets just say that it has been keeping him busy. Recently, one of the other division conrollers left the company and unfortunately they are not going to replace her. Instead they have taken the remaining 3 controllers and split their jobs by material as opposed to being split by company. Now, Jim is in charge of all asphalt and asphalt production. Another is in charge of concrete (his job changed very little) and the other person is in charge of something else (not sure what).

Luckily for Jim he did lose a few things from his previous duties, not so lucky, he aquired quite a bit more. Hopefully the transition goes well for him.

Jim's sister, Barb, also made a job change recently. She has been a physical therapist with Mercy Hospital for 12 years. With this she was stuck on a rotating schedule of weekends and holidays (that would drive me crazy!). She recently accepted a job offer from Methodist Hospital as a physical therapist but it is a Monday to Friday job. Congratulations to Barb, she makes the big move late June and here's hoping it's great!

Congratulations Emily!

Last Thursday Emily graduated from high school. For most of us this is a given, for Emily is was a feat. Not because she is unintelligent, but because she has had to face things that would seem foreign to most of us. She has worked SO hard, far harder than many of us have ever worked. This past year alone she has worked 2 jobs to equal full time so she can provide insurance for herself and Kameron, gone to school, been a full time Mom, and provided completely for herself and her son.

There have been people in Emily's life who have told her she wouldn't make it, and those of us who have always told her she would. She worked hard and she did it. Not only did she graduate, she did so with honors, awards, scholorships, and the respect of her teachers and peers.

Attending her graduation was amazing. I have never been to a high school graduation that was so touching and heart felt. The ceremony is small, about 65 kids from her school (its an alternate high school from the main one). Emily got the chance to speak and she did an awesome job. The subject of her speech revolved around the saying "Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass, it's about learning to dance in the rain." For most of these kids that is something they need to be reminded of often.

Everything about the ceremony was fantastic. The principal's talk was great, you could tell her emotional and invidual connection with many, if not all, of the students. The teachers also had amazing things to say. There were tears many times but nothing compared to handing out the roses. Each student was given 5 white roses to give to the people who made a difference in their life, people who they could not have done this without. Needless to say I was very touched as Emily came down and handed me one of her roses.

I have always been there for Emily. She has become like a little sister to me. I always tell her to remember that my expectations of her aren't high, I just expect things when others in her life may not. She has so much potential and it was great to see that be recognized that evening. As they announce each graduate they list the awards and scholarships they have achieved upon graduating. Emily's list was long, far longer than any of her classmates. Some of them she knew about, others were a surprise and it was awesome to see her reaction.

Congratulations Emily, you did amazing!

Lots of Busy Weekends

As with many of us our weekends fill quickly with quite a lot to do. The weekend before Mother's Day kicked off a run of busy weekends for us. Jim's Dad and his wife Linda came into town that weekend so we could all help honor Harry for 35 years of refereeing and umpiring for Iowa highschools. Harry, Linda, Barb, Jim and myself were all able to attend a nice banquet in Ames, there were a few people being honored for 35 years and 2 or so being honored for 50 years, although there were other honorees there. It is amazing to think of working so many years and working so hard, everyone was proud of him.



While Harry and Linda were in town we had lunch at our place and we were able to show both of them all the changes we have made in the house. It was looking a whole lot better from the last time Jim's dad saw it. Jim, Harry, and Barb also put up our garage door opener that Barb got for us as a house warming gift. I wasn't able to help much because I had a couple of photo shoots that weekend but they went very well. The garage door opener works great and makes using the garage a whole lot easier, that for sure!!

The next weekend, Mother's Day Weekend, Jim's mom came into town. Her and Barb spent time together Friday and until Saturday evening, then they came over for dinner at our place. We also had Jayke over for the weekend so we had quite a group. We grilled ribs along with other goodies, then we played Wii and watched a movie. We were also able to show Joy our home for the first time which was exciting. I think she liked and now she will have 2 choices of places to stay when she visits!! The following day we headed to church for the Mother's Day service, but they were inducting a new minister so it ended up being different than a regular service but it was still nice. We all headed to lunch before Jim and I went to meet Chelsea to drop off Jayke. He was so good and so awesome all weekend. We certainly love him!




Last weekend I headed to Omaha to celebrate my Mom's birthday and Mother's Day with her. A couple of years ago we were able to do that and it was a lot of fun so it was nice to have another Mom and Mandy Day. We did some running, some shopping, we headed to the Dodge House which was a lot of fun, and just had a good ol' time hanging out. I think my brother and sister liked me being able to see their softball games and I liked it as well. I stayed through the weekend to see my cousin Nicholas graduate high school and then headed home to spend Sunday night with Jim before he had to head to Salt Lake City for the better part of this past week.







This week has been pretty chill for us. It is nice to take some time and just relax. I am taking a Photoshop class which began this weekend and Emily's graduation party but other than that we have been able to take it easy. I was pretty excited on Saturday evening because my friend Melissa who lives in Chicago but I spent time with in China was passing through Des Moines on her way back to Chicago and so we were able to meet and have dinner. It was a blast! I miss having some of my good friends around sometimes, that is for sure! We have some more busy weekends coming up very soon so we better enjoy this break!