They grow up so fast!

 Do you see the cute little blonde girl completely enthralled with Robb's story?

:) She turned 30 yesterday!!!

Happy Belated Birthday Maddy!!  I love you!

* I did wish it to her in person yesterday! We ate ice cream. And we celebrated both hers and her husband, Matthew's LAST weekend as that fell right smack in between both of their birthdays.

It just occurred to me that each of my kids and their loves birthdays are right next to each other.  I couldn't have planned that if I'd tried.

Ketchup and Cabooses

 Wow!  Since July?!  A lot has happened.  

If I tried to get caught up with a post for each, I'd never get it done.

I lost 47 pounds JUST in time for the cruise!  I'm hovering around 45-47 pounds off since. For example, we're out of chips so today is a salad day!  Judging from these pics, I could stand to lose another 20 but that's for another day.

I went on the cruise with Leon, Meri and her bf Ryan, and two sisters (a BIL, nephew and his fam) and an aunt.  It was a lot of fun, a lot of money and a LOT of food!  Will show more pics later when I feel like it.

The gang

The MSC island, super early in the morning.  We were the ONLY ones on the beach until my niece-in-law showed up! SO beautiful!

Leon FINALLY at the water park on the cruise ship.

Teresa and I. We found that they were at the airport at the exact same time as us on the way back!  Leon and I were waiting for food at the food court and he saw them. Hey, isn't that your sister?! HA! 

The weekend that we got back from the cruise, we threw Aggie her FIRST birthday!!!  Her actual birthday was the week before but the cruise...  so they didn't do the party until the next week and that worked out great for me!  Her other grandparents were there too and lots of aunts and uncles and friends.  

At the party, Ryan and Jen announced that they'd been secretly married for the last two weeks! WHA???  Only Leon and Meri knew.  They had attended a Creed concert and took a friend along that can perform weddings and said "I do!" JUST as the song "With Arms Wide Open" started!  So I'd been calling her my daughter-in-law for so long already, it felt natural.  I have 3 daughters now!

I went to the Iowa State Fair with my sister, Kristin, and her kids. So much fun, so little time.  I was also dogsitting in Mason City so I couldn't be gone too long. We made every second count.  Oh and I got NO ribbons for my entries. Oh well.  NEXT year.

My nephew, Brae, and me found a photo booth!  He's a crack up!

Leon started school here this year and appears to be doing fine and making lots of friends.  Only one note from a teacher so far about him not participating very much in class but he's been talked to about that by his dad.  He started learning the flute and with the band playing along with him, he decided that it's not for him. He can't hear himself play and can't tell if he's actually playing the note or not.  So we're trying to track down a clarinet.  Meri has one packed away somewhere and she'll find it this weekend I hope!  But boy oh boy, he knows how to make the flute work if he's the only one in the room!  oh well.

We've had lots of car problems/expenses in the last few months.  I think we're through the worst of it, but I think Ryan's car needs brakes now.  sigh.  It's ALWAYS something!  Our car guy either loves or hates us.  I'm not sure which and afraid to ask.  His wife just keeps taking our money so okey dokey.  It must be LOVE!

I'm painting the guest room this weekend, starting over lunch today.  My bestie from NC is coming in less than 2 weeks for a visit!!!!  I can't wait!  and the guest room is full of my sewing equipment and still has the paint job I did for the girls in 2005.  It's time.  We're going to hit our favorite Mexican restaurant and hang around in Des Moines before taking her to the airport that Friday.

Tomorrow, I'm going to watch Dirty Dancing with my other bestie, Ada, at the nursing home.  It's her favorite movie and I gave her the decision of what we should watch.  My mistake!  We've already watched it twice this year alone.  That's ok.  I'll just keep singing along with the songs.  And I'll start thinking about suggestions for the next movie.

Thinking about taking Leon to the new PG13 Monster movie this weekend.  I need to make sure it's ok with his dad before I talk to Leon about it.  But that could be a fun outing!

Anyway, back to work.  I've got one more miracle to pull out of my caboose before the weekend!

Cousins! Favorite Cousins!

I met up for lunch with my favorite-est cousin in the world, Julie!!

We've done Zombie Burger twice now or was it 3?   It's a little farther for her to drive to it, but she loves it too.

We spent a two hour lunch talking about everything under the sun.

I'm so glad I have this chick in my life!!

This was us last year.

She brings back ALL the wonderful memories!  We were hoping to do this every 6 months but January and life got in the way, so it's been a whole year.  We're going to remedy that!

We're going to the Zoo! Zoo! Zoo!

 How about You, You, You?

You can come too, too, too!

We're going to the Zoo! Zoo! Zoo!

That song gets in my head and I can't shake it!

On Wednesday of last week, I heard that my sister and some of her kids and grandkids were in Des Moines and going to the zoo that morning!  I'm not THAT far away and talked to my boss about taking the morning off to see her.  He said SHURRE!

So after attempting to wake up Leon unsuccessfully (he literally grumbled, "I don't WANT to go the zoo!", off I went!  and had a wonderful time with Ruth Ann and company!

Ruth Ann wouldn't let me pay my own way into the zoo since it was my birthday and when the worker heard that, he said, "We have things for you!" and let me pick out a birthday sticker and gave me a free pass to ride the train!  I'm not going to ride the train alone, so I had some of our party come with me.  A couple of my nephews, grand-nieces and a niece-in-law.

I was headed home around 1ish and got a call from Leon, who had just woken up. "Where ARE you?!"

"Um, I went to the zoo and am on my way back!"

Immediate tears!!  "You went to the zoo withOUT me?!!!"

It took some convincing to explain that  he is a sleep-liar like his dad.  I had asked him 3 times to go and he said NO.  So I promised him that we'd go again on Saturday.

And yes we DID go on Saturday too!  It took some convincing to get him to get out of bed that day too!  Cripes he needs to get to bed sooner in the evenings!!  School is starting in a month.  Might need to wake him up 15 minutes progressively earlier each day until then.

Jen, Ryan, Aggie and a niece and her family joined us and also my mother-in-law.  

I got there early enough to score a free wheelchair loan so she wouldn't have to walk all around it.  So I got a workout! Which I needed anyway.

So MORE fun at the zoo and the kids enjoyed their time immensely.

Leon is only looking like that because he tries to discourage me from taking pics.

I need to be sneakier.

And Aggie got to hang out with a 2nd cousin and the 2nd cousin's cousin!

If you can't tell, Aggie is the smiley one.

Lots of pool time this summer.  Aggs is enjoying the water a lot and Jen is enjoying our family pool pass.  She said they were going to be pool rats this summer and they're making use of it!

And we played Yardzee and with bubbles on the deck one day and I noticed that we were caught on our security camera. Gotta save those memories!

Anyway, that about brings us to current. My life is a rush and here we are.

Sew behind

So I hightailed it back to Iowa from Kentucky and made it to Maddy's house JUST in time to head out to the barn quilt painting night nearby.  We were each given a free token from a drink. :)

and then got to work!  Matthew arrived later but watched us work while he enjoyed a drink too.

Our finished products.  Mine graces the entryway table.

And because Matthew's sister was getting married over the 4th weekend, I dog sat the "girls" for them at their house for 5 days.  I DID come back home to have an outting with Leon on the 4th though. 

and I got to see Aggs a little too!  She is walking now!

 I borrowed Maddy's kayak and then piled Leon's in with it and we went to a lake nearby.  Had a great time!  We didn't figure out the kayak launch thingy until we got back from exploring the lake though.  It would have made getting into them easier and not gotten my feet wet.

And every time I want to get a pic of this kid, he tries to strike a pose to discourage me.

And when he's NOT looking like an alien, he comes off looking like a child model!

While dog sitting, I did as much sewing as I could.  I finally finished these compression leggings!  I started them 3 years ago at a sewing workshop, using a flat-fel stitch with my serger.  I screwed up and left my blade on and it practically had fallen apart on me when I tried them on back then.  Plus they were super tight.  But I guess that was their intent anyway.

So I pulled all the seams apart and just serged them up like normal.  I felt like Sandy in the last scene of Grease.  REALLY snug!  But wow, they made my legs look great!

Since then, I've cut them into shorts length, and they'll be the bottoms of my swimsuit for the cruise.

Of course, now, I can't find them... but I'm sure they'll turn up.

And through one of my widow groups on FB, I met up with another widow who is staying the summer in the town near where Maddy lives.  After a false start to watching fireworks together, due to absolutely NO parking within 1.5 miles of the lake, we met up a couple days later to go on a cruise around the lake.  I had seen where Maddy had been on it a few times and it looked like SO much fun.  Maddy had encouraged me to actually go on the cruise while I was there, so I did with my new widow friend and her boyfriend.

However we never left the dock...  We sat on top of the boat sipping on drinks for 1.5 hours until we saw the "captain" plug the boat back in. Um hey...  are we NOT going out?  Nope, something was wrong with the starter and if we wanted to wait until 4pm, we could go out then or get our money back.

Well, I needed to get back to the pups, and they had other plans too, so we parted ways and I headed back to Maddy's.

This is the paddle boat part that WOULD have been working, if it had started.

And this is the boat.

Someday...

Anyway, I didn't get as much sewing done as I'd wanted over the 5 days, but that's ok.  As long as I get two/maybe three things done by fair time.  I've got more snaps on order for a toddler jumper, need to do the buttonholes on the jacket for Matthew and stitch up a coat for me.  And then after the cruise, hem a dress for Maddy for her other sister-in-law's wedding!  So many weddings!

I guess that's what Saturdays are for.  Sewing catch up.

Kentucky or Bust!

 I visited my sister in Kentucky a few weeks ago!  She is a fabulous musician, botanist and world traveler.

Her guest room boasted instruments from all over the world as well as her original guitar that she played in gigs when she was younger.

Since I was still on my diet, she helped me stay on it as much as possible. :)

Her deck is covered with probably 20ish banana and other tropical trees.  I got to bring home a banana tree baby and a few Taro tree babies and she gave me instructions on what to do with them in the winter time so they'll continue to thrive.  At the moment, they're looking nice on my deck as I try to keep them out of the wind.

Tammy remodeled her home and added a woodfire pizza oven in her kitchen!  Some of her kids came over Tuesday night and we made personal pan pizzas in it.  Taking roughly 2 minutes per pizza, this was loads quicker than in my meager oven.  The temp in the oven got up to almost 900 degrees!

Us with three of her boys and her grands.

The grand niece and nephew!

My pizza is the tiny one on the right!

 

Took about 2 minutes and we slid it back out.

Tada!!

More in the making!

She uses a watered down rake to move the coals to the side when it's reached the max temp.  I was astounded at either how either it really didn't heat the room up at all or we just got used to it.  The coals were still hot for 2 more days and every now and then Tammy would pop an eggplant in to cook or some other veggie to use up the residual heat.  I might need one of these...

Another day we went on a walk around a local park and check out this tree trunk!  Spikes all the way up! yikes! That would cure me of climbing trees!

If I climbed trees, that is.

My niece, Christy, came over for breakfast a couple mornings so I got to visit with her too.

One of the days, Tammy and I visited the National Quilt museum in Paducah.  

The details were amazing in every single quilt!

And we inspected closely, without touching them, the various techniques used in each.

Isn't this awesome?!

We only made it about half way through before we got "talent overload" and then skimmed the rest, nodding or saying "ooh ahh!" "keep walking".

We drove down to the river's edge and Tammy freaked me out a little, making me think I'd need to push her car back up the embankment. 

And the artsy district!

We had so much fun!  The trip down took 9 hours, but the trip back took 11.  Almost the same route but had to stop for a work emergency for a bit. BARELY got back to Iowa in time to go to a barn quilting class with my kids.  More on that another time.

I hope you're enjoying your summer!