The End of an Era...until next year

We've experienced our first round of youth sports. Ben coached Caleb's team-The Buckskins-of four, five and six year old boys and girls. Caleb really enjoyed it and is eager to play again next year. Ben doesn't seem quite so excited. *heehee*

Goalie Caleb

Score-a-Goal Caleb

Dribbler Caleb
The Team
Champion Caleb!

Lil Critter...

Lately, it's been cool at night so I've kept the windows open. Last night as Berkley sat in the living room keeping watch on the front of the house, he found something.

And he needed to let me know.

I was in the kitchen on the computer backtracking through the first season of Lost, and he was just plain annoying me with the nonstop barking. No matter how much I told him to stop, Berkley persisted.

So I went over and sat on the floor looking out the windows. The only odd thing I heard was a small cooing sound. Like an owl almost. I couldn't see anything, so I went out front looking for the source of the noise.

And there he was. Clinging to the side of the house.

Notice Berkley is quite upset I'm out there and he's stuck inside.

It looks like he was hanging on for dear life, and he may have been. He seemed very calm though and watched me a lot. When I moved to the porch to get a shot of his face, Berkley distracted him.

I tell ya, if I didn't know better, I would have walked over and plucked him from the house and cuddled him in my arms. This little guy looked like a stuffed animal, he was so cute.

I believe I've seen his mom before. A few days ago at about dusk, Connor and I spied a raccoon climbing the large oak tree directly in front of the house. In these pictures above, the tree is right behind me. The creature climbed up rather slowly, (I must say that I'm used to hundreds of squirrels climbing these trees each day--at a hundred miles per hour) and perched in a space high up where a large branch had broken off at some time. The raccoon sat there for some time and watched us, as we proceeded to have everyone in the house come out and see.

So I wonder if this house climbing baby lives in my tree too. Maybe we'll see him again...

If You Like Dodds...

These past few weeks have been crazy. And in a good way. I love excitement- 'cause let's face it...I don't have much in my day-to-day. We had family in for a few weeks and this is what we did:

Spaghetti Dinner at our house: Monday
Liz, Matt, John Jensen, Ben

Will, Kaylee, Parker, Cate, Ben, Connor, Craig

Baseball at George's: Tuesday
Rebecca, Matthew, Sam

Patti, Daniel, Linda, Sarah, Cate


LaFinca: Wednesday
Too many to list...
Swimming at Tedd's: Wednesday
Father & Daughter


Zoo: Thursday
Connor's Birthday Party: Thursday Night
Connor is 3!

Caleb and Cara

3 out of 13

Westley and Craig

Pinata Time: There are several missing from this picture.
So yes, there were a lot of kids!

Rehearsal Dinner: Friday
No pictures!

Wedding: SaturdayJacob and Mallory

Our Crew

The Belle of the Ball

Two of My SILs- Kim and Nicole

I LOVE having a big family!!

Extreme Home Makeover...in progress

Kitchen

Before:
Three layers of wallpaper, yellow cabinets, brass hardware, white laminate counters and backsplash, green monster oven.

After:
Brownish-pinkish-spicy paint on textured walls, white cabinets with brown glaze, coppery-bronzy (spray painted) hardware, butcher block counters, new sink and faucet, copper tin tile (actually plastic) backsplash, new oven and microwave, and new ceiling fan and light fixture.

Before

After

Entry
Before (I'd already started tearing the wallpaper down.):
Brown fabric-like wallpaper (over two other layers of wallpaper) on top half of wall, cream colored paneling on bottom half of wall.

After:
Wallpaper removed, few coats of drywall mud to get smooth walls. Yellow paint with brown glaze over top, dragged with large brush for a linen-like texture. White paint on paneling.
Powder Bath
Before:
Wallpaper on top and bottom half of wall, brass fixtures, linoleum floor.
After:
Removed wallpaper and mudded wall until smooth. Painted red and then painted design. White beadboard on bottom half of wall. Spray painted most fixtures same color as kitchen. New faucet (Overstock is getting a boost from us!), new pedestal sink (though we would have used the old one had Connor not pushed the standing base over on the concrete patio and shattered it), new hexagonal-and-square patterned white tile. And one of Ben's shutters.

Living Room
After (Sorry there's no before. It was just cream colored flocked wallpaper.):
Sloppy mud technique over the wallpaper to cover the flocked-ness. Painted a slightly lighter shade than the kitchen on three walls, the fourth the red from the bathroom.