softball & cactus flower

Michael got called to sub in for the Soul Softball team this summer once or twice. This time I came to watch. I didn't really end up with any great pictures, but here's a token photo.On our honeymoon in Arizona I bought this little cactus pot to commemorate our trip. Well, it is still surviving (although I have lost one cactus) and occasionally when I neglect it just the right amount and then water it, it produces a lovely flower (I think this is the 4th one).Pretty amazing, eh? I kind of hope this thing lasts a long time, wouldn't it be cool if I still had it when we celebrated being married 25 years?

Spontaneity at its best...

Dan & Jenn have been trying to coordinate having a weiner roast with us in the park for two summers, but it just didn't seem to work out, until now. My mom was out to visit, and we were all bumming around the house on Sunday night when someone suggested that we should have a weiner roast. So, the guys ran to the 711 to grab buns & dogs and we headed off. We even made smores, and played catch. We had a good time...and I survived the spontaneous aspect of it just fine (admittedly, it took me a while to warm up to the idea).

a piano!

Well, I can hardly believe it myself, but there's a piano in our house! I've been thinking and talking about this for at least 6 months. I was beginning to realize that music used to be really important to me, I loved it and it was a great emotional outlet. So, Michael and I talked about possibly getting a piano. A few months ago we almost thought we'd move my piano from BC out here because we were starting to look at houses and were watching one that would actually be big enough...but that all fell through. But left me wanting a piano even more. So, I started watching kijiji, and set myself a price limit and some stipulations like no repairs and it had to be apartment sized. I watched many ads come to my inbox, none of which met these rules.

Then, this one showed up in my email, on a day when Michael and I could actually go see it that same evening. So, that night we came home with a piano! It looks much nicer in the pictures than it is in person, so we're planning to paint it (we have a friend who did this, who gave us some advice). I've been playing through my old books...I'm surprised how familiar some of the songs I used to love are, and yet my fingers respond as though I'm wearing three layers of rubber gloves!

In the next couple of weeks we'll get it tuned. It is not terribly out of tune, but some keys are and I'm sure the pitch has slipped. It'll be even nicer when it's tuned and painted and I can get my fingers back into shape!

landscaping our yard

This was our summer to finally do something with our grass only yard. Michael and I took a long time to agree on where to put flower beds, but we finally did...Michael did all the hard work, including working for a dirt company for a day to earn the dirt we needed.

I am quite please with the result. The shopping for plants was fun, although a little overwhelming. Not everything worked out, but somethings really did.

Michael also decided that he wanted real garden space this year, so he built this gorgeous box in the backyard. That is the south side of the building so things grow there really well.

I really need to post some pictures of the the tomato plants as they grow, They have already grown so much.

I think the thing I am most proud of is these flower boxes. I had so much fun designing them, and I totally love the colours...

the cottage

It has officially become tradition to spend May long weekend with my Winnipeg parents at the cottage. I love it, I love having a tradition like this. We always have a lot of fun and do a lot of relaxing. This year Michael and I brought our quads, so we also did some riding, which was also lots of fun.

I think this year was one of our most crazy weekends for weather. It was sort of snowing when we got there Friday night, really wet & slushy. In morning we had snow that had stuck to the ground. Thankfully it melted quickly. Sunday was absolutely gorgeous and Monday was even better.

to do lists

I've had this clipping since way before I began to blog. I've been tidying up and came across it again. I've been wanting to share this for a long time, but after several fights with the scanner where I lost, I had almost given up. Today I tried again, and I won! Yay! So here it is for your enjoyement!

Is anyone willing to admit to writing stuff on their to do list that is already complete, just to have the satisfaction of crossing it off?

happy 1/2 anniversary to us!

Well, today marks 4.5 years of marriage for us. Unbelievable! We have changed and grown so much, it's hard to remember what it was like at the beginning! I stumbled upon this recently:

I remember that when I wrote our anniversary post, I could hardly remember what we did. Don't how I could forget. Michael took me out for dinner, we dressed up and went to the symphony. He planned every detail. It was great! Unfortunately I was a little sleep deprived, so I had to really focus to stay awake, but it was still a fabulous evening.

For our 1/2 anniversary Michael was really on the ball too (much more than I). Every month on the 13th we have what we call "sacred date night" to mark our anniversary and make sure that we are taking time out to have fun. I had completely over looked that it was the 13th. Michael hinted at a suprise the night before, which I just brushed off as nice but weird. At work on the 13th I got an ecard, another hops & yoyo one, some of our favorites. It was called you smell good, totally loved it! It told me he was taking me out to dinner. Sweet, I'm off the hook for cooking! Yay! We had a nice dinner and a chance to talk & catch up, since life had been a little crazy! Thanks Michael for remembering the 13th, and even figuring out that it was the half a year mark!

Narcisse Snake Dens

I got to mark another thing off my list of things to see and do while I live in Manitoba. There is a place where thousands of garter snakes congregate every spring and fall. In fall they meet to go deep underground to hibernate for winter, in spring they come up to mate and enjoy the summer. They have had to create fences and underpasses for the snakes because otherwise when they migrate they cover the highway. It's really cool to see and weird to be able to hear so many snakes moving around!

baby Caleb

Baby Caleb arrived! We went to meet him at the hospital. He is our friends, Duane & Wendy's little boy. Isn't the picture of Michael holding him too sweet?

St Malo Poker Derby

Michael and I went to our very first poker derby with Kerry (my coworker's husband). We had a great time, it was very muddy. We did manage to keep up with the big quads and didn't get too stuck. When we did get stuck, Michael could just pull our quads out, when the big ones gut stuck, it took winches and several guys to get them unstuck. Michael took care of planning everything and packing. He wasn't quite prepared for the mud, so he drove home in his gitch and I was wrapped in a blanket, so we didn't get the car all full of mud!