Keegan Got Married

Our nephew Keegan, got married.  Our family has been planning this family reunion for over a year and when Keegan and Stacey set their date, it looked like Mike and I would be hosting 14 people in the house for that weekend.  When the wedding weekend finally arrived, we ended up hosting 5 people. The others either didn't come or stayed somewhere else.

Who were the five?  My niece Meredith, A.J. and Tripp and our two girls Molly and Maggie.  I had never met Tripp before and was very excited to meet him and to also see how well my house was toddler proof. And it is always excellent to see the girls.

The wedding was on Sunday so we had Saturday to do fun things.  I hadn't been to Niabi Zoo since I was very young so we decided to go there for the afternoon.  It was a misty cold day so we practically had to zoo to ourselves.  It was fun.

We were then off to Wisconsin on Sunday for the wedding.

Cousins...  Brice, Meredith, Keegan, Molly, Maggie

Sisters.....Jo, Mary, Sherry, Elizabeth....always in the order of birth.

Keegan's parents, my sister Sherry and Stuart...

I realize I don't have a photo of the bride!  I will have to get one and add it to another blog story.


Monday we went to the Cheese store and Molly had a great time tasting every cheese sample, sometimes twice.  We always end up buying tons of cheese, especially a huge bag of cheese curds.

As always, it is very sad when the girls leave.

 I had something to look forward to though.  My sister Jo and Gary stayed in Wisconsin to visit Gary's family and then headed our way towards the end of the week. I had a list of things for Gary to do while visiting.  When they pulled up, they had the tractor Gary bought from my sister Sherry and Stuart.  Gary is very excited about his new old tractor that doesn't run.

It was a good visit and we even were able to get to Greeley Iowa to have lunch with our cousins Pat and Sandy.  We forgot to take a picture of all of us but I did get a picture of Sandy's farm cats!

After lunch, we went to the cemetery to visit Mom and Dad. It just so happened that it was also Grandma Rose's 123 birthday so we sang Happy Birthday to her. I am sure she was impressed as the four of us sounded pretty good together.

Gary got a lot of things done around the house for us.  He put in the new deadbolts including the front door.  This was mom and dad's knob and then our new one.  The front door knob is something I wanted to change since we first moved in.

We also got a new mailbox post, and new posts for the front porch.

I guess I didn't take a picture of the actual new mailbox post.

It was a beautiful day to sit outside and have a cocktail while we watched Gary work.

I could never get used to our new chandelier in the dining room so Jo and I went shopping and found one that Mike won't hit his head on when he stands from his chair.

Before

After

Gary did tons of other things too.  Thanks Gary!

Doors and Closets

One of my colleagues used to flip houses so we have fun talking about renovations and design.  One day she came in my office very excited to tell me she was getting rid of all of the Iowa Oak trim in her house, including her doors.  One of my first conversations with her when I started my job was that everyone has so much oak in their houses up here in Iowa. The term Iowa Oak was born.  She couldn't wait to tell me she was getting new white trim and having her Iowa Oak doors painted white. She was also changing out her brushed nickel door hardware to black hardware.  That is when I became very excited.  We have gold door knobs and hinges and with so many years of use, the knobs have become pretty nasty. Plus, when I painted all of our doors white, I left the knobs and hinges on so there is paint on them.  I always planned to go back and scrape all of the paint off but never did it.

I asked her what she planned to do with her brushed nickle knobs and hardware and she smiled and said she was going to give them to me! I became just as excited as she was!

As they worked on her house, they kept it all organized for us  and placed it in a bucket. It was very heavy when I lifted it out of her car.

Mike took everything out and started cleaning what we needed for our house.  I decided since we were taking the doors down, I might as well give them another coat of paint.  When we did all that painting when we first moved in, the doors were the last things painted and you could tell we were getting tired of doing that task.  If I remember correctly, and I guess I could check my earlier blogs, I did two coats of primer and three coats of paint on the doors.   I would now add two more coats!  These Iowa Oak doors sure soaked it in.

Mike and I had a system. We would take the doors down together, he would take off the gold hardware and knobs, I would paint, he would clean the new used brushed nickel hardware and knobs and put them on the freshly painted doors, and then we would hang the doors back up together.
Hanging the doors really tested our marriage.

I did have to buy new deadbolts for our outside doors. I knew then that we really saved tons of money because of my friend at work.  The four deadbolts were not cheap!  I started on the first deadbolt and realized they were bigger than the hole in the door.  I decided to leave that job up to Gary, when my sister Jo and Gary are here in a few weeks.

I bet everyone is wondering where in the heck are the before and after photos of our new bathroom.  I have a few minor touches before I take photos and blog about that.

I do want to talk about our closet though.  We moved walls in our closet to make room for a bigger shower in the bathroom. We pulled everything out of our closet and invaded the spare bedrooms.  Once the bathroom construction was done, it was time for me to decide how to take advantage of every square foot of the closet.  This took awhile and with the help of my sisters, I decided I needed more shelves.   I shopped everywhere and couldn't find what I wanted and if I did find something that could work, it was too expensive.  We headed to Menards and found shelving that matched the old shelf we had put back in. So we bought shelves and brackets.

The original shelf and rod fit perfectly in the new area.  It was at that point we knew we didn't lose any closet space with the construction, except for a coat closet.  See my not to scale blueprint below.

I was so careful in measuring space between the brackets and I couldn't believe how level I was making everything.  I was pretty impressed.

Mike moved his clothes back in but I wanted to wait until I got all the shelves in.   I needed more on the side of the closet.

Once all shelves were leveled and in place, I started moving my clothes back in.  This took a very long time because I went through everything.  If I hadn't worn it in a year, out it went.  If I had worn it and thought I would keep an item, I tried it on to see if it still fit.  If not, out it went.   During the middle of the task, I decided I needed a break and made some phone calls.  I usually talk to people lying down in the front spare bedroom.  I was talking to my sister when I heard a very strange noise and thought "now what are the cats getting into?". I continued to talk.   When Mike came back from the neighbors while I was still on the phone, he went to the closet to see my progress.  All I heard was "Whoa, what a mess!".  I knew something wasn't right.

I was so disappointed to see my beautiful, perfect job was not so perfect.
A few days later I headed to Lowes and bought a very nice stud finder.  The anchors I used were not enough to support all of our clothes.  All week I worked on the closet, making sure everything was sturdy.

Yesterday, I moved everything back into the closet and it hasn't fallen yet! The house is finally getting back into order, just in time for the girls and my niece's family to come next weekend for my nephew's wedding. 

My Life in Semesters

As I  finish up another Labor Day weekend, I am thinking about the next holiday time off I will have working for a University.  I then start thinking about time and how my life is always in semester time since I have been working for Universities for over 20 years.  How time flies when you live your  life in semesters.

Thinking about last semester.....

In Fall 2018 an email was sent out to all employees asking for volunteers to be clients for the senior capstone class for the Human Performance and Fitness majors.  The students would be the Personal Trainer and the volunteers would get a good workout.  I was tempted and started to send a reply, but then chickened out.    I had been using the new Wellness Center on campus during my lunch hour when the weather wasn't nice, but only had enough guts to use the track. The students were intimidating in the workout and weight rooms.  I didn't know how to use the machines so,  I would walk in circles on the track.    I would sometimes see the capstone students working with their older volunteer clients and wondered what I was so worried about.

Spring 2019 came and once again the email came asking for volunteers.  This time I replied stating yes, I was interested! Of course there were too many people interested so the Kinesiolgy Department decided to draw names out of  a hat.  I received the email that I was not chosen. Darn. After finally deciding I would do it, I wouldn't be doing it.

Not five minutes later, I received an email stating someone had backed out and so they pulled another name and it was mine!!  I was excited and nervous at the same time.   The volunteers had a meeting with the professor which gave us an idea what this would be all about. We also had to talk about our health, to make sure we could do it.  Since I walk at least one mile 5 days a week and am healthy, there wasn't a problem.

Candace came to my office to meet with me and to talk about my goals. This was what I told her in this order...

1) Overall strengthen my body
2) Improve Balance
3) Tone Core
4) Lose weight (not main goal but would like to


The first day we met in the gym was just a test day.  She pinched and measured me, I did sit ups, reaches, and walked laps on the track as she timed me.  I wanted to do my best so she would be impressed but now looking back, it is kind of like bowling in a league.  You want to bowl the best the first time so your teammates are impressed, but that messes up your handicap.   This old silver haired woman wanted to impress her student trainer.

We would meet three times a week during my lunch hour, the other two days I would continue to walk outside or on the indoor track.    Candace taught me how to use all of the different machines, how to use the free weights, different stretches, core exercises and balance exercises.  The best part was she did all of this with me.

Here we are posing with my biggest accomplishment, the leg press.

By the end of the semester, we had become friends and I was becoming fit and confident using the equipment in the Wellness Center.  But, it was time for Candace to graduate.  I promised her and myself that I would keep it up.   During the hot summer days it was easy to go to the gym, not only because it was hot outside, but there were hardly any students!  Candace had given me her notes from the class so I was able to remember everything we did.  Now that the days are not as hot and the students are back and I love it outside right now, I haven't been going to the gym for many weeks.  I have been walking outside during my lunch hour but, without the gym I can tell I am getting jiggly again. Even though I don't want winter to come, I am looking forward to it so that I go back to the gym!  Thanks Candace!

A Few Projects Going On

What am I standing under?

How excited I was to see a semi hauling a windmill blade stopped at a rest stop.  I have seen the semi's going down the interstate but have never seen one just sitting.  In a previous blog I talked about how much I am infatuated with these windmills.  They look like they are dancing in the wind.  Photos don't do it any justice as far as the size.  These are huge, and there were three semi's because there are three blades on a windmill.


Anyway, I thought I would blog about a few projects going on around here.  Of course the master bath is still being worked on but it keeps getting closer to being done.  The three to four weeks is now seven weeks and I think they probably have two more weeks to go.

In the spring when we were getting all that rain that caused all that flooding, I noticed water sitting up against the house in the back.  Water against a house is never good so when it rained, I would sit on the back porch and study the water puddle and how the water wanted to travel.  I decided it was time to dig a trench and direct the water where it wanted to go.

It was so muddy digging this trench that I almost lost my boots.

We split some hosta plants that were by the creek and planted them next to the trench.  How rewarding it is to see water flow down the dry bed and into the back hill.  Ducks even enjoy our new sanctuary for them, right under the bird feeders.

We decided to pull down the front porch railing.  It wasn't hard.  Mike did a karate kick and everything went flying. The poles were so water rotted, they were not even touching the concrete on the porch. We had to put blocks under them.  We had planned to have a new railing built but I am getting used to not having one at all.

Our flowers have grown since the above photo.

Janelle had so much rhubarb growing that I made three rhubarb strawberry crisps.  I don't have photos of that because I made it when the band boys were here and they ate it so fast I didn't have time to grab my camera.  But I did make some rhubarb syrup planning to make a cocktail but I like it on my pancakes better!

Our church had a craft day and I couldn't wait to go. I wanted to learn how to make baskets.  We had a pretty good turnout.

Marilyn, who taught us how to make baskets, said she drooled when she saw my spool of rope as I carried it in.  I wasn't sure it would work but it is perfect!  I found this spool of rope in the thrift store for next to nothing. I didn't buy it right away and then went home thinking I could find a use for it.   Mike and I went back the next day and he bought it for my birthday.  Who would have known two years later I would need all this to make baskets!

The basket I made at Church that day is still my favorite.

When I took it home to show Mike, he promptly placed it on his head.

Since I have so much rope, I decided to make a huge basket.

Some, but not all of my finished products.

I am hooked.  I can't stop making them.  Now, on to more baskets and other projects!