Flowers

One of Gramma Ellie's neighbors has a wonderful "green thumb". She cut a few flowers from her garden and shared them with Anna. What a blessing!!!!

and back at home, LOOK-- the new basketball hoop is up!! Now, let's get rid of the rain so we can play!!!!

Burlington, Iowa

Last Saturday night, while we were in Iowa, we had a delicious dinner at a restaurant that was high atop a hill, called Martini's. We had a beautiful view looking out over the Mississippi River an the downtown area....

a beautiful view and awesome food!!! I WILL go back!!!!

Wordless Wednesday....Ambition

Easter

We spent Easter weekend in Burlington, Iowa....our hometown, visiting my hubby's parents. The sun was out and the temps. were in the low 60's....perfect!! and it was perfect for climbing trees!!!
We had a delightful meal of ham, potatoes, noodles, vegetable casserole and a festive jello salad...
but most of all, we enjoyed the company of our family....they're the best!!!!!

College Boy....

I picked up Andrew from college last night.....he was excited to come home and have a home cooked meal!! I had lasagna, bread sticks and salad ready for him. He will be home for a long weekend and then go back for a week and then he will finish his freshman year on May 3rd. This weekend he will be filling out more summer internship applications and a few summer job applications =)

Retro- 1995 Lake Arrowhead

Wordless Wednesday- Chillin' in our cozies

Sunrise

I was up early the other day and captured this beautiful sunrise......awesome!!!!

Weekend

The weekend weather was pretty yucky....we even saw some snow fall !!! The biggest excitement was that we got rid of this....
and got this........
John and I drove to Madison on Friday morning to pick it up. John needed to get back to Milwaukee for work by 1 p.m., so he left me in Madison with the new car and no map!! I had never been to Madison before and I had no idea how to get home!! What a helpless feeling!! BUT....John reminded me that we now have Navigation in the car, so I just programmed in our address, and it told me how to get home!! WOW...that was cool!!!

Sunday, we had some sunshine, so it was time for a project. John, Ben and Luker worked on pulling out the old basketball hoop......we're replacing it with a new and improved model! They worked and worked and soon had the huge cement block pulled out!! Let's give a cheer for teamwork!!! Yea!!!!

A bit of rambling....

I made these yummy Ice Cream cinnamon rolls this week for the teachers/staff at school......
I spent 2 hours in the dentist chair yesterday getting a crown put on.....it wasn't fun....and it sure wasn't how I wanted to spend $1000 dollars!! I feel blessed that we have good dental insurance and it covered half of the expenses. Since I have a crown, does that make me a PRINCESS???

and poor Bella Roo is very sick....she contracted kennel cough last week at her doggie daycare and now has bronchitis along with that....she is coughing and coughing and barfing and barfing. She's not able to take her antibiotics or cough meds because she just throws everything back up....it's very frustrating. I hope she feels better soon so we can go outside and play ball!!!
and here was the highlight of my day yesterday.....my friend in the tree.....he did eventually come to the bird feeder but I couldn't capture the moment in time!!

Retro-- 2002

Yes.........it's a lizard.........

Wordless Wednesday- Ben

Friends

Last Saturday we had some friends over....we hadn't seen them for almost a year!! It's amazing how time can fly!! We grilled up a bunch of meat...

After it was all said and done, we only had 3 chicken breasts left!! WOW!! I bought a ton of meat, hoping to have lots of leftovers!! I guess that's what happens when 2 families get together and there's a total of 8 guys and 4 girls!!!

We had lots of fun and lots of laughs that night!!!
The Mundinger family who visited has 6 in their family, just like us.....they also have 4 kids...3 boys and 1 girlie....and they have a teacup yorkie too. (but they left Belle at home)

Lumberjack

The weekend was Beautiful for working outside......John was like a little kid on Saturday...he was up early in anticipation of heading to our tree line and playing lumberjack with his new chainsaw. He had made plans with the neighbor to meet out there around 9 am! Of course by 8 am, he was outside raking the yard....just waiting for 9 to come so he could rev up the chainsaw.... the "boys" had a great time.....
It was actually warm enough that I didn't feel guilty about giving Minnie a bath....

Recipe

This is my new favorite cake....it's so light, so yummy and HEALTHY...

1 box lemon cake mix
1/3 cup egg beaters
2 small cans of mandarin oranges (juice and all)

Mix all together in a 9x13 and bake at 350 for 30 minutes......
Top with light Cool Whip when cake is cool. Enjoy!!!

PUP

Evidentally Luke thinks Bella has Osgood Schlatter's disease......he put his knee brace on her!!!! Bella is a good sport!!!

Wordless Wednesday....New Glove

Retro.....Circa 1979

Found this photo of me with my BFF, Kelli....... The words on the back of the picture say "after the 2nd all-star game...July 1979....won district- beat western and nationals".......These were certainly good times and great memories!!!!