Living and Dining Room

Here's pictures of our lastest project. We repainted the living and dining room in June. It was a pretty easy project for the most part. We had to do some wall patching which was interesting because we have slightly textured walls known as orange peel but we found some KnockDown at Home Depot that gave the same affect. Other than that we just changed out the lighting, and removed the ugly, heavy, very large mirror!!! The only things left are to make some curtains and get a new couch and chair.

Summer Fun Part 2

Yes, I'm terrible I know. It is now September and I am just getting around to getting to part 2 of our summer vacation.
So surprisingly the drive back to Minnesota went extremely well. It was a little tight in the back seat but Belle did great with extra people. Those in the back seat just got a little extra hairier.
So I'm trying to think back to the fun things we did with the girls. After driving up on Tuesday, we just hung out on Wednesday. We might of went out to eat but nothing too exciting. Thursday though, we headed to the cities. First up, the MOA-Mall of America. Boy did we make numerous trips around that place...and boy is it big. And wouldn't you know, I think we each only came out of there with one bag. While there we went and ate at Bubba Gumps, which has a great atmosphere-wasn't incredibly impressed with the food though. It was okay just not awesome :)
Also at the Mall we went to the Underwater Adventures which was pretty cool. I especially enjoyed the new jellyfish exhibit.
After the mall, we went to IKEA, which is a pretty cool store, especially if you are just starting out own your own and looking for some reasonably priced home furnishings and you have a small living place, just thought I'd throw that out there.

From there we watched our lives flash before our eyes as we almost got hit leaving the parking lot. Scared the begeezous out of me, but Tony seemed pretty calm about that.
So, we didn't go to the cities prepared at all on where we were going to stay for the night and we really wanted to go swimming. Wouldn't you know the third hotel we checked had a pool and a king sized bed available. It took us a while to find three hotels but we did get to see some cool neighborhoods in St. Paul.

The swimming experience was enjoyable to say the least and if anyone has seen my darling husband try to tread water you know why. He did manage to beat all of us in our races but I'm still sticking to the theory that he makes us laugh too hard and it's tough to laugh and swim at the same time.

The second day in the cities we weren't really sure what we wanted to do, and it turned out to be a rainy overcast day. We did want to go to St. Paul's Cathedral though. This place was absolutely beautiful. Everywhere you looked, there was something new to see.

From the Cathedral (we also drove past the State Capital building), Tony decided to give a driving tour of the cities. Granted this is list the first time we had been there our selves and he's giving us a tour... with no map referencing. We did drive past the University of Minnesota and we got to see a bunch more areas. After about 20 minutes of driving I start to panic b/c well 1, we don't have a plan, and I NEED a plan, and 2, we are lost. Finally I get out the trusty atlas and get us back in the correct direction(with a little map ready assistance from Tony).

After that we head to the Minnesota Zoo. Which by the way is a great zoo. Tons of animals, which a large majority of them being animals in colder climates..go figure. You won't find an elephant or giraffe at this zoo, but they some really cool exhibits.

After the zoo, we took the scenic route back home. Everyone was pooped.

The next couple of days we just hung out. I'm really having trouble remembering everything we did, but I do know we played many hours of the farming game. One of the days the next week we went to the Freeborn County Fair. The fairs up here are nothing like the Wabaunsee County Fairs....just ask my dad if you don't believe me. Anyway we went to the Love and Theft Concert and had a great time. I thoroughly enjoyed watching the fiddle player....it's okay...Tony knows I love fiddle players.

All in all we had a great time with the girls up here. I hope we can do it every summer:)

I'll talk about Mom and Dad's visit and let Tony tell you about the trapping convention in some later posts.

Summer Fun

At the end of July my first full week of vacation had arrived! I was so excited! Our plan was to go home for a couple of days and then bring our sisters up for some fun in the cities. Once again our drive home was pretty uneventful. But I did see a baby raccoon and I went nuts! I'm not sure how high of decibels my voice reached but I managed to put Belle into a slight frenzy and I definitely got Tony's attention. The little thing was so darn CUTE! I don't think I have ever seen one that small. Of course all Tony could think about was trapping after that but I told him he was not allowed to ever catch one that small. That goes for you too Wayne :) Other than that the only other exciting thing that happened was in Liberty, MO. We had to slam on the breaks for a red light. The car in the lane next to us decided to run it and Tony says, "watch he's going to get pulled over." And sure enough, here comes a police car with its lights flashy and pulls the guy over. Tony didn't think it was that exciting but I sure did, then again I entertain easily.

We got in Thursday night/Friday morning. Friday we headed to Alma for most of the day. That evening we headed to Uncle Mikes house for Lizzie's 10th (can you believe she is 10!) birthday party. There I finally got to meet the adorable Kaden. Oh he is just the precious/happiest little thing. I just wanted to eat him up ;)

Saturday's big event was Joni and Grady's Wedding!!! What a beautiful day and a beautiful couple. We had a great time catching up with everyone. I love our mini reunions! Congrats again to Joni and Grady we are very happy for the both of you!

Sunday we took it easy, just hung out with the fam's and oh of course attended the annual Wabaunsee County Fair and had some tasty pork burgers.

On Monday we headed up to Manhattan to go meet up with a bunch of Tony's past employers and catch up a bit. We also enjoyed lunch at the Bambo Buffet which I miss so very dearly. The Chinese restaurants in Austin have nothing on the Bambo. That afternoon we spent at Joe and Diane's and were I got to have some fun coloring and playing with playdough with Bailey. Not getting to see her more often is probably one of the hardest things about living so far away. She is growing so fast!!

Finally our trip home came to and end on Tuesday. We loaded up the girls and Belle (Picture 5 grown people and a 70lb dog in our tiny car heading for an 8 hour trip. We had no idea how this would work. I'll save the part two of our trip for the next post.

Sand-Volleyball Tournament

A couple of Saturday's ago, Tony and I participated in a fundraiser put on by the Rotaract Club. The fundraiser was a sand volleyball tournament in Rose Creek, a small town about 15min from Austin. Boy was it hot that day. Our team played very well and we ended up getting 3rd. Our final game was very close with the final score being 23-21. At this point we were pretty much exhausted. We didn't eat all day, the sun was blazing hot and so was the sand but all in all we had a great time. The pain from the sunburns to come later. We ended up also winning a couple of door prizes too so that was great!

Below is a picture of us with our team.

Independence Day

The weather was rainy but we were troopers and still went to the parade. Luckily the rain stopped in the afternoon in time to head to bandshell park. The entertainment and fireworks were great as usual....so was the yummy soft pretzel.

Camping at Sakatah State Park

Me and Lisa took a camping trip last weekend to Sakatah State Park. I wanted to go where there were plenty of lakes for fishing. It is about an hour and a half drive north of Austin. Once I got Lisa straightened out on the navigating, we checked in at the campground at about 5 on Friday. We got the tent set up and I went fishing.

I just fished from the boat dock because I didn't feel like unloading my jonboat. I hooked into a northern pike and got it all the way to the bank. I tried to lift the line to get the fish onto the bank but the line broke. The good thing was, the fish was in shallow enough water that it didn't move. I wasn't sure what to do to get it for a picture, so I decided to try and grab it. As soon as my hands got around it, it took off with my lure in its mouth. It was about 2 ft long and I think it weighed 3-4 pounds. It put up a good fight and ended up winning. Later that night I caught a fat bullhead and threw it back.

Saturday morning we woke up at about 5, but it was already light enough to fish. We put the boat on Sakatah Lake and went to a spot that a man at the boat dock recommended the night before. There were a lot of weeds on the lake. There were also Northerns surfacing all around us. We stayed on the water for about 3 hours without a bite. Pretty disappointing.

We went geocaching that afternoon and managed to find a few. We were the only ones on the trails, except for the thousand mosquitoes following us. Lisa's directional difficulties improved a little bit with the GPS in her hands.

Saturday afternoon we went about 15 miles to Madison Lake. It's supposed to be one of the best fishing lakes in Southern Minnesota. It gets down to 60 ft deep, and my anchor wouldn't reach at that depth. We found a quiet cove where other big boats couldn't harass us and tried some more fishing. The trolling motor battery died so it was all rowing at this lake. Lisa rowed for about 1/2 mile and did pretty good. Of course, I managed to snag a whopper bluegill. Lisa caught 2 drum. At least we didn't get skunked. If you notice Lisa's shirt, you can imagine the bad sunburn she got on her back.

Saturday night we relaxed around the campsite. We ate some good hamburgers and a brat. Lisa got a lot of reading in. Sunday morning I woke up early to give Lisa a good campfire breakfast. Luckily, she's not very picky. I just cooked a couple eggs and burnt a little bacon and she was satisfied. We got a warning from the park rangers about our dog being unattended the day before. Sorry about that Rangers. She was pretty understanding when I explained that my small boat with 2 people and a dog wouldn't work very well. We tried to go out fishing again Sunday morning with the dog and us in the boat. Lisa didn't care for Belle making the boat move so much. I was used to it. A storm was coming in and we didn't want to get struck by lightning, so we headed back to the truck after 1/2 an hour.

Overall, I think the trip went good. We had nice weather until late morning of the last day there. We got to spend a lot of time on the water. We couldn't get any fish for eatin, but I was glad to have my fishing partner with me.

Here Little Fishy

We went on our first official fishing trip of the year last Sunday. We just headed over to Fountain Lake in Albert Lea. Planned on getting on the lake with the jon boat but it was much to windy. We didn't have much luck but Tony managed to snag two of these whoppers ;)