Many updates

We have returned home from our trips to Ohio and Michigan, and I WANNA GO BACK!

It is too hot and muggy here!

OK, let's try and get a lot of catching up in tonight. I left off in my last post angry at Dave. After several hours of being angry, I realized he was ready to discuss calmly what the problems were. We did and shared out frustrations and were fine. Of course it meant that the entire evening was ruined for going anywhere or doing anything, but that is ok. We went and got Taco Bell for dinner at midnight lol.

We woke up the next morning after sleeping in some and loaded the car to return to Cincinnati. I was reluctant to leave as the weather was just perfect, even if it did rain some. The temperatures were nice and chilly! Jeans and sweatshirt weather at night and jeans and tshirt in daytime. Not muggy, not hot, just perfect! I could live there in a heartbeat. The drive back to Ohio was nice. I stayed awake to help entertain Dave..it is a rather boring drive. Facebook on my cell phone kept me entertained and awake. Plus we made several stops along the way. We drove through Lansing and Ann Arbor. He wanted to stop in the mall at the U of M store to look around. We got the girls some gifts (Abbi some socks and Libbi a hat) and Dave got some stickers. We then headed to the Cabela's store....WOW it was big. Very much like Bass Pro. I got some flip flops to replace my other rugged ones falling apart. Then we headed towards our girls. I was so anxious to see them after almost a week away. We picked them up and headed right for Skyline where we met my hs band director for dinner. WOW, it was nice to see him! He retired a few years ago (I knew this from running into him another time we were home) and is currently conducting the Ham. Fairfield Symphony. It was nice catching up! The girls were in complete awe though.....he rode a motorcycle and they were enamoured lol.

After dinner we went to the St. Bernard Church festival. You have to understand something here. Just a few weeks after Dave and I met, he took me to the festival. He graduated from the grade school there. He had an ulterior motive for taking me. He took me inside the church sanctuary and showed it to me. I had never been in it. It was really beautiful with a stone aisle and very high ceiling. I remember standing there and knowing how special of a place it was to him. Months later her told me he took me in there so I'd fall in love with it as he had known his whole life that he would get married there. And apparently after he met me, he knew quickly he would marry me. He wanted to share with me that church. So, when it came time that we had been engaged and started planning the wedding, I knew without a doubt where we would get married....in his church. I allowed him to select so many parts of our wedding.....

I digress.

The festival was nice! The weather was nice too...not too warm and not too chilly. The girls had such a great time! They played games and won prizes and rode rides. This was the first time they had ever ridden carnival type rides together and wow did they have fun. Libbi was a bit leery of the kids Ferris wheel at first, but Abbi grabbed her hand and took her. From there it was a blessing to watch them squeal with delight on the rides.....Ferris wheel, helicopters, huge slide. We did have the camera and got some great pictures!

Saturday brought us our drive back home to TN. By that point in time we were all completely ready to get back home. Again, Libbi had to stop many times to pee....geesh! Between her and Dave and their small bladders. We got home and assessed the damage from the bad storm and 80 mph winds that had swept through the night before. We had three crape Myrtle trees leaning severely and trying to uproot and a few big branches down in the back from the woods behind our house, but otherwise things were ok. The power had been out for about 10 hours we hear. Glad we missed out on that! We had to fix all the clocks before heading to bed. But oh how nice it was to sleep in our own beds!

We woke Sunday morning around 7:15 to awful storms. Very loud and I loved it! Another one came around 8 am and was just as bad. It knocked the power out for about a half hour, but it was so enjoyable to just lay in the bed and listen to the storm. Had it not been for two extra humans in my bed and a cat, it might have been a bit romantic!

We all slept in a bit after the storms passed. Once we got up, the sun was out and we went out to start cleaning up some. We got the trees anchored and I worked on my flowerbeds.

The girls have VBS this week at church and it has been so exciting for them! I drop them off at 8:15 each morning and pick them up at 12:30 pm. They talk the whole way home about all the fun they had and everything they did.

Monday night Dave had the 4th Degree Knights Officer Installation at church and I shopped for and set-up the reception. Pies, chips and cookies. Went well.

Tuesday Abbi had an appt. with her ENT and she has been RELEASED from his care! Oh happy day! Her ear drums have healed amazingly fast after surgery and he said they look perfect! We are blessed! I also had my yearly check-up with my GYN and it went well. Everything looks to check out fine and I have been put on a vitamin with Calcium..fun. No problems, just something necessary as the aging process goes. It was funny, once the doc came for the exam, I made the girls step outside. I could just imagine the stories they went and told at VBS the next day if I allowed them to stay in with me hehe. I also need to get a mammogram sometime this summer so that there is a baseline test for my future ones to be compared against. NOT looking forward to that.

I began a new thing here in our house this week...a chore chart for the girls. Some order in this dept. was desperately needed and while the girls do help, I needed to put some organization to it. It is taking some getting used to, but it is starting to work. The girls are old enough to help do things and I have listed things they need to accomplish. 3 days into it and they are starting to get the idea! We have built an allowance into this. They will get one quarter for each check mark they get. Hope it works!

My elbow is starting to bother me again. It felt aggravated last week. After a long orchestra practice tonight it feels worse. While it is not useless, it's not good for it to be feeling this way. Thankfully there is no orchestra until next week so it will get some rest.

I think that's about all I can think of for now. The big news is our 11th anniversary this Saturday. Not sure if we will do anything special or not...have not gotten that far yet.

My bed calls me. I wanted to get this update in though.