Maybe next time...

I spent too much time changing my layout - got errands to run - maybe next time I'll find more pictures! :) Have a great weekend!

I'm baaaack....

Greetings everyone - here's my pictoral walk through my yard, I forgot to take pictures of our new floor in the house, so they'll be more, but let me post this and then I'll look through Sam's computer and see if I can find anything else! Hope you enjoy our yard as much as we do!
Ruff, ruff, ruff, ruff! (Translation: Someone pet me! Love me! Pet me!) Tonto says hi! I thought this was the cutest picture - I was just walking around the yard taking pictures and poor little T dog was following me just waiting for me to love on him, as usual. And he posed so perfectly. You'll notice how goofy he is because his tail is wagging like a mile a minute, that's why it's so blurry in this photo!

Amazing - these flowers came up out of no where this year! And in the garden of all places! You'll see below what we can actually grow in our garden (hint* nothing!). So we know this plant was placed right there from the Lord at the entrance of our garden as if to say - Don't give up on me! Look what I can do!

Well, here's a crooked shot of our patio - there isn't much blooming right now, peak is way over, but I thought I'd get some pictures on here - we have been delighted with the wave petunias this year. You can't see them all that well, but that would be what tha big pot of flowers by our door is. We have found the utmost solace this year in our yard. We have taken advantage of eating outside quite a bit this summer, we've had a couple friends over - it's way cooler outside as we were never home, so we never installed our window airconditioner. Sam was going to do that before he left for Chicago, but it's been good. It does get to the 90's during the day, but tonight's low is suppose to be 54! I think the summer is winding down! But it is so peaceful to come out in the morning and just sit and look at everything in the cool of the early morning - what a way to start the day!!!! Not quite ready for the Fall as of yet, but I love the cooler mornings/evenings.

Here's the steal of a deal for the summer so far! We were out rummage saleing last weekend when we came across this beautiful piller! Ok, so it may not be so beautiful right now, but I think someone tried to paint it and it didn't take so they threw it out - yep, that's right ladies and gentlemen - we found it in the garbarge for Free99! Then the pot on top we got for $5, so the whole get-up = a total of $5!!! I especially posted this for mom! (dad, don't hate me!)

Here is our first arbor that Sam built - it goes into our crazy garden where we can't grow anything but weeds, even our onions from last year came back and are BLOOMING! Oh well, we are in the process of turning it into an orchard. So far, we have an apricot tree, an apple tree, a plum tree, raspberries and strawberries - oh yeah, and A LOT of sunflowers and maybe some pumpkins and gords, we'll have to see about that. So yeah, you like this cute little arbor? Well, it blew over in a storm we had last night! It totally broke our fence and so we are going to have to be redoing it a bit, but anyway, it puts a nice facade on our otherwise unsightly garden!

This is the new arch that Sam made this year, we are still in the process of painting it. But it is at the top of our steps as you come up to the front of our house. Our driveway is in the back, so that the way we come most often, so this is the view we have most of the time!

This is the view we have of Tonto every time we come home. He's so faithful, just sitting there waiting for us!

The Lord is smiling on me!

Guess what - I finally had to go to Jury Duty today... It's kind of been a nightmare the whole time. You know this was my third time being called and tomorrow Sam and I leave for our Minneapolis mission trip and so for some reason, I thought I had to call TODAY for jury duty TOMORROW. Well, they called yesterday and said I was suppose to call for today's jury duty... Well, that was kind of annoying, but ok, so I had to be there at 8:45am today. So I rush down there and get in the building by 8:45am, then I was with this whole group of people - I'm such a doofus! Anyway, so I followed them up to the 2nd floor. And no one told me where I was suppose to go, but you remember those finely tuned deductive reasoning skills I once told you about... Well, don't always trust them! So I'm standing with the whole group of people and this guy says, come over here and I'll talk to you... I'd never been before. So I walk over and he starts whispering about an assault case, etc. and all these people (probably 8 or so) are all looking at me like I'm crazy. Then finally, I'm like - Is this Jury Duty?! And the lawyer was like, No, that would be the end of the hall on the left! Hello - I was mortified! I'm listening in on these poor people's case! Ha! So I run down the hallway, now knowing I'm LATE for jury duty... And they said I had to go to the 3rd floor. So I run back to the big group of people and wait for what seems like forever for the elevator - my only option was to pass that whole group of people I was listening in on to get to the stairs, at this point, I didn't know which was worse. So finally, the elevator came and there wasn't a soul in the hallway for Jury duty. So I didn't know where to go at all... Luckily at the far end of the hallway, this guy goes, Jury Duty? I said, Yes, please. He said, it's all the way down at the other end of the hallway! Great! So anyway, I'm halfway running, when the door opens up and this older lady pokes her head out and I said, Is this where I go for Jury Duty? And she said, Are you Sarah Coleman? I said yes, and she asked me a question and let me in and said I can sit with all the other Jury Prospectives. I was so embarrassed. Anyway, so then the Clerk of Court went over the whole list of people and how far they had to drive because you get reimbursed per mile. Some of these poor people had to drive 97 miles and 50 miles round trip to get there, and here I was late and I had to travel 1 mile round trip! Oh man, it figures something like that would happen to me! So then we just sit there and finally the judge comes in and goes over the whole Jury process. I got chosen in the first 14 and we were asked a bunch of questions, then we individually had to go through and say a little about ourselves, whether we were married, where we worked and what we did for our spare time. So then the attorney's asked questions and then they got the chance to kick 4 members a piece off the jury. They only needed to get back down to 6 people. Anyway, so I was "excused" after that process. I don't know what it was about me they didn't like, but I'm sure glad they sent me home! It was a DUI case and to tell you the truth, after the morning I'd been through - I got there, and I was like - seriously? Are you really telling me that this is a DUI case, and you've just interrupted like 15 people's personal lives for THIS?! Give the woman a ticket and let's go home!!! Anyway, that's what I was thinking, the defending attorney must have gotten that vibe from me, because for some reason, he didn't want me! He's my new best friend!

So my day is back on track, an hour later... Just thought I'd update you on that exciting news! Have a great weekend! We leave tomorrow and come back next Tuesday from Minneapolis. If you could, please pray. We never have trouble with chaperone's, but Sam and I are the only ones going with about 12 students. It should be fun, but we'll both have to drive the whole way and you never get all that much sleep on these trips. Thanks!

Birthday Surprises!

Thanks to my finely tuned deductive reasoning skills, I guessed right! Sam and I headed out around 2pm on Monday for Medora - Western North Dakota - the Badlands! We went through the park a little ways and then headed north through the National Grasslands - the nice thing about ND is that President Teddy Roosevelt made sure that 1 out of ever 4 acres is National Grasslands or National Park land. So in essence, that means, that you can roam all over it! Anywhere you want! They've struck oil in these them hills - so there are a lot of oil wells, but that's on private land and fenced off. And in the National Parks, you have to camp at the regular camping grounds with all the normal stuff - fire rings, side by side camping, etc. etc. etc. But in the National Grasslands - you are free to go wherever you want! And we really dig primitive camping if it means that there is no one else around! What's the point in camping if there are like 6 million people around you. Hello. I could sleep in my own bed. So we found a spot where the National Grasslands had the Little Missouri River running right through it so that we could go swimming! It was like 97 degrees on Monday!!! So we found the perfect spot, it was about 8pm and we got camp all set up - aka - our tent! Then we went swimming. Here's the kicker - the Badlands in July has killer Kamikaze Tsetse flies! I don't know what kind of flies they are but they are deadly - dive bombing us, even while we were in the water! So the whole time, we were trying to get away from them and finally decided the only way to do that was escape to the tent! It gets dark around 10 or 10:30 pm anyway, so it was going to get cold. They were calling for temps. to get into the 50's! So anyway, all that to say Bethers, thanks for the sentiments, there were bugs, but it was worth it to get away! Then we got up on Tuesday and just went on a drive around the Badlands, we were looking for Teddy Roosevelt's Elkhorn Ranch, but there were no roads leading to it. So we gave up and headed home! We had a nice afternoon of getting things done. It was just to nice of Sam to plan this little get-away. It's been so busy lately and my favorite thing in the world is spending time with him, so I really appreciate him taking this much time out of his extremely busy schedule to whisk me away! And then, if that wasn't enough, he did give me a gift certificate to a local spa for a pedicure - I don't know that I've ever had anything so fancy. I'm always looking for the cheapest one in town, which happens to be in the mall run by a bunch of Vietnamese, don't get me wrong - they do a great job! But I'm really looking forward to that. There is one minor problem with that. The other Sunday at the Wedding Brunch, I was taking out the trash and someone had put glass in the bag and I didn't know it. So it scraped my leg a little, but it was right on the shin and so it bled a lot. Anyway, I carefully chucked the bag into the trash bin and a big ole' piece of glass came popping out of the top and landed right on my third toe at the base. So it's basically right in the way of any flip flops I want to wear. Well, it cut pretty deep. I should have gone in for stitches, but that's no fun, so I've been babying it - not so well, I might add, with Neosporine and band aids.... For as much blood as came spurting out of it, you'd think I cut the thing off. Goodness gracious. But anyway, all that to say - I have to wait for that to heal before I can begin thinking about my relaxing pedicure! Well, that's about all I had to share! Oh, I was going to tell you this one other funny story! While we were camping the other night, I moved a little and my feet swished the tent in the corner and I don't know how much I've shared about Sam's crazy sleeping stories - oh that just spring boards into about a million more stories for you... But anyway, he woke up and started yelling, "There's something out there! There's something out there!" And I said, no, it was just me - and he said, no it wasn't, there is something out there - and he jumps up on all fours and is staring out the tent window, growling! I'm so serious! He's growling!!!! Then our poor dog Tonto - is scared to death. I think he thought something was going to get him, so he came running to our tent and started scratching the side for us to let him in! I just died laughing, I told Sam that it was only Tonto, to go back to sleep! Oh my goodness, I've been laughing about it ever since! Oh the stories could go on forever, but I only have about 30 more minutes before I need to leave work - so I should get some stuff done!!! :) Hope you enjoyed this post half as much as I did! See ya!

It's finally time....

We'll see how far this update goes before the Internet shuts down! Well, what have we been up to for the last month - month?!?! What? I can't believe it! Well, I won't even try to remember back that far. I wish I had pictures to post - it would be so much more fun! But oh well....

Let's see, we had a Girls Getaway weekend on June 22 - 24 for Katie, that was a lot of fun. Sadie's in laws have this beautiful lake cabin in Park Rapids, MN and they so graciously offered to open it up for us.... So we had about 8 girls all together, and we ate, boated, watched movies, wave ran, water skied, roller bladed, biked, did a great scavenger hunt and had a great time! It was a lot of fun! Thanks to Lauren for her Karaoke machine and lots of fingernail polish, it turned out to be the best girls weekend ever! So then we came back on Tuesday and then had a few days to get back into the groove of things, then all of Sam's brothers and sisters headed back out to Park Rapids for another quick weekend. This time, it was just a family send off for Katie and Mike since it was the last time we'd really have to spend with them before they head out to WA. The weather was pretty crappy this time, but we had a great time playing Tripoly and watching more movies! Then we took old time photos and that was tons of fun - imagine trying to get 9 of us all dressed in costumes and posed for a picture - it was a good time! So we got back late on Sunday night and the next day, let's see, what are we up to now? June 30th? My parents flew in!

We had a great time - a whirlwind trip of working, working, working! On Tuesday and Wednesday, we put Laminate flooring in our family room - it looks so good - I'm going to have post pictures one of these days! Then on Thursday and Friday, my poor parents spent all day arranging flowers for Katie's wedding. They turned out beautiful - but long days for the 'rents! Poor things. Then on Saturday, we had the big wedding and that was an all day affair for me - with pictures and other "bridesmaid" responsibilities! It was fun. We had the dance and didn't get home till 1am! Then Sunday, there was a family brunch and we stayed up late playing Double Pinochle! We all needed tons of sleep by the time they left on July 8th. In fact, my poor mom has been home sick with a summer cold since we wore her out so desperately... I hope she's feeling better...

Then it was non-stop going since then. Tuesday night, Sam was going to head out to Medora with his family, but then they decided not to go and so we went out to dinner instead. Wednesday, we had about 16 kids over playing cards at our house for Rock Solid - Wednesday night activities. The plan was to play v-ball, but we got rained out. Then on Thursday, we had a great family from our church come over for a picnic - then we did get a great game of v-ball in. On Friday, we had another baby sitting adventure at church. So we did some crafts, watched movies, played games and rocked babies to sleep! Let's see - Saturday - I was exhausted, I slept in late, ran one errand - actually this is really sad. There is a local flower shop here who hosts lots of Christmas decorating classes, other informational classes and they are retiring, so the shop is going out of business. It's really sad, but we ran over to see if we could find some bargains and they are already pretty picked over - it's only down to 30% off right now - you can see how much this shop is loved.... Sad.... So then we went home and it was soooo windy out that you really couldn't do anything. So Sam finally got the opportunity to do some painting and I took a nap! Imagine that?! Then around 4pm, we headed out for a 2.5 hour drive to Fargo to help Sadie and Nathan move, but about 30 miles out, Ruth's water pump broke. Everyone we knew in town was in the car with us at that moment, so we tracked down someone going back into Bismarck and hitched a ride with them. Poor thing - she said, I don't usually do this, let me call my husband and let him know that I picked up some strangers.... We totally understood. Anyway, it was really nice of her to bring us back. By this time it was nearly 7pm, so we decided not to turn around and head back to Fargo. Then Sunday, yesterday, we had a brunch to go to after church and headed home and ended up taking another nap - a long one! Then we went for a walk along the river, it was good for Tonto to get out. We had V-ball - which, we won all three games! Then we took Rootbeer Floats over to a friends house and didn't end up leaving there until 12:15! So this morning was kind of hard to wake up! But we woke up to a beautiful birthday morning for me! Sam's got plans for this afternoon. He asked me to take off work tomorrow and won't tell me what we are doing or where we are going. But as we were making the bed this morning, he told me we wouldn't be sleeping there tonight - so using my finely tuned deductive reasoning skills, I've decided we are going camping! We'll see. I guess I'll post on Wednesday if I am right or not! But that should bring you up to date for the moment. I'll go through Sam's computer and get some highlight pictures of the last couple of weeks and hopefully get something posted on here in the way of pictures! Still want to show you all the work done in our yard, even though we've had to pause for the last couple of weeks!

This weekend coming up is our Jr. High Mission trip to Minneapolis, then we get back next Tuesday and Sam leaves next Saturday for Chicago for a week. Then he gets back and has VBS in SD, then leaves the following Saturday for a Boy's trip to the Boundary Waters. So after this weekend coming up, my summer will slow down considerably, but alas, without Sam... Sad...

So that's how it is for me! Sorry for the long posts and infrequent updates, but I'm always saving up for pictures, I should just give up on pictures! I like pictures though! Ok, I must sign off! Later!