WR: Christine Graduates!!!

It was a big weekend for us as Christine graduated from high school!

We went back on Friday night, and celebrated Caroline's College Graduation with the family.

It was a nice party! Chester enjoyed playing with Kody (who was recovering from mouth surgery, poor guy) and his new friend Coco (they've only met once before).

Saturday was busy as we spent most of the day preparing for Christine's Grad Party on Sunday.

We did take a break so we could give Christine her birthday gifts from us.

We gave her Sherbert and Birthday Cake Oreos (she loves different flavored ones),

a Twins fleece blanket, and a ticket to a Twins game in September when she's up at college. Something to look forward to!

The family also gave her a scrapbook of all her school and a few baby photos. This was the SUPER SECRET PROJECT that I've been working on the past few weeks. I blame the Cricut for it taking me so long to do. I love the Cricut, but it is very time consuming!

Chester enjoyed Christine's new blanket as well!

Adam and Dad were able to sneak away for a bit to do some fishing.
While I was getting ready, Chester decided he needed a better view out the bedroom window -

 

That night, we all took a break and went to a movie together - The Great Gatsby. I enjoyed it, but didn't love it as much as I thought I would!

Sunday morning brought more party prep right up until it was time to go.

Mom helped Christine get her cap and gown on.

Christine thought Chester should try on her cap. He was not amused!

And then it was time to take some photos!

Adam's parents even came down to celebrate Christine's Graduation! It was so thoughtful of them.

At the school, we of course took more photos before the ceremony.

Here was part of Christine's cheering section -

 And then it was time for Christine to graduate!

Graduation was done by 3, so we had plenty of time for more photos and then the finishing touches before her party started at 4:30. It was a great party! By going through her list, my mom figured about 130 people came.

Even our favorite French teacher came! We both had Monsieur for French from 7th Grade through Senior year!

There was great food like a taco bar, nacho machine, popcorn machine, but the best was the Slush Puppy machine!

And here are the 3 photo boards I put together! Excessive, I know!

Chester even wore his Gophers costume in honor of Christine's future college!

I had kitchen duty for a few hours so was kept super busy refilling everything. Then we partied into the night and even had a bonfire.

Monday was a low key day due to the weather. Lots of grad party guests came over to my parent's house for lunch and to visit. We also celebrated Curt's birthday - I even made cakeballs for the occasion!

Happy Birthday Christine!

Can you believe my baby sister is 18? I can't. It makes me feel so old! She's always been my baby sister (we are almost 11 years apart), so I can't believe she's now officially an adult. And she graduates from high school this weekend too!

 

It's hard to imagine that she was barely 8 when I left for college ten years ago. Where did that time go? Seriously.

Happy Birthday Christine!

WR: From Jungle to Garden

Yard work was the story of our weekend. Adam was able to borrow a truck from work, so we were definitely going to take advantage of it. It was raining Friday night, so we decided to just have a low key evening. After dinner, we watched a movie "The Way Back," which was somewhat dull. Then I caught my second wind and decided to work on my secret project upstairs for a few hours. I was up until midnight working on it!

On Saturday, we slept in until 10. Chester too! I think it helped that he was in his kennel and the house was dark because it was raining again. Saturday was supposed to be our big yard work day, so we were a little nervous. I made some french toast for breakfast, and then we were off to Linder's Greenhouse. This weekend Linder's had their annual fundraiser coupon where 15% of your purchase went towards the MN Midwest Pug Rescue. By the time we got there, it was only sprinkling. We got a hydrangea, rose bush, geranium, a flower for my hanging basket, and then some tomatoes, tomatillos and jalepenos. It was great to pick up some stuff and support the rescue!

Next was Menard's to pick up some gardening supplies like compost, peat moss and a little top soil. Our last stop was Jimmy John's to grab some lunch quick so we could devote our afternoon to the yard!

Our main area of focus was the mess behind the garage. As I mentioned last week, it's a jungle. This is what it looked like last spring.


the jungle last spring

By summer, you couldn't even see behind the compost bin, much less walk back there. It was a nightmare. And the thought of trying to do anything with it was pretty overwhelming. As Adam said when we were done, "I never thought we'd do anything with this space!"

Luckily, I had cut down most of the vines last weekend, 

the jungle last weekend

so all we had to deal with was the really thick vines and weed trees. We spent the warm afternoon cutting trees down (Adam), hauling branches to the truck (me), and taking THREE full truck loads to the compost site nearby (Adam). We also worked on cleaning up the fence line of weed trees and vines behind all the raspberry bushes. It was exhausting!

And here it is - all clean and ready for planting! Who knew those block dividers were even there?
They kind of look like hell, but who cares!

Chester was a really good boy, especially considering he spent most of the day watching us from the back door because it was too hot out for him (he still hasn't shed all his winter fur).

We rewarded ourselves when we were done with some cold beverages on the patio. For dinner, Adam grilled burgers and I made a side salad.

Chester was fascinated by the helicopter that went by -

I was so tired from all our hard work that I fell asleep on the couch at 8! Crazy.

We got up around 9 on Sunday, and soon found ourselves outside again. Unfortunately for us, it was a really warm and humid day. Once again, Chester spent most of the day watching us from the back door. Occasionally, I would bring him outside for 15 minutes until he got too hot. He loved it.


So sleepy...

Saturday was the clean up day, and Sunday was the planting day. Since we were relocating our garden from the middle tier to behind the garage, we had to move all the cages. Then Adam took down the old fence. It looks terrible now, but soon the grass will take over. It originally was grass when we moved in 3+ years ago, but we decided to make it our garden. The grass never took the hint and we were constantly battling it. To help it along, Adam also added some grass seed.

Behind the garage, Adam spread all the peat moss, compost and top soil in the space, and then I started to plant. It faces south and gets a lot of sunlight, so hopefully this space will work out for us.

I also planted some beans and herbs along the side of the garage where we always plant. While I was planting, Adam mowed the lawn, put down grass seed, and fertilized.

Our last task was to plant the hydrangea on the side of the house and rose bush in my flower garden (3rd time's the charm, right?).

We were well wrapped up by the time the storms rolled around. We got a little bit of hail, but not enough to cause damage. I was worrying about my decision to plant, but everything looks fine. In between storms, Adam worked on cleaning out and fixing the rain gutter along the house. I read inside with a snuggly pug. It was delightful. Poor Adam.

It was an exhausting weekend, but it feels great to finally reclaim all that wasted space behind the garage AND finally have our garden planted. We could have done this long ago if we actually would have had any kind of spring...

Twins Game Suite Style

We went to the Twins vs White Sox game on Tuesday night with tickets we bought as a fundraiser from MN Pug Rescue (where we adopted Chester from). It was our first time in a suite since my birthday back in 2010.

We got there early for the giveaway (fleece blankets on a 90° night!) and to get good seats in the suite deck. It was so early that we even caught some of batting practice!

The suite seats included hot dogs, snacks, and pop, which was nice.

It was a perfect night for baseball! It was warm, but there was a cool breeze and it had cooled off a lot by the time the game was over.

I enjoyed watching the game from a different vantage point. And even though the Twins lost, we had fun!