Turning in Early!

I could tell Zach was tired tonight. It has been a busy start to the school year for him. We had dinner and afterwards I told him he could play with Lego's until 7 pm and then we would read before bed time at 8 pm. When I went to give him the "5 minute warning" he was all tucked into bed and fast asleep. He didn't wake up until morning!

Sam and I went outside and enjoyed the nice evening by riding (he rode, I pushed) his tricycle up and down the sidewalk in front of the house.

Zach was sad in the morning that he had missed out on bike time!

"Perfect"

I arrived at the office at 1:30 pm today from meetings and had flowers waiting for me at the front desk. Aww....who sent flowers? I had just gotten back to my office when Melonnie stuck her head in and asked "who are the flowers from, I received the same ones". I opened the card - "Perfect". I knew right away who had sent them - Steve, a co-worker from Prudhoe Bay.

I had talked to Steve the other day and he said "Perfect" while laughing. Apparently I say that quite a bit....and I do, now that someone has pointed it out. When talking on the phone and needing that "pause, I am thinking moment", I seem to say "Perfect". Too funny!

At least I knew who had sent the flowers. Melonnie's card said "Just Because" and she had no idea, she wanted to know before asking her husband. Donna had also received the same flowers and was none too pleased that the card said "Clean Your Desk". Ahh, haa!! I laughed until I had tears in my eyes; you have to know Donna's desk to understand. She had been tracking down every prankster in the office and laid the blame on them. Donna laughed when she knew who had sent the flowers, but I think she was secretly planning her revenge.

Renee, Donna & Melonnie with our beautiful flowers. It isn't very often that someone sends flowers, calls or e-mails just to say thanks for being a great co-worker. Thanks Steve!

I love this card....and am now somewhat paranoid on my thinking pauses. "Perfect"!

Eeeeek!

Doug left for the airport this morning at 5 am for a trip to Bethel. I got the kids up and to school on time, got to BP at 8:15 am to sit in the lobby and read all the material for a 9 am meeting. Had the 9 am meeting. Then drove co-worker, Chris, and I to a 10 am - 1 pm Contractor's HSE Forum meeting the CIRI building; not far from the BP office. We arrived a few minutes prior to 10 am and found the parking lot to be full. The e-mail we had said to park in the "over flow" area near the Arctic Office Supply. Apparently we didn't park in the correct spot (along with others in the same meeting) because the below sticker was under my wind shield wiper when we returned!! Yikes, thank goodness I didn't get towed. Oh well, lesson learned.....at least the lunch provided at the meeting was awesome!

Manic Monday

After dinner the guys wanted to crash on the sofa.....wait, we have things to get done!

Zach had reading to do, but since Doug was fast asleep on the sofa super Mom came to the rescue! We read "Win White's Home", the little readers from the library are nice, I like them! A short story with easy words. Just long enough to keep Zach's attention.

It had been raining, the sky then got blue with huge white clouds on the mountains. It was quite impressive!

Happy Anniversary!

Wow! Our 13th anniversary is today! Time sure does go fast. We had a nice dinner at home and Doug brought home some beautiful sunflowers to celebrate.

Happy Anniversary!!

House Painting

The back of our house gets baked by the sun. Last summer Doug painted the lower section on part of the back near the deck. It was a lot of work and hard to do with 2 little kids running around. This year we evaluated the house condition. The trim really needed to be done and the rest of the back really needed help. It was more than we could do ourselves. The Halliburton office was painted earlier in the summer; S&B paint did a great job on it. They gave me a good quote on our house - the job is yours!

We wanted to darken the house a little and change the trim from green to white. I brought home a bunch of paint card samples and we evaluated them all. After a decision, a test with the neat pint size samples from Lowe's and approval from the homeowner's association on the color, we were ready to have the work done. Of course, it then rained the next 31 days. The weather finally held and the painters were able to get the work done last week.

The house in fall 1996 when we bought it.

Today. Very nice, the painters did a great job!

Pok-A-Dots!

It was a lovely evening. We sat outside and heard all about Doug's fishing adventure with friends. I had found at Target on 75% off a table cloth and place mats for the outside patio table. I had gotten some pok-a-dot plates at JCPenney a few weeks earlier for the boat - everything matches! How fun!

Howdie Doodie Cowboy!

We received an invitation to Soren's 1st birthday party when Papa and Mema were in town. The party was to be a Western theme, so they took Zach to the party store for a hat. He LOVES the hat he picked out. Apparently he tried them all on while admiring himself in the mirror at the store. In the end, he decided on a brown cowboy hat with dark brown stitching. Sammy got a black plastic hat for playing the part.

Sam loved Soren's vacuum cleaner! I need to put him to work at home! Sam's Uncle David loved vacuums when he was younger - Grandma gave the babysitter extra money to cover her electric bill!

Zach was so handsome. He wore Doug's Texas longhorn belt from when Doug was just a wee little cowboy. Zach might wear his outfit for Halloween!

The birthday boy! Soren and Mom, Shannon.

Sam had seen the other kids lasso the horse, he wanted to also!

Another little boy, Wally, was dressed just like Sam. The two of them were so cute playing together.

Yee-Haa!

Mason and Zach. Mason is the son of Doug's former co-worker, Stephaine.

We were all sporting our Western best. My hat is made from a Miller light box. It is a gag gift type of thing that I got at our church rummage sale last year. As Methodists don't have alcohol in their church buildings, it was thought to be disrespectful to sell a "beer hat" at the sale. It was sitting near the garbage can.....way to fun to discard, so was "discarded" to my car. The hat was a hit, everyone was curious where I had gotten it.

A fun afternoon, Sam was asleep in the car before we got home! It was nice that the rain stopped and the sun came out so the kids could all play outside!

Learning to Read

After Jacob's we went to the library to find some good beginning reader books for Zach. A good portion of Anchorage had also found a nice dry place to read....the library was packed! The kid's area librarian was super helpful and we checked out a stack of 8 page easy readers. Zach also found a comic type book for mom to read to him!

Zach knows the letters and their sounds, but struggles to sound out the words so that the sounds flow into a recognizable word. It is going to take some practice. We had plenty of inside time on Saturday night to read, read, read!

Playdate at Jacob's

It was raining today, yuck. Sarah invited us over for a play date. While us gals had a good time talking the kids took apart the house....oh, I mean played. It was a lot of energy - there were 7 boys! Next time we will meet somewhere like McDonald's or Bouncing Bears! We certainly won't be meeting at our house!

Fishing in Eshamy Bay

Doug, Matt & Jeff had planned a fishing trip early in the season. Same trip but on the Wooldridge instead of the Bayliner. The guys had a great long weekend.

A rockfish for dinner!