So I started from the bottom since that's the easiest way to put pictures on. So start there!
They finally tore down one of the condemned houses across the street! Yay! So much nicer now! That should help the value of our house go up a little.
Around the shower. haha, the curtain matches!
Where we got to on the ceiling. (that box will be the light)
Another look at those wires. *shudder* Talk about a fire hazard!! We're redoing those needless to say.
So we got some tar and tried to seal it off from the inside. I have a WHOLE new appreciation for Joseph Smith. This stuff was NASTY and I didn't even have to deal with it hot or touching me! I don't even know how he possibly COULD have cleaned up enough to preach the next day, not even thinking about the pain and exhaustion he must have felt!
Come on, everyone knows deconstruction is the most fun! You can take any frustrations out on the walls and it's really hard to mess up when you're taking something apart!
Ok, my parents came for a week and a half and we did a whirlwind bathroom remodeling project. Here's a picture tour of what we did! It started out as just replacing the bathtub and turned into replace everything. Here is the old bathtub!
I loved this picture while camping. Another family had a little powerboat on the river but I loved how it was all foggy and you could just see it.
Snowy has been really interested in the fridge lately! We have to be careful about not shutting her in!
Look at my giant mosquito bite that swelled up immediately! I got eaten pretty bad before it got dark. There weren't really any mosquitoes later when we watched the meteor shower.
We went camping at Mary Jane Thurston State Park so that we could watch the Perseids meteor shower. It was awesome and there was one meteor that looked like a firework! It went like all the way across the sky and lit up in a fireball! We then when kayaking the next day. We also really need to work on our charcoal lighting skills! We need to be more patient. The first time I'd ever lit charcoal myself was at girls camp and Sis. Steele got mad at my girls for not doing it right, but it was me that didn't do it right!
Look at this awesome giant praying mantis that was on our front door!
At the Tollers'. The Tollers have been so good to us! Along with the Felts. This summer we spent alot of time eating and playing games with the Felts : ) Now they are gone on an away rotation. We spent time with Steve too when Jenni was off in Utah. We love our friends, they make Toledo the best place we've ever been!
The boys playing football.
Fireworks on the 4th of July with the Wielands. They are so nice to us and invite us to things!
Snowy... how we all felt this summer! Way hot! She got to love being outside whenever she wanted!
Together. (They don't have drawers or doors yet.)
The cabinet I built at the beginning of the summer.
The counter I built at the beginning of the summer.
Living room where Joseph Smith and Emma slept. It was here that Joseph was tarred and feathered and their twins died.
Summer kitchen
We were at the John Johnson farm and we got to take a tour (Weston and I, most of the girls had already been). It was cool : ) There was some really beautiful woodwork and we really felt the spirit. Here is the kids room. "Sleep tight, don't let the bed bugs bite!" (I learned where that saying came from! Tighten the bed and beat it to get the bugs out of the straw!)
Weston's priesthood tent! He came up for the 1st 3 days!!
They laughed at me because I never made a normal smiling face for pictures, I always made weird faces. They're right! lol. I didn't realize that.
Katie
Robyn- Robyn and Ashley took way better pictures than I did!
Lexus and Ashley
Tori
Haley
These are the awesome young women that I got to be with at girls camp! I LOVED going to girls camp! Plus I liked being a leader because then I'm not pressured to make friends with the girls. They can think I'm weird and that's ok.
We bought kayaks instead of going on a road trip to Maine this year and oh how we love them! We've only taken them out 4 times but they were great! Twice on lake Erie at Maumee state park, once on lake Michigan (while visiting Weston's family in Holland, MI, that was a fun trip! Thank you for hosting Tami and it was so good to see Weston's cousins!), and once on the Maumee river around an Island. I'm going to keep doing that one. Plus, I've gone out on a limb and sent an invitation out on our ward's community blog for kayak partners. We'll see if anyone actually wants to come with me... I'm not very good at small talk, so I'm kind of nervous being alone with a girl (I'm much better at talking to boys) for two hours.
This is her in the morning exhausted from her night's work.
This is Snowy. She keeps a vigilant watch of our house at night. I just wish she would signal us if there were ever any suspicious humans outside!
Oh yeah, she had an exciting night while my parents were here! In the middle of the night I woke up to fabricy rustling sounds and bumps. When I opened my eyes I saw a shadow moving around the room and Snowy chasing something. I said "I think that's a bat!" And it was! We had a bat in our house and Snowy was trying to get it! I woke Weston up and we opened a window to try to get it out but it was flying too high! I was going around through the upstairs running into walls, I felt bad for it, but also a little wary because bats can carry rabies. When we opened our room window Weston tackled snowy and held her on our bed while she watched me trying to direct the bat out the window. We eventually trapped it in the bathroom and it found it's way out. But while I was watching there were several other bats that flew past our window while it was open! I wonder how it got in and now I can see why Snowy loves watching out the window at night!