Mud, Mud, and more Mud!

You would think that my children had been playing in the rain, mixing mud pies, wouldn't you? Nope. We finished drywalling Amber's room yesterday, so today I decided to start mudding and taping. Oh such fun! Really, I think that if you want to have a great time, you should come on down and I will show you how to tape and mud and then I will let you have at it. :) So here are some pictures of what her room looks like now. By the way, don't ask me to raise my right arm above my head. I am a little sore. :)


This is her closet.

Garden Canning!

Well, I canned a few peas and beans. The peas I canned the other day. I wasn't quite sure what to do, I hadn't ever canned before, but everything worked out just fine. Lots of calls to mom. :) The beans I just did tonight. They came out just fine and now that I have done it before it wasn't so bad.

We have walls!

Well the basement has progressed a lot. We now have sheetrock up in Ashley's room and the hallway. Amber's room has sheetrock on the ceiling and we are going to try and finish the walls up tomorrow. Then it is on to mudding and taping. FUN! Just kidding. I think that it will be definitely possible to finish mudding and taping before Canada. Maybe we will even get some primer and paint up. It really feels strange to walk downstairs and see a hallway. I don't know why that throws me, but the hallway does it for me. It is cool to see the transformation though.


This is what our basement looks like when you come downstairs. This part of the basement will also get finished, but right now it is holding all the sheetrock and furniture. You can see the entrance to the hallway though.


This is Amber's ceiling. Ooohh, aaahhh! :)


I don't understand why this photo won't show up the right way. It is correct in iPhoto, but not here. Anyways, turn your head and you can see Ashley's room, all done with sheetrock.


This is the hallway.

4th of July

Over the 4th of July we went to the Riverhouse on the Mississippi. Friday was really nice weather, and then Saturday it was rainy in the morning. We took the kids out to the river in the afternoon, and then for a treat went to Joe's Ice Cream. They have the best ice cream. After that we took the kids to the park to burn off some energy from being inside all morning. They had a lot of fun and so did the adults.
Sunday turned out to be a really nice day too and we did a lot of swimming. I even got in, and so did Katie (Tyler's wife). The kids wanted mom to swim and Bill went and got his life jacket on. Then he tried to push me in, but I cleverly escaped. I did eventually get in, but WOW, was it cold. After a little bit of swimming it wasn't too bad.