Spring Break Art Class for Brooke

Brooke took an art class over Spring Break.  She is so into everything creative!  Here is her work from start to finish.  It's now hanging in her bedroom:)

This weekend....

We had an all-over-the-place weekend:

Starting with Friday, we received a shipment of beautiful furniture Friday afternoon. Ashley’s great aunt Ardis passed away a couple months ago, and Fritz arranged for old family furniture to be shipped to us.

The drawers were filled with old wedding licenses, arrowheads from the family farm, report cards from 1908 and all sorts of other little treasures. The best part was a set of photo albums from 1954 to 1957. They were gifts from Ashley’s grandma, Bette, to Ardis for Christmas each year (Heather – reminds me of the albums you have done in the past). Ashley’s grandpa Glen worked for Kodak, and the photos are really amazing quality. It was so fun to go through these, look at what life was like in the mid 50s and think about Bette’s life as a whole.

The furniture as it landed in the family room Friday afternoon

Ashley looking at his great grandma's grade school diploma

Saturday morning, Ashley had to work, and I helped friends move. Bette passed away Saturday evening, although we didn’t get the message until Sunday a.m. We were very grateful for the timing of going through the albums and such on Friday. She was 93 and had lived on Hilton Head for almost 40 years. Ashley has such good memories visiting there growing up – I guess its strange to think no one from their family is there anymore.

Sunday then became such a busy day - we both had organized runs very early, and then we came home to prepare for hosting the neighborhood monthly dinner at our house (30+ neighbors for dinner).

A part of the neighborhood dinner group in the family room

It ended up being a weekend filled with such positive and fun things, but also big, if unsurprising, news. We're grateful for the timing of the furniture arrival and the opportunity to reflect on Bette's life the day before she passed. Such a neat gift.

Spring lately

Nothing too exciting lately to post here... Ashley's new work is going well, I did a bit of traveling to SoCal for work, had a visit from Dad, preparing for Santa Barbara trip, busy with house projects and seeing friends.

Last weekend we had a group of PECI coworkers over who are University of Colorado Alum (like Ashley) and next weekend we have the monthly neighborhood soup dinner at our house. Which meant I wasn't too excited about having people over for Easter this weekend, so we didn't make any big plans. It was still a good weekend:

Friday we went to happy hour with someone I went to high school with and randomly bumped into here in Portland. Turns out he lives just a few blocks from us.

Saturday Ashley worked on the stone back walkway:



I'm sure the church across the street was excited about this noise on Easter Sunday. : )

Saturday night we went to a bbq at my friend Colette's house and hung out around a fire.

Sunday, while Ashley worked on the walkway, I shoveled dirt with the neighbors. When we were done, we drank a beer in the sun and I lost all motivation to cook an Easter dinner. We ended up riding our bikes to dinner and eating outside in the sun - a random but nice Easter.

A few other random things:

New garage fixture we installed with Dad. We still need to fix the top part where the old fixture was.

Bryce's girlfriend turned 30 and had an 80's themed party at a bar where they were DJing 80s music. Ashley was Richard Simmons - he has on a small mesh tank and short pink shorts (unfortunately I have no good photos of this. I wonder why...)

Went to a wine tasting this Monday at a ballroom near our house. 30 wineries from the Columbia Gorge had tables to taste at - it was much easier than driving around the Gorge from winery to winery : ) Jami, Becky, Valerie and I biked over together after work, drank some wine and stopped by the food carts near our houses on the way home. This is Jami and Becky in front of the crepe cart, my favorite. It was a fun random Monday night.

I finally sewed new curtains for the upstairs bedroom window. There isn't much light here, but the roses are a grey and blue green color. Ignore the torch stained glass - we're hoping to replace that window in the next month or so before we paint the outside of the house. It will be nice to have a window that opens there!

I took a glass blowing class a while back (bought a Groupon for it with a girlfriend). We didn't get any pictures of us, but these are the furnaces and glass. I made a couple glass pumpkins (thought they would be cute fall decorations : )

Hoppy Easter

Easter Sunday

As per the picture, the boys weren't interested in the Easter bunny photo or the egg hunt for that matter.  There was serious discussion prior to the hunt on what was each of their cuts of the loot.  :)  And of course there was jelly bean juice/saliva all over her pretty white sweater and dress for church.  She was dressed and ready by 6am.  Hope it is a great day for everyone.

Heather and Family Q1 Update

How pathetic I have gotten to "quarterly" posts.  Life is busy, that's for sure.  Here are some random happenings from the last few months :)

Making jewelry at Discovery World

Don't you love my ring?  Mom helped me make it:)

Friday night fun - Ice Skating at Red Arrow Park downtown Milwaukee.  Our first and only time on skates this year.  Morgan brought her friend Amelia.  We had a great time!

Warming up after a dip in the hot tub.  Notice there are no pictures of the white trash hot tub.  That is our Easter Weekend project - LOL

Making "Celebrating Jesus" windsocks with my Christian Formation class.  Last night was the last week.  I survived 8 months!

This was a picture of Brooke at "Boxy's" funeral.  Boxy was her boxelder bug pet that died.  She made him a "casket" and we buried him in the back yard.  She was finally smiling in this picture after 30 minutes of tears.

So cute!  Brooke and cousin Emily chalking in Grammy's driveway at their sleepover.

Dad's March visit

Dad arrived last Thursday afternoon, and we went straight from the airport to a sports bar to catch the Badger game. So close!

Friday we all went out for a sunny walk to lunch at a Thai restaurant in our neighborhood.

On the way home, Ashley happened to spot a truck for sale... Low and behold, it was bought the next day. Apparently you can never have too many... trucks? : )

Saturday was also sunny, and we headed out to the Clackamas river for a hike.

Taking a breather. Carmen just wouldn't smile for this one... : )

On Sunday, Ashley and Dad got rid of that ugly fixture, re-ran the electrical and installed a new fixture.

Monday I had to work, and Dad wandered the neighborhood, including a theater nearby for the Hunger Games! I think he's looking forward to catching up with Morgan about it (if he hasn't already!). Tuesday a.m. we headed back to the airport for his return flight. A quick but fun trip! Thanks for everything Dad!