Instead of trying to post stuff in a timely manner, I am going to try posting only once or twice a month and just cover the highlights.
To start off, we finished redoing the girl's bedroom while they stayed with my folks. This project was not too terrible, although that's easy for me to say since I was gone for much of it, leaving most of the work to Cynthia. The end result is really cool and it brightens up their room quite a bit. We painted their dressers as well and coated them with a polycrylic clear coat and painted the hardware. Not bad!
Next, we started work on the kitchen. This is gonna take a while. The super dark cabinets are all painted and the hardware has been replaced (that was a lot of work right there, and again Cynthia did most of it), but before we paint the walls, we'll have to deal with the fake brick wall covering. That's gonna suck, but it will look a lot better when it's done. Then once the walls have been fixed and all of the painting done, we will replace the counter top, sink and faucets, and kitchen floor. At least it's not a huge kitchen. Also, no more hippy strawberry painting on the panel in front of the sink.
On Labor Day weekend we drove out and met Dave's fiancée, Daphne. She arrived in the U.S. from the Philippines on August 21st and was still trying to adjust her sleep schedule – although she seemed to be adjusting well when we saw her. In the Philippines she is used to getting up at 4am to run or swim and then start her day. Good luck, Dave! Hahahaha!
Daphne was so polite and well-spoken and it was great getting to meet her. She has so many interesting stories to tell and I hope her new life here will be full of good memories. We joked with her about living in the magical land of Peoria, IL, and tried to help her mentally prepare for winter. This will be her first time experiencing an actual winter with freezing cold temperatures and snow, so she was kinda of nervous. If you're looking to ease into midwestern winters, Illinois is probably not the best place to start.
We took some family pictures, but the ridiculous one was my favorite, so that one gets posted.
Dave and Daphne not looking ridiculous.
My mom and Daphne and Cynthia went out shopping for wedding stuff while the rest of us went over to my folk's church parking lot to fly my plane. As I was flying it, I explained that the one real problem with this plane is that it would sometimes lose the signal from the transmitter and when that happens it shuts off and I have no control over it. I flew the plane in a corkscrew pattern higher and higher and got a little carried away and flew it too high... and then it demonstrated what happens when it loses the signal with the transmitter. It began to descend rapidly towards the very high church roof and as it did so it suddenly regained its connection with the transmitter, but not soon enough and it landed on the roof. That was an adventure getting it off of that high roof and I had to climb across a narrow board over the glass dome and try not to fall through it!
Recently I bought an underwater camera housing and I've been trying that out in the Cedar River and some nearby streams. The Cedar River is the nastiest water ("brown water," as Emily calls it, and then she bursts into maniacal laughter) and I won't try that again, but the streams in contrast are surprisingly clear.
Since March, we have been at Edgewood and shortly after we began attending we were asked if we would join the worship team. We went from helping to doing the leading, which was not our intent, but it has been a good experience. It's a church in recovery and it's cool to see new faces appearing and I keep hoping that we get some more singers and musicians in there. It's really been a blast playing guitar and singing there and the congregation is openly supportive and vocal about it, which is something I am not used to. Often times they will applaud after a song, which always catches me by surprise and every Sunday several people will come up and tell us how much they enjoyed the worship. I'll be honest, the worship isn't spectacular, but it is a lot better than it was a few months ago. It's been cool to work alongside other musicians and to learn from each other. There's a level of camaraderie in a band that you don't really find anywhere else.
Work has been very hectic this summer, but when the pub schedule finally began to calm down, I took a day off and we went to Pinicon Ridge. The girls had a blast and were excited to go, but I suspect they mostly just like it when I let them ride in the bed of the truck. We drove up to the Observation Tower and just as Cynthia and I were walking up the sidewalk, we heard the girls shouting that they were at the top. No way. We had been out of the truck for like 30 seconds. But sure enough, they had climbed all the way to the top already. These are the same people who can barely muster the strength to pick up after themselves. Huh.
It's been a great summer for fires in the backyard!
