Preliminary Painting

Grace slept in again today. I wanted to run and get the birthday present for the party tonight after we ate breakfast but the only thing on her mind this morning was "A" and we had to wait for her to get here before we could do anything else. Her friend from down the street called and asked if Grace wanted to go to the park and I mentioned "A" and so she said she'd call after I knew if "A" would want to do that or not.

So "A" comes over and we all went to McDonalds for lunch and then they went to Grace's friends house as she was taking them to the park. So I had a little time to get a few things done before picking them back up. I ran to Wal-Mart and got the gift we needed for party later and a few other things for Grace. Then came home and started painting the wallpaper samples we're going to use on the ceiling in the family room. They look pretty cool. After Grace was in bed I stuck one of the samples to the ceiling and we both like it. I think it'll be a focal point and really cool. I just hope it's easier to paint than it was with the little sample bottles of paint that Benjamin Moore sells. But considering that it's a ceiling, I don't think easy will describe anything to do with it's installation or painting.

So then it was time to go and pick up Grace and "A" so we could make it to the party on time. Her friend from down the street wasn't so happy that she was leaving; She wanted to play longer. So Grace and "A" came back here and "A" helped Grace get ready for the party. Then I had her sign the card and we were actually ready to go 10 minutes early! WOW! So Grace and "A" played a quick game of checkers and then Grace and I left to go to the birthday party.

Grace had a wonderful time; a lot of her friends were there and they got to play for at least 2 of the 2 1/2 hours we were there. Julie showed up too; I wasn't sure she was coming because she had called earlier in the day and said she wasn't feeling well and that she would probably just go home. But she stopped and got to spend time with everyone; that was a nice surprise. On the way home we passed this house where all these people were outside holding signs that said "Round Lake Police broke into my house and killed my dog." I'm thinking, Wow that's crazy, how could that happen. So when I got home I asked my neighbor if he knew anything about it. He did - apparently it was a drug bust and when they broke in to arrest everyone their dog started attacking the police so they shot the dog. There's always more to the story isn't there...

It's still warm and very humid. The cool front that came through this afternoon and dropped .27 in. of rain in about 15 minutes including a little hail. But it didn't cool it off too much, plus the humidity didn't go away at all. The weather man says tomorrow will be much better. I sure hope so as it feels like an oven outside with the humidity.

The new gas station just a few blocks from our house opened on schedule today. It'll be nice to have a gas station that close. It's even closer than the Walgreens; that should tell you something seeing as how there are Walgreens on most every corner. The only bad thing is that it's location probably makes it be in Round Lake Park and not Hainesville so the tax revenue won't benefit our town I don't think.

I forgot to mention that I talked to DirecTV yesterday about the issue with the remote control where it's controlling both the High Definition tuner and the new DVR tuner. Yea, that's what its supposed to do and there isn't anything I can do. The two boxes weren't meant to be used right next to each other and that's just how it is. Nice. Then we get a "courtesy" call from them today asking if we're happy with our installation. Yea - couldn't be better.

Another Tuesday

Well it's Tuesday which means we've got gymnastics. This was the last week of gymnastics before the summer session starts and they called last week and asked us to come in at 10:00am instead of Noon. So we got there almost right at 10:00 and Miss Deb wasn't there. We got inside to find out that she wasn't going to be there because she was doing something for school with her son and that Grace was just going to have open gym instead of class. All of us parents said that if we'd known that, we wouldn't have come. So anyway, we all stayed and the girls all played around but I think they were bored. Grace's friend from class invited us to their end of school party at Centennial Park just down the street from gymnastics which was really nice.

So we went there after gymnastics and Grace had a wonderful time. She got to play with her friends and made some new friends. Unfortunately it was a little cold today, I think the high was only 61 and we didn't bring clothes for Grace to change into, but at least we had jackets and sweatshirts. She never said she was cold and of course she was running around a lot. I was kind of cold, but my sweatshirt was enough to keep me warm.

After that I got gas at the cheapest place I know of around here in Antioch which was $3.33/gal which was cheaper than their sign said $3.39. So that made me a little happy. Then we went to Menards to get a new toilet flushing mechanism as ours broke in the downstairs bathroom. Actually this is kind of cool (I know; how can a toilet flush mechanism be interesting right?) Well, it's called something like silent or quiet flush and they aren't using false advertising. That toilet is really quiet now when you flush it. Alright maybe it's not so exciting, but it's interesting. I never gave much thought to the volume of my toilet when it flushes, have you?

Alright, enough of that subject. We also got Grace a new kite. I had bought her one last year at like Jewel or somewhere and it was completely useless. We couldn't keep it in the air longer than 10-15 seconds. Apparently you get what you pay for so I saw these kites at Menards for like $10 or maybe a little less and found one that looked kind of cool - nothing really for girls - and got it for her. This was the new Menards up in Antioch by the way and I just have to say WOW that place is cool. They have a very large selection including things you wouldn't expect like food (just packaged food) and the lumber yard is not just indoors like at most Menards, but it's inside the store - heated, cooled, etc. I heard they had a good selection of plants, but we never made it over there. I also got a rain gauge so I know when to water the lawn. Until this week, we hadn't really gotten much rain so my yard was looking horrible.

They didn't have my grass trimmer attachment either, so I guess I'll have to call around and check the internet etc. because the areas that you would normally trim are looking really bad. And since we pay someone to come and fertilize the yard, it's the least I could do to keep things looking good. Speaking of which, I REALLY need to mow the back yard now. It's looking like a field and I'm not sure when it will be dry enough to cut. I'm pretty sure it won't be dry enough tomorrow since we also have a chance for rain again tomorrow afternoon. Then it's supposed to be like 92 on Thursday so maybe Friday is a possibility. We'll see. Thank goodness I mowed the front yard when I did or the neighbors would disown us.

So after the short shopping trip, Grace and I came home. She had already had lunch at the park so I needed to eat something. Then she went to play with her friend next door. Today was the day to pick up Market Day at our church while Grace was still at her friends house. So I stopped over to ask if it was alright if she stay there while I ran to church (not literally.) They said it was no problem so I ran and got that. Just before I got home Julie called and wondered where I was. I thought I'd be back home before she got there but I was off by about a minute I think.

So we all kind of hung out for a while and I made dinner for Grace - I ate my lunch really late and wasn't hungry and I don't think Julie was very hungry either because she couldn't decide what she wanted. I offered to cook something for her but that didn't seem to help her decide either. Then while Grace was eating her friend from across the street came over and said they were riding their bikes to the library and wondered if we wanted to come with. I definitely did because I needed the exercise, but Julie couldn't decide because she was still trying to decide what to eat. But she decided to come along and just eat something later which is usually ice cream :->

So we all rode to the library and it's like 55 degrees outside in June - just crazy! We were all bundled up, the girls with their gloves on and everyone with a jacket and/or sweatshirt. The girls were having a blast and we made it there in like record time. Boy was I tired; I think we averaged about 10.6 mph on the way there, and it seemed faster. Maybe the jeans I was wearing didn't help - they made my legs feel like I was wearing a wool blanket on them. But the next time I ride with shorts my legs will feel really light! So the average speed for the whole trip which was just under 5 miles was 9.8 mph. So we slowed down about 2 mph overall I think on the way back but we made it and now my legs feel like rubber. I should try to ride tomorrow to get my legs moving. We'll see as I'm pretty sure we're going to Great America with another of Grace's friends. He's so cute and the two of them just seem to really like each other. This will be their first "play date" and I think she's excited - and I haven't even told her where we're going yet.

My Aunt from Nebraska called today. She's coming out in July (which is kind of funny because we're going to see her later in July) and was making sure we'd be around and be able to pick her up from the airport and such. So now we have something to look forward to in the beginning of July. We normally go to the Taste of Chicago before the 4th, but we haven't made any plans yet. Maybe we should start working on making those plans and then we'll have even more to look forward to.

Looks like I am going to the Cubs game next Tuesday, so I'll be missing the Village Board Meeting. I've been going to them since March I think. It's really opened my eyes to the things going on in our Village and the surrounding area. But I can miss just this one right? I called my BIL to see if he could go and it looks like he can. So it looks like the three of us are going, should be fun! I've never been to a night game at Wrigley - at least I don't think so.

Oh when I went to the library I got a book about learning Windows Server 2003. I don't know much about it and this'll help me learn how to start playing around with it since I installed it on the computer I got from my Dad. I'm not sure if it'll really work since it's only licensed for development purposes. But I can certainly play around with it until it tells me to stop or something doesn't work when it really should be working. So I now have 10 books checked out of the library. Most of them are stuff for vacation though, so I'm not reading the entire book for those, just trying to get ideas.