Feline Friday: New spaces

Feline Friday: New places

Pixel finally jumped up into the missing block cubby.

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May 2013 Recap

May 2013 Recap

Good lord! How is it already June?? It’s officially twelve days until the wedding. My to-do list is long, but manageable if I stay on task. Oh boy, June is going to go by fast. Here are some highlights of May.

*****

1) Nate went on his Boys Weekend to beautiful Reno, Nevada. They took Megabus from Sacramento to Reno on Friday morning. Word on the street is they played Blackjack, Jeff cooked up some good grub and someone tried to steal a pair of sunglasses of their porch but was thwarted by a neighbor.

2) I started working on wedding favors. I won’t go in much detail here because I will have a very long post all about it. I will say I learned a lot of valuable info by experimenting with the materials. So my valuable lesson learned was doing this project early gave me the time to do it right.

3) My fitbit and I have solidified our relationship. I wear it day and night. Combined with the Tone it Up Girls Bikini Series I have really kept my anxiety down with a ton of exercise. Hopefully this becomes habit and I continue after the wedding.

4) We had a couple crazy rain storms in May. Here’s the heavy rain cloud wall on my way to my friends’ Annual Que Bueno Nacho Bar Party. Most of the evening was spent under a tent as a rain bucketed down. Don’t worry, I still ate my fair share of cheese.

5) Our apricot harvest was a total bust this year (tears). I had high hopes but those *&$% squirrels got to them first.

6) My hoover had a slow death this month after I repeatedly trying to clean it out to get any suction. In the end I bought a pet vacuum from Bissell that had good reviews. So-far-so-good, but I am not going to review it until at least 6 months in.

7) Some good friends of mine are getting married two weeks after our wedding. It’s been fun having the spotlight on someone else and getting a chance to celebrate them.

8) A few wedding tasks we’ve been avoiding include purchasing Nate’s wedding ring. Neither one of us were looking forward to shopping for the ring, but in the end we really found the perfect band for him.

9) With the warm weather, the cats have been hunting moths and lizards like crazy. One night Loki, surprised us by bringing a 4″ alligator lizard into the house and then losing it. We hoped he ran up the box springs of this chair so we put it outside overnight. Hopefully he escaped and is living a happy lizard life somewhere safe.

*****

Ok, that’s it for May. Now back to the continuing coverage of Andrea + Nate’s wedding.

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Feline Friday: (Really) bad cat

May162013_4471

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Wedding Work Days Continue with Crafts

Wedding Work Days

For our third work day at my parents house two weekends ago, we had a full crew over to finish the major projects on the backyard and backdrop. It was awesome to have so many people come over because we accomplished more than we thought!

Finalizing the pathways

Saturday Work Day

During the last work day, mass quantities of wood chips were wheelbarrowed in. Now they did more detail work leveling the wood chips throughout the garden.

Saturday Work Day

They also created a solid edge between the lawn and garden that looks mighty fine.

Wedding Work Days

Kevin took on a side project and fixed the brick path to the pool.

Heart Garlands

Wedding Work Days

With the guys occupied outside, Wendy, Julie, Adie and Alice helped me work on our backdrop. I won’t go into much detail of how it will look finished, but one component is garlands of hearts that echo our invitation design.

Wedding Work Days

The ladies spent hours cutting construction paper hearts out in red, orange and white. Then the hearts were stapled onto a 8′ length of cooking twine which is the height of our backdrop.

Wedding Work Days

Each garland of hearts was then accordion folded and placed into a standard envelope. We did this to prevent tangling in storage and make setup as easy as possible.

Swing set goes down

Wedding Work Days

Another task that fell to the boys was taking down the swing set. This set was an original 1950′s piece from our local elementary school that made it’s way to my parents backyard for the grandchildren a few years back.

Wedding Work Days

We expected it would be a pain to take apart, but it turned out to be the easiest project of the day. The set was very well made and all the bolts and connections came apart easily with no sign of rust.

Wedding Work Days

Of course the Hannah (pictured) and Teagan (my niece) had a hard time seeing it put away, but we assured them it would be back after the wedding.

Installing posts

Wedding Work Days

We will be lighting the backyard with strings of lights that crisscross the lawn and patio areas. My parents decided they wanted to install posts into the garden to hang them and be the support for our backdrop.

Wedding Work Days

The boys got to work digging holes for each post. Nate and Jeremy used some reclaimed lumber from my dad’s supply to cut down into posts.

Feeding the troops

Wedding Work Days

Around lunchtime, we all took a break. I grilled up some burgers and my mom made pasta salad.

Wedding Work Days

Then everyone sat down to eat.

Back to work

postholes

After everyone’s bellies were full, we went back to work. The boys figured out the depth of the posts and got to work filling the post holes with cement.

Wedding Work Days

Wedding Work Days

Wedding Work Days

Finally, they built a frame for the backdrop and raised it.

Wedding Work Days

Then they made sure it was level and filled the post holes.

Wedding Work Days

Here’s the final frame propped up to let the cement dry.

Thanks

swimming

And with the posts up the work day was completed, the kids (and parents) took a dip in the pool to celebrate.

Wedding Work Days

It was another great work day with our friends. As I have mentioned before, Nate and I are very thankful for the help. I’d like to give a big round of applause to Kevin, Julie, Derek, Wendy, Scott, Alice, Jeff, Hannah, Joe and Jeremy for helping out on their Saturday. A special thank you goes out to my parents for hosting us once again. ;)

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Feline Friday: 4 Years Old

The kitties are four!

Today we celebrate the fourth birthday of our favorite furballs, Loki and Pixel. Above are some of my favorite photos from the last year and links to each are included below.

1. The company I keep, 2. “Have fun on your run,” they say without turning around. #birdwatching #100bysummer #tiubride, 3. May312012_5854, 4. Feline Friday: A fern nest, 5. Raccoon, 6. Untitled, 7. Feline Friday: The Feather, 8. Feline Friday: Cat Mountain, 9. Feline Friday: On the go, 10. Feline Friday: Modified Cobra, 11. Loki entertained me as I ate my breakfast this #morning. What a ham. #photoadayjune, 12. Green eyes, 13. Feline Friday: Flat cat, 14. Box Balancing, 15. Feline Friday: Bad cat, 16. Thrift Frame & Art Project, 17. Loki preparing to pounce on his sister, 18. Feline Friday: Behind the glass, 19. Feline Friday: Pool cat, 20. Guard cat and man #watchdogs, 21. Jun242012_6581, 22. Scared of Scott, Loki is hiding on the bathroom shelfi., 23. Our new centerpiece #fallfavorites, 24. Annual Vet Visit. Stressful for all involved., 25. Feline Friday: Yawn, 26. Feline Friday: A fern nest, 27. Good morning Saturday, 28. Feline Friday: Watching, 29. DIY: Cat Bed Makeover, 30. This guy and his sister are four today., 31. Sandwiched between cats, 32. Working on the cat unicorn hat, 33. Feline Friday Pods, 34. Feline Friday: Anteater, 35. Holding on, 36. Pixel tries to sit in her broken hammock by propping herself up with her arms

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Boys Only Work Day

Boys Work Day

A few weeks ago, we had the second “wedding work day” at my parents to prep the yard for the wedding. I was out-of-town on my girls weekend (more on that later), so this work day was all about the amazing gentlemen in our lives.

All photos below are courtesy of my parents. Thanks for documenting guys!

Prepping for the Work Day

dadandsod

Earlier that week, my parents picked up supplies including wood chips and sod for the day. (Seriously, how cute is my dad in this photo?)

Boys Work Day

They had 15 cubic yards of wood chips delivered fill in the garden paths on the far side of the property. They also picked up sod to lay right next to the brand new decomposed granite patio.

Boys Work Day

My dad also got the paths along the back side of the property ready for wood chips. This is where the wedding party will be walking to and from the ceremony.

Breaking it up

digging

Once the work crew arrived on Saturday, they got started breaking up the dirt path that was left over after the decomposed granite patio was installed. The dirt was highly compacted after years under a swing set so the boys had to really put some muscle into it to break it up.

Boys Work Day

Next, Jeremy and my Dad worked on adding a permanent edge between the patio and lawn.

Boys Work Day

They dug a deep ditch and installed a 2×4 along the length of the patio. Once installed it laid flush with the decomposed granite.

Onto the garden paths

Boys Work Day

While Dad and Jeremy worked, the rest of the crew started on the garden paths. A layer of landscape cloth was installed first and then the wood chips were brought in load by load.

Boys Work Day

Teagan the Garden Fairy helped Uncle Nate with his wheelbarrow loads.

Boys Work Day

Here’s the wood chips installed along the path. The boys laid a nice thick path that with time will flatten out.

Installing the sod

Boys Work Day

With the edging complete, it was finally time to lay the sod. The soil was raked and wet down first. Then the sod strips were laid down edge to edge with staggered joints kinda like bricks in a wall.

Boys Work Day

A patch of sod was also laid down next to the citrus trees to cover a bare patch. Once all the grass strips were in, the whole area was watered thoroughly.

sod

It takes about 1-3 weeks for the sod to root to the soil, so it’s a critical time for keeping the grass healthy. My parents have watered daily to keep the entire area moist. It’s important that the sod not be over-watered because it will prevent grass from rooting and potentially cause rot.

*****

Overall, it was a super productive day at the wedding site. We owe a big thank you to Jeremy, Jeff, Joe and Alan for helping us out once again on this epic adventure.

Next, I will report on our work day from the last weekend. You will be able to see how much the sod has grown in the last few weeks.

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