Painting Party!

At least by calling it a painting party, I was able to trick people into coming. It was really my way of enlisting free (minus the price of pizza) help to get my basement's first coat of paint on, and boy was it effective! :)Eduardo striking a threatening pose. My camera heeded his warning and remains an unpainted photo-operat :)
Brent (The CONTROLLER) Jones putting some mean green on the living room wall. It was fun watching his daughter get involved which meant the occasional horse play... or was that Sandra? Mack striking a pose with a tray and brush. The aftermath of the pose was her proclaiming "paint everywhere, paint everywhere." I think she let the tray tip a little bit :(
Thank you Karen for letting Bryan come and play. He and Eduardo did a beautiful job in Leckie's room to be.
Wyatt brought the whole crew for moral support. It was appreciated and they showed a genuine interest the project.
Doug didn't really do much, but he was there... and without him, much of the pizza purchased for the "party" wouldn't have disappeared. :) (Just kidding! Doug helped a ton, and stayed late to help with clean up even, so at least 2 kudos to Doug)
Wyatt had told us all that he used to paint in a professional capacity... As soon as the paint and rollers came out however his story changed to "I actually never did paint." Truth be told, you wouldn't have known it.

A HUGE thanks to those who came and joined the fun this evening! I offer a very full "If you ever need anything" and left over pizza for lunch tomorrow as a thank you.

The Carpet installers are coming on Wednesday which will mark a huge milestone towards the house being done. It's only a bit of finish work that will need to be done once the carpet is down, and the house will be ready to move in to! SWEET!

Precious

I had to document something that happened before I forgot, and the people reading this will appreciate the inherent and tender beauty of the situation. So Ansley and I went to Karen and Bryan's tonight to hang out for a while. As part of the evening, Karen asked for a blessing from myself and Bryan. After we finished, Ansley insisted it was her turn. Before I knew it, she was sitting on the stool with her arms folded wanting us to "pray for her." I love my daughter more than ever for her beautiful spirit and thought to share this "awwwwwww" moment with the Grandma's and Aunts/Uncles/Cousins.

Cherries!

This is going to be a short post with a little update on the progress, and one happy discovery.

We finished hanging all the drywall last night that needs to be hung before the finishers can come do their thing (tape and texture). We do have a plumber coming sometime this week to run a couple lines for a new washer/dryer hookup in the upstairs. He was scheduled to come yesterday but had family come in to town and so I let him off the hook. Once he's done his thing, I can call the finishers to come and then it's time for paint. We painted my bedroom upstairs while kind of waiting, and we'll be laying tile here in a week or so. The carpet can go in once we've painted the basement and Ansley's room, so I think we're still at least a few weeks from being "done." But with a house, I understand, you're never really done, hence the quotation marks.

So the lawn was getting kind of high and it occurred to me that I am responsible for mowing it "so so short" as Ansley put it. The back corner of my lot had a tree with small cherries a couple weeks back that I noticed, but while mowing the lawn on Friday, I discovered that they're ripe and ready. Today after church Ansley and I went and picked about 5 pounds of red cherries. Some were perhaps less ripe, but still edible, so I'd rather have them than letting the birds have their way with MY fruit :)

I asked Ansley to pose with a cherry, and a rather adorable photo resulted.