Back to Normalcy...

I finally finished my fall travel and am back in the office for work. Unfortunately, when I am on the road for work, it pretty much consumes my life. I am horrible at keeping up with email and phone calls normally, but when I am on the road, I am even worse. So to all of you who think I dropped off the face of the earth, I apologize!

I did make time for a few fun things over the past couple of months though...so here are the highlights:

Labor day weekend my friend Nick from elementary/middle/high school, married his beautiful wife Christina. They had a gorgeous day for the wedding and it was fun to catch up with old friends that I don't see very often.

Nick and Christina dancing the night away

A month-and-a-half later, Nick's best friend followed suit and got married as well. :) So the weekend of October 23-25 I made the long trip out to Bismarck for my friend Nate's wedding. Nate and I have always been extremely close, so I was happy to be able to celebrate the big day with him and his wife Brook. I have known Nate's whole family my entire life, so it was very much like going to a family wedding, rather than a friend's wedding. They are fantastic together and I wish them a lifetime of happiness!!

Brook and Nate

Brooke and Nate with 3 of his sisters (Erin, Traci, and Karena)

I was home again this year for Halloween and my friend Jessi had a Halloween/Surprise 30th birthday party for her husband Curt. I had a really hard time coming up with costume ideas and had pretty much decided to just go as a witch (how original and exciting huh?). I think I have probably been a witch 12 times in my life (ok...so maybe I'm exaggerating). Anyway, I was at Halloween Express trying to get some other ideas when I decided it would be fun to be a hippie. I found a great wig and went with it! It was a fun night....my favorite part of my costume were the sunglasses. :)

"Peace dude"

The day after Halloween was the day that the Vikings played the Packers at Lambeau. I went over to my friend Lisa's to watch the game with her and the kids. Here's a picture of the kiddos in their Vike's gear!

Maddie, Noah, and Makenna

Lisa's husband (a former soldier) has been in the VA hospital in the cities for about 6 weeks. He ruptured his Achilles tendon back in March and had a couple of surgeries on it. After the second surgery (in late summer), Brian developed a severe infection in his leg (due to the surgeon not closing the incision completely). He ended up being transferred to the VA by ambulance and went through numerous additional surgeries where they ended up having to remove the tendon completely along with a lot of muscle and skin tissue. After an EXTREMELY long surgery where they did some tissue and skin grafting, he has about another 4-6 weeks left before he will be able to come home and then a long road to recovery. We are all just very excited that he didn't end up losing his leg (which was a very real possibility). He is too young to have the limitations that he will have once he is done with the recovery process, but he ended up being fairly lucky all things considered.

New Bedroom Furniture

My wonderful parents helped my sister and I each buy a new bedroom set recently. Mary got hers when she moved to Fargo and I just got mine last week. I am so fortunate and appreciate them so much!

Anyway, I went to Slumberland a couple of times to check out what they had and see if there was anything that piqued my interest. I found a set that I REALLY liked, but decided it was too expensive (it was going to mean too much out-of-pocket for me after I subtracted what my parents were pitching in). Low and behold, the next week the bed went on sale. So I decided to go back to the store and see what they could do for me. I explained that my parents had just purchased a set for my sister from the Slumberland in St. Cloud and now were going to help me buy one as well and I wanted to know what the best deal was they could give me on the bed, chest, and night stand.

The woman crunched some numbers (and used additional coupons, sales, etc) in addition to the bed already being on sale and came back to me with two amounts. One amount included delivery and one did not. I called my dad to talk it over with him and he said to ask them to knock another $25 off and we would do it. So I asked the woman if they could do it for that price and she said she would talk to her supervisor. She came back with a yes. Since I had asked if they could do it for $25 less than the "non-delivery" price, I figured that meant I would have to line up some strong help to move it in for me. However, two days later she called me to schedule delivery. She had INCLUDED the delivery in the price that was $25 less than the "non-delivery" price she had originally quoted me. I jumped all over that!!

Luckily, CTK, CK, and Joe W were willing to come over and help move my old stuff out for me so the new stuff could be delivered. We stored it in the garage for the night and Dad came up the next day to take the old stuff home.

Here are some pics...the angles I had to take the pictures from make it look huge. ( Oh, and the bed is actually the same color as the dresser and night stand...it just photographed darker because of the lighting.)

Extreme Makeover Home Edition Update

So the house is done, and unfortunately I didn't get to help with it. By the time I got things in order at work to sign up (the day after I wrote my last blog), they were no longer accepting volunteers for general labor. At that point they only needed help with skilled labor (drywall, electrical, plumbing, etc). I am kicking myself because not only was I not able to help out, but I didn't even manage to make it out there as a spectator. If I had, I might have been pulled from the crowd to work. Apparently they were asking the spectators to volunteer if they were shorthanded.

Even though I didn't make it out there, I did keep up with the progress through the website. The house they built is very unique and also very environmentally friendly. No sprawling 5,000 sq ft place this time. They built a 2,300 sq ft house using as many local and/or sustainable materials as possible. They also made it extremely energy efficient. I heard the head contractor on the radio and he said that they actually built it to be 300% above the energy efficiency requirement. Pretty awesome!

If you want to check out before, during, and after pictures, or read the family's story, you can visit www.extremebuilderscommonwealth.com.

"BUS DRIVER…..MOVE THAT BUS!!"

Extreme Makeover Home Edition is coming to Duluth!! They will be working a house for a Duluth family from August 3-12. They are asking for volunteers and I am seriously considering doing it. My friend Alissa helped with one in North Dakota a couple of years ago, and I decided to ask what her experience was like before I made a concrete decision about whether or not to sign up to help. I think it would be really rewarding to know that I was part of building that house for the deserving family. I can rarely get through an episode of the show without crying (partially due to the wonderful editing job they do, I know), but still....they have highlighted so many wonderful people on the show over the years.

They aren't actually announcing the exact location or the family's name until August 3rd when they do the "door knock" at the family's home, so I am not sure where in Duluth it will be happening. They are going to make all of the info public, though, and are encouraging people to stop by, drive by, and help out. I will keep you all updated on what I decide to do...stay tuned!! :)

Evolution

A friend of mine had posted this video from Dove on her Facebook and I thought it was very eye opening. Check it out:

http://www.dove.us/?dl=/features/videos/default.aspx%7Ccp-documentid=7049579&source=shareBlogger

two month average

So apparently, my new average for how often I update this is every two months or so. Sorry I am so inconsistent with it. I need to get a more exciting life, so I have things to talk about. :)

A couple of weekends ago, Long Prairie had their annual community celebration (like most small towns do). The festival used to be called "Prairie Days" but was revamped two years ago because of lack of interest and the new name to go with the new activities is "Prairie Fest". I know that it isn't very creative, but it could be worse....Wadena has "Wad of Fun Days" and Little Falls has the "Dam Festival".

Side note: I loved the radio ads for the "Dam Festival" that I heard on my way home that weekend... "Come down to the Dam Festival for the Dam carnival, the Dam petting zoo, and the Dam parade, etc". It made me giggle.

Ok...back to the story at hand. Some of the activities that we have during Prairie Fest are a scholarship pageant, a full fledged carnival (rides, games, cotton candy, etc), a rodeo, a bmx bike race, a parade, and a couple of concerts. The highlight of Prairie Fest this year (not just for me but for MANY others), was the Friday night concert. They had Hairball (for the second year in a row) and ended up having 1,250 people come through the doors for it. It was unbelievable! It was halfway through the break that they finally got the last of the people in the door for the first time (which is the middle of the show because they only take one break). They had half of our hockey/expo area for the concert (there was expo stuff set up in the other half) and it was PACKED. Next year, if they have Hairball back, they are going to need a much bigger space. It was just ridiculous.

Then Saturday night, they had a band called Aulitmate Ozzy, and the 90s sensation, Firehouse. This night they ONLY had 250 people!! And I guess Firehouse was terrible! I didn't go...but I heard it was bad!

The parade was on Sunday and was the final activity of the festival. It rained the WHOLE time. Did that stop it from happening? Of course not. Did it stop people from going to watch? Nope. We sat out there in our lawn chairs (lined up along mainstreet) with our umbrellas over our heads watching the parade. I know to many of you who didn't grow up in small towns, this sounds ridiculous, but for me, it is one of the reasons I LOVED growing up there! Who can pass up a parade full of hay wagons turned into floats, firetrucks, "royalty" from Long Prairie and neighboring towns, horses, tractors, small town marching bands, and all of the local businesses doing giveaways and handing out candy to all of the little kids along the parade route? It is very "small town America" and I love it!

fargo

A lot has happened since I posted last...well in my sister's life anyway!

Mary moved to Fargo today. Luckily two of my uncles, plus my cousin and her boyfriend were able to help Mary and Dad haul her stuff up there and move her in.

When she first started looking for apartments online, she narrowed it down to two or three to look at in person. One of the complexes happened to be same one that my cousin lives in. Mary and this cousin, Melanie, have been best friends since they were really little and went to school together until college. So the possibility they would be living in the same complex was exciting. After going to Fargo with Dad and looking at all of her options, that complex was the nicest and she signed the lease. After signing the lease, her property manager said "Well now that you are officially a resident, I can tell you that you will be living in the same building as your cousin. In fact, you are on the same floor...and the only thing separating your walls from hers is a stairwell." So now Mary and Melanie are neighbors!

The transition to being an full-fledged adult and moving to a new city has been nervewracking for her, so I am glad she has Mel so close! It will be a huge help I am sure!

She will be starting as an RN at MeritCare on Monday. She is on a rehab floor (physical rehab...not chemical dependency rehab). She was so fortunate to find a job....believe it or not, the job market for RNs even sucks right now. So many of the major hospitals have hiring freezes in place and many of her classmates are still without jobs. MeritCare was the single largest employer for her class (they hired 6 CSS students I think).

She did great on her NCLEX and passed on the first try (with the minimum number of questions). I guess all that studying paid off...not to mention she is a smart girl and a great test taker! Unfortunately, she wasn't offered the job before she registered for the test, so after getting her MN license, she had to apply to have it transferred to North Dakota. This meant an extra cost and needing to get a temporary license to start work on Monday.

I have Friday off, since the 4th falls on a Saturday this year, so I am thinking about going up there and helping her get stuff unpacked that day. Hopefully she can get mostly settled in before she starts working!