A thousand words
Lets not even talk about how long its been since I blogged. There’s lot of reasons for my blog slacking but not worth talking about so lets just play catch up. I figured it would take days to write a blog post about all of the things that have happened since I blogged last so I’m going to rely on photos to tell the story…a thousand words, right? Sadly, I’m having some Photoshop problems. Apparently I need more RAM (whatever the hell that means). That means these photos are all Straight-Out-Of-Camera. It pains me to show them to you in their unedited state, because I know how fabulous they could be. So don’t judge me and my unedited art.
So here we go with brief explanations of our latest adventures and photos to fill in the blanks…
Where we left off: The tasting in Galena got cancelled. With far less notice than is socially acceptable. I’m over it, I swear. The tasting hasn’t been rescheduled yet, but our reception venue has a new wedding coordinator who seems far more promising than the last so I’m hopeful that the ball is now rolling in the right direction and when we do taste food, I’ll tell you about.
Since we couldn’t go to Galena we had to go somewhere. It had been raining for WEEKS. I couldn’t handle another weekend of rain. So I looked at the weather map and it was to be sunny and 90 in Kentucky. Never been to Kentucky so we figured we might as well visit.
We packed up the Jeep and went to Land Between the Lakes, which is about 3 hours Southeast of us. It was beautiful! The lakes are massive and whole place was just beyond scenic. So we camped, fished, hiked about and just enjoyed the heat! I recommend it if you’re looking for a new place to boat or fish or bike or what have you. We’ll be returning soon.
The view from our campsite
Goin fishin
I like to fish. Or maybe more accurately, based on my success rate, I like to hold a fishing pole.
The following weekend we had work to do. Our roommate was moving out, leaving us with a much-needed spare room and boy did we have plans to use it. I had made a list earlier in the week of small-ish projects I wanted us to take on to spruce up the house a bit. It was meant to be a summer-long list. But I being myself, I decided I would prefer to do everything in a weekend. Zac never turns down a challenge so he agreed.
We built wall-mounted floating nightstands, shelves to make a ‘feature wall,’ shelves for our dining room, and other assorted shelves. We also purchased and assembled a new dining room table. Finally we have an appropriate place to eat meals!! And, we moved the infamous bar from our dining room space, up our curvy, steep, townhouse stairs and put it in the spare room. If you know what our bar looks like, and you know what our stairs look like – you can enjoy picturing us making that move all by ourselves. There was a lot of “PIVOT, PIVOT, PIVOTING!!”
So far in this post I have been seen fishing and using power tools. Jeeze, I'm such a badass.
I love this picture! It shows how impressed Zac is with my ability to do work, be helpful and take pictures all at the same time. HA!
Rain threatened our ability to stain...so we put up our "garage." Worked like a charm!
I won't bore you with a bunch of photos of shelves. But trust me, they are amazing. I'll leave you with just this - one of our floating nightstands. I heart them.
On to the next weekend! We went to Bloomington for Marks graduation – big congrats to Mark on graduation and his new job as an SLP! Yay! I failed to take my camera to the graduation. Approximately 8 other members of the extended Medema family remembered their cameras though so there is no shortage of photos…I just don’t have any yet! I assure you we all looked lovely and proud.
The next night…oh the next night. There was a stag. I’ll pause here to discuss stags as they seem to be an Illinois Valley phenomenon. A stag/stagette is a wedding celebration comprised of assorted illegal activities, beer and food. Enough said. What did we learn this particular weekend? Don’t take Maggie to functions where draft beer is unlimited and nachos are in short supply.
The night began with me feeling sorry for myself and ended with me doing my best June Carter kareoke. Successful night, no? What I don’t understand is…6 or 7 different people witnessed my singing. Only one found me talented. Whatever – I sounded just like June and just like Stevie Nicks and I know it.
I’d also like to say here that nothing in life makes me happier than singalongs. Babies, puppies, cupcakes, those things bring me great joy. But rarely do I feel as happy as when I’m with a group of people who are willing to break into song, sing at the tops of their voices and attempt to imitate the singer. If you don’t try to sound like Cher then what’s the point really?
I say this because this is my biggest wedding request – behind of course that people actually come to the wedding. Once you are at the wedding, I don’t care if you show up in flannel pajamas and bring toilet paper as a gift – just sing. The karaoke machine was vetoed…I’m getting over that. But I still dream of singalongs.
I’m talkin “Jeramiah was a bullfrog…”
“Bah Bah Bah Beennniieee, Bennie, Bennie and the Ja-hets…”
“Little ditty, bout Jack and Die-ah-han”
Serious, world-class sing alongs. Start practicing now. I can give you a copy of the play list if you need to rehearse. If I spot you at the wedding, and your happy ass ain’t singin, it’s no more free booze for you. Capice?
Back to the pictures…
Just in case there’s any question of how much I adore Zac, consult the above photo!! Zac just loves when I make this face at him and start giggling. It always gets a big long sigh and an “ohhhh Maggie” out of him. Like he knows he’s about to have his hands full. As shown, I’m about 4.5 seconds from loving everyone and being a really great singer.
I drank alllll those beers. No not really. Thank God. I do recall making several inappropriate comments about the ribbing on these plastic cups though. I'm so classy.
Here we have Jackie demonstrating the oddness of the bathroom. It is unlike any other bathroom in the world. I hope anyway. Two potties. Two shower curtains. You must pass through one "stall" to get to the other. After one beer - is ridiculous and probably a violation of health codes. After six beers - its hilarious and a great place to make new friends.
Nachos. I wanted nachos in a bad way. No one would take me to get any. I missed the fact that they were available at the big table of food. Then I spotted Aunt Mary Jo Jo who placed a big bowl of nachos at her seat and then walked away from it. I pounced. Pictured with me is Uncle Greg, who did nothing to defend his wife's nachos.
And moving on…Nick went to prom this year with his lovely gal Janelle – whose name I have no idea how to spell. Anywho, we were excited to see them since last year, Nick’s prom fell the same weekend as our college graduation! A few photos from the prom fun…
Quite lovely, no?
Metering light at high noon can be tricky but I love how moody this one is and I really love her shadow. All sorts of sass!
And as you might recall from my previous posts – I don’t like to make a trip home without teaching Lily the dog some sort of bad trick. Last month she learned about licking cutting boards. This month she learned about toilet paper. You see, she has an issue with removing toilet paper from trash cans. Gross. I feel like this little trick is part of her personality, she thinks its hilarious. So I can’t change that. I can at least teach her to play with clean TP though, right? You betchya! I’m proud to say Lily now gets her toilet paper straight from the roll.
She learns quickly.
Showing the TP who's boss.
Nom Nom Nom!!!
Then it was back to Eville where we spent a day making our patio look all bright and summery! I love planting flowers!! This year we used both full plants and seeds and its been lots of fun watching the seeds sprout up! Expect lots of photos of blooming flowers in the next month as I perfect depth-of-focus in my never ending attempt to become a photographer. Flowers make for good practice, they don’t move.
I LOVE dahliahs!!
And then this past Thursday, we went to the Elton John/Billy Joel concert. We’ve seen some great concerts and this one definitely ranks high at the top. It was phenomenal. If you ever have a chance to see this show, or either of them separately, don’t pass it up!
Good stuff – a lot of those songs are like a punch in the gut right now…listened to Allentown recently?
Well were waiting here in allentown
For the pennsylvania we never found
For the promises our teachers gave
If we worked hard
If we behaved
So the graduations hang on the wall
But they never really helped us at all
No they never taught us what was real
Iron and coke
And chromium steel
And were waiting here in allentown
mmm hmmm.
Or “My Life” – I cannot tell you how badly I needed to belt out those lyrics on that particular evening…
And you can speak your mind
But not on my time
See, here we are yelling those lyrics…
If you’re not listening to Billy Joel at least 5 out of 7 days a week you’re missing out. Seriously. And few things can boost my mood as quickly as belting out Elton John’s “Your Song” or “Bennie and the Jets.” Try it some time. You won’t sound as good as I do, but that’s ok.
And so this is where my blog will leave off for today….I know its not much but its the best I can do. My gift is my blog and this ones for you. Get it? Ha.
And if you don’t get it you need to go lock yourself in a closet with a walkman and an Elton John cassette and come out when you’ve learned a thing or two. K? Good. When you’re finished start learning the words to “We didn’t start the fire” so you can keep up with Zac and I at the wedding.
Oh and PS – Lets all conjure up those old memories of Zac wearing ridiculously tight pants and very large pink sunglasses while rocking “Crocodile Rock” at the Key Club charity lip sync. What I wouldn’t give to find those photos and scan them into this blog…
Anyway – to all of you who said, “What have you been doing? I don’t know what you’re doing when you don’t blog.” Thanks. I’m glad to know you give two shits about what I’m doing = ) Again with the class. But, seriously, thanks!! Its so awesome that people read this!!
Check back in a few days for a recap of last weekend when we ventured down to Grant’s Farm to bottle feed baby goats and hang out with Clysdale horses. Hilarious pictures, I promise.