Rain

I woke up yesterday morning with a nasty migraine. Lots of Excedrin and coffee and still couldn't shake it. Watched an amazing movie...Courageous. What a wonderful production and testimony. Highly recommend it ! Went to work for a little while, but it was really slow so I went home. It had been raining...Hard...all day long...bucketing actually! So I came home, turned on the fireplace, and curled up on the couch with a few books and lit a new candle.

Vanilla Snowflake from Bath and Body Works. This is my new favorite! Just a hint of vanilla, soft and yummy!  They are on sale right now...if there are any left!

I read a bit of Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace, and the I read the sweetest book, The 13th Day of Christmas by Jason Wright. This was a delightful and lovely story!  I know it's after Christmas, but it extended it just a bit for me! Go check it out at your library!

Woke up this morning and my headache was gone...yea!! No more rain either, but I noticed the pond was up quite a bit. Went outside with my camera and saw this!!

and this!

When we put the dock in last summer we measured it to the high water mark and then added a little bit. It's scary to think we've hit it already and it's only January! We're going to try and pump some of the water out tomorrow as we have a big cold front moving in and we don't want the pond to freeze around the boards. Sound fun? I don't think so either!!!!

Wish the water was always this high!!! It would make jumping off a little more fun!

Snow for the weekend...good thing my outdoor Christmas lights are still up! Makes it more sparkly!!

Wedding Project # 1

It's begun. The wedding is 11 1/2 months away and we're already feeling the pressure! So last weekend we (I provided drinks!) got one thing out of the way.  


The Dock.

Three years ago, when we cleared out the blackberries, we had a friend come in with a REALLY BIG tractor and dig out the roots, level, grade etc.. And while he was here, Brian and he had the brilliant idea to run out and get some posts so that Grant could pound them in with the bucket of the REALLY BIG tractor. So they did. And that was it. It's been like that all this time.

But last weekend Brian decided it was time to "get er done". Papa Ron came over to help. Tyler even got in quite a few hours, but I don't have a picture of him...surprise...

The little paddle boat came in quite handy for working on the end of the dock. The pond is down about 4 feet right now, but it's still quite a drop off. Only a few feet out and it's over our heads.
Brian, Papa and Tyler got the framing part done. If you look in the background there are piles of blackberry vines. That was my other contribution!

The next day Brady (SIL) came out to help, along with papa again, and the got all the decking cut and installed. Only a few things were dropped, and they were found pretty quickly!

We ended up being one board shy, so I guess technically, it's not really finished!

The guys getting approval from the future bride and the grandma! It turned out great, especially for  randomly pounding posts into the water!

No pictures, but Brian did the first cannon ball off of it yesterday! Works great!!!!

Hoping to add some lighting and hang some lanterns for the wedding.


One project down....1078 more to go!

The Rest of the Weekend...

A little continuation of the weekend...Sunday Bliss!!

The weather here is finally BEAUTIFUL! Sunny, not too hot, but hot enough and a great breeze out here at our place.

After church on Sunday we thought it would be nice to be around water somewhere...Lake Whatcom? Bellingham Bay? Semiahmoo? Whiterock?  Just didn't have it in us to go home, pack up, drive around and be surrounded by people. So.....we went to our own "beach"!!!

Brian raked the beach, set up the chairs and umbrella and blew up the floatie toys!

I packed a picnic lunch and drinks, set up the iPod speakers, gathered some books and magazines and walked the 50 feet to the pond!

When we first moved here, 8 years ago, you could hardly see the pond. Covered in blackberries, we set to work on clearing things out.

The neighbor's section was pretty...

But ours was a mess!

 Cleared one side the first year and then worked on the back.

The kids would swim on the neighbor's side, but you couldn't even access it on our side!

 

There was a lot of pond weed...not fun to swim in!!! After some research, we were able to get some grass carp for the pond. They've been in almost three summers and this was the year they were hungry!!! We started with five, but only have three now. There is hardly any junk in the pond at all!!!

It's so beautiful now!!

We added a little beach...

 And that is where we spent the day. It was WOnderFul!!! We ate, read, floated, swam, listened to music and had a few cat naps!!! No driving, parking, hauling, searching for a spot....and nice clean bathrooms just a few yards away!!

We're loving our "new found" get away!!!!

In fact, I'm headed out there now!!! I have a few things I need to catch up on!!

Enjoy the sunshine!