RIP Mrs. Gray

Mrs. Gray had an apparent stroke (I think) yesterday and we found her late last night on her side unable to move. Scott is a good sport and took us to the emergency vet to have her euthanized. And he buried her along the side of the property - at around midnight. Cars kept slowing down driving by, I'm sure we looked suspicious.

Interesting

After you read Scott's very long post below, try out some of these tests. They are very interesting. (warning: its a little time consuming and you can't have any distractions around you)

https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/research/

Busy Summer

Hi all, Scott here again. Laura is sleeping sound so I thought I'd take another shot at updating the blog. We have had a busy summer so far, so I'll just highlight the activities of the last three weekends.

Over the fourth of July weekend Laura and I headed over to Aylmer, Ont. for a family reunion on my mom's side. We celebrated my great-grandma's 100th birthday (it's actually coming up in December, but who wants to travel then?)

Oma (Dutch for grandma,) Laura, and I

My bro and sis-in-law - Jeremy and Marilee (plus the twins!)

1/8th of the family...and the only Americans!

It was nice getting to see everyone again, and neither Laura nor Marilee had met most of the people before so it was nice that they got to see more of the fam...

The following weekend Laura, her dad, and I headed toward Chicago to attend her cousin Charles's wedding. It was my turn to meet a new person or two, although most of the people were new to Laura, too.

Charles and Christina

Cousin Joy

Myself with a very tropical Laura

On Sunday we got to see the dedication of Adalynn which was super cool! :) May God hold you in the palm of his hand, Adalynn!

And finally, but certainly not least, we come to this past weekend (and yes...my main motivation for posting today). :)

This past weekend the whole fam went camping at Hayes State Park. It rained...and rained...and rained. And was muggy. And mosquito(y?) But, it was nice just to have some time to relax and spend with the family. And on Sunday, we got to do one of the coolest things anyone can do...drive a real NASCAR car on a super speedway! Some of the pics from that day are below....you can also see them (and more) at Laura's Flickr account.

Nemo demonstrating the wet weather



The racers (ok, drivers!)

Rusty ain't got nothin' on me!

Me and my loving, patient, and sun burnt wife! I love you, babe! :)

Creig and the kids before his drivin' the #8

We look way cooler in safety suits!

Me climbing on in

Woo hoo...pushin' 150mph!

Some of the very patient and loving fam!!

The driving experience itself was intense. I pretty much thought I was going to die the first couple laps. The next couple laps were spent regaining composure and realizing that the car sticks really good. And the last lap or two were spent thinking...I can do this, and this is super cool! Laura and I are already hoping to go back someday...this time, Laura is also going to be driving, though! :)

A big THANK YOU to Mom and Ed for an amazing weekend and experience. Your gift was/is greatly appreciated!!!

Well, that's it for this blog. Now to see if it actually posts.

-Scott

Long Post

Two posts in less than a month, we're on a roll!
First off, the new look of the house. After three weeks, we (and by we I mean Scott) finished all of the flooring. It looks great in here! (At least we think so)





Last weekend we went up to Cadillac for some fishing and relaxation with Scott's parents. Scott even convinced me to go out on the boat with him. I took some pictures while he fished, and I even held a pole for a couple minutes. We caught nothing but had a good time. I even got a tour of Lake Mitchell and Lake Cadillac. I realize that even though I'm not the hugest fan of fishing, I like watching Scott just b/c he is so totally in his element and happy.

We saw an eagle from the front yard of the cottage (you'll just have to take my word..)

Scott fishing again. You can't tell, but he is actually standing in the front yard. The lake is so high from all of the storms a few weeks ago.

This is my favorite picture! Scott kept catching little sunfish or perch or bluegill and throwing them back. I caught one fish in the air.Sunday we went up to Traverse City and visited Scott's friends Ben and Holly and their daughter Ellie. We had a fun time hiking and then eating at the Blue Tractor. I would love to have trails like this so close to our house!
We saw ants moving into a new house (I think) - they were in a line across the trail.

A rainbow on the drive home.
We finally have a weekend to relax before crazy July hits. We meant to make the most of it and get some painting done, but that's not happening. Maybe August.... :)

Work

Last weekend was pretty eventful. Scott had to give up bass fishing to finally put in the new laminate flooring that has been sitting in our basement for like 6 months. Thankfully we had some help from Travis, Cara, and Adalynn.


We pulled up the old carpet and pulled out several hundred staples.





The green stuff is the moisture barrier. And the flooring begins...

They got quite a bit farther than this before Travis and Cara had to leave. Now Scott is thankful he married someone who can use a table saw (and any other saw for that matter). :)

We were able to finish up the living room that night - only about 12 hours after starting. (Thankfully Travis helped move the entertainment unit before he left because there was no way I could lift it.)We took Sunday off from working and played Scrabble instead. We're nerds. :)
Scott finished up a little more before heading down to the lake on Monday.

He finished most of the hallway monday night and did another board or two a night until finally finishing it completely this morning.

Today his dad is here helping with the kitchen flooring. Pictures later...

We forgot three pets in our last post. This is Jimmy and Patrick.



Jimmy

Pets

Hey all...Scott here. So, yesterday we went out and got a new camera...Nikon D60. And no, the recent commercials with Ashton Kutcher had nothing to do w/ it...honest! :) Anyways, we shot some pics of the pets we thought you might enjoy. Feel free to make offers on them! ;) j/k

Married Life

Well this post is a little belated. I'll start with the wedding... :)
The day went absolutely perfect, at least from our point of view. On the drive to hotel Scott and I talked about how blessed we are to have such awesome family and friends. We were quite overwhelmed with the helpfulness and generosity of everyone - we didn't have to worry about anything the whole day!

We don't have the disc from Peter (the photographer) yet. So here are some from Jerilynn (and I think some other people too but I'm not sure who took them).









And the honeymoon... People keep asking how it was and it seems like such a distant memory. But it was great, I wish we could go back.




I think we settled into a routine pretty quickly after coming home. It was strange the first couple nights realizing that he didn't have to leave. And a little rough getting used to sharing a bed. :) But we are both sleeping better now. Now we are keeping busy painting and soon putting in flooring, fixing the bathroom in the basement, etc. I'll take some pictures soon and update with some before and afters. So far the painting is looking great. We've been looking at houses in the area and will probably list the house once all the work is done. Scott got accepted into a masters program at U of M so we were going to potentially move to ann arbor for that. But this week we found out that GE will give him a leave of absence but then will not reimburse the tuition - they will however reimburse the tuition if he continues working full time. That's not really helpful for our situation so Scott had to decline. Its too bad but I'm so proud of him for trying!