This made me smile

My husband is a big fan of this stuff.So when NPR did a report on a museum dedicated to it...I had to smile and thought I should save a link to the site, just in case we are ever in that area of the country, we will have to stop by! Plus I will have to tell Kevin about August 7th!!



In other news...we were without water for awhile because of a crack in one of our pipes.
I had to brush my teeth and wash my face with bottled water. It was kinda like camping...except you were able to sleep in your own bed!
Let's just say I truly do appreciate the comforts of having clean running water coming into my home!! You don't realize how much you use that nice clean running water...until you have to cut it off! We did turn it on in the evening so that we could take a quick shower and flush the toilet!) Thankfully we aren't normally home all that much anyhow. Still it was weird to not have running water readily available!
After the pipe was fixed yesterday evening we did three loads of laundry (Which my older sister is going to say that is probably what she does every day, but we are just a couple with no kids or pets, so laundry isn't an everyday occurrence in our house!)

Also, I have been dreaming up some great quilting plans in my head...hopefully I will get the time to get some done soon! (However, I have a super busy weekend ahead...so probably not for awhile!!)

A little update on life in Emileeville...(sorry no pictures)

I have been carving out time in my schedule to fit in a bit of sewing lately.
(I made 5 pillow covers for Mary's futon on Friday night when I spent the night there after the wedding rehearsal...and one more on Sunday at the AtlMQG sewing day at Rae's.)

I had been really missing it....


However...


this means that something else had to fall by the wayside
(So that I could have time to sew!)

Most of my reading time was already on the "I'll get back to that when I have a vacation" pile yet somehow I cut it out even more and got even further behind in what I was supposed to be getting read this summer. (Sorry Mary, I am a horrible book club person!! I am ready for chapter 5...we are supposed to be through chapter 10 by tonight's meeting...which I am skipping!)
And I can't seem to catch up on my daily bible reading. (It's not really that hard, if you're behind you can't just keep reading one day's worth and then miraculously be caught up!!!)

Blogging (at least regularly) appears to be another casualty in this Summer schedule of mine!

Also, I still haven't met my friend's new baby (I am not sure if you read this, but in case you do I am really trying to work something out Rachel, I do love you and I am really wanting to meet little Jonah!) or one of my sister's best friend's new little guy. (Who actually lives super close to me...and yet I still haven't met him either!!)

In all honesty Kevin and I haven't seen a ton of each other since the Summer began...and I think he was getting a bit jealous of all the other things that have been keeping me away, but we are getting better about making the most of what little time we do have together with our busy schedules!! (And we are one of those couples that are normally just as happy apart doing our own thing as we are when we're together-but we were seeing THAT little of each other!!)

Kev is keeping himself busy working on our "vacation" (more about that later) and I am finishing up things with the youth theater group (the play is at the end of this month) and more weddings...of course!
I had another wedding at Stonewall Manor this weekend and met a new photographer that was fun to work with. His wife is out on maternity leave, but his temporary helper, Kat was super nice as well...(I should probably hold off judgment on how nice they really were until I see if they actually did ERASE all those pictures of me dancing Cupid's Shuffle...)

I am REALLY excited about the plans for this Sunday! One of my lifelong friends is home for a few weeks this month (she lives in Hawaii right now) along with her sister (who lives in England) so my sisters and I, along with another set of sisters that we have known since we were little, are all getting together while everyone is in town! (Actually I think we will be missing two girls, Lauren and Betsy, but otherwise it will be an Aschmann, Binkley, Monson girl reunion!!) I am sure we will have a blast hanging out and catching up!!

Keeping busy and getting older...

Last week I celebrated my 29th birthday!
I've started my last year in my twenties...wow!!

Over the 4th we celebrated with our families with swimming, cooking out, some wave runner action, of course fireworks, and I even ate some of the yummy birthday cake my MIL Barbara made for me!!
(I didn't feel too terrible afterward...so it was worth it for sure!!)

Jan (one of my co-workers) bought me the lov-er-ly flowers for my birthday...I couldn't have picked out flowers that were more "me" myself!!

I finally found a little time to sew and put together my flag quilt top.

(It has been on the project list for awhile!!)

I really like how it turned out!
(Now to just find the time to get it quilted before September! I am wanting to give it to my grandparents as a housewarming gift when they move into their new apartment!)

I got some goodies in the mail from my good friend Amazon.
(Who I must say I LOVE right now!! One of the items was missing from the original package, I was panicked that I was going to be out of luck, but when I contacted customer service they got back to me within an hour and sent another one next day!! I really love Amazon!!)

Kevin's birthday gift to me was 2 tickets to see The Phantom of the Opera at the Fox Theater.
My MIL Barbara and I went on Thursday night. (My actual birthday.)
It was fantastic!!

I finally got around to mailing out a package to my dear friend Abby. She moved into a new place awhile back, and I have been meaning to send something her way for ages!

Saturday we had our AMQG meeting at Whipstich.
(We had two new members come and I actually met a third new member, who joined in June while I was away!)

(And I did a bit of shopping...bad me, but I just can't help it when there is so much beautiful fabric all around me!!)

Chicago (Part 3)

Here are a few pictures from Mary's camera from our wandering around Chicago!

We love to get pictures with random sculpture.
(The moose reminds me of my summer in Norway!)

These street performers were fun and had some mad skills. You should see the video Mare got on her camera...I will see if I can figure out how to post that!

Here is that weird fountain-thingy in the park.

Now on to the wedding pictures...

Mom and I, dressed up and ready to head to the wedding!I LOVE this shot of Mare and me!
We are on the double deck bus they had for us to go from the hotel to the church.
(The tour-guide on the bus was entertaining us on the way over by asking some questions, and made fun of Mare & me for shopping at not one, but TWO Payless shoestores while we were staying right next to the famous shopping on Michigan Avenue!!)(I didn't realize my camera was zoomed in, but I think this is actually a fun picture!)Dad on the bus, with the Knickerbocker in the background.
(This was where we stayed, it was CRAZY expensive, but it was nice to be right there where the reception site was!)
The wedding party got to ride on a trolley!!

The Beautiful ChurchGoofing around while waiting out front
(the ceremony was in-between to Mass services, so we had to wait for it to let out before we could go in, and there were people ready to go in for the next service while we were coming out after the ceremony)
The amazing details inside the church (reminded me of our trip to Europe)The Wedding Party at the alterMare and I decided to walk back to the hotel after the ceremony
(and stopped for a bit of shopping as well!!)The reception Hall at the Millennium Knickerbocker.The tables (there were 18, plus a big one for the wedding party!)The place settingI made a bracelet out of the ribbon on the chocolates (which Mare ate right away because it was already 8:30 at this point...9:30 at home) and the flower from my napkin!Mare and I at our tableMom and DadThe Cake (there were two flavors, white and carrot cake...yum yum!!)Couple's first dance...her dress was custom made!!!Marcia and Mom!Me and Ellie (Elizabeth's little bundle of joy!)Elizabeth and meThe dinner (served around 10:30-11:30 our time)The walls were mirrors....Mare and I had fun with this!On the dance floor!Me, Christina & Mary

Chicago (Part 2)

We tried to spend our 24 hours in Chicago wisely, and after checking into the hotel we set out for some lunch, shopping and touristy fun!

After eating pizza at the suggested famous eatery (it looked DELISH!!)We headed out to find a map (I am my father's daughter, and love to be the "map" girl!!) and see some sights.

The main thing mom wanted to see was the American Girl Company Store, so we all went there first, then after browsing for awhile (and picking out everything I am going to want my little girls to have someday-because I am positive I WILL have little girls someday!!) Mare and I split off from mom and dad and did some sightseeing on our own. Here is a picture over view of our afternoon...(well, from my phone, Mare took some great pics, but she hasn't emailed them to me yet!)

Can you find Mare & me in this picture?This was taken after Mare and I had walked 10 blocks in the wrong direction-not because we were lost (hello, queen of maps here), but so that we could get to another Payless and pick up a pair of cute sandals that were on sale...yeah, we are Binkley's!! We go to Michigan Avenue in Chicago and shop at not one but TWO Payless Shoestores! (Bargain shopping is what we do!!)