Pancakes and Flash Photography

Today's weather promised to be in the 70's. Sounds good to me.

I of course would be too busy to partake in any fun.

For breakfast we had pancakes and smoothies.

Scott finished work in the basement while Meadow and I had mama-baby time.

It took way longer than I thought to get all this done. Finally pretty much finished.

We enjoyed the weather by going for a bike ride. Meadow sure got heavier since last year. Going up hills was much more difficult with her on back so we stuck to the Victory Memorial Parkway.

Brooke whipped together some summer rolls from leftovers.

Mr. Joel, a friend of mine from the neighborhood board, came over and we pulled off some bulging tile. The plan was just to repair this section, but then we changed our minds. All this plastic tile would have to go.

Scott ripped off the old wallpaper and found ghosts of bathrooms past. It looks like our bathroom originally had the fake or maybe real subway tile that went up past the vanity mirror.

While Scott and Joel worked on the bathroom I cleaned all the dust in the basement. Now it doesn't feel so scary to go down there anymore. Yes I am still afraid of dark basements.

It could still use a coat of paint on the dry wall, but everything else looks great.

My belated birthday cake was a Double Chocolate Bundt with Peanut Butter Filling. Meadow enjoyed the cake after her nap.

She slept through the warmest part of the day. We tried to catch the end of it while Scott made dinner.

The only thing I could come up with was mixed green ravioli. Why the flash Brooke?

My friend Brian decided to join us for dinner.

I showed off my flash photography skills.

In both of these photos clearly.

Scott always complains my photos are blurry. I fixed that problem.

Meadow was just happy to have Brian over. We all scarfed down the ravioli and talked about the future.

Comments

A 250th 4th of July in Three Lakes

A couple of weeks after we were last up at the cottage, you say? Not soon enough, we say. We assumed dinner would have already been done by the time we arrived so we stopped to eat at Culver's in Rhinelander. While we were eating, I got a text from my dad saying he was in Rhinelander with Chelsea at Urgent Care. I guess Viola had taken a hard fall. When we got to the cottage Daniel was just starting dinner. We hadn't seen Viola since Christmas, she's a little girl now. She was super shy around us at first. She did also just get back from the hospital. I'm not sure if I approve of fireworks the night we get there, but due to scheduling conflicts that's when Three Lakes got in their fireworks show. 2nd of July fireworks would do. The next morning Blake made us croissant breakfast sandwiches for breakfast. Then Viola and I played down by the dock. Theo would have made a good big brother. Chelsea gave her boys haircuts and even trimmed my neck hair. Every boat we own ...

Backcountry Camping with Kids in Theodore Roosevelt National Park

Day 1 Back in May I stumbled upon Theodore Roosevelt National Park. I had no idea there was a National Park in North Dakota and that it was the northern end of the Badlands. Usually our summer vacations coincide with Scott's work trips. Since he didn't have any this summer I thought we should take advantage of actually taking a vacation. What, my workcations are always classics? I suppose a second real vacation this year wouldn't hurt. We definitely have more time than normal. As long as we took Covid-19 precautions and avoided people. We finally settled on a time to go. Blake joined us so we borrowed our dad's van so we could ride together. Scott had just driven from Michigan the day before. Blake had met my parents in Wisconsin to get the van and then drove from Duluth to pick us up. I offered to drive since I literally only drive twice a month. I was still pretty tired from a long drive home. Since we were near Fergus Falls we had to stop by the abandoned state ho...

Japan Family Trip - Part II: Exploring the Shrines and Wilds of Nikko

We had originally planned on taking the bullet train down from Tokyo to Kyoto for a day or two. While being epically fast, it was a bit spendy for the four of us. After talking to Brooke's coworker we settled on a two day trip to Nikko and its World Heritage Sites to break up our week in Tokyo. This turned out to be an amazing decision. The town is teaming with beauty from ancient shrines to epic waterfalls and some of the best meals we had on our trip. Kyoto didn't seem all that appealing to me when I started researching which location to go to. I too am glad we chose to head north to Nikko. When we booked our Tobu Nikko Spacia X tickets I upgraded to the premium seats thinking that we'd be sitting facing one another. Instead we ended up with 4 individual seats, two in the first two rows and two in the last two rows. It turned out just fine with the kids sitting in front of us in two groups. Meadow and I were seated at the front of the car. Once in awhile we'd pas...

Search This Blog