Two weeks after Andy turned 40, his brother, Dave, also turned 40.  We headed up to the Rockford area for the birthday bash.  We stayed in Byron with my Uncle Art and Aunt Tammy.  We drove up on Friday and got to Byron about 6 pm.  My cousin, Erin, and her daughter, Thalia, were there.  This was especially exciting for me because I had not seen Erin since her wedding and had never met Thalia, who is 5 years old.  It was a great evening. We hung out in their pool, chatted, and watched the kids play.  Thalia and Laura got along very well and played until bedtime. Laura was especially excited because Tammy painted her toenails and fingernails!  After eating a large portion of Tammy’s cherry tomatoes, Laura also decided that she was the “Queen of Tomatoes” and even made up a song and dance to it.  Lucky for all of you, Andy caught it on video. 

...or "Older, but not necessarily wiser."

Another birthday has come and gone.  This one, however, was a little different than most.  I was born on July 23, 1970.  If my deteriorating gray matter can still do subtraction, that puts me at the big 4-0.  Statistically, I'm beginning the last half of my life.  The beginning is all behind me, only the end lies ahead.  On the other hand, I've lived 40 pretty good years.  If the next 40 (I hope) are as good, or even better, I'm the luckiest man alive.  I have some much better things to look forward to than I did in the past 40 years, too.  I have two beautiful children I get to watch grow and become independent people.  I get to grow old with my wonderful wife, and try to keep her from becoming a grumpy old lady (being grumpy and old is my job!)  I've spent 40 years laying the groundwork for enjoying the life that's just beginning!  I'm able to say that it's because of the great (sometimes "interesting") people I'm related to, and the wonderful people I've met along the way.

I had the opportunity to celebrate my life and everything I have with a lot of those people recently, thanks to Erica (who planned a great birthday party).  We spent a lot of time preparing the house in the days leading up to the party, and I was afraid I was going to be too exhausted to really enjoy it.  Steam cleaning old carpets until 1am is never fun.  We patched walls, painted, scrubbed, cleaned, polished, and touched up everything.  I spent Thursday working on the yard (and got a nice sunburn for my efforts!) trying to get it ready too.  It was a lot of work, and left time for little else.

You are probably wondering why we haven’t posted in a while.  Well, up until recently, we haven’t had much to say.  June was an incredibly busy month, but it was mostly because every weekend we had projects to complete.  This is all in preparation for Andy’s 40^th birthday party or at least that is the excuse I’m using, because it’s better than admitting we just have found other things to do! 

• Finish the garden – It looks great and is growing fast now.  Soon we will have fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplant, squash, and jalapeno pepper.  We also planted brussel sprouts, but I’m not so sure about those.
• Add new mulch to the front planting beds – It took 9 bags to remulch.  I had no idea so much had washed away in just a year’s time.
• Clean the outside of the house – Ask Andy about the house wash that he found at Home Depot for only $8/bottle.  Spray it on, let it sit for 5 minutes, and rinse it off.  All the mold GONE.
• Clean the deck – We used the deck wash from the same company that made the house wash.  Our deck is amazingly clean.  It had a lot of mold on it and it’s gone now!  Of course, the actual cleaning process was a lot of scrubbing and hard work, but it looks great now!
• Change up some pictures in certain rooms
• Etc., etc., etc.