The Blanchard Family: Random Summer Pictures

Thursday, August 30, 2012

Random Summer Pictures

As I was going through pictures to update the blog, I found some from just several random events that happened this summer, so some of these are from June, some July, and some August. Here are some of the random things from this summer!

Spring 2012- We started gutting our basement bathroom! We remodeled our main floor bathroom when we moved in the house, and it has been our only bathroom, however; we decided it would be nice to have a second one. There was a bathroom in the basement when we moved into our house, but it was so gross and nasty that we have never used it. So, we decided to gut it and completely remodel it! I can't wait until it's done and we have two bathrooms to use! We are also re-doing the "family room" area of the basement, so we will have another living space, it will be so nice when it's done! Here are some pictures of our progress so far!

Hole in the floor....we had to move the drain for the shower, which meant putting a nice hole in our basement floor....but it's all fixed now!

Insulation done and plastic going up!

Shower is in! We won't have a tub, but that's okay since we have one upstairs.

We actually now have the inside all sheet-rocked too, but I don't have any pictures of that yet. :)

6/24- We went swimming! We didn't get a pass for the water park this summer, it is something I have been thinking about, but we just didn't do it this summer...maybe next year! Anyways, the people that live next door to my parent's have an in-ground pool in their back yard. They moved in several years after we did and had two kids, one was my brother's age, and one was a few years younger. Both are now grown and in college, so not around as much. We saw the mom at Sturgis Falls, and she invited us to come swim whenever we wanted! The pool is all one depth, and it's about 4 ft, so the kids can't touch, but we still have had fun swimming over there this summer. Here are some pictures from the first time we went!

We haven't really taken the kids swimming a lot. Norah loved floating in the lady bug float, and did that for quite a while. Kyler had one of those puddle jumper floats on, and we were trying to get him to "swim" in it....but he didn't really like that idea, he just wanted to sit on the float the whole time. I think we need to get Kyler into some swimming lessons, and get him more familiar with the water! He's just not very daring about things like that, especially when he can't touch the bottom.

Norah and Mommy!

Kyler on his "rafty thing" (as he liked to call it)

Kyler and Daddy!

6/25- We ate lunch with Henry and Geneva! It was Geneva's birthday at the end of June, so we decided to take them out to lunch, along with my parent's, one day at My Verona...right before it closed. :) Anyways, we had a great time and enjoyed making Geneva feel special for her birthday! These two hold such a dear place in my heart, as they are like another set of Grandparents to me, because, as I have said before, Geneva babysat me since I was about 6 weeks old.

Norah with Geneva and Henry

Both kids with Henry and Geneva

7/26- We replaced our sidewalk! Last summer one of our chunks of sidewalk was "marked" by the city, meaning it had to be replaced. It had to be done by August 1st of this year. So, one Sunday afternoon in July (when it was about 100 degrees out) :) Erik took a sledge hammer to the old chunk of sidewalk and broke it up. Since we only had one piece, we just decided to do it ourselves, rather than hire someone to do it. After he got out the old chunk, he went to Menards and bought some cement mix for sidewalks. My uncle had a hand cement mixer, so I went out and picked that up one morning, so that Erik could easily mix the concrete instead of doing it in buckets. Then one evening, Erik and Kyler mixed up all the cement and filled in the big hole, aka, the sidewalk! :) And waalaa! We have a new chunk of sidewalk!

Uncle Nick showing Erik how to run the mixer

Starting to fill in the hole....

Kyler helping Daddy :)

My little man :)

8/11- 50th Wedding Anniversary! My aunt and uncle celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in August. Their daughters threw a surprise celebration at Montage for them. They had told them that it was just going to be a family dinner and then invited the rest of us to come, so when they showed up, there were a lot more people there than just their family! It was a fun night celebrating a very special occasion!