Flying Tessa & Bailey

Spring has almost sprung! And Tessa likes spending her time at the park with her good friend Bailey! They didn't get a sand castle built but they spend time on the swings or should I say flying out of the swings! Note Miss Tessa has on her slippers, I am sure that they were athletic slippers! They caught some good air, enjoy!

The Wall That Is NO MORE!

I can see clearly now the wall is gone! I have moved all obstacles in my way! You know the song, I am sure you were humming along while you read the first few lines. Anywho! After being laid off on Tuesday I found myself with a little extra time on my hands and decided to get busy!!

For those of you who have not been to my home here is a little back ground. I have, I mean, I had a wall between the living room and the dining room with a pocket door. The living room is...was 21 feet long and could spare some square footage. My dining room was about 9 feet long and cramping my style!! We have been talking about doing this for eight years and on March 4th the gloves came off!! (Or went on..... so I didn't get splinters!!) I had pulled the trim off the pocket door Wednesday night and Thursday we hit it with the saws-all as soon as my slave labor, I mean hired man got home from school!


It starts! And My hired man


Now our home was built in 1960 by a mason who believed in rock and mortar! All the interior walls are buffalo board, which is the first generation of sheet rock and then anywhere from 3/8 inch to an full inch of plaster with small aggregate. Needless to say the blades did not last very long on the saws-all!

Even with the bomb shelter challenges we have that puppy ripped out by 8:30pm. Now Steve is on a traveling circuit with Nash right now and was not home to share in the awesome occasion. He was driving back to Cold Spring from Omaha with his VP and got a text message from Levi of me holding the saws-all like an AK47 and full battle gear (protective glasses). Then the next text message he got was a movie of me hitting the wall with the saws-all! What great fun. We got most of the wall out except for the perpendicular connections to the ceiling, walls and floor because all of those connections had expanded metal lath. We had to wait for the big gun to get home!


Making progress.

Put your back into Man!

And your Leg!


Ok, give it all you've got!

We're through! We are really through!

The weekend was spent cleaning up the edges and getting the header that went across for the sliding door. This header was tied all the way back to the main support wall running down the center of the house. Yes, I checked to make sure that I was not screwing with the structure before I hit the wall. But I still look at it every once in awhile to make sure it is not sagging!





My Big Gun! Not the saws-all, Steve!


Look at those bulging muscles!

The open feeling is just incredible I love the connection between the living room and the kitchen area! We hope to have the additional vinyl-wood floor in this weekend and the new carpet laid next week! Then I get to dust and vacuum again! You will all have to stop by and see it, the transformation is stupendous!

Now do you see why I sing, I can see clearly now the wall is gone!

History of Dance, Part II

We hoped you enjoyed the quick little photo tour of Levi and the boys at their dance recital. I think prom this year could be kinda of fun to watch with all of the kids that took dance class.

History Of Dance

The dance class

I am sure you all have seen the history of dance on You Tube. If you haven't you should check it out! Well, our little boy Levi made his own history today with his first dance recital. No tutus were involved! But there was lots of pretty girls dressed in great dresses and stiletto heels. (those heels were gone by the 5th or 6th dance!)

This was a class at school that our athletic director Mr. Johnson teaches every trimester. This trimester has been one of his best for the amount of boys. Levi and his wrestling buddies, Alex, Adam and Chris along with a few other good friends, Chase and Kyle were all in the class. It was good that these boys had wrestling this last trimester, the dancing stamina was definitely there!

It was great to go to the gym and see all of the parents with perma-grin watching there kids truly enjoying the wonderful art of dance. They learned a Tango, Waltz, Polka, Cha-Cha and Swing! They even learned how to flip their partners. (The girls wore spandex shorts under their pretty dresses!)

Unfortunately Steve was in Omaha on business and could not be here to watch it. I was in my "Momma" element. You see I got laid off on Tuesday and now I get to do these wonderful things with my kids. It is truly a blessing and not one tear was shed about losing by job. This day was an awesome day!

Jordan Hanson and Chris Bruan getting ready to strut their stuff.



Levi "swinging"

Somethings happened so Fast!! Even the camera couldn't stop them!


Adam Tango Alex Polka!

There will be two entries because of the file sizes.

Faith and B-Ball!

The suns streams into the old gym framing a lone figure holding a basketball under her arm. Silence....one must concentrate, breath deep, feel the energy from the ones that have gone before.....Nahhh. Let's just play ball! And she did! Those girls are really starting to play as a team! Which warms the cockles of my basketball heart.

This is her first year ever playing and her coaches had never coached before so it is wonderful to see how well they are coming along with their plays and understanding the game. Faith stayed with her girl like they were Siamese twins. She wasn't scared to put up the ball and was a key player on all plays.

Here are few pics of her "doin' her thang!"

Wrestling Feb 6th

Running into the gym. Dogpile and the Flying Alex!

Well on the previous blog entry I was telling you about Levi trying to make weight. Well he did with excellent results. He ended up being .4 under! But what is so amazing about the night was he was flat on his back sick yesterday with a 100.3 temp, body aches, cough and congestion! It did not seem to bother him on the mat that much. The first two periods were scoreless. If fact it was just short of a boxing match, only open hands. This kid was even trying to whip him around by his head gear. But he missed the gear and was pulling his hair! In fact when Levi took his head gear off his hair came with it!

They finally got down to the mat and scored some points. The final score was 4-3, kept control of him until the buzzer rang, that was a long 25 seconds!

His momma and daddy are so proud!

Wrasslin'

We are winding down in the wrestling season or wrasslin'! Levi has had a great second half. He has really come into his own. He had made the paper a couple of time. One time the writer labeled the picture, "Is he flat enough for you, ref?" It did seem like it was a long time to actually "slap the mat."


The first big multiple win via pin night was when we had a quadrangle at a little town called Osakis, just nort of us about 45 minutes. As a team we swept the tournament; on a individual level the boys were doing fantastic! Steve, the girls and I had to come late because Faith had basketball practice so we missed the first match. Levi was pinned by a state ranked kid. So we drove like mad men or women or persons if you really want to go that far, to get to the next match. We burst through the gym doors just as he was taking the mat, shook hands and they were off! Levi dominated the whole 23 seconds of the match! Yes, 23 seconds later the kid was counting ceiling tiles! That victory tasted good. It was a great wave to ride! The last match was 59 second, Levi had him tied up and pinned! We where so excited. The worst thing about the whole night was I forgot my camera!


We then went to Big Lake for a triangular meet with Big Lake, duh, and Pierz. The Big Lake kid ended up pinning Levi in the second period. But Levi took his next kid from Pierz to the mat and pinned him!


Just Tuesday, Feb. 3rd we had a meet at home against Sauk Rapids. We racked up a team win, but had a few heartbreaking matches. Levi's a nail biter until the end. He went all three periods and pulled a reversal and a near-fall out of his onzie (singlet) in the last few seconds of the match to win by decision. Levi hates when I refer to it as a onzie, but for those of you who don't know the wrestling lingo, you knew exactly what I was talking about!

We have a match against Little Falls tonight. I just got off the phone with my little wrestler and he is trying to make weight. He is 1.3 pounds over! (If you are over forty, 1.3 pounds would take three weeks to lose, but he will have it off in an hour! If not he won't wrestle tonight!) He was running and jumping rope when I talked to him.