We celebrated fourteen wonderful, and busy, years of marriage this week. This picture is one that my dad snapped of us after we returned from our honeymoon. We had a family tradition of pushing people into my grandparent's pond. I certainly wasn't letting hubby push me in without a valiant attempt to pull him in with me! I just typed about 10 things that I deleted because they were entirely too sappy for a public blog, so I'll just leave you with a picture chuckle.

Out with the Arsenic!

I got a call yesterday morning from the man whom we chose to run the plumbing from our new water main to our house. He said, "Read about you in the paper yesterday. I was feeling sorry for you with all those kids and that arsenic water. Could I come over today to at least run your pipes?" Uhhh........ YEAH! So they arrived at my house an hour later, and started working.

First they dug this deep, but rather small hole in my yard, laying aside the turf so that they could put it back on when they were done.

Then they measured the distance to their entry point.

They sealed off the basement to capture the dust.

Then they started drilling underground to that little hole that they had dug. It was extremely loud, and my house was a disaster for the day. The water authority approved our water main at 3:30 and gave us permission to hook up, so the guys worked until 12:30 in the morning. Today we have water, no indoor signs that the men were here, and no extra landscaping to do! They boys were so excited to be able to drink out of the tap that they rushed to the bathroom and stuck their faces under the faucet! Oh, happy day!

First Recital

CoCo started taking piano lessons at the beginning of the school year. He really enjoys it, and can't walk past the piano without playing it. In fact, that is his rather nontraditional style of practicing. He walks past the piano, plays his current song once, an old song once, and then walks away. He does this several times a day. I figure it all adds up, and I don't pester him about practicing. Well, he was very excited about participating in the recital and practiced his song for over a month. He was very prepared.

This is CoCo before his recital - all handsome and concealing his nervousness pretty well. Moments later, the floodgates opened; and we knew that there would be no recital for CoCo this year. We watched the other kids perform then headed home with grandma and grandpa for a private family recital.

Here he is playing "Indian Dance." We even got a couple of wonderful bows when he finished!

Concerts and Awards

Last night was SS' spring concert. She has been a part of concert choir this year and gets to stand right in the front row. She remembered all of her words- much to her relief. She gets herself quite worried for weeks leading up to the concert.

Tonight was awards night. She has been on high honor roll all year, and received an award in Mathematics - her LEAST favorite subject. However, considering that she knew our numbers when she came to America like we know Roman numerals, she has come a long way. She worked hard to learn to do math computations with our numbers and fully deserves that award.

Her girlfriends joined us as moral support. SS didn't even want to go to the awards ceremony at all until a couple of days ago because she felt uncomfortable in front of so many people.

This was KiKi's interest in the awards ceremony. He was asleep before they even finished the introductory music!

Deck Progress

I've had lots of people asking about deck progress. These pictures are from two weeks ago, but last night hubby put in the last floor screw. He can't do anything with the poolside deck until the pool is up. Hopefully, we will have water in a couple of weeks so that we can take care of that. The boys are already making use of the deck. They are playing "stories" out there and reading books, and Anni basks in the sun every morning. Nice to see that the deck will be put to good use!

Only 7 Again!

SS' best friends stayed with us for 9 days, and headed home this evening. I thought that I would be pulling my hair out with so many kids and some potentially moody teenagers, but our week went great. The little boys begged them not to leave, and we were sorry to see them go too. On the other hand, I am sure that they will be happy to return to their much quieter home where they can actually sleep in once in a while!

Making Tracks for Celiacs

Every year since my grandfather discovered that he is a celiac (can't eat anything with gluten in it), we have joined him and several other members of our family on the annual fundraiser walk. We always have a great time, but this year was even nicer because of the picnic that my aunt organized for after the event. Here are a few pictures - didn't get any great ones of my grandparents, but here are a few of some of my other family members.

My dad, always a drinker. ;-)

My cousins' twin boys enjoying some watermelon.

My other cousin's beautiful little charmer!

The organizer and baker!

My cousins. We used to chase each other with four wheelers and hope we didn't flip; now we chase after our children and hope that we can visit for more than a minute!