Family Reunion and House Destruction

This past weekend Shane and I headed up to Chattanooga, TN for the Puffer Family Reunion. My dad is one of 6 boys, and all but one made it to the reunion. My whole immediate family was there, which was great. Grayson and Will are growing so fast!
We arrived Friday at 2am thanks to Sarah's heaving right foot. Shane and I watched the USA game Friday morning with Matt and Will and then headed over to the Aquarium in downtown on the river. It was pretty neat. That night we had a cookout at the pool. Saturday we relaxed all day and went downtown that night to eat and listen to the Charlie Daniel's band. It was a great weekend.

The house project had a minor turn last week. The inspector came last week. We were all excited because we couldn't wait to hear him say that all of Shane's work was pefect, which he DID! But he also said that there is no record of the pre-existing stuff having it's final inspection. Boo. With that said, we will have to take out the insulation upstairs and replace it with a thicker insulation, and do other small, tedious things. Thankfully Jeanie is allowing us to move into her house for the next couple weeks while she is in Washington. She offered to pay for someone to come out and do all of this because she hates that Shane has to do it, but Shane told her not to worry and that we would get it done. So that is what we will be working on the next few off-days and hopefully get the messy work finished before Jeanie returns. I'll have some pretty good pictures to post of our bedroom/living area covered in drywall and insulation in a couple days! Woo!

Enough of that...Here are some pictures from the Reunion this past weekend.





















Our sweet nephew, Will!















Sarah, Grayson, and Shane playing around at Blue Plate Restaurant waiting for the Charlie Daniel's band to play.
















He loves Uncle Shane, who is taking his pictures right now.
















Shane and me at Blue Plate




















Grandpa and Will at Uncle John's house.

Picture time!

I finally got around to putting the pictures on the computer. I'll explain what is happening. Some of y'all have seen the apartment, so bear with me.

Here is the wall that Shane is in the process of doing. He finished the framing and now we are waiting on the inspector to come so that Shane can put the drywall up. The wall is separating the garage area from our kitchen area. Shane is putting in a door on the far left of the wall. You can see the exterior door and the new interior door resting on the wall.

This is the kitchen area. The cabinets on the right used to be on the same wall at the window (to the left of the window). One of the first things Shane did was move the cabinets and sink to that wall.

Here is a better picture of the cabinet/sink area. The little white thing to the right is our pantry. Right now it has all the dishes and food in it because we emptied out the cabinets so that Shane could take them back off the wall and replace the insulation board that is now up with drywall.

Here is a picture of the door that Shane put in. The window was there, and he took the window out in the kitchen, cut into the brick on the bottom, and put the door in. I went to work that morning, and then when I got home, it was in. Pretty impressive!

He also took the insulation board off this wall so that he could replace it with drywall.

Another picture of the door. You can see the brick at the bottom that Shane cut through with a concrete saw that he rented. The brick dust is still settling and all of the dishes we clean don't really stay clean that long....ha.

Well, I think that just about covers all of it, EXCEPT where we live! Here are a couple pictures of the upstairs.

Shane watching the world cup early in the morning.

And the rest of the place.

Hope you have all enjoyed this!

Kitchen tear down!

We continue to have fun working on the crazy apartment. Sometimes we think, "What did we get ourselves into?" but then remember how blessed we are to have an opportunity to serve Jeanie, the lady we rent from.

Jeanie's daughter got married a couple weeks ago. I hadn't seen her since the wedding until earlier this week. I don't talk to her much because usually she needs to talk to Shane about the apartment. She was weeding in the yard on memorial day, so I asked her how the wedding was. It opened a heart breaking conversation. I am thankful for her openness and hope it leads to even more in the future. We just want to love her. Shane and I are going to have dinner with her tonight. His friend Tim came in town not too long ago and brought us fish that he caught, so we are going to cook that up. Shane and I catch ourselves complaining about how we don't have enough time together because of our crazy schedules and late nights at work, but at least we have each other to come home to, whatever time that may be.

We packed up our kitchen stuff yesterday morning so that Shane can tear down the cabinets again and replace whatever wall stuff is up right now and put drywall up. We are picking up a fridge from a friend of the Kirkpatrick's, but until then we have been using a mini fridge which only holds so much. With that said, we eat out more than we'd like. One of our favorites is a Chinese place down the street. We are trying to build a relationship with a girl that works there. Last week I shared with her that I went to China a couple years ago and she has clung to us since then. She comes up and talks to us every time we are in there now. She works 7 days a week 11am til 11pm. She has a 5 month old and a 2 year old. I don't know who keeps her kids considering her husband works all day at another chinese restaurant in town. She cannot drive so her boss picks her up for work every day. She mentioned that she liked my purse and would like one in white instead of brown. I told her I would love to take her shopping and that we would figure out a time that works for both of us next time we are in there. So funny story...I decided to go ahead and start looking for a purse for her since we hadn't figured out a time when I could take her out. I found one and it's so cute! I almost bought one for myself. I got off work yesterday at 8 and Shane didn't until 9. So I went to Home Depot at 9, picked Shane up, and we headed over to #1 China. I went in and showed her the purse and she said, "No no, I do not like that style." It was pretty funny. Oh well! I'll try again. She said she had Sunday mornings available but I told her we go to church...she has no interest in going. "I'm Buddha," she said.

Shane and I decided to put my car on craigslist to see what would happen. I walk to work most days as long as it isn't raining, so we really have no reason to have 2 cars. Well, we had a few bites on it, which surprised both of us. One guy has seen it a couple times and decided to buy it. We are meeting him at the bank this afternoon to sell him the car. Woo!

Alright, that's it for now...pictures next time! Promise.