No, I haven't left the business world to teach. And no, my Fortune 15 employer didn't become so concerned with employee work/life balance and productivity that it decided to give its employees the summer off. When you live in the midwest and the long, gray winter finally ends, you have a greater appreciation for the warm, sunny summer and everyday really feels like a bit of a vacation. Because I have a bit of free time tonight and actually have the urge to blog, I thought I would write a bit about our busy and productive summer.
We kicked off our summer this year with a trip to Alabama for the week following Memorial Day. It was a much needed trip as I had not been home since the fall -- the longest I've ever gone without a visit to Tuscaloosa since moving to Ohio. We celebrated Dad's birthday with "Birthday in a Box all the way from Cincinnati" -- translate as "a cooler full of 12 pints of Graeter's ice cream packed on dry ice that made the trip down to Alabama for a celebration". We spent the week piddling around -- hanging by the pool, taking the "neices and nephews" swimming, joking and having fun with Dad & Babs, and riding the John Deere Gator. We got to catch up with my cousin Brandy and her husband and to see the new house they were building. We even had our first ever adult-only outing with David and Christie (seriously, we tried to think about it and the 4 of us had never been out without the kids before) to Kozy's - a great little local restaurant. After such a great visit, our time ended on a sad note as our friend Drew (who was an usher in our wedding) lost his wife Amy to cancer that Wednesday, and Jonathan made a quick exit from AL down to FL to be with Drew during this difficult time.
After returning home from AL, we needed a bit of an aviation fix. The following Sunday, we rented a Piper J-7 Cub (since our airplane is still out of commission after being geared up by our partner in April) and flew over to Lee Bottom Field outside of Madison, IN for "Sinful Sunday". Lee Bottom Field is a grass strip runway along a river in southeast Indiana. During the summer, it's home to Sinful Sunday the first Sunday of every month. Hundreds of people fly in and land there to look at all of the other small airplanes that have landed there and to eat sloppy joes and ice cream sundaes -- get it? sinful sundaes? Ha! It was unbelieveably hot, but it was a lot of fun and there were a lot of beautiful old airplanes there. It's always fun for Jonathan and I to get to fly a Piper Cub together too since he tried to impress me way back when we were dating by taking me up in a Piper Cub on floats in FL and landing it on a little lake with a restaurant where we had grouper sandwiches together.
Only a week later, we were excited to have Jonathan's mom and dad in for the 3rd annual Father's Day weekend extravaganza - also known as the H. Men Go to the Kentucky Speedway for a Race While the H. Women Do Something a Little More Lady Like. As always, the guys enjoyed themselves. I would say more if I could, but I've managed to go 3 and 1/2 years of marriage without having to go to the KY Speedway with them, and I'm trying to keep it that way. Mrs. H. and I went to see "Jersey Boys" at the Aronoff which turned out to be quite a treat. As always, good times with the in-laws.
By the time that July rolled around, we had made the decision to commit 100% to finally finishing our basement. So July 4th, we hit it hard core with the help our our neighbor Randy (a.k.a "Redneck Randy"). Randy works in construction and is a whiz at all things related to building, especially finishing basements. He came over, and he and Jonathan spent the afternoon framing up the basement with metal studs. We were on our way! It took us from 7/4 to 9/4, but we got our basement rec room done and a full bathroom put into the basement doing most of the work ourselves with the help of a few of Randy's construction buddies here and there. We're thrilled with the results. I'll dedicate and entire post to that, though, later this week.
In mid-July I was surprised with a visit from my good friend Melissa. Melissa is the best friend that I've made at work in my 6 1/2 years with the company. She's someone that I just clicked with from day one and we were inseparable... until they transferred her to the Philadelphia area. That stunk. Luckily, though, she still has to come to town from time to time for work, and she usually stays with us so that we get to spend a little more time together. While we both worked well passed midnight the 2 nights she was here, it was great to be able to spend a little time together. She's getting married in Denver next week, and we'll be headed out there for the event. :)
The end of July is Jonathan's favorite time of the year. EAA Oshkosk week in Oshkosk, Wisconsin (that's "Westconsin" for my mother in law). Jonathan and his dad spent 8 days and nights in a pop-up camper in WI with several hundred thousand other aviation enthusiasts. It sounds a little crazy even to me, but it's something that they love and do together each year. I think it's a great blessing that they make that time to go for a week just the two of them.
After Oshkosh, it was time for Jonathan's second favorite event of the year -- Drum Corp International World Championships. Yes, it is just as dorky as it sounds. 40K people in a football stadium cheering wildly for marching band on steriods. It's a cult I tell you. Our good friends Justin and Jenn are also Drum Corp enthusiasts. This year, we went in and bought tickets together for the entire event (nevermind that they cost an arm and a leg and I almost killed Jonathan when I found out that we owed Jenn & Just $300 for our share of the tickets - not that we owed them half of $300!!!!!) Justin and Jenn went to quarter finals on Thursday night. Jonathan and I went to semi-finals on Friday night, and Justin & Jonathan went to finals on Saturday night. Each night was interesting. I was acosted by a band parent who sitting one seat down from us who was upset that I didn't give her son's corp a standing ovation. (By the way, her son was the tuba player in the corp that tripped and fell on the field during their performance. There's nothing quite as funny as a crowd of drum corp enthusiasts all gasping at the same time when one of their own goes down on the field. I did not laugh mind you. I kept it all inside. I was quite proud of myself.) I did thoroughly enjoy the show of the Corp that our friend Justin is an alumnus of. And I clearly have good taste because that is the Corp that ended up taking home the world championship trophy on the final night when Justin and Jonathan were there.
Just a week later, we got a visit from Jonathan's sister Leslie who is now living in Ft. Campbell, KY - just 4 1/2 hours south. She came up to hang out with us and to go to a concert with Jonathan on Sunday afternoon. She came by herself for the first time as her husband is now serving in Iraq. Little did she know that when she arrived we'd be putting her to work. Bless her heart - she helped us put an entire coat of paint on our newly hung and primed dry wall in the basement. I almost didn't have the heart to tell her a week later that the color was entirely wrong and that we had to repaint the entire thing a different color (a la the dining room painting debacle of July 2006). Anyway, we had a great time hanging with her in our incredibly messy, dusty, under-construction house that weekend. Oh, and Leslie got a bonus - she left with a new favorite song that weekend. "In the ciiiiiittttaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyy...." - that's just for you, Sister in Law.
To wrap up his own crazy summer, Dad came for a visit for a few days the next to last week of August. It was just he and I this time as Jonathan was working. And though he probably regretted coming, he was quite a life-saver for me. To keep our basement completion on schedule (date being driven by the fact that our new sectional was being delivered on 9/4), we had to 1) finish all painting in the rec room and bathroom - including ceiling painting - 2 coats on everything, 2) grout and seal the tile I had laid on the bathroom floor, 3) pick out and install trim around the bathroom floor where the vanity and toilet were to be installed on 8/25, and 4) pick out and order carpet to be installed no later than 9/3. If my dad hadn't been here to help me, there is no way I could have gotten all that done by myself! Never mind that he also planted 6 rose of sharon bushes, and 4 crepe myrtles for me just for fun. We worked together and listened to oldies while we worked. And he seriously looked at me at one point and said "How do you know all of these songs?" I said "Because you listened to them!" Quite a vacation it turned out to for him, huh? I have to say - dads are the best!
Sounds like a lot already, I know, but we had one last hurrah to end our summer. I like to refer to it as the greatest weekend ever for the H's. Labor Day weekend, we flew ourselves down to Lawrenceville, GA which is right in the middle of Athens, GA and Atlanta, GA. At noon:thirty on Saturday, 8/30 we were in Samford Stadium on the campus of the University of Georgia to cheer on Jonathan's alma mater the Georgia Southern University Eagles (a Div. I-AA team) who were taking on the #1 team in the land. We met up with David & Christie - they in their black, us in our navy and white - to tour the UGA campus before the game and hang out a bit. Then we went our separate ways into the stadium where we were in 90 degree Georgia heat with 85% humidity and almost no clouds in the sky. We were the hottest and sweatiest I think we've ever been. And though GSU didn't pull the upset, we were proud that they managed to put 21 points on the board. We then hopped in our little HHR rental car (why can we never get away from PT Cruisers or HHRs when we rent cars?) and high-tailed it back to our hotel in Lawrenceville just in time for quick showers, changing into our crimson & white, grabbing Chick Fil A drive thu, and making it to the station to take the MARTA to the Georgia Dome in time to see Alabama take on Clemson in what was I am sure the best Alabama football game that I've been to since Alabama spanked Florida in Bryant Denny Stadium in 2005. It was so much fun. And then, we ended the weekend flying ourselves back to Cincinnati on a perfectly beautiful Sunday afternoon in September.
Overall, I'd say we had one of the best summers yet. Not to get too deep after a very surface-y description of our summer, I spent a lot of time this summer realizing just how blessed we are - I am. There were several more serious things that went on this summer that I didn't mention - family drama, cancer scans, losing loved one, etc. Through it all, though, what Jonathan and I kept saying to each other was just that we have so much to be thankful for. Frankly, we really have it very easy. It's scarey for me to put that down in print. Almost like, I think that by actually admitting it, I'm jinxing us -- that all of the sudden something really bad is going to happen. I think I need to admit it though. I think I need to be grateful everyday for the good and the blessings in our life and pray that the thankfulness and the good times would be burned on my heart and in my memory. To never forget where it comes from. And to know that even when the bad times come and that when things get hard, I still need to be thankful. I still need to be grateful, and I need to know that He is always good.
This was the best view of the rec room that you could get because of the huge hearth and wood burning fire place there. Note the LOVELY wood paneling on the wall. That wasn’t the cheap kind of paneling either. When you rubbed your hand across the wall, you could feel the pseudo ridges of the would-be wood.
I just thought you’d like to see a close up view of this thing. Yes, I did have to pay extra on the home owners insurance because of that stupid wood burning stove that was never used. Strangely enough, we did manage to sell it to a family from rural OH for $100. They ONLY use wood burning stoves to heat their house – Seriously!
The TV is on the wall where the hearth and wood burning stove used to be!
This was the best view of the rec room that you could get because of the huge hearth and wood burning fire place there. Note the LOVELY wood paneling on the wall. That wasn’t the cheap kind of paneling either. When you rubbed your hand across the wall, you could feel the pseudo ridges of the would-be wood.
I just thought you’d like to see a close up view of this thing. Yes, I did have to pay extra on the home owners insurance because of that stupid wood burning stove that was never used. Strangely enough, we did manage to sell it to a family from rural OH for $100. They ONLY use wood burning stoves to heat their house – Seriously!
