Tuesday News

We had a delightful visit with my mom and dad this weekend and it was nice for Mike to be around all of us. We showed off his new place of employment and his duplex to the grandparents on Sunday and he seems to be dealing with the breakup pretty well. Jesi threw a great party for AJ on Saturday with lots of friends and family. This year AJ knew what presents were and was anxiously awaiting the opportunity to rip into them. His real birthday is Friday so I am sure the excitement of turning 3 will last all week.

No wedding in Mike's immediate future

It was not a good week for Mike. Kristin has decided that she is not ready for independent living and is moving back to her parents home. She wanted a wedding, but maybe not a marriage. Living with Mike has not been her cup of tea even as just roommates, ( they have had separate bedrooms) so we can only imagine what it would have been like if they were married. This weekend she will be moving out and we are in the process of finding a new roommate for Mike. He is sad. He is disappointed. But he knows that things will be OK. He deserves to have someone care about him as much as he cares about them. This was just not the case with Kristin. She liked being with Mike and being his fiance and she really wanted to have a nice wedding but she was not prepared to be a partner in a marital relationship. She has not been as capable of adapting to independent living as Mike.
Mike is coming to our house for the weekend as we are entertaining my parents who will be here for AJ's 3rd birthday party Saturday. It will be a family weekend and Mike will have lots of support to continue in his goal of independent living. He does like the new job and living in Bowling Green. Perhaps it is better that this is happening sooner rather than later.

New Roof

Once again a long week. The big news is that we got a new roof on our house. It has been on the agenda for several years but since there were no major leaks and it was a MAJOR expense it was delayed. The issue became more pressing as the roof on the second story appeared to have a ripple to it. In our estimate the roofer quoted replacing the wood sheets as he felt that rotted wood was causing the ripple. But on day 3 as they tore off the shingles on this section of the roof they found not rotted wood but warped rafters that were not up to code for the length and slant of the roof. So ... bring in the carpenter and replace 24 rafters. Ouch! Of course this work was not in the original estimate. The only consolation in all of this is that the roof looks great and we will not have to worry about getting lots and lots of snow for the next 30 winters.

We did have a house inspection before we purchased the house and this defect should have been brought to our attention. The carpenter even thought the house should never have passed the original inspection because the rafters were not to code. Perhaps some building inspector got a little cash to overlook it. I was able to pull out the inspection that was done when we bought the house and we are considering what options we might have. All of this "fun" I got to handle by myself because Steve was out of town this week.

Update

I did not realize how busy I had been until I took the memory card out of the camera. I took pictures today of the Belmont Ladies Senior Golf Champion and I wanted to get the prints made up. When I saw all of the past pictures I realized what other blog entries I had failed to make.

So first here are a couple of the pictures from the surprise birthday party that Steve's sister Janet arranged. All of Steve's sibling got together on July 18th at Janet's for dinner and catching up. Steve was surprised and we had a great dinner. Thank you Jan and Janet. Later in the evening Andrew and Tim provided a fireworks display that they had been working on. A great evening.

A Buckeye Cake from Judy

Carol in the background (older) brother John and Steve

The five siblings

Then last weekend I was in Kalamazoo for my mother (Bunschoten) side of the family annual reunion. We have been having a picnic on the First Sunday of August since either 1969 or 1970. No one could quite remember which year it started but it is a real tradition. The little cousins all have big kids now and some of the aunts and uncles are great grandparents too. A wonderful way to keep in touch. My brother always updates everyones information and sends it to us all so we have the most current addresses and phone numbers as well as email addresses now. Another thank you for all involved in the work to make this come off every year. We have the ideal spot at my mom's sister's farm, complete with the pond.

Kids saw dust hunt for pennies

It has been great golf weather and I have been taking advantage of that.

Yes we are alive and well

Just been busy. Will post all about Kalamazoo reunion with pictures later.