What is Your Nemisis?

Do you have a Nemisis?  Like joker to Batman or superman's kryptonite, something that just really, really gets on your last nerve.  I do.  I have been battling it everyday this summer.

 The dog hair around here is driving me crazy.  Tumble weeds gather around everywhere.  Kayla and I vacuum several times a day.

We end up throwing away enough hair to cover a cat daily.  Not just any cat mind you, but a Tina sized cat. Oh well, it could be worse, but it is my battle to fight since I don't have enough sense to not get my children pets.  What was I thinking?

Walking the Plank

Every summer brings projects, you know the kind that you think about all winter when it is freezing cold and all you want to do is get outside.  Our summer projects are to replace the front and back porch and build a fence for the puppies..who are BIG dogs now.

Kyle employed the help of our full time missionaries (who work for food) and stripped down all the old wood.  The roof is gone from both porches.

The floor boards are also gone from both porches.

Hence the walking of the planks to get in and out of both doors.  Sounds like fun being a pirate for a few days right...well a few days has turned into two weeks waiting on supplies to be special ordered from Home Depot.  The don't carry metal roofing we want to match the other.  Then we need to pay for all of our stuff on one bill to get a discount, hence the timeframe.  Arggg, matey, I can't wait to quit walking the plank.

The rainy evenings have been warping our boards and it is a bit scary sometimes.  Can't wait to see the finished product either.  So I guess we will button down the hatches and wait out all the storms.

Family Home Evening with Friends at the Park

This family home evening (info click here), we tried to have twice. Last Monday it rained really hard about 3:30 in the afternoon and the radar showed more so we canceled.  Then it didn't rain until late.

Today it was supposed to be nice... While we were grilling our food this tree limb fell down...should be a sign for the brig thunderstorm that blew in.

So needless to say I didn't get many pictures... We still had fun.  We crowded into Kylie's place of employment to stay safe from the rain and eat our picnics.

A couple of us braved the storm for a bit to finish cooking.

Before the storm the little ones enjoyed bubbles.

...and maybe some of the big ones too.

I forgot to take more pictures while we were in the building.  Oh well, fun story to remember with our home and visiting teaching families.  I had a lot of fun and enjoyed talking to my friends.

Grand Marais, Michigan with My Kyle

How do you describe the most perfect for us vacation destination in the world?  We love quiet and tranquil places.  We love to experience nature and the beauty of the creation.

 I was worried that when you get married before you are twenty; or even 19 in my case, that we would be another divorce statistic.  I thought that my own parents did not stay married past 19 years of marriage, how could I do it.  But, I was 18 so this worry was fleeting, it would pass through my mind on occasion.  But, we have learned so much about ourselves and marriage over these past few years.

 We have learned that we can't get everything we want right now.  (The hard way.)  We went into a lot of debt when we were first married.  We made all of our payments just fine, until we both lost our jobs...2 months a part.

 At that point in our life we learned to rely more on Heavenly Father,  than on ourselves.  That decision alone has made more changes to our lives and our marriage than any one decision that we have made since then.

 We learned that families can be together forever, not just until death do you part.  We learned to pay an honest tithe.

 We learned to rely on each other and we learned to appreciate our young family.

 We made many sacrifices, like me going to college and Kyle working by himself to support us through.  We sometimes went to the grocery store on a roll of dimes to get just enough to make what was in the cupboards stretch until we got the next pay check.

 We knew that getting me through school would help us to be able to build our dream home on a few acres and have a small farm to be able to sustain us through any future hardships.

 We worked hard to be to this point in our lives.  Like the icebergs in this picture we learned to get through the cool hard parts of marriage and get on to the next task.

 We have raised two children and are moving into the adult children phase.  Funny, wonder when they will starting acting as adults.  Even funnier that I was married and had Kota when I was his age now.  Can't image either of them making the same choices.  (No wonder our parents were asking us if we were ready for marriage 20 years ago.)

 One thing I realized on this trip, that I still love Mr. Crawford after all these years.  I know now that 20 years isn't all that long and I hope to be one of those elderly couples in the newspaper celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary.  Maybe even seeing great-great grandchildren.

 We realized that we still want to move to the Upper Pennisula of Michigan, and we hope that we can do that in the next five years.  (Growing up, it doesn't have to  be now!)

 

 Have you ever seen a wood chuck (ground hog) in a tree?  Well this guy had the best seat in the house.  He was sitting 600 feet above Lake Superior on a branch hanging out over the lake.

 Crazy woodpecker had these all over this tree.  I bet it will fall down soon.

As you can see, Grand Marais area of Lake Michigan is beautiful.  It was a great 4 day hang out for Kyle and I on our 20th anniversary week.  Hope we can repeat this trip, over and over.  Here is to 20 more, and then 20 more after that!

K+S 4-ever: 20 Years

Do you remember in elementary school when you would dream about the cute boy from class taking you on dates?  Then you would make the hearts on your notebook with the said cute boy's initials and yours and you would write 4-ever?  This was pre text codes people.  But do your remember what I'm talking about?  

Well K. C. was never the initials I was writing about in elementary, who knew my hubby to be was 1,000 miles away,  and three grades ahead of me in school.  But, I was lucky enough to meet K. C. When it was time to get married.  Who knew my soul mate would be from so far way.  Well, we just celebrated our 20th anniversary on June 4th.

 To celebrate our milestone, we took a spur of the moment camping trip to Grand Marais, Michigan.

We saw so many wonderful things it will take me several days to post them all.  The best part is that I know that I am still married to my best friend.  I'll talk more about this later, but when you get married at 18, you worry about if the marriage is going to last.  

It was so beautiful here in Michigan. It was in the 60s during the day and 40s to 50s at night so a bit colder than in Ohio, but we loved every minute of it.

Au Sable Lighthouse

Do you see those white things floating in the horizon?  Yep, those were icebergs.

Au sable Lighthouse

Shipwreck by the lighthouse, they call it the ghost coast because of all the shipwrecks in the area.

The iron right soil turns the creeks and rivers into tea colored water.

Lake Superior is beautiful, we spent many hours looking at it from different areas at different times of day, but my favorite is sunset.  Kyle said if it weren't for the mosquitoes it would be like heaven up here.  I think I have to agree.