The Money Pit

The one thing I wish for is that we could have one visit to the cottage that does not involve a massive construction project.

Saturday morning Pat went into the bathroom and when he flushed the toilet all the water came up through the shower. Oh great, is all we could say. Pat spent most of the morning trying to fix the problem by plunging. Then he went down to the crawl space to find a much bigger problem than we could imagine.

This winter we had a pipe freeze and flooded our entire crawl space. This ruined our water softener, water heater, and furnace. We thought this problem was fixed, but apparently it is not. There were several leaking pipes that also were frozen and cracked and the pipes from the bathroom are so plugged from many years of hard water and rust. We had a plumber come out last night and he started working on the project, but as every project around this cottage there is never a "small" project. He will be back this morning to hopefully finish. It is pretty difficult with 4 kids, 3 adults and a dog to not have water. What a mess.

Goodbye for now Grandpa

Tuesday night while I was at work I received a phone call from my mother-in-law that told me Pat's Grandpa Ellison passed away. Grandpa Ellison was 80 years old and has been battling Parkinson's disease and strokes for many years. We miss him dearly but are so blessed to know he is now without pain and suffering.

What can I say about him, he was one of the funniest men I have ever known. Even in his last few weeks at the nursing home he had many jokes and stories to tell the kids. Maybe they weren't always the most appropriate for kids but they were funny.

As I sat at the funeral yesterday I realized I knew Harry Ellison as my grandpa just as long in my life as I knew my own grandpa. Grandpa Ellison loved to spend time with his family and grand kids and great grand kids. We loved to have him come visit at the cottage and take him out on the boat to go fishing. He loved nature and parties and he enjoy doing everything with a cold beer in his hand. Grandma Ellison could always count on Pat to sneak grandpa a few beers even when he wasn't supposed to be drinking but grandpa loved it, so Pat couldn't say no.

It is hard to watch your husband lose a man that he admired so greatly, but I know that Grandpa is with each of us now and we will see him again someday.

Pat Turned 30!!!!!

Pat turned 30 last weekend on April 18. I threw him a surprise party and I actually pulled it off. I am horrible with surprises so Pat was shocked that I did it. The weather was gorgeous and we had a great turn out of friends and family.

I am huge and pregnant (35 weeks) so by then end of the night I think I may have felt worse than those that were drinking. We had a bon fire, tons of food, and lots of drinks.

I lost my camera so I am waiting to steal pictures from my sister when she gets a chance to send them to me. So for now I was able to steal this from a friend of mine.

I can't believe we were only 16 when we started dating, 30 seemed like forever when we were that age. Pat and I have been through so much together and I could not ask for a better father for my kids and husband for myself.

I am glad you enjoyed your party you deserved it, you work so hard for the kids and I are always there for us when we need you to be. We love you very much.

Funny Story

So, I just had to share this funny story. Today My sister-in-law Liz and I went to run some errands together. She wanted to go to the hair supply store so I told her I would take her but I had a doc. appointment at 11:30, so she would have to some with me. When we got there I told her she could come in with me, it was just a tummy measuring heartbeat listening appointment so I didn't care. She just had to promise not to tell anyone how bad my belly looks :).

I wasn't going to see my regular doctor today and I have never met this doctor. Right when she walked in I could tell she had a funny look on her face and she kept asking us questions, like we were both the "mommies". We just busted out laughing and clarified that we were sister-in-laws.

I felt so bad for the doctor, she felt bad. Today it is more common so she probably didn't want to be rude if we were a couple. But it was so funny. All day we have been laughing about it.