Painting the Kitchen

We've started the changes we want to make in the kitchen. I selected "Spanish Tile" for our new paint color. Here's the before and "after" (I still have a bit of edge work to do...and I might paint under the cabinets a little ways...it will eventually be tiled):
Other things we' have plans to add/change:

*tile the backsplash

*install an "over the stove" microwave

*install under cabinet lighting

*change hardware from gold to black

*trim out windows and opening between the kitchen and dining room

Anybody Want a Nice Black Lab??

Because we have two!

This is Noah...
and this is Moses...
They used to belong to our neighbors, but they kept them chained to trees with no shelter and when we started to see the dogs ribs show, we called animal control. Our county "shelter" has a very high kill rate, so we pulled them to foster.


As you can see, they were so neglected (Noah was downright emaciated) but you'd never know it with how sweet and loyal they are! They've both put on about 10lbs each since these bottom pictures were taken and they're doing great with their crates!

My Uncle's Birthday

I promised my Aunt Barbara that I would post some pictures and a video of my Uncle Rodger's 50th Birthday party, so that my cousin, Brent, could see. So, we'll see if the video will load.

The event was a suprise "roast" and there were lots of family and friends there...After the "roasting" we sang some Karaoke and Barb and Rodger did their standard "I got you babe" by Sonny and Cher and Rodger did his infamous "Soul Man."Little Rodger and Jessica were super funny with their speech that they (and Brent) had written.

½ Second

Curtis writes:

It is amazing what can happen (or not happen) in ½ second. I had a very close call while driving to work last week on I-65. Everything happened so fast that it is hard to take it all in.

I was in the middle lane when I noticed something out of the corner of my eye to my right. It was a gray Dodge Durango coming in my direction in the air. Apparently this driver was going too fast or hit a slick spot on the ramp onto I-65, went down the embankment, hit the road and became airborne. The SUV landed in the lane beside me blowing out its front-left tire and careened across every lane of traffic and about 2 feet in front of me. Pieces of tires, sparks and other shrapnel flew in my direction. The SUV came to rest after hitting concrete median.

At first I was simply amazed at what had just happened. I’m not sure if I even hit the brakes. It was almost a scene out of “Days of Thunder” where the racecar drivers speed up and power through the wreck in front of them. It felt like I just ran a marathon as my legs were cramped from tensing up and I was breathing hard from the excitement of it all.

It took me a few days to realize how lucky I actually was. I brushed it off as an interesting story to a normally mundane drive to work. However, after thinking about it for a while, if I was 6 feet farther than what I was I could have been into the median wall with the Durango. Or, I could have gotten clipped, spun around or even flipped my car.

I am very thankful for every day of my life right down to the ½ seconds.