Bedroom makeover

Out with the old ...

and in with the new:

Andy and I bought the first set in late 1996 from Dania. It's still in good shape except that a few of the drawer slides don't work too well and the drawers don't pull out all the way. It didn't bother us much when we bought it but after 20-plus years, it was time to upgrade. We were able to sell it all (except one tall dresser we moved into Mayu/B's room) to a local family for $300. Seems fitting the furniture was delivered on what would have been mom's 79th birthday since we used inheritance money to buy it. Muffles wasn't ready to let it go:

The day started with a lunar eclipse, which Andy got a picture of:

And, interestingly being mom's birthday, I saw a cardinal in our back yard. They say a cardinal is a visitor from heaven. After I saw this male cardinal ...

... he flew into the neighbor's tree to be with a female cardinal. Hmmm.

Then, later, when I was watering a plant I had from mom's funeral I looked out the window and the cardinal was there again. Hmmm.

Our '80s basement

Andy was cleaning up his workroom the other day when he came across these signs that used to hang in Watterson Towers at ISU. Not sure how he ended up with them, I'm sure there's a story there, but he's been hanging onto them for about 30 years now so I decided it would be best to at least hang them up so he can enjoy them ... and remember the good ole college days. He hung these three above his work bench. "Jolt" and "Excalibur" were names of two of the dorm's four elevators. I don't believe they were named when I lived in the dorm the year before Andy did.

And the workroom shall now be known as "Conference Room B" ...

and the laundry room is the area coordinator's office. Just brings a little more ISU to our basement that already has my sorority composite and membership certificate...

... our favorite albums surrounding our ISU flag. Pretty easy to tell which side is Andy's and which is mine ...

... and the framed R.E.M. "Document" poster with the concert ticket of our first date. Awww!

Japanese treats

The Japanese students from Akita arrived Saturday and today was their first day at school. L brought home a letter that Takako had sent along with the students who were able to come this year. She is preparing for scholarship exams so she can go to school to be a kindergarten teacher. She said she treasures the photo album I made of her trip here and she keeps it in her room. And she might be traveling to Chicago to summer!

B's host family had contacted him last month and asked him what, if anything, they could send with the students. He said he gave the family a few ideas, but wasn't sure whether they would send anything since he hadn't heard from them since. Mayu brought home this huge bag of candy that one of the students said was for B. Now my trick is to hide the candy from L until B gets home.

Testing toilets

When you're at Costco and can't find any other place to sit?

Wienermobile surprise

Andy and I went to the church's congregational meeting this morning. It was three hours long though I left at the beginning to take Mayu home from track practice and Andy left mid-way through to attend the track parents' meeting. But still. Three hours.

After the meeting, we took the girls to Fuddrucker's for lunch. L went to a fabric store to pick out fleece for a blanket her youth minister ordered so she can then donate it to a silent auction. On the way to the fabric store, we saw the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile and had to stop. What an American experience for Mayu! You don't see a Wienermobile every day. This was the smaller, Mini Cooper version. Andy asked, in an interesting way, if the driver (called hotdoggers, really) had "wiener envy" because she didn't have the big Wienermobile. She assured him that she drives that one too. It was pretty funny. We all got whistles ...

... and the girls got stickers. I asked L when the last time was we saw the Weinermobile and she said she was young. She was right.

L loves the whistle!

Revisiting the '80s

L has been asking for a turntable for a long time. I have no idea why. Who wants vinyl records when you can store everything digitally? Anyway, she found a turntable with Bluetooth capabilities at JC Penneys over the weekend and used her leftover Christmas money to buy it. Only cost her $25 and it sounds pretty good. I pulled out the albums of mine that I could find - the Go-Go's, Wham!, REM's Document and an AC/DC one which I'm guessing is Andy's - and she chose to play the Go-Go's!

Preparing for Japan

L found a suitcase to take to Japan this summer that she believes reflects her fun, loud personality.

'Hamilton'!

Andy and I have been debating for months whether to see "Hamilton" and last night we finally did! We had dinner at Geppetto's in Oak Park then drove downtown. Fortunately, traffic was light.

Waiting for the show to begin.

We both liked the show. It was nonstop singing and dancing, hardly any dialogue. At times it was hard to understand the rapping, but we caught most of it. There was so much energy on stage I was tired just watching the performers.

30 years?

Today is the 30th (!) anniversary of the Founding Class of my sorority at ISU. We pledged in spring semester 1987 and rushed our first class before being initiated ourselves. I don't have any pictures from the initiation, but I do have a picture of me with Andy that night. He was having a party and I went over after the initiation was done.

We look so young!

This was the first rush event for the Founding class.

My jacket! Yes, I still have it.

The chapter gave me a red rose, the sorority's flower, before my graduation.

Pretty poses

New screensavers for my iPad.

Foggy Sunday

B sent me this photo of the foggy quad this morning. It's foggy here too.

Drive time

Thanks to the incredibly cold temperatures in recent weeks, fewer drivers have been venturing out. That's good news for L, who has been getting a lot of driving practice in with me. She's in driver's ed this semester and even though she hasn't started driving in school, she's improved a lot already. I've been letting her drive to and from the church each night to pick Mayu up from track practice. So far, so good. Here she is on a side street.

Today, though, we went out and here she is on the Harlem Avenue overpass. You can tell by that lovely pose that she's feeling more confident behind the wheel. We drove all over and ended up at JC Penney, with L driving the whole time, and found some cute Thanksgiving items on clearance:

Another b-day cake

One of L's lucky friends got this hand-delivered to her at school today. L baked it last night, five layers like Andy's, but she made a (from scratch!) white cake batter and mixed purple food coloring in three of the layers to give those a marbled look. She frosted it with chocolate and purple-colored vanilla frosting. I'm not sure about the brown/purple color combination but her friend liked it.

And, of course, against her mother's wishes, she took candles and matches to school and was going to light the candles until her chemistry teacher walked by, saw her and asked her what she thought she was doing. "Lighting candles on my friend's birthday cake," L said. "Oh no, you're not," teacher replied. Thanks, teacher. OPRF survives!

Office presents

Andy stayed home from work yesterday to attend his godmother's funeral (interesting that we both spent our 51st birthdays at funerals) so when he returned to work today, he got a few gifts. The partners at his office gave him an Edible Arrangement of fruit in a golf ball base. It was big enough that he called to have me pick him up from the train so he didn't have to carry it on the walk home.

Some of the employees gave him a box of cupcakes. There was another cupcake that said "Happy Birthday" on it with a single candle attached. We ate that one for dessert.

Andy's birthday

A late start to the school day gave L time to finish decorating Andy's birthday cake. She made a five-layer chocolate cake last night while we were at a wake and put it to cool on the front porch so Andy wouldn't see it. However, she left her dishes in the sink and he loaded the dishwasher this morning so he was wondering where the cake was.

She made it obvious that he's 51.

The birthday boy.

We took the girls to Margarita's for a Mexican birthday dinner. He wouldn't let us tell the waiters that it was his birthday. He hates the singing, etc., as do I.

This is the birthday card from Andy's mom ...

... I think she knows her son pretty well! Cheers!