Words from Wisconsin: June 1, 2011

Well summer has officially started and we are finally experiencing some warmer weather. We still have trees leaving out so we have had a very cold start so far. Fortunately we decided to leap right pass spring into summer with temperatures hitting 80 degrees yesterday and a possible 90 degree mark predicted for this Friday.

We continue to work on putting our house into order with pictures starting to be hung and the start of planning some renovations to make the house a little more us - and to bring things into the 21st century. We weren't sure at the beginning if we would be able to use all of our large paintings from my mom, but with some creative hanging approaches we found a way to put them all up on the walls. It does make our living room look pretty dramatic - but everyone now and then you need to make a statement. We have started to meet with contractors to discuss our changes and to say how painful the pricing will be to accomplish what we want. The changes mostly center around updating the bathrooms, moving the laundry out of the basement, and adding some closet space so our clothes aren't scattered all over four bedroom closets.

For the long Memorial Day weekend, we took advantage of our new living arrangements - that is me staying home to take care of all the chores so our weekends are free to play. On Saturday we drove over to Madison to spend the day with Kathy, John, and Drew. First we hit the world's largest Bratfest (only in Wisconsin would this even be a contest and one does wonder how you can guarantee that you are largest Bratfest, who is keeping track and what are the criteria for claiming the prize of largest - number of brats served, people in the gate??), then up to the Farmer's Market on the Square, down to the Union, and then checking out some furniture stores for some ideas on filling a couple of spaces in our house. After a great dinner of shish-kabobs we headed home very tired but content with everything we got accomplished. Then after our morning run on Sunday, we hopped in the car again to travel to Lake Geneva to spend time with John and Linda and family. Unfortunately, the weather didn't cooperate to allow us to cruise around the lake, but we had a great time solving all the world's problems and enjoying hamburgers on the grill. On the way back to town we did stop at a farm store for some fresh asparagus and rhubarb along with a carrot cake to die for (or from, since the icing was about two inches thick). Then to complete our travels, on Monday we drove to Kewaskum, WI to buy a bench that Kathy and Jo had found on Craigslist. It was quite the deal since all the benches we had found during our furniture shopping was several hundred dollars - this one was only $35 plus the cost of gas. Love to save money. Plus we found a Woodman's grocery store during our trip - which allowed us to stock up on some key items missing from the local grocery stores! All in all a very successful weekend. This was actually our second time in Kewaskum as it was the center piece to an interesting travel adventure during graduate school and was key in Jo and I learning to never have two cars following each other without both knowing exactly where they are going.