After Easter weekend - which was so much fun - the following weekend was Women of Faith here in Spokane. I went with my dear friend Jane and had a great time. The speakers were wonderful and the musical artists were fantastic. It was a really good time to reflect and remind me why I sacrifice and try to live the life God would want. Our friends from Tri-Cities were also up for the Conference and afterwards came over and had a good time.
The next week April 24-26 we had our hard wood floors refinished. Lots of sanding and dust and did I mention the STINK! WOW that stuff is smelly. We thought we could handle it by staying downstairs for a couple of days but we quickly discovered that it was necessary to evacuate. Thankfully we have wonderful friends and we retreated to their guest room for a couple of nights. Thanks Rusty and Jordan. When it was all dry and we were let back in the floors looked wonderful! We love them.
April 28-30 brought us outside for our motorcycle training class. It was a ton of fun learning to maneuver the bike and feel safe on it. By the end of that really long weekend we were both legal motorcycle drivers. We got our licenses updated that next week and we are now enjoying the bike in the warm weather.
We had a bit of fun with the teens on Cinco de Mayo with Game show night. All the teens and their families were invited - the youth staff set up 4 or 5 different game show games and we pulled the contestants out of the audience. It was great fun.
After that we ended the night at a Cinco de Drinko party with some friends and had a good time there as well.
The following weekend May 11-13 was filled with picking out, deciding on, buying, cutting, laying and grouting new tile for our fireplace. It was a totally new adventure and thankfully it turned out really great. We still can't wait to get it finished with the rest of the wood pillars and mantle. But that will come soon enough.Starting on May 15th we began the adventure of installing a sprinkler system. There was lots of figuring, drawing, charting, mapping, discussing and then came the removal of the sod the digging the digging and more digging! Both of our parents joined us for a long weekend... after it was all in it was wonderful to know that our grass would be green and that Mark would not be moving around a hose and sprinkler all summer again.
Saturday morning the 27th of May we loaded up the Subaru, picked up our friends, made sure we had birth certificates along and took off for the northern border. We went to a fun little town in Canada. While in Nelson B.C., we stayed in a historic hotel, visited the Ainsworth hot springs. On our way home we took a ferry ride across Kootenay Lake, stopped at a couple casinos and had a nice drive home. It was an action packed trip full of good memories.The first weekend in June was great! We finally emptied the garage onto the driveway and had a "garage sale" with some friends. We sold just about everything on the first day and thank goodness because the next couple days were super rainy.
The first part of June went by so fast with us finishing up small jobs around the house, celebrating Karen’s 25th birthday, painting a carousel pony for a charity auction and just trying to stay ahead at work. 
Soon we were leaving for Mexico (June 16). We packed the church bus full of 45 people (teens and adults) and headed this time for the south border. It was a long ride but we made it with little trouble. Once in Mexico we set out to build 3 houses in 3 days, finishing with time to spare. There was lots of playing with the Mexican children and giving away lots of toys. Those teens work so hard and gain some real perspective on how others live in our world. Mark and I feel really blessed to have been apart of such a great trip again this year.More to come soon to bring you all the way up to date...hopefully
