A visit with the newlyweds

Melody and I visited this fun newlywed couple for a few days this week, and we had a wonderful time!

Gretchen recieved a package from a friend while we were there. Bet you can't tell what was in it!

Notice the baby sling is in neutral colors. They are 90% sure they are having a girl, but you never know! This way the sling can be used for the next baby too. This is the newest addition to their family.
Mel enjoyed playing with Buttons, and I think the feeling was mutual.
One of the days, Gretchen took us to Walnut Point State Park. We hiked a 2-mile trail and enjoyed the beautiful fall colors.
She and Kyle have decided the trail difficulty is measured by number of benches, paved or non-paved, and the terrain. We were on moderately difficult trail. It was not paved and it only had one bench. Later we were brave and took a side trail into the unknown! It had a ravine and no benches--we were quite the explorers! ;-)
The bench was great for pictures. Some people say Melody and I look alot alike, and while normally I don't agree, I do think we resemble each other in this picture.
A silly picture
Are you all tired out, girls?
What an artistic shot!
Well...okay...it was a little contrived. We had to hunt for the different colors of leaves, but the fungus was there originally!
Natural modern art
I braved the weeds for this picture. The tree was huge!
The ravine of the difficult trail had steps going down one side but not the other. What's up with that? The trees surrounding the lake were so beautiful!

It was interesting taking pictures of all three of us.

We had to find some place to put the camera and then set the timer.
I think this was our favorite tree.
The brilliant red was so gorgeous! The picture doesn't do it justice!

Kyle thought of putting these flowers in our bedroom to welcome us. He picked them from their flower garden outside. They were so bright and colorful!
We talked, played games, talked, cooked, talked, ate, talked, watched a movie, talked, visited some friends, talked, hiked, and hmmm....talked some more! We had other options of things we could do, but we had so much fun visiting that we didn't get around to doing them all!

Notice the baby is in the picture too! A few more months and we'll get to see who she is!!!!

Thanks for inviting us! We had a great time with you both!

Girl Day in the Quad Cities

Last Friday we met some friends in the Quad Cities to have a "girl day". Our original purpose for going to Davenport was for Crystal and I to pick up our flutes from Denny's Instrument Service. We decided to meet up with Amber Moeller and Ava and Helena Bluedorn and spend the day together. We started at Borders and then went to Hobby Lobby and a few other stores before heading over to the mall.

Faith and Amber - aren't they cute in their pettiskirts?

At Hobby Lobby Amber was quite anxious to ring the little service bell...

Lunch at the food court in the mall...

First stop after lunch was Icing by Claires.
Crystal, I think that belt is a wee bit too big on you!
Becky and Helena had fun trying on the sun glasses. Ava very firmly told her sister, "Helena, you are not getting those!"

Aww, very cute, Amber! :)

Faith found a friend in the little bear that was sitting in the ear piercing chair.


What do you think, the next Batman?

Becky and I were nearly drooling over the fudge displayed at this Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory stand. We had to take a picture with the big bear just like we did on the last girls' day!

We really didn't buy that much, but we had fun browsing and just being together.


Here we are getting our flutes. They were being worked on for about two weeks and we missed them!



Naughty Becky...Needs to be spanked by her mom...(long story, you'll have to ask!)

Here are most of the girls, tired out from a long day of shopping....
We all had a great time and decided that we should get together like this more often! :)

Barn dance

What better way to enjoy a beautiful sunny day than at a barn dance?!

The Fuzak family hosted this fun event at their farm, and we had a wonderful time meeting new people, visiting with friends, eating yummy food, and, of course, dancing!

We decided we needed some new pictures of Jason, and one of them actually turned out!

Any of you that know him, know he has a hard time smiling right for the camera and not making a goofy face or a funny grin. We were quite pleased to have a nice one of him.

We liked the lighting and the background, so we had to take a few of ourselves too.
The barn was really neat! Amber M. was there that afternoon as well. She went with us to the English country dance the night before, and then we all came here for square dancing. Two nights of dancing in a row!
Dads and daughters...Mr. M, Mr. B, Amber M, and April B. Josh Fuzak
The Fuzaks demonstrating how to do "The Horse and Buggy"...... and the Hemmers dancing it. Dad was there too, but he mostly stayed out of the barn because of his allergies. Mine acted up as well, but I just took an antihistamine and tried to ignore them. I didn't want to miss out on all the fun!

Amber loves to dance, and her dad joined in too!
Mr. and Mrs. Fuzak are dance instructors. It was neat to watch them dance together--their movements were so fluid and beautiful! Mrs. Fuzak even taught Jason and Melody the correct steps for waltzing. Next time you see them, you'll have to ask them to demonstrate for you to see if they remember. =)
Our fiddler for the evening did a wonderful job!
Siblings and best friends