60 Years and Counting

Cal and Laurel Bucher were kind enough to stay married for 60 years so we could have a party today. It was great to see them as well as a number of folks we knew from years ago at Kimball Church.

Click on the photo below which will take you to an online photo album of today's party.

Cal and Laurel Bucher's 60th Anniversary Party

New Clothes

After sending my returns back and ordering some replacements I decided to try our local Sears store to see what they could offer. Rachel and I went to the old tired mall (instead of the new fancy mall) and found everything in the Petites section on sale-yay! I got two tops and two capri pants all for $35.

Next, to the shoe store for some new walking shoes to replace the free pair I got from Janet which now are totally worn out. I really wanted Nikes because they seem to fit the best on my fat feet. Lady Foot Locker seemed too expensive, then Rachel spied what I really wanted in a different section of the store: white Nike walking shoes, on sale, and in wide width. Yay!

The rain keeps coming, but Gary managed to mow the lawn again last night just before the latest downpour. This morning he's weeding his flower garden while listening to tapes.

This afternoon we plan to go to Cal and Laurel Bucher's 60th wedding anniversary party.

In other news, Rachel is helping at a Vacation Bible school this morning and has faxed her resume to yet another Christian school.

Returns

I spent the early birthday money my mom sent me on some clothes from Land's End. They arrived today, and not one of the tops fit. If they had come from the boutique, I would have remodeled them since they were all too big. Instead, I sent them back to exchange the size. We also recently bought Gary a couple new pairs of pants and they are all too long. Good thing I know how to sew.

Rachel continues to look for a teaching job for the fall. She has yet another Christian school to apply at--but they really want a PE/music teacher. Wouldn't it be a hoot to have Rachel be the PE teacher??

Andrew sent an email last night. He's got his hands full these days. Here's an excerpt:

we sent in the final version of a $2.1 million six year extension for the VCT project. Deadlines and proposals always are stressful. Also, we got a surprise bill for $11,050 unexpected and unbudgeted fines from the process of receiving all of those containers of food today, which was not pleasant and we are trying to negotiate out of. Tomorrow the director of [****] is coming to visit one of our projects on the [****]coast, so I have been working on setting that up too. And Friday the four interns come for five months and me and Laura are trying to set up their apartment since Monica is gone on home leave now and she is the one who is supposed to oversee the interns. Also one of the four seems to have a mother who is a little over anxious about her coming and working in the HIV testing project because her mom thinks this will give her AIDS. So I have had to deal with an upset mom this week, and her daughter still isn't here yet.

He makes our life seem so hum-drum.

And it continues to rain here! Here it is the end of June and it is raining every day. The grass won't quit growing.

Our plans for our trip to California and Oregon are nearly complete. We've bought our airline tickets and reserved the rental cars. Turns out we will see Gary's parents while we are in CA as they will be visiting there too.

Slow Day

Not much going on today. Gary finished the mowing. We've been having so much rain even this late into the summer that the grass keeps growing, but there is no time to mow because it is always wet.

David has finished his 2nd year of medical school and has scheduled his big standardized test for late July. He has to pass this test to move on to the next phase.

Rachel had another job interview yesterday but didn't think it went that well. I guess she just has to wait and see. And she has to keep trying.

My mom already sent me a check for my upcoming birthday so I got inspired and went shopping on the internet at Land's End. I hope the three tops fit.

Gary is starting to work on his sermons for our upcoming trip. He finished another project yesterday, so now he's on to working on this.

Andrew Won

This month we received an unexpected sizable gift in our monthly support check. This happened just when Andrew was here visiting us a few days ago. A discussion (that's a nice way to put it) ensued about which project these extra funds should go toward:

Me: We need new bathrooms.
Gary: We need a new car.
Andrew: You need a Roth IRA.

Today I capitulated to Andrew. I even tried to read those 48 pages of gobbledygook. No wonder people get degrees in financial planning--no ordinary person could begin to understand all that stuff!

Change in Plans

Poor Rachel. Some people seem to always get the bad luck!

She worked hard studying all week to take her ESL certification test tomorrow. This afternoon she pulled out the admission ticket and it had a date in AUGUST on it! So, it looks like she won't be taking the test tomorrow.

We know exactly how this mixup happened--she had tried to get approved for alternative testing, but was denied. However, the person who denied her signed her up for regular testing, as she had asked them to do. However, the lady signed her up for a different day--accidentally, we assume. Unfortunately, Rachel didn't notice the mistake until this afternoon, too late to do anything about it.

Rachel was pretty upset for a number of reasons, so we decided to go to the Lake to eat our Subway sandwiches. That was a pleasant way to get her mind off the abrupt change in plans. While at the lake Gary stole some ripe bluebonnet seed pods and removed the seeds to plant in his own garden.

Update

The house is more or less back to normal. Andrew and Laura got safely back home in San Pedro Sula. I assume David got back home too, but he didn't call me (bad David!!). It was lots of fun having everyone together for a short time. I posted some photos which you can see by clicking on the photo below.

Family Reunion June 2007

If you're reading Rachel's blog, you'll see that she's already posted her version of the fun birthday vacation weekend.

Now Rachel has to get back to studying hard as she takes another certification test on Saturday morning. Please pray for her.

Our internet has been so cranky, I'm thinking about changing providers. Other than that, life is good.

Rachel's Birthday

Our internet continues to be very cranky, so I'm going to try to hurry and post this before it dies again!!

Andrew provided Rachel with a gift of 12 Rangers' tickets, so she gathered together some friends and family and off we went. We were too cheap to pay for parking, and besides, after eating the cake and ice cream we brought, we needed a 15 minute walk across the freeway to burn up some calories.


The Rangers got clobbered, but the weather was perfect and we had a nice time.

Back from a Very Little Trip

Sigh. Our trip to Oklahoma didn't turn out very well. Rachel's car died just south of Gainesville. We were going along at 60mph and suddenly, it just died. Rachel was driving and did a great job coasting over to the side of the road and putting us in a (relatively) safe place. Read the details on her blog.

She was very disappointed not be able to see her roommate get married, but at least we were safe, so I told her she had to be happy about that.

So we got home early and did some window washing and carpet cleaning instead.

Off On a Little Trip

Tomorrow morning Rachel and I are planning to hop in her little car (1988 Subaru) and see if it will make it to Oklahoma City. Further, we plan to use this trip as a time when Rachel can practice some freeway driving. Unfortunately, last night three warning lights lit up and when she took it in for a mechanic to look at this morning, he just mumbled something about a bad sensor. Let's hope that's all it is. But I am taking the jumper cables along, just in case.

The reason for the trip is Rachel's former roommate, Shannon, is getting married at 2pm.

Tomorrow Gary will continue his job sawing up another tree that fell down in the back yard.