Before, after, and a surprise!

So I wrote on Facebook that I placed rubber mulch in my flower beds.  It looks so much better than bark, it holds the moisture in better, doesn't loose it's color, and is coated with antimicrobials so it will not grow mold. 

Here is the flowerbed before I did any planting or layed the rubber mulch. It is pretty sad looking.

Here it is after rubber mulch is placed, and flowers planted.  I should have taken pictures before the tree started to loose it's leaves.  It looks so much better. 

This is a close up of the rubber mulch.  It looks real and totally improved the look of the front flower bed. 

We were completely limited on what we could do to the front of the house per HOA regulations.  We wanted to increase the curb appeal by placing nice chocolate brown shutters, paint the front door, and change the entrance light fixtures to bigger ones.  The HOA shot down each of these ideas.  They said we could do anything that was already done on other homes...I don't think they understand that this does not help us STAND OUT from the other homes in the area.  Some of these other things involved placing siding or rock up on the house.  Both of these options are REALLY expensive and we wanted to improve curb appeal for small $$.  Geez...they totally don't watch HGTV (my favorite channel). 

Anyway, we hope our small changes help us bring in the $$ quickly because.....

DRUMROLL.......

We are moving and need to sell! 

Yes, you read right.  We made an offer on a home almost 2.5 weeks ago and just heard that we are under contract.  We are supposed to close by October 30th!  We are kinda freaking out that October 30th is only 2 weeks away. 

We have a LOT to do in the next 2 weeks and not looking foward to it, but we are WAY excited!  I will post pictures of the house a little later! 

Just a tad bit behind...

So I've slacked again and just barely posted things from back in July. So please scroll on down through some posts to see the previous ones that took me forever.

I had some serious issues with the slide show feature today. It totally ticked me off and then I called Ashley and of course she knew how to fix it. I should have called her earlier and saved myself some time. Thanks Ash!

Oh well...I have more to post but will call it a day today. More later.

Battle wounds...

When Al sliced his wrist open with a mirror (accident) back on Memorial Day weekend, I took pictures with my phone camera while we were in the ER. When we got home, I couldn't find where my phone had saved them. I looked forever. Then the other day I FOUND THEM!

**WARNING**

Bloody pictures to follow...

If you have a weak stomach, you may want to skip this post...

(Personally, I think they are awesome pictures and not gruesome at all. But I've been reminded that not all people like blood. I just wish my phone camera was better quality; they are a little grainy and don't show all the cool anatomy that the mirror slice exposed.)

His wrist is healing slowly. He has had problems with some "binding" of the tendons. The surgeon thinks he has some scar tissue that developed around the tendons which is limiting his movement. He has another follow-up appointment next week (I think) to evaluate to the need for further surgery to break up the scar tissue. He has been doing his exercises to loosen the tendons but it just doesn't seem to be improving a whole lot.

We hope he doesn't have to have another surgery. However, he says, "if I have to get it done, I want to get it done before Christmas so I can snowmobile at the cabin." Talk about priorities. LOL!

Island Park with Friends!!

We went to my Dad's cabin with our friends and their families in July. We planned the excursion MONTHS in advance so everyone could arrange their schedules, get work off, plan, etc....

All in all we had 6 adults (Beka, Kent, Dave, Katie, Al and myself) and 5 kids (Tyse, Emmitt, Ollie, Lincoln, and Scout). Despite the long drive and packing involved, we had an awesome time.
Al and I pulled our boat up and the kids had a blast. Now whenever Katie or Beka mention to their kids that Al and Nikki are coming somewhere, they ask if we are bringing the boat. I guess we are now the "boat people". We surfed, wake boarded, and skied. The kids spent a lot of time swimming (even when the water was cold and their teeth were chattering so bad they couldn't talk).


We spent a day in Yellowstone park seeing Old Faithful and the other geysers in that area. Al and I are not very good at taking pictures. We just forget we have a camera and don't remember to take it out.

Now we all need to plan for a winter exhibition to the cabin...

I caved to the rage

I caved to the Twilight rage. I started reading the books before our trip to Island Park (week of July 4th) and since then I've read all four of the Twilight books. I must say that books 1 and 3 were my favorites.
I'm definitely part of "Team Edward". I've heard that many people did not like four book, "Breaking Dawn", I have to disagree. It wasn't my favorite, but I still enjoyed it.

What can I say? I caved and am in love with the saga. Although I don't think I got into as much as my friend Kristina - she claims to have had times where she wondered what Edward was doing. (Sorry Kristina. I had to confess the different levels of obsession so I could say I wasn't as bad as you).

Anyway, I loved it and highly recommend it to others (like myself) who resisted the initial craze.

Island Park 2009 - - Hunsaker Family Trip

Ode to the beautful cabin

and it's amazing sun sets...

This family time at the cabin was especially important as it was right before Kenny and Carrie moved to China. It would be the last time our entire family was together for a long time. We had tons of fun and laughed way too much.

Highlights include:

The first "Dink Olympics" starring Kenny and Craig.

Exhibit 1:

Exhibit 2:

Austin's 5th birthday at the cabin.

Noah got a little excited to help Austin with the candles.

Fishing:

Surfing:

More pictures:

Last group of pictures:

Fun was had by all and the week went by WAY too fast for me. I swear, I will find something that I can do while living at the cabin so I never have to leave. Until then, I just have to continue to visit often and enjoy it while it lasts.

Decision time

I've been doing a lot of thinking about my future and what I really want out of life. I have a great opportunity at work and am feeling some HUGE pressure to apply for the job that I've been doing as a "temporary" assignment for the last year.

A little background for those of you who may not know, I have been doing double duty at work for the last year. Not only have I been the Dialysis Nurse Manager (and occasionally still staffing the unit) but I've also been the Acting Associate Chief of Ambulatory Care. The second job is my boss' old job. She was just promoted to be the Nurse Executive for the hospital. The hospital's main leadership is called "The Pentad" and it consists of (obviously) 5 members: The Director, The Associate Director, The Chief of Staff, The Nurse Executive, and The Director of Clinical Operations. Under the Nurse Executive are the "Associate Chiefs". I've been doing one of those jobs (which consists of being over all the out patient areas in the hospital for nursing). It is a pretty high visibility job and I love doing it. However, I also love doing dialysis and being their manager. I get a little confused on what I want out of life and what choices I should make.

The job became available a couple weeks ago and I applied so I wouldn't have to act in the position any longer. I hoped that by not acting that my decision would become more clear. The VA has this rule about not acting in a position that you want to apply for...some how acting in a position for a year is okay but acting in it while the position is posted MIGHT give me some unfair advantage. Whatever...the advantage already happened. Not acting did it's job. I was able to find some clarity and peace with my decision. I didn't falter anymore.

I made up my mind last week. I do not want to apply for the job. I should rephrase that, I want it but the timing is all wrong. As much as part of me wants the job, I want to focus on other aspects of my life. It was pictures like the ones in this post that helped me make my decision. These pictures just make me smile. After looking at them or spending time with these kids that I know FOR SURE that I want kids to be in my future and I can't get them here if I'm working all the time or if I'm so stressed that I can't function outside of work.

I've stolen most of these pictures from other peoples' blogs...so for those of you who see Carrie or Ashley's blog on a frequent basis, this may be a repeat for you. Oh well...enjoy them again.

If you didn't know, the kids in this post are my sibs kids. The little girl is Ellie (Ashley's little girl), the first boy - in green shirt - is Micah (Chris' youngest boy), 2nd boy - in red shirt - is Zachary (Chris' oldest boy), 3rd boy -in royal blue shirt - is Austin (Chris' middle boy), and the 4th boy - in sky blue shirt - is Noah (Kenny's little boy).