Addition, So Simple!

This is what Brian and I are considering doing in our halfbath downstairs after the hardwoods are completed. Let us know what you think!

A lovely nightstand:

+

A stylish wash basin:

=

An awesome new vanity!

If we end up following through with it, we'll have stolen the idea from younghouselove--a fun blog I peruse when I have time. Pictures of the hardwood installation coming soon. Promise.

Cheers!

It's Alive!

Thanks to Rob...my sister Tracy's husband...my trusty old Dell is up and running again. It has been for some time now, I've just been lazy to post anything. I've taken a lot of pictures since that fateful day my computer zoinked just haven't been faithful to post them for your viewing pleasure. Don't worry, I'll get there.

Anyway, I'm super excited that this came in the mail today!
Now, just picture Debbie & Brian in place of Morgan & Gavin and voila. Our mantle will be adorned :). (Baby stockings not included)

I'll try to post more pictures later of things we've been up to in the last couple months. We're slowly finishing the upstairs painting. Just one bedroom and a lot of trim left to go. We've been entertaining several estimates on hardwoods downstairs and carpet upstairs. I hope to see those installed before the end of the year.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. I'm looking forward to the short work week next week!

Computer Crash

Yep, that's right. My trusty old Dell went kaput. That's onnnnnnne of the reasons the blog hasn't been updated, along with all my pictures going bye-bye. I still have the pictures I backed up....a YEAR ago...sigh. Oh well. Guess I need to bust out the camera again and start taking pictures again :). It's just sad to think of how many pics are gone...good thing I blogged some of them!

So, maybe I'll have time to update the blog this weekend. We got Columbus Day off on Monday; a nice treat. I've got painting on the brain--I hope to get our master bedroom done this weekend!

Never fear my faithful few...there will be more posts...I promise...mwahaha.

Friday Who's Who...

A tad late *ahem* sorry :)

This one is a toughy. I'll be super impressed with those of you that get it right! This picture is from the Cincinnati Flying Pig 10k. My first race ever!

So, what's your guess? [click pic to enlarge]

Friday Who's Who?

Here's your weekly dose of Twin!

Who's who? Can you tell?

Friday's Who's Who?

I think I'm going to try to make this a regular post. I post a picture of my twin sister and me and you, my lovely reader, get to try to guess who's who! This may be a good Friday post, but with travel and such I can't guarantee it will be every Friday.

Thus, the picture:



So, how good are you? Post your comment!

The Hamricks House

This past weekend we crashed G & Mary's house in Herndon, VA while for the Chesapeake Open Ultimate tournament. They graciously allowed us to stay in their new-to-them home, even though they couldn't be there with us. Thank you again Hamricks for your hospitality.

Here are some pictures of their home. Unfortunately, it was dark while we were trying to take these so we didn't get many b/c the lighting was poor and the flash was doing funny things.

This is a picture of their pretty, new stainless appliances in the kitchen.

The Living Room

This was a really neat art piece that G made.
I think Brian and I may be copying it soon :)

Here's a sneak peak at a new purse Brian made for Mary
as a thank you for letting us crash their place!

The weekend was fun, and Brian's team did really well losing in the Finals after a hard-fought match against a team from Atlanta, GA. Way to go Ring of Fire. Being near DC makes me want to go back for a sight-seeing tour of the city...which I haven't done since I was going into 4th grade. I think we'll be calling on G & Mary in the near(ish) future. 8-)

To a fun trip!

A Picture I like

Who's who? Can you tell? :)

For all you Pet Lovers

An interesting post by my friend Zack. Check it out.



Let me know your thoughts, if you have any :)

House Update #3

Well, not much has happened around the Lowther Lodge lately. Projects have basically been put on hold due to a hectic ultimate schedule. Every other weekend tournaments really takes a lot out of the home improvement project time line! Though, as I write this I'm overwhelmed by pictures I've neglected to share with you. Like the mulch spreading, the cut down trees, and the completed closet project! So, without further ado, the pictures...

Here are a couple of shots of the mulch we finally were able to spread. Notice how far the pile has dwindled?! Yay. We have a couple more ideas about what to do with what's left.

Here are some before and after pictures of the work we did spreading mulch. We had to take up all the old pinestraw and pull weeds like crazy.

Before:


After:

More Mulch Pictures

On the right of this picture is a plant we recently planted. I can't remember what kind it is but it has fuzzy leaves and should grow up to 6' tall and 6' wide. Great hedge plants that should help screen the view of our neighbors' motorcycle backyard. We discovered 3 hollies and a couple of hostas peeking up among the weeds. Now that they have a prominent place in the bed, hopefully they'll grow up to be nice strong plants!

Brian and I hope to replace that dead plant over in the left hand corner with a Japanese maple one day. Also, we want to put in larger foundation plants because these suckers do an awesome horrible job disguising our foundation.

GROSS OUT ALERT!--If you are easily squeamish please do not look below! Except I have nongross out pictures after it...so scroll through quickly if you can't handle it :-D






Here's a little guy that came out to visit while I was clearing out the hosta bed along the righthand side of the house (see photo above). I seriously squealed with delight out of fear when he came slithering out RIGHT NEXT TO MY HAND! Brian calmly scooped him into the recycling bin and deposited him in the easement behind our home. We were curious if any of you might know what kind it is (click picture to enlarge)? We figured it was a harmless garden snake, but as you can see from the picture below he was coiled ready to strike. I guess that doesn't mean he's not a garden snake....anyone?....anyone?....Bueller?

And if you click on the picture to enlarge it you can see just how ginormous our little visitor really was! But seriously...when it's right there next to your hand, I don't care how big or small the thing is, eeeeeek! Our neighbor assured us he had never seen a snake in his yard. But he quickly observed our backyard is nearly a jungle compared to his perfectly manicured lawn. Just the way we like it :)

And now, here's the finished product of our closet venture...Should have seen the mess it was before. Thanks Brian and David for your hard work putting together a spectacular new closet!

Brian and David measuring to make it perfect. Perfection is hard to come by when your walls are not exactly straight :-/. But who can tell?!


Yep, appears to be level[headed]. har-har. Excuse me while I push my glasses back up my nose. *snort*


*The Handymen*
and...

TaDa! Hurray for no longer having your clothes in a pile on the floor. Notice the stained rods? I did that *clap, clap, clap*!

That's all for now, and if you're still reading, thanks! I hope you enjoyed another House Update!

Until next time,

Travels Galore

Ok, maybe not galore. As I told you recently, Brian headed to Seattle last week and got back this past Tuesday. Before he went there we took a mini vacation with Sion and Emily to Hilton Head. Here are a couple of pics. I was horrible with the camera so there aren't many!

Can you believe the size of that squash and zucchini?! Homegrown from the Stone's garden :)

On the trip back Brian's odometer rolled over to 150,000!












Here are some pictures of Brian's trip to Seattle! He did a great job and some are very artistic. I wouldn't be surprised to find several of the bridge pictures printed and framed on some lucky wall in our house sometime.



Here's a video of the famous flying sockeye!

Flourishing Fauna

Here are some photos of how my edgeworthia is progressing!

I love seeing how abundant my plant is becoming. I'm so thankful it seems to be growing well. Every time I take a look at it I notice new leaf buds sprouting out the top!

And something hilarious. Spellchecker didn't like the word edgeworthia so it suggested the following:

• Noteworthiness
  
• Blameworthiness
  
• Praiseworthiness
  
• Seaworthiness

Tehee :)

And a picture of my fern...bouncing back to life! I can't wait until this guy is jumbo and fills in that corner of the plant bed.
Anyone know what that pretty bush behind the fern is? I love the star shaped leaves but have no idea what it is!

Cheers!

Conviction

This post spoke directly to me. I can totally relate to this blogger...not sure who s/he is but man, I completely understand.

I had such an incident even today. Not walking through Central Park, but sitting at my desk. I even prayed on my way to work this morning that the Holy Spirit would fill me and help me control my tongue/thoughts. I even paraphrased 2 Cor 10:5 in order to prepare myself. I failed. But I know God's grace abounds.

Just wanted to share.

Busy Bees

Bzzzzz

So what have we been up to lately?

Well, Brian did an awesome job spreading this monster pile of mulch we got a couple weeks ago. We still have some left but he made a nice mulch path along the right side of our house leading to the backyard. It used to be a mucky, marshy mess (alliteration anyone?!) and now it's a pretty, mulch-y trail. He even repositioned the stepping stones and I couldn't be more pleased with his efforts. Great job sweetie!

My edgeworthia chrysantha is doing quite well. I'm actually very happy that it's surviving the heat. My fern seems to be bouncing back too! I was beginning to feel like a black thumb rather than a green thumb when I realized I scorched my fern! A Fern! One of the easiest plants to grow...they're very hardy, and forgiving--which is why I guess it's doing ok right now. ***With this current heat wave I better go check on it this afternoon!

I got the painting in the upstairs hallway finished this weekend! *Score* Just 2 more rooms to go and some baseboard painting before we get new carpet ! It will be awesome to get all that done and then get the rest of our furniture moved upstairs and have it actually look like we're trying to live in the upstairs of our house!

Brian and I got to go to Hilton Head with another couple last week (Aug 5-7). It was a great time and relaxing. All four of us got stung by a jelly fish--not bad though. We enjoyed playing bocce ball and reading and swimming in the pool. It was nice to just not be thinking about work and get to recharge for a few days. Thanks Emily & Sion for a fun time!

Brian heads off to Seattle, WA this Wednesday for the Emerald City Classic tournament. Go Ring! He'll be gone Wednesday-Monday arriving early Tuesday on the red-eye. I hope he and his teammates play well--I'll update you all once we know the results! They play the top 3 teams in the nation, right off the bat--shewy, what a lineup. I'm off to Winston-Salem this weekend for the Glazed Days Tournament. Looking forward to some Krispy Kreme doughnuts and fun ultimate!

I think that's all for now. It's been a busy past couple of weeks. August is nonstop for us with tournaments and planned activities! I hope to post some pictures to correspond with some of these posts. In the meantime, I hope you're enjoying life and loving Christ!

I'm Scared!

Brian and I came home yesterday to a door tag on our front door informing us that the Power company had contracted with Such & Such tree removal company to cut down a few trees on our property that pose a threat to the adjacent power lines.

I thought, oh, no biggie. Then I walked around to the back. There were about 10, T-E-N, trees flagged for removal! I was shocked. And not only was it 10 trees, it was ten HARDWOOD trees :-(.

The tree removal company showed up at 7:30am and Brian went and talked to them about what they were about to do. Sally called me this morning at work, because she was taking Grandma Lowther on a tour through our house, and prepared me for the drastic change. Always the upbeat, positive lady that she is she encouraged me with what wonderful new plants I could plant in place of the removed trees.

I've been in a rather depressed state today. Every time my mind wanders to the trees that are going to be gone I get sad. I'm trying to look at this as an opportunity to have more light stream through the back of the house and the potential for more sun-loving plants in the backyard. But I feel like our privacy and the secluded, quiet, feel-like-you're-in-the-middle-of-nowhere-backyard will now be whacked open for all the world to see...well open to all the folks that walk down the easement to the lake anyway.

Sigh. I'm sad. I took before pictures and believe me, I'll be taking some after pictures to chronicle the destruction I'm afraid has taken place. But hopefully, the rainbow in this picture will be a new direction for the backyard with a landscaped feel and the pot of gold will be a new place to plant that tree Brian and I bought months ago that has been residing in the Lowther's garden this summer.

Here's to a bright & sunny future!

Visitors & Razors!

The week before July 4th we had a few visitors. G was passing through and spent the night. He brought along Molly & Sadie. They had a good time looking out the storm door.

Sadie had had enough. And Molly looks guilty about something (;-)

Here's a sneak peak of the closet that Brian and his dad worked on on July 3rd. But mostly, this is a picture of how long Brian's hair had gotten. He kept complaining about how long it was and asked me to cut it(!).

I was a little nervous getting started. Wow, that's a weird face! But I didn't want to shave him bald!

I couldn't have done it without David's help! Thanks David!

Feeling a bit more confident...Brian looks a little nervous

He's either in pain or scared out of his mind!

Ahh, it came out alright :) Let me know what you think!