Go Cubbies!!!!

We managed to catch part of the I-Cubs game over the Labor Day Holiday. We left about the 5th inning. On the way through the parking lot Gavin said, "Can we could do something fun, now?"

Max is two wheelin' it!!

Max is now tall enough to reach the pedals of the two wheeled bike!! He is so excited about riding his bike and wearing his helmet. It is awesome that him and Gavin are both bike riders now. I was able to go for a walk tonight, at a pace that was faster than turtle, with Gavin and Max riding their bikes!!

Fishing Frenzy

Gavin is the fisherman in the family. Something he learned from me, I think. Well, definitely not from Ron. So far Gavin has caught more fish than Ron has this year! (Not that Ron is counting)

KINDERGARTEN!!!!

Gavin loves Kindergarten. He talks about recess, friends, PE, lunch, and everything in between. Tonight he asked if I would make him his lunch to take tomorrow. So tonight is the first time I packed a school lunch. How exciting for me AND for him!!!

Iowa State Fair

We managed to make our way to the Iowa State Fair again this year. And we brought Great-Grandma along for the ride!! We managed to borrow a scooter for G Grandma to ride on and nearly run people over with! Here are some pics from the beautiful day.

Slip-n-Slide

So we pulled out the Slip-n-Slide for the boys to play on. Ron thought he had to show Gavin how to do it. I think Ron just wanted to try it for himself.

However we officially sunk to "white trash" level when Ron pulled off his shorts and started sliding in his underwear. Now we almost have to move!

Meet the Teacher

We were able to meet Gavin's Kindergarten teacher at a picnic in the city park. From what I understand, none of the other teachers put this together which makes me very excited to see what the rest of the year brings!! We were able to visit with Mrs Bejarno, ask questions, meet the other parents and students, and then the kids played a game with the teacher. I am soooo excited for Gavin to start Kindergarten. I just know he is going to love it!! Only 5 days left!!

Reconstruction

Well, we are making progress on the basement. Thanks a bunch to Raymond for all of your work!!!! We had to cut out the bottom foot of drywall all the way around the whole basement. And of course, in order to do that, we had to remove all trim, the sink, the carpet, and so much more. The drywall is replaced, mud and taped, and textured again. We had to repaint everything so we went with off-white (thinking ahead to selling time). Of course, Ron can't go without his wonderfully beautiful HDTV flat panel tv. So he sits in a folding chair and watches it all by himself in the basement. Men and their electronics. I will never understand it!!!!

During clean up

These are clean up pictures. The carpet is pulled up and fans are blowing under the carpet. There is a monster size dehumidifier in the basement. All of the walls have holes poked in them about every 6 inches at least. They had to discard the baseboards and carpet pad. Where they took off the baseboards some of the paint peeled off and the dry wall tape peeled up. In the bathroom is the worst, as far as the walls. It took a chunk of dry wall off.

I also added a picture of our garage which is crammed with stuff, a lot we will have to throw away after the adjuster sees it. Like the couch: It sits close to the floor and so the water wicked up the fabric and into the inside of the couch. It was wet at least 4-6 inches up the side of the couch.

The basement version of Typhoon Lagoon

With all of the torential rains, flooding, high winds, tornadoes, etc, etc here in Iowa, it seems amazing that we made it through the end of June with no problems. However, the problem caught up to us and now we are paying (a deductible) for it. The photos are of our basement which flooded Sunday night. Since the electricity went out we were without a sump pump for 9 hours. We had a small river in our basement which managed to wreak havoc on nearly everything. Our furniture, sub woofer, entertainment center, book case, along with several other things are currently being stored in our garage until the adjuster can come look at it and assess the total cost of damage.

Service Master came out today and pulled up the carpet, tore out and disposed of the carpet pad, punched holes in the wall to dry the insides of the wall out, sprayed anti-mold foam on everything, and cleaned up the dirt and sand that washed in. I am gratefuly they did all the work!!

These are before pictures. You can see where the water is by the color difference in the carpet. The darker areas of carpet are where it is wet. If you can't see a color difference it is because all of the carpet in the picture is wet. 95% of the basement carpet is wet.

Typhoon Lagoon

The kids area had little slides, squirt guns, water falls, and a short little river they could float down. They had so much fun here, and they were exhausted when we left.