Happy Father's Day!

We got a lot closer to finishing the bathroom this week.  We installed the sinks, faucets, and hooked up the plumbing.  We’re happy to report that there are no leaks! 

The vanity is starting to look much better.  We still have to make some modifications to the drawers but we can at least get the final inspections completed without them. 

The closet wall (which we have been using as the main door for the bathroom up to now) has been installed and the first couple coats of drywall compound have been applied.  It’s amazing how dark the hallway feels now that the opening is gone.  We have the door already painted and should install it this week!

Over the weekend we continued with the fence installation.  It was too hot during the middle of the day so we worked a little bit each evening.  We now have the pickets installed on the right side of the fence.  To finish the fence all we need to do is build a gate for that side.  Then it will just be a matter of taking down the old fence.  I’ll share pictures once it’s completed.

We were disappointed this week – our CSA was supposed to make the first delivery but there was a problem at the farm.  Hopefully it’s all fixed and we’ll get our first basket this week!   I am so excited about having delicious vegetables!

Our garden is doing very well.  Our tomato plants are thriving and it looks like we’ll have a good harvest of squash this year.  The eggplants and peppers are not great but they seem to do better with the warmer temperatures in summer.  It’s also nice to be able to go out and grab a handful of fresh basil again – we’ve missed it!

We did a lot of non-house related things this weekend.  On Saturday we walked over to the Columbia Lakefront for the Festival of the Arts.  We got to see the trapeze artists, listen to good music, and go to Bookapalooza at the library (Samantha enjoyed storytelling).  It was a fun (but tiring) day!

On Sunday, after church, we went to the grand opening of the new Wegman’s near us (doesn’t everyone go to the grocery store on Father’s Day?).  There were a ton of people there but it looks like a great store – 135,000 square feet!  We bought food for our Father’s Day picnic there and we were not disappointed.  I hope to take Samantha back next week when the crowd dies down a little bit. 

To celebrate Father’s Day, we packed up a picnic lunch and headed to Centennial Lake.  We had a nice time enjoying the day.   Samantha enjoyed lying on the blanket outside and she kept squirming her way over to get a hold of the grass.  We have a feeling she’s going to be crawling soon!

This week was Samantha’s four month checkup at the pediatrician.  She is doing great!  She is meeting all the milestones for her age (plus some!).  She weighed in at 15 lb. 9 oz. (over 90^th percentile) and is 26 inches long (97^th percentile).  So we have a very large (but proportional) baby.  The one thing that isn’t proportional is her head circumference – she’s in the 25^th percentile for that! 

We looked at my old health records and Samantha and I are almost exactly the same size at that age (she weighs 3 oz. more and is the same length).  I guess this means she’ll be about 5’8” when she’s all grown up! 

While Chris and I were installing fence pickets, Samantha was sitting in one of her seats outside.  I looked over and she had a big mosquito on her forehead – it’s a pretty decent size bite so we’ll just have to keep an eye on it. 

She has been very vocal lately and is laughing a lot more.  Here is a video I took of her in the swing at one of our neighborhood playgrounds (there is a highway close to this one so there’s a lot of background noise).

She seems to find Tucker fascinating.  Every evening when Daddy gets home, they go out in the backyard with the dog.  Tucker rolls around, plays with sticks, runs in circles, and barks, and Samantha giggles, smiles, and watches him intently.

She is very close to sitting unaided and she keeps trying to sit up when she’s lying on her back.  She gets about halfway up before getting frustrated.  (Yes, that is our new toilet in the background!)

And of course she continues to love playing with toys.  One of her favorite games is during dinner – “Drop my rattle on the ground and see how many times they’ll pick it up for me when I cry!”  That game is getting old very quickly!

 

This week’s pictures were after bath time so they’re a little dark and she’s a little tired!

That’s all for this week!  We hope to have the shower plumbing and toilet installed soon so we can get the final inspections completed for the bathrooms.