Recap of early July

We had a great trip to the beach and made it back safely. We got to spend some time with my sister, who has been there all summer with Summer Beach Project. She's been working as a lifeguard at Shipwreck Island waterpark and staying very busy with all sorts of projects, bible studies, etc. The "hotel" they are staying in (ok, it's actually a motor inn!) is quite cramped, so she stayed two nights with us. I would be scrambling for a night away too, if I was staying in a room with 5 other girls! Anyway, we visited with Laura, spent an afternoon with a friend of Jeremy's and his family, relaxed and read by the pool, and ate a ton of excellent food. Successful vacation! I have to say that Panama City has changed a lot since the last time I was there (May 2002). For so long, Panama City has had the party place reputation, and the last time I was there it certainly lived up to that reputation. However, it seems that they are making a conscious effort to return to a more family-friendly atmosphere, and it seems to be working. The majority of the lower-end strip motels have been turned into condos, and most places seem to require a minimum age of 25 to check in. The "strip," while still packed and slow-moving nearly all the time, was not full of drunk teenagers hanging out of car windows or riding in the back of trucks. I am sure there is more of that going on during Spring Break and senior trip time, but overall, we found PCB very laid-back and family-friendly. The new dining and shopping locale, Pier Park, was very nice and we went there at some point almost every day. It's similar to Bridge Street in Huntsville, but a little bigger. The only drawback was that most of the shops closed at 9. We tend to eat dinner pretty late on vacation, so a couple of nights we were left without many options for entertainment after dinner. We did venture over to Apalachicola on Saturday, where we spent the afternoon exploring and taking pictures. There is a very old cemetery right in downtown, and it was interesting to walk around and take in the history contained there. My favorite part was reading the inscriptions on the markers...kind of morbid, I know, but it's fascinating. Some of them dated back to before the Civil War. You can't find that just anywhere! Here are a few pictures from our trip:

Dinner at The Backporch with my sister and a friend of hers.

View of the beach from our balcony, with a storm coming in.

Spending the afternoon by the pool with Laura.

The week we got back from the beach was the week of the 4th of July, so I had a very short week. Jeremy worked on the 4th, so my mom, my aunt, and my cousin came to Huntsville. We did some bargain-shopping (Big Lots!) and had dinner. That evening, I learned just how much the people in my neighborhood love this holiday. Several people in our neighborhood shot fireworks, and I have to say, it was just as good as any professional show I've seen! I can't imagine the money they spent on fireworks, but I sat in the backyard and enjoyed them for two full hours. Chloe (our Eskimo Spitz) loved it because I was letting her run around the yard and bark her little heart out at them, but Petey Grace (my black-eyed shelter dog) was absolutely terrified of the fireworks. She refused to come outside after they started, and she sat at the backdoor the whole time so she could keep her eyes on us. The one time I coaxed (okay, pushed) her out the door, she jumped up in my lap in the lawn chair. Have I mentioned that she is not a small dog? She's about 30 pounds and very long-legged, so the image of her trying to curl up on my lap in the lawn chair she would barely fit in alone was quite comical. Apparently some of the neighborhood kids had leftovers from the 4th, because all weekend they shot small fireworks periodically. Poor Petey Grace was scared to go outside for days, but I think she's finally gotten over it.

So that's what has been going on in our lives lately. Nothing too exciting, just enjoying the summer as much as we can around our work schedules. We did have a pool party for the youth group on Sunday afternoon, which was a lot of fun, but tiring. The weather had been iffy all morning, but it held off for two hours, just for us! Literally...it was cloudy just before we got there, and it was raining less than thirty minutes after we left. God knew we needed that fellowship, I guess!

Weekend Happenings

This weekend was a pretty good one, as far as weekends go...at least until Sunday afternoon, but I'll get to that in a minute. Jeremy took off Friday night and we ventured into Huntsville to get my overdue birthday present (a brand-new laptop!) and had breakfast for dinner at Cracker Barrel. Saturday night was Kelly's birthday get-together, which I was a little unsure about all week. I was excited to see some people I hadn't seen in quite awhile, but also wondering if we'd have anything to talk about, since we are quickly moving way beyond the college sorority days. Kelly's circle of friends and mine began to diverge a little in college, and she is still in close contact with a lot more people than I am. I really shouldn't have worried though, it turned out to be a really enjoyable evening. I do miss seeing those girls sometimes, and though our conversations lean more toward the trials of sharing a marital checking account than which fraternity's formal is coming up next, I found I still had plenty in common with most of them. We grilled and just enjoyed being outside once the sun went down and it cooled down a little.

Sunday got off to a good start. Jeremy and I kept the nursery during church and we had 4 little boys to enjoy for an hour. I think Jeremy had a good time working puzzles and playing with the matchbox cars! It was our pastor's last Sunday with us, and it wasn't until after church was over that I realized I missed his last sermon. He has been with us for 4 years, which is a long time in the Methodist church, so we will miss him and his family a lot, I think. Having said that, we are all very excited about meeting our new pastor next week. He has three children, one of whom will be joining us in the youth group, and we have heard only good things about him so far. After church on Sunday, we went to dinner with my family, then headed for home. When we were around 30 minutes from home, Jeremy got a call from one of the county dispatchers, who asked if our dogs liked to escape from the backyard. (As a matter of fact, they do, which is something we are trying our hardest to fix, but we have some really smart dogs!) It seems our neighbor across the street had called the police because our dogs were in his yard. Needless to say, we made it home in record time. By the time we got there, the deputy had already caught our dogs and put them back inside the fence, and was out front talking to the complainer. They did not attack or bite anyone, and the neighbor even admitted the teenage boy in his yard had kicked one of my dogs when they wouldn't go away. The neighbor then went inside and got a shotgun and fired a shot in the ground to scare them. I was unbelievably upset at the way all of this transpired. I would completely understand some of this if my dogs had bitten or attacked someone, but I do not think our neighbor handled the situation well at all. I am really just thankful my dogs were not hurt, and I am glad they didn't hurt anyone either. Can you guess what Jeremy spent his day doing yesterday? If you said fixing the fence, you're a winner! We actually just got a privacy fence put up a couple of weeks ago, so we are just working out the kinks and blocking all the places they have been able to dig out underneath the fence (because we live on a hill, there are a few gaps where they can dig and squeeze out). We have tried a new method this time, and we are praying it takes care of the problem! So far, so good.

Puppies & Christmas Trees

Last week, I worked over a period of about two days putting up my Christmas tree (brand-new to me...thanks, Dad!) and getting it decorated just the way I wanted. Yesterday, in a period of about three hours, my two dogs completely destroyed all the hard work. I left them inside yesterday morning when we left for church because I knew it was going to rain, and I didn't really want to have to bathe them when I got home. Yes, I know, I should have known better.

I left church with my family to go eat, while Jeremy headed home to get ready for work...therefore, I didn't get the full effect of the destruction scene firsthand. But I can imagine. I thought for sure Jeremy was exaggerating when he said most of the ornaments from the bottom HALF of the tree were now crushed in the floor...he wasn't! How those two medium sized dogs managed to reach ornaments from 3-4 feet up the tree, I will never know. The bulk of our ornaments were glass balls, of course, so I was a little worried about how much glass they might have consumed. It doesn't seem to be bothering them so far, though.

Petey Grace gave me a glimpse of how much fun they must have had un-decorating my tree. I found two loose ornaments they had missed underneath the coffee table, so I laid them on top of the table until I got ready to repair the damage. Petey Grace took one look at me, grabbed the smallest ornament, and gleefully took off with it, apparently hoping someone would chase her. It was cute, infuriating as it was, and I could only picture the two of them spending the morning chasing each other around the room with colored Christmas balls in their little mouths. I had, up until that point, mostly blamed the damage on Chloe, as she is definitely the more mischevious one. However, Petey Grace clearly demonstrated she was a willing participant in the debacle. The final bit of damage I found was the frayed cord on the last strand of lights. They had completely chewed off the plug! At that point, I was just thankful they hadn't been electrocuted.

I redecorated the tree, pulling extra ornaments out of storage and moving some from the back to the front. I think I repaired it well enough for this season, but new ornaments will be in order for next year. I most definitely learned my lesson about leaving the dogs in the house unattended...they just aren't ready for all that freedom yet, apparently!