Summer Garden and Cat Pictures

Here are some pictures from our garden in mid-Summer and some cat pictures:

A Wedding and a Vacation

One of Chad's oldest friends got married this summer.  Their wedding was the day before we left for vacation, so we were very glad to get to be there for their big day.  Here are some pictures from Butch & Cissy's wedding:

We love going to Wrightsville Beach for vacation and I was really looking forward to enjoying the beach this summer. But, unfortunately we had a pretty bad vacation this year and ended up coming home early.  The place where we stay (and where my family has been staying for almost 20 years) decided to do work to the building in the middle of peak beach season.  After 4 days of drilling on the building (2 of those days were on our room balcony!) we decided to leave early and come home.  Also, Chad somehow hurt his neck, so I couldn't keep going out on the beach and hanging out knowing that he's hurting.  Even though I was VERY disappointed with the place we stay, the bright side was we got some extra time off at home which was nice too.  But, I still LOVE the beach and we did get to spend some time on the beach even with our shortened trip.  Here are the pictures from our shortened vacation:

Canning Class

Chad & I have been interested in canning for awhile now.  We found out that most county extension offices offer the classes for a VERY reasonable price.  The Union Co. extension office ended up offering a class on a day and time that worked for us.  We also invited another couple we're friends with who are also interested in canning, Mike and Leanda.  Leanda and I work together currently and Mike and I have worked together in the past.  It was a lot of fun to get to take the class with another couple who's also interested in a lot of the things Chad & I are interested in.  The class had a LOT of information, but the instructor was great and she made it really interesting and fun.  Here are a few pictures from our canning class:

Barbee Farm Tour May 11, 2013

We LOVE our local farmer's market and are very glad that one of the locations near us is year-round.  We go just about every weekend and even when I have to work on a weekend Chad will go for us.  During the winter months the farmer's market slows down and there are only a few die-hard farmers that come throughout the winter.  Because we were there almost every week, we got to know a few of the farmers a little better.  One of the farms that we buy a lot of our vegetables from is Barbee Farms.  This May they had a tour of their farm that was open to any and all of their customers.  We definitely wanted to be there to continue to show our support to their farm, but also because you get to really see where this food comes from.  When you buy food in a grocery store you have no idea who grew it, picked it, packaged it, etc.  Plus, there was free all-you-can-eat homemade ice cream!  Here are our pictures from the Barbee Farm tour:

Spring Changes at Our New House

One of the things we were most excited about with our new house was the fact that we could have a much bigger garden.  Throughout the winter Chad was working on our garden area - laying down cardboard to kill the grass, building the raised beds, putting up a fence, etc.  So, here are some pictures of our new garden:



Chad also installed a new ceiling fan for our bedroom. Here are some pictures of the installation and our new fan:

We also bought some patriotic decorations for our new house for Memorial Day and the 4th of July: