On saturday, we toured Brandon and Jess' new home on the Coulee. During the landing process, they broke a pipe under the house, so they'll move in later this week. Congrats, guys! 

I carpooled with my parents back to La Crosse this weekend for my grandparent's 49th wedding anniversary. First, we stopped and saw Maryellen's new home (still under construction). 

Look at that fine Scandinavian-Italian craftsmanship. 

Hanging out out on the deck. We picked up a new outdoor table and chair set (no chairs pictured here). 

We finished the deck this morning. I put the last eight balusters (the spindly posts that function half as decoration and half as supports for the railing) on this morning. We grilled last night on it for the first time, too. 

Jane helped to coordinate the Evanston Athletic Club portion of the Lance Armstrong Ride for the Cure. She spun downtown outside of the NBC channel 5 news station. 

What a big mess! I went back to school for the first time today and found I had a new room. The buildings and grounds people are taking down the library shleving and I straightened much of it, but there's still HOURS of work to do to prepare for the school year.  

"Is that a pink dog purse?" -- Yes, yes it is. There are some questionable fashion designers out there. 

Here's what the deck looks like from standing on the deck. 

We passed the second inspection on our deck this morning. The structure is complete, and now, we dive into laying the decking, adding hand rails, and building stairs. The excessive curve on the deck is a function of photo manipulation, not construction. 

Yesterday, I staked out all of the posts for my deck, and tihs morning, I'm going to dig all the holes and insert the forms for concrete. 

Can you smell all that wood? I open up my garage and the pungent perfume of freshly cut wood wafts through my backyard. The wood is organized according to my Type A personality traits, by cut and by length. Yes, that is 24 backs of concrete in the corner. No, I hope not to use that many! 

These are two holes that I cut into the blacktop for posts for my deck. I used a circular saw with a masonary blade to make the incisions, then forked it out with a giant crowbar.  

The Interpretation

The Interpretation - Joe's new blog. He's trying to bring an artistic dimension to the world of blogging. I'm still confused, but I'm sure in time it'll come to make some sense. He's a good writer, I'll be interested to read further.

Yuck! I took down the stairs to our backdoor this evening. Tomorrow begins the big construction--I'll be installing the ledgers along the house, measuring out for the posts, and digging the post holes this weekend. 

Jane and I saw Allison Krause last night at Ravinia. We had awesome seats (thanks Joanna) with Brittany and Michael, but Amanda, Paddy, and her mom joined us on the lawn for some pre-concert eats. 

Whoa! We almost didn't get our deck supplies into the back yard, but our handy home depot delivery man somehow manuevered over my tomatoes to safely place our deck materials in the garage.  

John, Kerri, Elizabeth, Erin, and Jane. Erin and John are friends from IU, and Kerri is Erin's sister from Urbana-Champagne. All were in town today because John is presenting a paper at U of Chicago. Elizabeth is so cute (and pudgy!) 

Run, girls, run! 

My buddy Scott organized field day. Yes, ladies, Scott is still single.