How we spent our New Years Eve

Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Every New Years Eve for the past 4 years, Christi and I have not spent our New Years Eve like most people.  Many people are at homes gathered together with family and friends watching TV or playing games and eventually watching the ball drop in New York at Midnight.  We have spent our New Years Eve running sound and lights and slideshows for a New Years Eve Concert which was held at our church.  It was not put on by our church but our auditorium would be rented by a local quartet called “The Staffmen”, and they would have several other groups that would sing as well.  We always laughed as it was what we liked to call the “Grey Haired People’s Concert”, as the average age attending this concert seemed to by around 70 years old or more.  It was amazing every year they would pack it out with around 1,000 people in attendance.  We thought we would share some pictures as this may be our last year hosting it as the “Staffmen” may be retiring after 45 years of singing together.  The concert would start at 8:00pm and end at midnight and then we would spend a couple of hours cleaning up afterwards.  Christi has always been a big help to me on this evening as she would help with running lights or putting up songs on the big screens when the audience would sing.  This year we just made it a fun time for the two of us, and took these picture to share.

My wife is the ultimate multi-tasker and here you see her putting the picture on the blue computer screen up on the big screens, and checking her email and singing along with the song.

                                     Songshow

Here Christi is listening to the concert and working on her Stampin’ Up! project by cutting something out for a card she is creating.  She is even using two mouse’s at the same time, and two different keyboards.  We had a laugh at one time as she pushed the spacebar on the wrong keyboard and made a song come up on the screen at the wrong time.

Stamping Up             Using two mouse's

What was I doing while she was doing ALL this work??

Running soundboard and lights.

And, of course, checking on my email!

Running sound              Running lights

We always get a laugh at around 10:00 to 10:30 it must be a lot of people’s bedtime as during an audience singing time we would watch a mass exit as we would lose about one half the audience so that at the end of the night, at midnight we would be down to only around 200 people.  If this is the last year of holding this concert we will have to start a new, New Years Eve tradition that we can enjoy together for years to come.  We wish all our friends and family a Happy New Year!!!!!!!!!

 

Dale

Time For Another Building Project

Monday, January 2, 2012

The laundry room/bathroom is complete so now it is time to start our next faze of finishing off the basement.  Christi helped me before going off to Texas on Tuesday for Stampin’UP! leaders meeting. We cleared out the side of the basement where we are going to install a second kitchen complete with sink, stove and refrigerator.  And then as Christi says, “Lots and Lots of cupboards”. 

This is what it looks like before I start.  I did just finish installing a new breaker box as our old one was out of breakers.  The picture on the right, is the hallway which will lead into the Kitchen, we will have another opening also which will come from the large project room Christi does her classes in.

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First had to make a trip to my favorite store, “Lowes” to pick up some lumber.

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That’s all I got done on Monday as I had Tyler and Gracie come over and spend some time with their Grandpa.  Gracie had fun playing on the computer while Tyler and I watched the Michigan vs.. Michigan State basketball game.  Tyler is a big State fan and of course Grandpa is a Michigan fan.  We enjoyed teasing each other back and forth while enjoying some popcorn.  They had to leave before the game got done so yesterday at 7:45am I get a phone call from Tyler, and he said “Grandpa, who won the game?”.  I got to tell him Michigan won by one point.  He was not to happy about that.

Tonight with my wife off in Texas enjoying 75 degree weather and it being 9 degrees here with the wind chill making it feel like 4 below (do I sound a little jealous?) it was time to see about putting the wall together.  It went quite well and I was able to get it up.

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Now that the wall is up, I need to figure out where I need to put all the electrical outlets and plan for the cupboards.  This is the part I do not enjoy, the planning out how to build the cupboards.  I have been doing a lot of reading and “Google” searching on how I want to go about building them.  I have to do this all before I put the outlets in and put up any drywall.  So for now I think I will go and enjoy some Redwings hockey and find something to snack on.

Dale

About Us

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Welcome to our blog. We have been married for 33 years. Dale works as the facilities manager at Grace Community Church (the same church that we have both attended since we were babies). Christi does day care at home along with her Stampin'Up! business and cake decorating business. We have 3 children. Our daughter Julie is married to Jeremy and has two kids, Tyler and Gracie. She works part time as an Office Manager and full time as a mom to our two grandkids. Jeremy is a chef at Uccello's Italian Restaurant. Our son Jeff works as a Certified Termite Route Technician for ORKIN and was recently married to Jessica. We are thrilled to have this new daughter added to our family. Our son Joey works in the warehouse at Gentex.

Our Family Blogs

Our Family Blogs
Click picture above to visit Christi's blog dedicated to her cards and cakes

Click picture above to visit our daughter Julie's blog

Jeff's Books

Jeff's Books
Click Picture To Preview & Order

Click Picture To Preview & Order