Locked and Loaded

A month or so before Christmas Rich bought himself a Smith and Wesson 9 mm pistol. It's something that he's been wanting for a while and when a couple guys he works with bought one, he figured it was his turn.

On a side note: He works in Detroit in a not so nice area. I always worry about him at work and it's nice to know that he has a way to protect himself if he needs to.  Plus pretty much everyone working there is packing heat now!

Anyway, a few weeks ago he decided to buy another pistol, a smaller one this time that would fit in my hand easier. This is a Smith and Wesson M&P 380 Bodyguard. He says he bought it for me but he's not fooling me...he likes it more than I do!

This weekend we finally went to the firing range and for the first time in my life I shot a pistol; both of them in fact!

Here's my observation:

They are very loud!

They are very powerful!


They scare the bejeebers out of me!

 I can't hit the broad side of a barn!

But when we were done we both left there with smiles on our faces! We loved it and can't wait to go again!

There is an outdoor shooting range at Island Lake State Park and I think we will try that next time now that the weather is getting warmer.

And we are also planning on taking the class to get a concealed pistol license.

Yep, we're going to be locked and loaded!!!!

Until the next time....

WOW

Wow! It's been almost two months since I put a post on here. I guess I need to do some catching up!

It's been a long and very cold winter but now the temps are finally warming up, the snow is starting to melt, the sun is out more and more and the wedding is less than 3 months away!

 Here's some random things that have been going on.

My great nephew Gabriel turned 1 year old. His mom doesn't give him a lot of sweets so when he got a taste of his birthday cake he pretty much just planted his face into it!

My niece had to keep wiping cake out of his nose so he could breath! Guess he liked it!

I have a stand-up monitor stand at work now. The whole thing goes up and down and now I can either work standing up or sitting down. It's been great and I wish I would have had it years ago!

Another great nephew, Francis was baptized. Here is a picture of my dad and all his great grandsons!

Dominic holding Gabriel, Dante next to my dad holding Francis and Anthony on the other end!

It's hard to take a picture with crying , wiggling kids!

I stressed a lot about Shauna's bridal shower, which is April 12th.  It's being hosted by my daughter-in-law Marissa, who is the matron of honor, and Shauna's friends Sandy and Abby who are bridesmaids. I got everyone together including Shauna and Sandy, Brad's mom. and we had a planning session. Everyone has a particular job and it should all come together pretty good! 

The wedding planning is also coming along good. Brad and Shauna are taking care of most of the details, I'm just giving advice and helping when I can! It's going to be very nice!

Until the next time.....

Campus Martius Park

One Saturday night Rich and I decided to go to downtown Detroit, specifically to Campus Martius Park. We had heard it was pretty and actually had never been there during Christmas time.

We passed the RenCen on the way. You can't read the sign but GM headquarters is there. It was lit pretty although it's hard to tell through that dirty windshield!


We decided to just walk around. It was cold but not too freezing!

The tree was very pretty!

There is also a ice rink which was kind of crowded!

And a fire stick performer guy!

And horse drawn carriage rides. Sorry for the blurry pictures!

And pretty decorations all around!


It was a nice way to spend a Saturday night.

Until the next time!

Even More Random Catch Up

We picked up Shauna's wedding dress.

Here's a preview

Sorry, that's all you get until the wedding pictures! It is as beautiful as we knew it would be! The one she tried on in the store was cream colored but she ordered the dress in white.  It's VERY white and we were both afraid to touch it! It's also heavy!

This is a bread that someone I work with made to bring to the office Christmas party! So clever!

I took my dad to the Detroit Veterans Hospital for an appointment. This is the Wi-Fi page on my phone. Such a cool name they assigned their Wi-Fi!

He goes to the VA hospital strictly for his medications. He only has to go once a year and he gets them so much cheaper through there! That's is the least the government can do for him! He served in the Korean war and it wasn't voluntary.  He was drafted!

Until the next time!

More Random Catch Up

 
Here's some other stuff that went on...not necessarily in chronological order.

Rich's great nephew Lucas turned 1 year old!

He's cuter than cute that little guy! When it came time for his birthday cake he was a little overwhelmed with all the attention as a 1-year-old tends to be.

When his dad put the cake down Lucas just wanted to play with the candle!

When his dad took the candle away Lucas was not happy!

Until he got a taste of the cake that is!

In other baby news..my brothers third grandson was born!

This is Francis Arthur. I'm not saying anything about his name........! He is a cutie, though!

Until the next time!

Catching up

Well, these past few weeks have seen me extremely lacking in motivation and I have no idea why! Today I finally got my pictures off of my phone and camera so I figured I would do some catch up posts!

So as I mentioned in my last post, Shauna and Brad finally moved into their house. I didn't get any pictures of the empty new house but I did manage to snap some of the messy apartment before we started moving stuff out!

 As you can see we had our work cut out for us, but we managed to get it all loaded into a truck and 4 cars and hauled it 4.7 miles to the new house.

And the happy couple in front of their house before they went in for the first time!

I have to say that the previous owners were less than stellar homeowners.  First of all, the clean house that we first looked at was gone. It wasn't exactly filthy but there was a lot of crumbs in the cupboards and drawers and the bathrooms each needed a good cleaning. Thankfully, Sandy, Brad's mom took that task on while I cleaned the kitchen cupboards and appliances. The microwave was disgusting! I cannot tolerate a gross microwave! On a side note: 1 cup vinegar, hot water and 10 drops of lemon essential oil in a small spray bottle makes an awesome refrigerator and microwave cleaner! Works wonderful and smells so fresh and clean!

Another thing was the light bulbs. They were out all over the house! I know light bulbs sometimes have a tendency to go out at the same time, but usually only a couple.  In the light over the kitchen sink there was sockets for two bulbs, one was missing and the one that was there was out! The overhead light in the kitchen had a bulb out too. So as it was starting to get dark the kitchen lighting was pretty dim! Rich went and bought some bulbs and we replaced them and what a difference it made!

We also replaced the porch light bulb because that was burnt out, too! There were several others out around the house in the bathrooms and bedrooms. I don't think they replaced a bulb in 5 years!


But they love it and they are so happy to be out of that tiny apartment!

Plus they are only 3.7 miles from us! Bonus!

Until the next time!

6 weeks?

Just popping in to say hi and in case you are not friends with me on Facebook, I am still around..

Just busier than I ever want to be!

To catch you up:

Shauna and Brad moved into their new house last week. We worked from 7:00 a.m to 8:00 p.m. There is new meaning to the work exhausted but it looks nice and they are over the moon happy! More details later!

Work has been crazy busy but I also am taking my share of time off. I have to work through Christmas but I have New Years Eve off and don't go back to work until the following Monday.

I had 27 people at my house for Thanksgiving and trying to get a house with 5 cats ready for company is always monumental...but I loved it and we had a blast. It was so nice to see my four little great nephews runnning around!

I have the day off again tomorrow to go with my Dad to the VA hospital. I want to meet his new doctor and make sure they are taking good care of him!

I'll be back before too long with a proper post!

Until then...

Merry Christmas to all of you!