I can’t wait, can’t wait, can’t wait. Today is the neighborhood BBQ. It should be a lot of fun. I love our neighbors and celebrating the 4th is going to be the best ever. I got my camera ready to go for the whole evening so look forward to pictures later. Yesterday I went to Costco and got all the things we needed for the BBQ. It was fun buying all the party things. I love parties. I love hosting them and having people over. The best part is as the host it’s my responsibility to make sure everyone is having a good time and making it as easy for everyone to enjoy the night. I think some people forget about that sort of thing but I think it’s important to be at ease but also make sure everyone is having a good time. There’s nothing worse than going to a party, dinner, etc where you’re not having fun or they can’t be bothered.

I’ve been excited about today so much I needed to distract myself from it all. I could have done laundry and things like that, things that need to be done but instead I’ve been scrapbooking. I LOVE scrapbooking! Today I’ve done several layouts and had a blast doing it. I love the creative process of it all. I love selecting the pictures, the paper and creating a unique and fun layout. I’ve noticed too that I have more simple layouts than I used to. It’s like ti do the paper and pictures first then I pick the embellishments to add a little “pizazz” to it all. Oh, crap! it’s 3pm. I got go put the pop in the cooler. I’ll post later with pictures and things.

I’m going to keep this short because I have a MILLION things to get done before I go back to work on Monday. I just want to toot my own horn for a bit. Eric and I have been talking for a while that we want to build another raised bed on the other side of our back yard but haven’t done it. We’ve been saying we needed to build the thing for the last year. Well, yesterday I did it… Me… all by myself me. Eric was at work and we’d gotten the materials the day before so I had everything I needed. Before I started it was a nothing spot, just for the dog. I had three oak barrels on that side of the lattice but other than that, not a whole lot. Yesterday I built the beds, even made them pretty level, just don’t bring it out and check. I took the soil from the oak barrels and put it in the beds and then tossed a million bazzilion amount of peet moss in there with some great organic soil. After I got all that done I planted the herbs for that garden. We’re going to have a ton and a half of them. I think we’ve got just about every herb that grows here.

After finishing the garden I build the little deck for the BBQ. Before the BBQ was up to the house and on top of a pile of river rock. I took all that river rock and put it in between the deck supports so that things not going anywhere. I also picked up all the river rock mixed in with the pea gravel too so now the space is all pea gravel. Now the BBQ is on a nice deck and I got a shepherds hook and put it right next to is to hook the light out there when Eric’s BBQing. I love the way it looks now. It’s great and I did it…. all by myself

Tomorrow we’re working on the rest of the garden. We’ve got to add soil and Peet and then put the 1 foot grid in and plant and then put in irrigation. I can’t wait though. This year we’re doing the 1 foot gardening method which is a great concept. It makes it easier to plant things too. I found the book at Coscto and was glad I did. I took measurements of just the garden and herb sections of the raised beds, NOT the flower part and it’s over 100 square feet.. That’s a lot. Tomorrow I’ll take pictures of the rest of the garden for you all.

Tonight was so much fun. Today was so much fun. I worked from home today and got a lot done on this project I’m working on. The crazy part of it is this HUGE project is due in just a couple of weeks. It’s wild to think that what I’m working on is going to go out to the entire company. It’s a lot of pressure and means a lot of working day and night, week days and weekends to get it all done by the deadline.

Tonight was great though because we went over to our friend Ed and Livia’s house for a BBQ dinner. Ed and Livia have three kids that are just adorable. The youngest is Emmy a little girl about 4 years old. She’s so cute I wanted to just scoop her up and hug her all night. She’s a little monkey too and spent most of the night climbing all over things, especially her mom. Alex and Grayson (the boys) are so incredibly cute and the most well-mannered boys I’ve ever met. Ed and Livia should be proud.

Last night Eric made some great salmon, Livia made a wonderful spinach salad and we had rice too. Oh and I made dessert of cobbler. It was such a yummy dinner. It was great that we all helped make the dinner too. Ed broke out some great wine. I forget what it was but it was tasty and one of the wines served at our reception last year. The night was so nice. We sat and joked, laughed, chatted about all sorts of things and enjoyed a wonderful relaxing night with friends. It really made me appreciate my friends. On the drive home Eric and I talked a lot about friends and how great they can make you feel. How you can go months and not see or talk to a good friend but then you talk on the phone and the months seem to dissolve and it’s like only a day has passed. I think that’s really true from my very best friend LeAnne or Jim. I can go months without talking to either of them and then either I pick up the phone or they do and we talk forever. Friends are great!

Well, it’s late and should get to bed. I’ve got a great book to read right now….

Today was AWESOME! We had a whole bunch of people over for a BBQ, it was so nice. We had Eric’s brother and family, guys from Eric’s basketball team, some of my friends from Intel and the neighbors. It was such a great group of people.

The weather was wonderful and so nice that we were all able to hang out outside and chat without being super hot. It was a great afternoon. I think everyone had a great time. We all had things we could talk about and I don’t think we talked work (Intel) much at all which is really hard to do when you’ve got a bunch of people from work. Everyone brought something to the potluck. The food was so great. We had wonderful salads, and desserts for everyone. Eric made this great lemonade too. Man it was great!

Most everyone left by 7 or 8 but Mike and his family stayed and we watched some TV. We watches the first two episodes of 30 days and a few other shows. It was so great to all hang out together, watch some TV and chat about things. Mike’s kids are so well behaved. I was so impressed. His kids are early teenagers. Not once did I see them pull one of their parents aside and ask to leave or give the look that they didn’t want to be here. Very impressive! It was such a great night, I hope that we can get together with them more and have something like a games night or something. I guess we’ll see.