Our house is only 3 years old, but most of the trim on the front columns had rotted. How does that happen you ask? The builder doesn't caulk it well. So handyman Chris pulled out his miter saw and replaced the trim. My job was to repaint the columns. Fortunately Chris wasn't around to see me balancing precariously a story up on the ladder to get the job done:)
Of course, after I painted the columns I realized that the trim around the door was looking rather shabby, I had to repaint that, too. It's a good thing the kids had to be picked up for school or I might have done all the house trim--as Chris says you have to watch out if you put a paint brush in my hand!
Project #4: Basketball Stand
This is a long one. Last week we had a basketball pole installed (unfortunately our neighborhood requires that b-ball stands are set into the ground) and the company who installed it did a terrible job of the concrete work, it was completely unfinished. Chris talked to them about how bad it looked and when they came back Thurs. to put up the backboard they "finished" the concrete work.
Two hours later...I arrived home, checked out their work and it was HORRIBLE!! They had freehanded the concrete--I can't think of another way to describe it--the edges were jagged (they told Chris that some of the pieces would just fall off when it dried--huh???), the sides were off each other in measurement by 4 inches(!!) and it was sloped and sloppy. In all fairness to Chris, he was in a hurry to get to the hospital when he paid them, and it did look better than before. I didn't take a picture of it, I didn't have time to, that concrete was drying too fast.
After a quick consultation with Chris, I ended up digging out all of the wet concrete before it could set. Chris came home and we went to work. You may ask why we didn't call the installation company. Have you ever tried to get contractors to come back after you've paid them? It can take weeks (if you're lucky) and we'd already had it with this company by this point (I'm not going into Chris' conversations with them prior to Thurs.).
So, anyway...Chris built a box, poured the concrete and finished it off (by carlight no less,--he was working way into the evening after a full day at the hospital). And the sides are completely even and finished, he made sure of that, he's precise when working on projects! I love that he can do anything (mild-mannered baby doc by day, fix-it handyman by night).
Hooray, hooray!! We finally have a basketball stand in our yard!!
Project #5: Halloween costumes
Saturday Kierst and I spent 3 hours at Joann's Craft Store. Ugh. One hour was just waiting in line to have fabric cut. We bought material to make over Kierst's vampire costume from last year into a witch costume, and material for Abs' and Lisi's cat costumes. You'll see the finished products when I blog about Halloween:)
Last thing for the week: Primary Program
Today was the primary program at church. This was my third primary program and although it was probably the hardest one to pull together, I think it's the best one we've ever done. It went very very well, the music was beautiful (thanks to our fantastic music leader), the children knew their parts, and most importantly, the Spirit was felt as we testified of the Savior's life and His love for us.
After church we drove up to the temple site to look at the construction. It's only 45 minutes away from our house, right off I-435. I still can't believe we'll be that close to a temple!! This was taken right in front of the site--can you see the teeny tiny freeway sign?
The foundation has been laid, and that's the elevator shaft behind the girls.
Passing the Missouri riverboat casinos on the way home we joked that when it's finished we'll be able to do a temple session and afterwards drop by the casino buffet for dinner. Haha!
A friend of ours works for the construction company that is building the temple and he said it's ahead of schedule! The temple should be completed before this time next year!!!! Hooray!!
Lisi is just happy to be there...
Chris was the official pumpkin lugger.
We didn't find as many as we wanted in the patch so we chose from
Kierst made it to the top!
I felt a sense of nostalgia being at this pumpkin patch, too, for all the times we'd been there before and the many times we'd traveled down the country roads that led to Grandma and Granpa Stapley's. We miss you, Julie and Ron!
What do you do with a bushel full of apples the next day?? 
With a little scoop of ice cream it's mmmmm, delicious!
checked out the new polar bear exhibit...
But the real reason we went to the zoo on Sat. was to see Aunt Tiffanie. She volunteers with a Star Wars group, they do fundraising and charity work and they spent part of their day at the zoo taking pictures with Star Wars fans.
What's not to like about fall?
