July festivities

Let's see... there's been a lot going on this past week. Last weekend we celebrated our little neighbor Jacob's first bday!! His mom and dad (Tracey and Jeff) hosted their bday part with lots of family, friends and neighbors. Always a good time over at the neighbors house!

Monday night Mark and I went to JGilberts (awesome steaks) with my coworker Jerry and Kristan, Steve and Mary, Joe and Michelle... this was our celebration dinner for our big win at work. It was a great time hanging out with them outside of work. And also a great chance for Mark to get to know them better.

Tuesday night was girls night #3 this month. My great friend Britty was in town with her daughter Deni (who will turn 1 yr old on the 31st). Funny how our girls night has changed over the years. Since we rarely get to see Deni and Britty rarely gets to see all of our kiddos, girl's night included our babies. So we had 7 ladies and 11 kids ages 3 and under.

Margie reserved the patio area at the Blue Moose for us which was the best idea. The kids had a place to run a little and be free. Plus we weren't disturbing all the other customers. The best part of the night was the $10 bottles of wine. ha ha Great price and the wine was actually pretty good. Better than i had anticipated.

Last night I made my monthly trip to Wichita for my client's board meeting. These meeting are always very interesting and a great source of info on happenings in the transportation field.

Girls Night #2

I am having a string of girls' nights in July in seems. The first was on the 10th when i went out with the old neighborhood ladies for our friend Cindy's bday. The second was this past week. We all went to Meal Smith which is one of those places where you make your own meals. There were about nine of us and we had apps and wine first and then dove into making our meals. I made 6 different ones. Mark and I have tried one already, the shrimp diablo which was very yummy.

I also made a calzone but had Kati seal the pastry. She has very steady hands to create a very nice looking edge! It was a great time to hang out with the girls.

The third girls night is this Tuesday when my good friend Britt is in town from Arizona. Can't wait to her and the other girls.

It's a major award...

So i have to brag a little tonight because my firm won a very nice project the other day that we didn't expect to win. In the engineering world, we have to submit proposals and then interview (if asked) for projects that we want to work on. Projects don't come easy and for the most part, don't just get handed to you or at least that's what i hear..... ha ha (okay okay for all my coworkers reading, yes I've been lucky the last 5 years with my KTA work). So anyways, my firm has been tracking this project for quite sometime. We knew the request for proposals was coming soon so we starting preparing. A lot of work goes into chasing projects. We meet with all the parties involved (in this case it was KCMO, MoDOT, and some others). We have to figure out our team internally. The right project manager is key to winning these things. And if we are shortlisted from our proposals to interview for the project, we have to practice practice practice.... So anyways, this project was one that seemed to wrapped up by our biggest competitor (not to name names but i used to work there). All the feedback we received was it was the competitors project to lose. So you can imagine that we weren't very confident we would win. Still, this was a project that our management wanted us to go after. We thought we had a good proposal and idea so we vowed to give it everything we had.

We got shortlisted so we knew we had to put together a presentation that would somehow show that we were the best team for the project. We practiced A LOT! Got grilled by our upper management over and over and over.... My supervisor Steve even offered to buy us steaks and beers if we won. Tuesday came and we interviewed at City Hall. I thought we nailed it. We were prepared for all the questions, didn't flinch an inch. Still, our competitor was scheduled to present after us. We were told we would hear sometime that afternoon. Wow, that clock just dragged on all morning and early afternoon. So ...... to our amazement, we WON!! It's definitely not the biggest project that we've ever won or the highest profile but darn it, we did something most didn't think we could pull off. Even other firms (who didn't submit for the project because they thought our competitor had it wrapped up) were surprised and sent us many congrats. And much to Steve's surprise, he now owes us dinner. So I wanted to brag a little and say congrats to my team. We done good! :)

Aaahhh, the Lake...

Just got back from Lake Viking today. Justin and Kati had us and a few other couples out for the weekend. I just love this place. The lake is the perfect size for boating, fishing, jet skiing and just having fun drinking in the sun!! And the best part is that it is small enough that it doesn't have all the craziness like the Ozarks. No giant boats to watch out for, it's not at all crowded, all the homes just look great and are kept up very well. Mom, i know you are reading this and I highly recommend you check this place out. There are quite a few homes for sale and i think it would perfect for you and dad. For one thing, it's only 1 1/2 hrs away. It's quiet and secluded. And you are closer to Iowa and all your friends and family. :) Did that convince ya? I'm sure Kati would let us come up to house shop sometime!!!

Anyhoo, we had a great time this weekend. Even with the rain that was there when we arrived. Still we got some good jet skiing time in, a nice relaxing booze cruise (although a bit chilly for Julia), and best of all fun time hanging out with our friends. And what a kick ass jet ski they have this year!! Brand new wave runner that can fly on the water. I think Kati and i got it up to around 60 mph. Woooo hoooo!! Somehow Mark lost on of his flip flops on the booze cruise. We haven't figured out how while he was trying to get out of the boat to help dock it, he sort of tripped and sent the shoe flying into the lake.

Nori had a great time as well. Joe and Angie brought their pup Wrigley with them so the dogs got to play. Wrigley also discovered that he can swim and didn't have any problems getting into the lake and swimming. Nori however, chose to sunbathe on the dock....

Some pictures from our weekend......

Julia, Tyler and Jackie hanging out...

Jackie and Julia playing
Me with Julia and Alex with Jackie
Angie with Tyler

We also visited our friends Matt and Jen and their new baby Alexa. she is soooo cute and so much lighter than Julia, ha ha. We went to their house on Friday night with fajitas in hand. The only bad part of the evening was when Nina left. She off on her 2 week vacation with her dad out to Pennsylvania. We'll pick her up in Baltimore on the 26th when we fly in for our week of vacation in Delaware. Can't Wait!!!

No More Naked Ears

Nina finally took the plunge and had her ears pierced yesterday. We've been talking about it for probably a year now. Nina has always been nervous about the pain that would come with getting them pierced but after weeks of reassuring her that it was just a pinch, she caved. So last night we headed out to Claire's at Town Center Plaza. What a selection of studs they have these days to choose from. All I remember is the gold studs that i had and as far as i know, the only choice you had. Nina had her choice of plain gold or silver studs, little fake diamond studs, birthstones or little daisy flower studs which is what she picked. Nina tried to hide the fear but when she saw the little gun that would shoot the earring into her ear, you could see the apprehension on her face. She held my hand and BAM, that first stud went in. Nina's reaction was priceless. She let out a big old "Ouch". The tears started to swell in her eyes and she fought them back so courageously. She claimed it was more than just a pinch she felt. So the tech got ready to do the other ear. Nina kept pulling away in anticipation of the pain. So again BAM, her other ear was done. Of course, 5 minutes later, she was just fine and so proud of her new shining earrings.

Happy Independence Day

We had a great day on the 4th. We went to the pool, although Julia and I just walked down (she strolled) to the pool and was there for about 5 minutes and walked back. Mark of course enjoyed 3 hours of pool time with the guys. ha ha Our neighbors Ron and Sheryl invited us over for a bbq and fireworks that evening. It was a very good time. We met a few more neighbors (one of which is an ISU alum from Harlan, IA) and also got to spend some time with some neighbors we haven't seen in a while.

Pictures of Julia from the 4th.

The rest of the weekend we have been just relaxing and hanging out. I may do some yard work today but who knows... :)