Story A Day

There are these little yellow post-its that show up on our door occasionally.  They’re notes from the St. Paul city assessor.  The stop by our house almost every time we close a permit.  I know they are planning to raise our taxes as soon as the basement can be considered “finished square footage.”  I always promptly call them, as they request.  They rarely call me back, and when they do, they ask if the project is complete.  For the last two years the answer has been no But now we are getting close to closing our building permit – Woohoo for the basement being close to done!  Boohoo for higher property taxes!  Oh well.  The good news is that the basement is coming along!  We passed the plumbing inspection yesterday, that last big one before finalizing the building permit – yipeee!  The plumbing permit is the one we were most worried about.  We anticipate another little yellow post-it when we finally close the building permit, and this time the answer to their question will has to be a “yes”

Tonight was a reminder of how grateful I am that I was a speech nerd in high school.  This evening I stood before a room of about 25 city officials and CIB taskforce members to present a proposal for a project I’ve been working on for a while related to a wooded area in Como Park.  We are seeking funding to restore a historical feature that will be the central meeting area for an outdoor classroom.  I am usually pretty comfortable with public speaking, but my stomach was turning before this one.  The good news is that if went farily well!  Whether or not we’ll get funding, well that’s yet to be determined.  Thanks speech team!

To learn more about the project, visit www.comowoodland.org

I’m hooked on these new fruit snacks, Annie’s Bunny Snacks They are organic fruit snacks, and they are SO good!  Target has been out of stock the last three times I’ve been there, so I bought four boxes when they had them is stock today Tim thought that was very funny, and I felt like I was 7 again.  Mmmmmmm…mmmmmmmm…

We celebrated Sarah’s upcoming wedding with the gals yesterday!  It was a lovely evening of conversation, cupcakes, flirtinis (not sure if that is spelled right!), games, and gifts.  We’re gonna miss this gal when she takes of to the Philippines with her new hubby who’s joining the Foreign Service!  The bride-to-be is the lovely lady in the pink sweater.  Congrats Sarah!

Tim and I are continuing our tradition of visiting a National Park in the summer!  We will be visiting North Cascades Nat’l Park at the end of August, after the conclusion of the very busy summer at BSP.  We recently finalized our trip plans   Check out the view from the lawn of the lodge where we will be staying for a few days…I think this photo will get me through many a crazy day this summer!

My friend Sarah (see link on blorgroll) is great at finding YouTube videos that bring a smile!  This one was just too good to pass up, so I am sharing it here too.  Check it out…

It was very gloomy today…rainy…gray…cold.  I spent the evening working on my computer and rockin’ out to some dance music to lift my spirits! Artists like this one – Cascada – added some energy to an otherwise energy-zapping day There’s nothing like getting some productive work done AND dancing in the chair while I type!

I know, I know, my spring phenology blogs are probably getting a little old – but hey, I am just so excited about the arrival of spring.  But, wait!  They just said on the news that we might get multiple inches of snow next weekend – agghh!!  Nooooo!!!  Well,  at least it will melt quickly Anyway, prior to being distracted by the news (do you like my blog play-by-play?) I was going to talk about the spring storm today.  It rained, it poured, it even thundered!   I think all of the rain will be good for my plants and they consider sprouting soon

The snow is gone, the weather is warming up, and the plants will soon begin sprouting from the ground!  So, Tim and I spent some time today putting mulch on the new garden in the front yard.  This is definitely the earliest that I have every laid mulch, but with the great weather, and some free time, what better time to get it done! 

There is a student at BSP who is a prolific writer and artist.  I’ve submitted a number of entries on his behalf to Teen Ink, and he discovered recently that one of his drawings was published in the Teen Ink magazine!  I’m so proud of him.  As an English Language Learner he struggles to get his thoughts on paper in the form that he is satisfied with, but he keeps trying no less, and his drawings are amazing as well!  I am glad he got this great recognition of his hard work!

Check it out – Page 14 in Teen Ink, his name is Roumany