26th Birthday (!), Macbeth, and a bee sting

Dave turned 26 at 2:06 P.M. Central Time yesterday. Woohoo! It landed on a Saturday, so we had a full day to party. We slept in a while, then opened presents because one of David's presents was tickets to see the movie Star Trek at a morning show. THANK YOU for the presents for David! He loved them.

We LOVED the movie! Afterwards, we ate lunch at Applebee's, one of Dave's favorite resteraunts, with a gift certificate I gave him for Father's Day. We did the 2 for $20 Applebee's deal, which got us an appetizer, two entres, and since it was Dave's bday, a dessert. What a deal.
Village Green had an Xbox Halo tournament from 2:00 PM--2:00 AM on Saturday. (It was originally only supposed to go until 10:00 PM, which I thought was still crazy long, but you know how those things are.) So when we got back from eating lunch, Dave went to play Halo and I helped a friend, Mos, get some egg rolls ready for a barbeque we had scheduled for dinner that night. The barbeque was delicious; afterwards, Dave had such a good time playing Halo that he went back to the tournament, while I went to a "girl's night" that had been intentionally planned for the wives while the husbands were gaming. We watched "Confessions of a Shopaholic"--I'm usually not that big into chick flicks, but I actually really liked this one!
Finally, at 11:30 PM, Dave officially blew out his birthday candles. What a day!


On Friday night, I dragged David to a Shakespeare play with me. Omaha has something called "Shakespeare on the Green," where every year they put on one or two Shakespearen plays outdoors and give free admission to guests. It was a little similar to Cedar City's Shakespearean Festival. That night, they performed "Macbeth." Macbeth hears a prophecy from three witches that he will one day be king, and with the encouragement of his wife, he murders the current king to make it happen--the rest of the play deals with their disintegrating sanity and efforts to cover up their crime and keep their slipping hold on the crown. We both enjoyed everything--the weather was perfect, and we had great seats.
One other story: on Wednesday, David got home early from school, so we visited the zoo for an hour or two. While we were there, we were admiring the bee exhibit (kind of like an ant farm in a glass case, there is a huge glass case enclosing thousands of bees and honeycomb), and I noticed that there was an escaped bee flying around the room. It just happened to land on Dave's shirt, and while he was frantically trying to get rid of it, it stung his arm! We don't know if it was a killer African bee, or if David also had a mosquito bite near the same spot as the sting, but his arm swelled up HUGE. This is a photo of his arm two days later:
You can't see it really well, but the redness had gone from his elbow to his wrist. And the day before, the main red area was REALLY red and swollen. I could see Dave's pulse on the sting site. He's doing better.

The Bob Bridge and Winter Quarters

Happy Father's Day on Sunday to all you husbands, fathers, and grandpas! We love you!
Right now it is extremely hot & humid, so we stay indoors next to the A/C. But here are some recent outings: (Omaha is the neatest place)
The "Bob" pedestrian bridge. Only bikes and pedestrians allowed; this is a great bike path, and it's fun to just stroll across and look at the mighty Missouri. On either sides of the bridge (Iowa side and Nebraska), there are parks and nice places to enjoy.

Dave exploring a tipi (or teepee) on the Nebraska side of the Bob bridge. It commemorates the exchanges between the explorers from the east and the Native Americans.

Dave testing out the fountains (also on the NE side). He didn't get wet, but there were a few other kids completely thrilled at getting soaked by the water works. This reminds me of the water fountain display at the Gateway Mall in Salt Lake.

Here is me and Dave at the Omaha Winter Quarters Temple. It is actually one of the top 10 places to visit in Omaha. It is a beautiful temple and there is a really special feeling all around the temple, the cemetary, and the visitors center.

My dad and David gave me some herbs to grow. They are just beginning to sprout.

I wanted Brooke to see my flower pots that she gave me for graduation! So pretty! They usually look even better, but we have had thunderstorms every night for the past few days, so they are a little droopy.

I haven't shown a picture of the outside of our house yet--here it is.

Me VS washing machine

Our washing machine's hoses have been leaking since our first laundry day. This past week I decided to rip out the carpet underneath and install linoleum. My prior experience with flooring consisted of buying a rug to go in our bathroom. So this was a big step for me.

Keep in mind, that I don't have ANY tools, not even measuring tape. I cut out the carpet with a butcher knife. By pure luck, I cut out the carpet exactly 4 by 6 feet; I bought 24 squares of foot-squared linoleum tiles and it fit perfectly.

The carpet, green matting underneath, and the cement were all wet. I wasn't utterly clueless on how to install linoleum; I looked up a website on the internet and got a lot of help. I was supposed to do a few wet-cement tests, but I just left a fan on the floor for 24 hours before I put anything down. (I also got a lot of suggestions/answers from Home Depot.)

Here is the cement completely bare and starting to get cleaned. Before I glued on the linoleum, I had to fill a few holes in the ground with cement-filler. Broke open the cement bottle with my knee and filled in the gaps using my bare fingers.

Installation day! This was pretty fun. The worst part was doing the sealing along the baseboards, which I did, once again, with my bare hands.

I was the biggest penny-pincher when getting all my materials from Home Depot. It was great because the whole process cost me around $50 and the cheapest tiles actually matched the surrounding really well. On the other hand, it isn't the best job in the world, but for my first try, I am really satisfied with it. Our washing machine hoses still leak, but I'm working on those, too.