Celebrating the Good Things

While I was in Minneapolis I had an opportunity to reconnect with my best friend from childhood, Summer. She had just moved from Tennessee to Minneapolis for her husband's new job so we had an opportunity to hang out during the week and catch up on the nearly 7 years it had been since we saw each other. It was so refreshing to take a break from work and enjoy life in the beautiful Minneapolis summer with such a good friend.

Paddle boarding in Minneapolis with Summer!

Work in Charlotte and growing up in general has not been so easy for me recently so I am happy to have another best friend only an hour away. My friend Katherine moved to Columbia, South Carolina a few months ago and we have been trying to get together for the past couple of months. We finally set a date and made it work for Katherine to come up to Charlotte for dinner. We had so much fun together, ending the night in a club dancing as hard as we could.

Forever friends

A Wednesday night out always makes for an exhausting Thursday so I was very happy to go home to my boys. On Friday we had Anvil Iron Works come to our house for another banister estimate, which was a big disappointment. We are coming to the realization that these banisters are going to cost around $3500. So sad :(

Oldest but nicest Iron Works man

On Friday night we headed to Kutztown for a family party to celebrate my Pop Pop's 94th birthday. The poor guy has dementia and doesn't know where he is 94% of the time but it's a nice excuse to get together as a family. Dinner Friday night turned into ice sledding down my parent's back yard. No one was too hurt, fortunately, and it was a fun little night.

The girls observing the sledding

We spent Saturday morning getting ready for the 40 people coming to our house to celebrate. It was a really nice day with extended family I haven't seen since before college. If I can be half the host my parents are, I will be happy. I think Pop Pop even had a nice time!

The weekend at home with family was exactly what I needed but I was excited to go home to our cats! Next weekend we have friends from Pittsburgh coming into town so I really wanted to get a few final chores done around the house, starting with painting the second floor ceiling I keep putting off.

Edging has been done for months...

Unfortunately, a chunk of the ceiling and wall came off as I was prepping to paint so I was stalled before I even started. 

Doesn't look great..

Bummer.

I ended up only spackling and completing the edging of the second floor hallway. 

What a mess.

Disappointing to not get the hallway ceiling painted today but it gave me the time to finish up the trim in the office and third floor hallway. The office really looks fantastic with the trim complete.

Before.

After

I am already so looking forward to coming home to celebrate Valentine's Day with the dinky boy and the cats and spend the weekend with our great friends!