August 2011

This month has flown by. It started off with my granddaughter Kirsten's 6th birthday on the 4th of August, followed by Clinton's 64th birthday on the 5th of August (along with his sister Carol and sister-in-law Donna). We went to Manhattan, KS to celebrate a family birthday at Olive Garden then to Doug and Donna's for ice/cream cake. My sister-in-law Debbie's birthday was on the 10th and we enjoyed a wonderful lunch without the guys at El Mezcal--our favorite lunch spot. Pop (Carl Reekie-Clinton's step-father) had back surgery on August 17th, Clinton went to Wichita to be with him. While Clinton was gone we had a terrible storm on the 18th and lost some very large limbs off of our big tree in the front--that made two holes in our roof and other damage. It was very scary for me and the cat--we ran down to the basement when the limbs hit the house. Clinton and his brother Larry worked all day on Saturday to clean up the mess of tree limbs, it took three full truck loads to haul it away to the compost facility. Clinton put a tarp up on the roof until the roofer could come and fix the holes in our new roof.

Then of course there is today, August 31, 2011 when my oldest daughter Anne Marie turned 34! I was lucky enough to be able to spend a few days with her during the last week to help celebrate early. I was in Chicago for meetings with people from other Railroads and with the Railroad Retirement Board. Wednesday, August 24, 2011 I was able to get tickets for Anne, Sarah, and Kaley to attend the Chicago Cubs game at Wrigley Field in Chicago with the rest of us from BNSF Railway. It was a good game and the Cubs won 3 to 2. Thursday after our meetings a group of four of us went to Navy Pier and took an Architectural Boat tour on the Chicago River. It was very interesting and I was able to get a few good pictures. Friday my meetings were over at noon and I met Anne at the train station. We went to Lombard and picked up Emily from daycare, then Sarah and Kaley from school and went shopping for Anne's birthday at the mall. Otto grilled brat's for dinner and they were great! Then I went with Kaley shopping for her mom while Sarah worked on her homework. Saturday I went to the dollar store and got some balloons and some crepe paper streamers, etc to decorate with. Anne, Sarah, Kaley, Emily and I went to the pool for a while in the afternoon so Otto could finish sanding the deck and go shopping. Sarah and I decorated when we got home and Anne was forbidden to come into the area until after dinner. Saturday evening we went to Giordano's for real Chicago style pizza, then home for the party. Anne was really surprised by the decorations and the card and gift that Otto got for her. She laughed her head off at the card Otto got for her--it was so funny and so good to hear Anne laugh! We had a good time. Sunday morning we all got up and Otto and Sarah took me to the airport to come home to Kansas while Anne stayed home with Kaley and Emily. I made it home safely and the roofer came to fix the holes in our roof today from the storm that we had this month. It has been a busy month!