Happy 4th of July!

I'll be back to write more later...right now we're off to pick strawberries!  

Here I am - back after a fun time picking strawberries with my dear, sweet man. On the way home, we picked up some delicious beef for burgers, some fresh buns and Mexican Coke to enjoy with homemade potato salad and baked beans. You have to eat an all-American meal on the 4th of July! And it was GOOD. Topped off with some of our freshly picked strawberries smashed into vanilla ice cream...ahhh.

We got our fireworks fix last night with Kyle's family. Their neighbor purchased over $5000 worth of amazing (though illegal) fireworks and put on quite the show last evening. He sets them off every 3rd of July, but this was the biggest and best show yet. Some of our friends joined us for the explosive time. It was lots of fun. So we got most of our celebrating in between last night and this afternoon.

The life of a cop's wife comes with holidays that are not complete holidays, however. The rest of my 4th of July will be spent by myself this year. I have plenty of things to keep me busy, but that still doesn't take the sort of hollow feeling away. This year my family is in South Dakota, taking in the sights and sounds and experience of Mount Rushmore, the Badlands and Custer State Park. Nate's last time in S.D. is one he doesn't recall, since he was all of one and Josh, bless his heart, has only been there in-utero. So it was high time the boys enjoyed the grand adventure of one of our nations most patriotic places. I'm just sad we couldn't take two vacations back to back and join them!

Here we are - Nate and I, eighteen years ago at Wall Drug on the 4th of July

For a girl to whom the 4th of July was almost as big a deal as Christmas, sans presents, its very odd to not be surrounded by tons of people I know and be making heaps of tasty picnic food for the hungry masses. It's kind of sad for me. The traditions fade and we all start new ones, which is nice, but it just isn't quite the same. I pulled out my scrapbooks from Fourth's gone by and it was fun to remember the good times we shared. And I'm happy to think of the Fourth's to come as well - new traditions to start as our own family. Who knows? Maybe next year the big BBQ will be at our new home?!

Three years ago today, Kyle and I had been dating for just a couple weeks when I flew out to Minnesota to celebrate the 4th of July with his family and mine (who had flown up from Florida). I found out later that he had thought about proposing to me on the 4th, since its such a significant day in the lives of our families. Shew! I'm glad he didn't, since we had only been dating about a month. But it would have been kinda fun if it had worked out that way. As it was, we had a very nice day of celebrating and were happy as could be.

Fourth of July 2005

So, I guess the 4th of July makes me pretty nostalgic. And makes me want to break out in patriotic song. A little "God Bless America" anyone? Some "Stars and Stripes Forever"? I hope you each have had a wonderful holiday and that the little things that remind you of how great it is to live in this beautiful country would cause you to praise the Lord for His kindness and thank the generations of Americans who have given so much to carry on the tradition and joy of freedom.

Happy Independance Day!

i woke up this morning with a song stuck in my head merely because of one phrase: "and we're so happy!"

because I am!!

last week we had the most beautiful vacation on the North Shore of Lake Superior (near Lutsen and Grand Marais, for all you MN peeps) with Kyle's family. It was marvelous. Hiking, swimming in the Temperance River, cliff jumping in the same river, walking around the cute shops in Grand Marais, eating delicious food, sitting on the rock ledge overlooking Lake Superior, playing games on rainy days, alpine sliding at Lutsen, more hiking, golfing, bonfires on the rock ledge, listening to the waves roll in at night, bug bites, the most amazing pie on the planet and celebrating Rick's birthday with homemade three-course fondue: that is what made up our lovely week.

Here is a sampling of the many, many photos that mostly Kyle and Sarah took over the course of the week. More are on Facebook linked on my profile from Kyle's and Sarah's albums.

to top it all off, on our way back down Hwy. 61 on Sunday, just outside of Two Harbors, Kyle finally got cell phone service again and his phone alerted us to a message. It was our realtor, who had called on Friday to tell us the happy news that the bank had accepted our offer on the hot tub house.

I can't really even explain on paper how utterly ecstatic, excited, overwhelmingly joyful and totally amazed we were/are. Since we put in the offer several weeks ago, we had been praying that if this was the house God wanted for us, that things would go much more quickly than a house in short sale usually goes. Both of us were anticipating "quickly" to mean mid-July to just hear if they liked the offer or not. And here God goes and does exceedingly, abundantly above what we had asked or thought. So like Him. Not even July - June 29. Which just happens to be two months to the date that we hope to close.

After we screamed and danced in our seats...oh wait, that was just me. Kyle was merely grinning from ear to ear, which is his way of screaming and dancing in his seat. We got out of the car at Two Harbors and I danced and jumped up and down in a gas station parking lot. And called a bunch of people who weren't at church to tell them the happy news (of course, when I prefaced it with: "I have happy news and I'm just about to pop with excitement," they all thought I was calling to say we're pregnant).

As we continued down the road on Sunday, it was very appropriate that the next song that shuffled on the iPod was Chris Tomlin's "Happy Song". We rolled down the windows and sang along at the top of our lungs as we cruised down London Road in Duluth.

Well I could sing unending songs
Of how you saved my soul
And I could dance a thousand miles
Because of your great love

My heart is bursting Lord
To tell of all you've done
Of how You've changed my life
And wiped away the past

I want to shout it out
From every rooftop sing
For now I know
That God is for me, not against me

Well I could sing unending songs
Of how you saved my soul
And I could dance a thousand miles
Because of your great love

My heart is bursting Lord
To tell of all you've done
Of how You've changed my life
And wiped away the past

I want to shout it out
From every rooftop sing
For now I know
That God is for me, not against me 

So now the eternal paperwork begineth. Signatures from the sellers, signatures from us, finalizing our financing, inspection, appraisal and then the closing, should all go well. Please be praying with us that the particular loan we are interested in using would still be available (its a program for first-time home buyers that usually runs out of money in late summer or something - gotta love the government) and that the Lord would continue to make His name great throughout the whole process. And then plan to come visit!!! We'll have a hot tub!

I had a MARVELOUS birthday weekend and day! Thank you so much to each of you special people that made my day sweet. Celebrating with my family on Saturday, Kyle's family on Sunday and then on my actual birthday, Kyle blessed me with fun little gifts throughout the day and a nice evening out on the town.

26 is closer to 30 than 20...its kinda weird to be on this side of 25 now. Not that I think it's all downhill from here or anything, but it feels like I'm on the climb toward middle age and I've always thought of myself as younger than that, you know? I can't really explain it, I guess. I am looking forward to whatever this year holds - moving into a house? getting pregnant? going to Mexico for vacation this winter? Who knows!

Here are some pictures from my birthday fun...pardon all the pictures of meself. Oh dear. Especially pay attention to the hilarious card my brother's got me...if you can't read it it says: Front: Hey Sister! I remembered your birthday! Inside: Show your appreciation by wearing this (sticker reads: "I am the sister of a wonderful and thoughtful person") Have a Happy Birthday!   If you know my brothers, you know this is PERFECT. Oh gosh, it made me laugh. The beautiful rose is from my sweet man. In the sticker photo I'm sporting a new shirt compliments of the AE gift card from my sweet parents-in-law. The last photo is all of us Puelstons at Daniel's deployment ceremony, which also happened on my birthday. I think we're a good looking bunch, don't you?

Thanks again for the sweet birthday love and wishes! You all know how to make me feel special. mwah.

Happy Father's Day to my wonderful dad! You have always encouraged me to "take the scenic route" in life...thank you for your support and wise advice for life. I know that when the time comes, you are going to be a fabulous grandpa . I hope this next year is wonderful for you as you press on in this race of life. Keep having fun and learning new things. I love you.

Thanks to my sweet family for the fun birthday bike ride and generous gifts yesterday. I'm pretty excited about the 15 miles in 1 hour and 5 minutes. That's a good start for the triathlon's 20 miles. Right after we biked (in a stiff wind), we enjoyed a picnic that my office hosted in Central Park in North Branch. Over 200 people came and ate a great BBQ meal....God was gracious to bless us with gorgeous weather too!

Today we spent time with the Puelston side of the family and had a really nice time. More Father's Day and my birthday fun! It's nice that we can be close to both our families for holidays and birthdays. We enjoyed a picnic dinner and the quintessential birthday DQ cake. Yum.

Tomorrow is the big send off for Kyle's brother Daniel as he is deployed to the horn of Africa with the Marines. We'll be praying for his safety and protection as he defends our freedom overseas.

le weekend

we had a busy weekend. Starting with making the offer on the hot tub house on Friday...we found out today that another offer has been made on it with better terms for the seller than our offer. We are going to change our offer slightly to be more competitive, but we're confident that it is in God's hands and if it's our house, we're golden in His grace and provision. Thanks for the prayers and well-wishes. We hope we can invite you all over to christen the hot tub.

My brother had his graduation party on Saturday, so as a good big sister who graduated from culinary school would, I helped out with the food preparation and keeping things going on the food tables. It was great to have the party at a park near my parents house - so easy and so much less to clean up! God blessed us with wonderful weather for this crazy spring we've been having and it was great to see so many old friends too. Thanks for coming to help celebrate and send Nate off to the Army with prayers and wisdom. He needs it.

Pics from the Party:

Nate and his girlfriend, Karla and Dad talks with a friend

Nate with Tyler, a boy we used to watch as a baby (not so anymore!) and Crazy Bro with his Sweet Sis

Nate with our dear friends, Phil and Chris and Shadow the Cute Shih Tzupoo

(I'm in love with the little doggy in the bottom photo - his name is Shadow and we watched him over the weekend for some friends. He is a sweet, sweet little bundle of non-barky fuzz. I want one SO BAD!!!)

While I helped my family, Kyle helped his by staying with his grandparents over the weekend. Grandpa is ever closer to the pearly gates and has proved to be challenging in his last days, mostly due to the medications that are helping keep him comfortable pain-wise. So Kyle had a taxing, but rewarding weekend of keeping his grandpa company and helping him.

We both dropped into blissful nap land after church yesterday and slept for three hours, and then turned around and went to bed at 10pm, having NO problem getting to sleep.

This morning I worked out my next 7 weeks of training for the Chisago Lakes Triathlon. My schedule is ambitious and strenous, but I know I can do it. I'm really excited about being MUCH more prepared for this year's race than I was for last year's. I have a FAR better bike, better gear, more training time and I'm in way better shape already this year than I was when I did the tri last year. I'm hoping to knock off a significant chunk of time from my pathetic time in 2007...if I stick to the training schedule I wrote out this morning, it will happen! Yay for goals and sticking to them. I hope anyone who can will come cheer us on on July 27th in Chisago City. The cheers and prayers of my family and friends were literally the only thing that got me to the finish line last year. It's going to be GREAT!