Early Birthday and Christmas Gifts

Since Dave's birthday is on October 6th, I wanted to get him his birthday gift early because we will probably be a little busy around then. =) I knew he wanted a motorized edger for the yard, but wasn't sure what style he would want--gas or electric. So, I volunteered to take him to Lowe's to pick out his gift. He ended up choosing an electric type since our yard wasn't that big. I also got him an electric hedge trimmer to help make our bushes look nicer. One time I tried to trim them with the hand-held clippers and that took a REALLY long time--they haven't been trimmed since! =) I think he was really happy with his birthday gifts because he LOVES to do yardwork but doesn't have much time to do it. Hopefully these tools will help get the job done more quickly and make his work more satisfying. We are slowly building up his yard tool collection as the years go by just for that reason! =)

As soon as we got home from Lowe's (about 11:30), he started mowing the yard which ALWAYS helps make a yard look better! Then, he tried to weed eat but he was unable to get the machine started (which I know he was disappointed about). Putting together the edger was a little more difficult than he first thought, but his loving wife came to the rescue and got out the DIRECTIONS so that we could get it put together in a more timely fashion....I'm sure all the sweat dripping off his face wasn't helping him have clear thoughts anyway... =) Finally, it was time to start edging. I was content watching him do what he loves to do, but being the "helpful" person that I am, I decided to get out there and help him sweep away all the trimmings from the edging process. (He was STILL dripping in sweat so I wanted him to be able to get done faster so he could come in and cool off....) Plus, sweeping was all I COULD do to help, even though I wanted to do so much more. Then, I noticed the sky was turning darker, and the process was taking longer than we thought it would since our yard had NEVER been truly edged in the 3 years we have lived in our house! My "go-time" mode clicked into gear and I was probably doing a little more than I should be at 37 weeks... It started sprinkling and since I was nervous about the electricity mixing with water, I told Dave it might be a good idea to go ahead and get everything edged really quickly and we could do the touch ups with a shovel and the manual edger when it was actually raining. He did that and just as he put the edger back in the garage, it started raining harder. We eventually used our team work to get everything done that he wanted to on the edging, but just in the rain. It was actually kind of fun. I kept telling him that it was better to have spent all this time now doing the initial work than after Brody gets here. Now all he will have to do is touch it up every couple weeks which won't take nearly as long (we hope!). He did a FANTASTIC job on the yard, and aside from the weed-eating, it looks GREAT! =) He is going to do that and the bush-trimming next Tuesday on his day off, God-willing. I am proud of his hard work--he was out there for over 2 hours doing very hard labor in the heat. Thank goodness for the coolness from the rain! =) AWESOME JOB, HONEY!!!! =)

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

AFTER

(Sorry--no "before" shot for this one..) Dave was workin' so hard!

Here's the first of his "results"--lookin' good!

Though this pile doesn't really do justice of all the trimmings we had at the end just for the sidewalk and part of the driveway, it was enough to fill half a lawn and garden style trash bag! That's a lot of trimmings!!

That's one sweaty and dirty boy! (ok, so SOME of the water may be from the rain, but most of it was sweat....the water just evaporated off us once it hit us because we were workin' so hard!)

And, I was a little wet from the rain, but it wasn't that bad.... And, NO, these are NOT my traditional work clothes! =) I wasn't anticipating helping when I first went outside...What a lovely drizzle!
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For my early Christmas present, Dave let me get a new digital camera for when Brody gets here. I probably don't "need" a new camera because the one I have works just fine, but all who know me well know I LOVE taking pictures and love new technology. This camera is very similar to my old camera (both Canon PowerShots) which made it easy for both Dave and I to figure out, but it has more updates, a much bigger screen, and takes even better pictures. It's also a 10.0 megapixel instead of a 7.1 megapixel so I can enlarge Brody's pictures even bigger when I get some good shots while we are on-the-go. =) I am so grateful that Dave was willing to get this for me. I know he likes all the pictures as much as I do, and he wants to make sure we get some good shots of Brody when he makes his arrival SOON! =) Thank you, Davey, for my awesome Christmas present! It will be a gift we will both enjoy! I love you!! =)