Full weekend in the cities...

We headed up to the cities on Friday night (after happy hour, so we got a late start...don't worry, we were 100% capable of driving). 35 minutes into our treck up to the cities, I asked Josh if he had our concert tickets, which he did! But at that very moment, we realized we forgot our Twins tickets for Sunday -so we had to turn around and go back...GRRR!!!

We went to the Travis Concert at Fine Lines. It was such a great time :) Josh was right - I liked it!

This band is a Scottish Alternative Rock Band!

We stayed at Mom McRae's house that night and Grandma and Grandpa were there. It was really nice to hang out and chat for awhile! We woke up and ate breakfast together...



Then we headed over to the golf course where Dad McRae set us up with some golf lessons! Boy did it help me :) We even played 9 holes! My dad and Other Josh came out to play with us :) Let is be known that I beat OJ on hole # 1 AND # 5 :) And this guy hit it more than 300 yards on one hole...so I have to brag - only because he's good :)



On Sunday Josh and I went to the Twins game with my parents. It was our first "season ticket" game for us this year. And we won - so that was really good! The Twins played the Angels - it sure was sad to see Hunter in a different jersey.


GO TWINS :)

McRae Extreme Home Makeover...BEGINNING!

Andy came over and began the make-over process in our house!

In one night we were able to get up the ceiling. I was able to help too - if you can believe it! I just held stuff up...which sucked, but someone had to do it!

Josh was drilling nails into it...


Oh the joys!

Ceiling ... COMPLETE!

Next step - the walls then mudding!

Denver, CO - It's all about the altitude!

Josh and I headed to Denver, CO for our Easter break. There we were greeted by two smiling faces: Aunt Colleen and Uncle Mike :) It was so much fun!

We began our journey by eating at Little Anita's. Boy was that place delicious! We were trying to convince the owner to branch out and open in MN, but that wasn't happening. We were in Denver for 4.5 days and we ate at this place 2 times :)

We headed directly to Estes Park which was up in the mountain. We saw the "Stanley Hotel" which is where the moving "The Shining" was filmed. I wanted to go in and tour it, but Josh was too chicken...how sweet would that have been. Then we headed to Bear Lake- which was still frozen and covered with snow...but it was still absolutely beautiful!

On our way out of the mountain we saw TONS of Elk. They didn't look pretty at all, but that's okay! We also saw a coyote that was out on a mission to catch some prairie dogs! It was pretty sweet. We felt like we were apart of National Geographic or something :) Just waiting for him to prance :)

We soon then headed to Boulder for some liquid beverages! It was crazy. This bar let you buy a 1/2 gallon jug of a beer of you choice. It was great watching Mike walk down the street carrying it :)

When we got back to their house it was about 8:00 pm, and it was the first time we had been there since we arrived. Boy were we tired. We pretty much crashed by 9:00 pm!

Saturday we headed to Breckenridge, CO. Our first stop was at Red Rocks, which is an amphitheatre built into the mountain. It was unbelievable. There were so many steps! Josh and I thought it would be genius to run up these steps...Yea...NOT! He made it the whole way up, and I made it 3/4 of the way. My chest was on fire and I couldn't breathe normally for about 2 hours.

Breckenridge was a fun town. It was pretty low key this time of the year, but it would be REALLY fun and alive during skiing season.

On our way to our next destination we drove through South Park City - literally. The TV show "South Park" was based on this hole in the wall town in CO. It was CRAZY!

We went to Loveland Pass after that which is 11,990 feet above sea level! And there were snowboarders that would hitchhike their way up the mountain and ski down the back slopes...and big bright orange "Warning Avalanche" signs hanging all over! Yeah - no thank you!

On our last night in Denver, Gretchen and her boyfriend, Curtis, took us out in downtown Denver. We took pictures at each bar we went to! We had a great time. Denver is a fun town!!

Theorie is where the Real World Denver was filmed! The bar was pretty dead, but it was sweet to be in there!

Denver sure was a great time, and Mike, Colleen & Gretchen were excellent hostesses! We had such a good time that we are going to go back again soon :) Can't wait to see you guys again :) LOVE YOU!!!!

Demolition at the McRae's

We began this project through discussions based on the current conditions of our downstairs guest room. From the beginning, when we first moved into our house, we wanted to create a "MN Gopher" room. The problem being, this bedroom had panelling for the walls.

We felt this room was put together rather "cheap" with paneling walls and stapled up tiled ceilings (the ceiling in which Striker, our cat, fell through...).

We began talking to some friends and discovered that it wouldn't be TOO difficult to do this project ourselves.

It all began today...This is what our room looked like with the paneling walls...

From here, we had some amazing helpers in the McRae Demolition process. Our good friends, Jason and Lisa Denzer came over and Bob Bednar (our school custodian) came by to make sure we didn't kill ourselves.

When Lisa came walking in holding a hammer and Bob with a Crowbar, we knew today would be a great day! Here are the beginning stages of room demolition! Tearing down the ceiling...

Once the ceiling was out, Lisa and I realized we had A LOT of nails and staples to pull out that were left behind from the stupid, cheap tiles! While we were pulling them out of the ceiling, the boys went at it and started tearing down the walls...

The one wall is the joining wall to our storage room. As soon as Bob pulled the one piece of panelling down, we realized just how messy our storage room really is! You see, we are having a garage sale this summer and figured we'd sell everything first and then donate it to an organization for whatever items didn't sell.

Here are a few pictures of an empty room...no walls, no ceiling...just cement and a storage room! Doesn't it look beautiful (NOT!)

I also am including a fun video of the men working :) This is the wall that is on the other side of our family room...Thank goodness Lisa is so smart! She managed to catch our fire alarm before it landed into a cup of water and our clock before it broke!

Without our great help today, Josh and I would be up to our heads in panelling and ceiling tiles...and we'd probably be killing each other right about now...

Step 1: Demolition....COMPLETE

Step 2: Purchasing materials

Step 3: Sheet Rocking....April 24/25 (if you want to help, let us know!!!)