We are Family

I picture of the Hendler family who took Asheville by storm last week. Here we all are enjoying a cheese spread and some wine. Ada and Michael joined us for a bit.

And Then There Was Wall

Things are moving along with the house in the masonry department. Seth's parents and brother Greg and his girlfriend Megan came to Asheville for a weekend visit. We ate out a bunch at some of our favorite restaurants and shopped the downtown. It's wonderful to see family and it's a shame the vistits come and go so fast. Greg and Megan are leaving tomorrow morning after a run and mom and dad are staying through Monday. The weekend was beautiful with constant blue skies and breezy evenings. Juniper got tangled up with a water snake this afternoon in Dupont State Forest. I managed to distract her enough and pull her away before she knew what was going on. I'm glad she's alive. Mandy just finished up her prenatal yoga class and we're off for yet another dinner with our guests. Mandy's now 18 weeks as of last Friday.

Test Run

This weekend we made our first baby supply purchase at the Wee Trade show, a consignment sale held twice a year. We left with a baby stroller full of inexpensive items, not to mention the stroller itself which Juniper tried out for us (with the help of a biscuit).

Knee Deep in Footers

Today was a busy day at 30 Gray Street. The masonry subs worked until after 8 setting re-bar and formwork. The picture on the left shows the enormous stump that took them a whole day to pluck from the ground. It left a huge crater that forced them to dig down about 8 feet to hit undisturbed soil. We suspect they will pour concrete tomorrow and start laying block on Monday. Mandy is in Nebraska until tomorrow doing WAND training. She's in the Omaha area and said there aren't many cowboy hats there, but a lot of john deere paraphnailia (she thinks they have a big plant there). It's just me and the June. We both just finished supper. I'm still munching on some pole beans our neighbors Paul and Amy gave us. It's my fist time eating them and they're a bit stringy. I resolved to just suck out the beans and leave the pod carcus behind. We're looking forward to a relaxing weekend. Thanks for taking another peek at our blog.

Hot August Nights

I'm officially 4 months pregnant as of yesterday, and I think I might have felt Bean movin around in there today...twice. Still at that akward in-between stage with the belly. On Thursday night I went walking with Michelle, then Hugh came over to go out with Seth, and we thought we'd post this picture too. By the way, I was in the local paper last weekend, writing about nuclear weapons and religion...here's the link:


http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060805/LIVING06/608050306/1201

Read at your own risk, content is unapoligetically political...

Two Years of Wedded Bliss!

We celebrated our 2nd year wedding anniversary last night in downtown Asheville. We has a scrumptous meal at Limones followed by some sloppy cold stone ice cream goodness (seth had ice cream, mandy was too full). Not much more to say other than...we're still in love after all these years!

Livingston Street Bus Shelter

These are pictures of a new bus shelter, which was designed and constructed by a group of architecture and planning students as part of an idependent community design/build studio. Mandy and I co-founded the studio with two other partners in 2005. This was our second project in Asheville and couldn't have been more successful. The studio lasted 8 weeks. The first 5 weeks were devoted to an intensive study of the neighborhood's assets and a continuous participatory design process. The last 2 weeks were devoted to constructing. It was a rush to the finish, but the group came together strong and created a wonderful new landmark in the Livingston Street community.

Welcome Cullen!

On Friday, July 28th, our sister-in-law Irene gave birth to Cullen...he weighed 7 lbs. 1 oz. I decided to travel to TN to see my new nephew on Sunday after church and take Monday off. I don't know when (if ever) I last laid eyes on a 2 day old baby, and he was unbelievably precious! Very tiny, a head full of hair, and long fingers that he would cross with the utmost seriousness as he slept. Perfectly folded tiny little hands! Ashton, who turned 2 in April, is not quite sure what to think of the "baby," as he calls Cullen. We spent lots of time playing with Ashton, and occasionally he would peer over at Cullen, get close to him, then declare, "Bye bye baby!" as he went back to playing. Irene and Corey are happy exhausted. We love Cullen already! Seth will get to see him in September.