Five Days: Two Graduates

Lots of family and friends gathered at Matt & Emily Sroka's house yesterday to celebrate Matt and Robin's recent college graduations. Matt from Liberty University and Robin from Towson University. Here they are counting down with me and Laura:Its going to be a busy week for us, but first I have to play 4 softball games tonight... we've had so many rain-outs this season! Let's hope I don't get hit in the face or something tonight.
-Bert

Six Days: Counting Down to Another Wedding

Last night, while Mackinzie had a sleep over at MiMi's and GrandPop's, Laura and I went to Dave and Cindy Kelley's wedding. I went to school with Dave since the seventh grade, but we really didn't become close friends until after college. Cindy is a great girl and a lot of fun to be around. Her Uncle Marty generously hosted a bunch of us for a whole week at his Ft. Lauderdale home last summer. Anyway, here is me, Dave, Cindy, & Laura counting down:

Did I mention the food was awesome?

At each table setting, there was a collage featuring Dave & Cindy and every person at that particular table. It was a very cool idea that, I'm sure, took a lot of time to do. It was a lot of fun to look back at some of our memories.

This morning, we're off to church where we'll reunite with Kinzie and then we're heading down to Annapolis to celebrate Matt and Robin's (Laura's brother and sister's) college gradutions with a party at Matt and Emily's house.

-Bert

The Countdown Begins: 7 Days!

Here is Mackinzie, fresh out of the bath this morning. She's enjoying a cup of milk and some "little bee" crackers while watching "Yo Gabba Gabba" on tv.

She's kicking off the countdown. One week from today, Laura and I will be getting married!

-Bert

"Real" Rock Band

We just got home from a short visit with (soon-to-be) Uncle Will and Aunt Brittany. After trying out "Grand Theft Auto IV" on Will's Playstation 3... and keeping Kinzie out of the room for most of the video game debauchery... we ventured down to the basement for a little "Real" Rock Band.
Kinzie loves playing the drums!



Each Sunday, after church, she practices a little bit on the electronic drum kit at Abbott, but this is the first time she got to play a real drum set.


















Will is a good teacher.


























Even I joined in, and I've got to be honest... I've played with worse drummers...
(*cough* Jon Chester *cough* *cough*)

Tomorrow, it will be exactly one week until our wedding! Laura and I are going to try and blog each day with a countdown leading up to next Saturday, July 5th.
-Bert

Dancin' Queen...

After a delicous meal that I slaved over ALL day.... (meaning 20 minutes)....

we cleaned up the house a little and turned around to find a MONSTER!... haha... just kidding, it was our little dancin queen! :) You would think she got into mommys hairspray, but suprisingly nope, this is au' natural! ;)

It's not always fun to put the crazy girl to sleep, but someone's got to do it! :) Sleep sweet! ~Laura

New Stuff

We were very productive yesterday. Laura found a brand new sleigh bed on Craigslist for just $350. The seller lived just off the Carney exit from I-695, so it was literally a three minute drive to check it out and pick it up. The lady selling the bed was very nice and it was definitely brand new. It had never been set up and the rails were still the box! It sells on JC Penney's website for $499, so we got a great deal. It looks like this:We didn't take any pictures of it set up in the bedroom yet, but maybe later we will. Its especially nice if you consider that I've been sleeping on just a mattress and box-spring on the floor for over two years! I'd like to thank Brittany for helping me pick up the bed frame and also helping me set it up.

Laura also took advantage of some of the many Bed,Bath, & Beyond gift cards she received at her bridal shower by purchasing a much needed book shelf for our living room. Mackinzie helped me assemble it.

The next big purchase is gonna have to be a big flat-screen television for the bedroom now. With the new sleigh bed, we can only see the top 2/3rds of the television screen and accessing the remote sensor for the TiVo isn't an easy task. .... yep, a wall-mounted flat-screen tv would be a great wedding gift to receive..... -haha!

-Bert

Honeymoon Tickets

Yesterday, Laura, Mackinzie, and I visited Pauline at Accent on Travel to pick up the tickets for our honeymoon. Laura and I will be spending 4 nights in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. I had never even heard of Punta Cana until I called the travel agent for help with planning the honeymoon. We are leaving on Monday, July 7 and returning on Friday the 11th. The best part of all the honeymoon planning came a couple of weeks ago. We were all set to spend 4 nights at the SunScape Punta Cana resort, a 4-Apple resort (based on Apple Vacations rating system). Everything was set and paid for when Pauline called me to say that SunScape was shutting down from June 1st through December for refurbishments. (now, why a resort would still accept reservations when they know they will be closing their doors for a while is beyond me...) Anyway, the upside to this came with our free upgrade to Dreams Punta Cana resort, a 6-GOLDEN Apple resort! Needless to say, we are very excited about it!!

Last night, after playing the last two softball games of the church league season, we celebrated with champagne and a movie with my brother Will, and his fiancee, Brittany. Laura is holding our tickets in the picture.
- Bert

The Weekend

Its back to the Monday morning routine for us. I'm up at 8am working at my desk and Laura and Mackinzie are sleeping in. We had a fun weekend though. My brother and I took a trip to the dump on Saturday morning... which is always fun, followed by bachelor and bachelorette parties for Laura and me. Laura went out downtown with a bunch of her girlfriends, while me and the guys stayed in Parkville for a cookout and some cornhole. (bean-bag toss game) There was talk of making it "strip-cornhole"... with the first two losers wrestling it out for the right to put their clothes back on, but fortunately that game never came to fruition. We spent some time visiting Laura's family on Sunday afternoon before heading up to Mountainview Bible camp. This is camp week for our church and last night was the first night of camp. Mackinzie loved the big slide on the playground!
Before I sign off, I wanted to include a couple of pictures from the Jimmy Buffett concert from last Saturday.... I could write a whole blog about it, but it might take me all day and I'd get frustrated all over again!

That's it for now. We've got a busy week with some small wedding details for work out... including the purchase of several cases of Boordy wine. If you have a favorite kind, let us know so we can buy it!

-Bert

We're Getting Married!!

The date is set. The dress is bought. The plans are falling nicely into place.

On Saturday, July 5th we officially become a family!
Come back and visit our blog for pictures and stories about the wedding
-Bert