What a crazy, fun weekend we had! I am SO excited to be able to share things that don't have to do with Emma because I have been feeling a bit like she's all I talk about on here. But it's hard to have other things to share about when I'm with her 24/7....and I don't mean to make that sound negative. I LOVE LOVE LOVE the incredible blessing and privilege I have to stay home with her and don't take it lightly.
Anyway, without further ado....our weekend. (or at least the 2 highlights)
For Christmas, Jarred's parents gave us and his brother/sister-in-law gift certificates to go out to eat and demanded that they babysit all the kiddos while we double date. They were going to expire tomorrow so we quickly made reservations for Saturday night at this local place called the Bube's Brewery. This restaurant has 3 eating areas and we were planning to go to this part called the Catacombs. At the last minute we realized the cheapest thing on the menu was $30 so we nixed that idea for one of the cheaper parts of the restaurant, The Bottling Works. Dinner was so-so...really slow service and I ordered a chicken ceasar salad that must have been from the kids menu because it was so tiny and bland and definitely not worth $12. When we asked for the bill, the hubby's get out their gift certificates, and the waiter informs us that he can only accept one of them. We said no no, we know we can only use one per check but we are 2 separate checks so it's okay. He explains that they "don't do separate checks anymore" and if he uses both of the certificates on one check, knowing that goes against their policy, it'll be taken out of his paycheck. So he offers to get the manager for us. Thanks. 20 minutes later, a woman strolls over, seriously dressed like a hippie in a flowy skirt with bright red lipstick, clutching her purse under her arm and although the verdict is still deciding if she actually was the manager or some street person like Jarred thinks, she proceeded to tell us a bunch of bologna about how they can't accept both of them and went into a confusing explanation about some other things before finally offering to get us the owner of the establishment. Great. Another 25 minutes go by, all the while, we're stewing over how ridiculous this is. If we had sat at different tables, there would be no issue. Finally the owner comes out. She plays it sugar sweet, asking how she could help us. We explained that we were trying to resolve an issue with our bill, that we were given these as gifts and now are being told that we can't use them because you can't separate our checks. She says, well yes it is our policy that we don't separate checks. We calmly explain that we were never informed of that policy, it's not written anywhere in the restaurant or on the menu and since MANY people do that everyday, we would suggest making that policy MUCH more well known. "oooooh" she says..."that's a wonderful suggestion. We should think about doing that." ha you're welcome, now what are you going to do about our problem here. She tells us that she could separate our checks, but she was still unwilling to use both of our certificates and starts to tell us how they aren't responsible for the certificates because they weren't actually purchased at their restaurant, they were purchased through a radio station and the person that bought them had to have agreed to the policy. We explained that they WERE responsible for accepting the certificates because, duh..what do you know...they are FOR THEIR RESTAURANT! She tried to argue that it's basically like "trying to use a Giant card at Weis?" and a bunch of other nonsense that didn't even make sense. She even went so far as to tell us that "they probably aren't going to do these certificates again." Again, great, but what are you going to do about OUR problem??? (and through all of this, we are VERY calm and respectful, not at all being rude or out of line). She told us that she wasn't going to argue with us, that she would only take one certificate and without coming to ANY sort of resolution, the owner of the restaurant, WALKED OUT ON US! Just left...abandoned paying customers! Can you believe it??? So there we are, sitting there baffled, with our mouths open like "Did that seriously just happen?" The poor waiter came back over and asked if we had reached a solution and after explaining our situation he said, "well all I can tell you to do is just pay it and never come back again." haha you know it's bad when an employee tells you never to return! So we paid our bill, used our ONE certificate and to redeem the situation, we gave our extra one to the young family behind us! :)
Unbelievable.....at least we have a ridiculous story to look back on and laugh.
So today, (this story is much shorter and involves pictures!) we had a little family picnic with Jarred's family here at our house. Out of nowhere a HUGE thunderstorm dropped 3.5in of rain/hail on us very fast. Our road was a complete river. Here's a picture of our mailbox catching a wave and the main road...
Looking out our front porch to the road. We have a very small creek that goes under that bridge which was totally overflowed and made a big lake out of our meadow.
But the night cleared up and we caught this AMAZING sunset. Seriously, our God is incredible. Mighty and awesome!!!
The John Deere tractor is not so amazingly nice on the back, but she looks so darn cute driving it! And it makes Daddy super proud to see his girl loving the green tractors already! haha Speaking of John Deere....yesterday I volunteered to help my hubby mow the lawn. If you've never been to our house, you wouldn't know that we have LOTS of yard to mow. It takes Jarred about 4 hours to get it all done. And since he's very particular with how to yard looks, he does it pretty much every other day. Add that to an already looong day of farming and we pretty much don't see a lot of him in the spring and summer months. So I volunteered to give it a whirl yesterday while Emma took her afternoon nap. He pulled out the Deere, gave me a demo lesson on how to work it and strictly forbad me from going near the front yard. I was delagated to the back where no one could see my figure 8s :) haha I worked SO hard, trying to make very straight lines and in the end he was impressed although he did comment that I didn't make "striped lines" alternating the direction on each pass. Goodness....what did he expect? i'm a novice mower and the man makes lines practically for a living driving tractors! ha! 
