Day@theBeach

Hanging in there...

2011-10-06T04:55:00.000-07:00

I had really hoped that I could keep up with my blog through school. But that's proving to be a challenge with everything else I'm doing. I know, school and housewife,... rough. But lately there are days I come home and am just so exhausted! I'm still enjoying school though. I'm constantly looking forward towards graduation.

Yesterday we had a girl graduate. She was a prior nail tech. She had gone through the nail tech program, and worked for a solid year, then returned for cosmetology school. Crazy huh?? I was sorry to see her go. She was really sweet, and so very helpful! I had hoped to pick her brain even more so while I had the chance.

Also yesterday,... I did my first full set of tips on a CLIENT. It's one thing to do them on another student, but a client is to me a true test. I've done a couple sets on students,... however, the two I've done them on, don't even TRY to take care of them. Put them on Saturday afternoon, but Tuesday they've pulled them all off. Bleh.

So, this gal that came in, was getting the WORKS! she wanted pedicure, manicure, hair colored and high lighted!!! While they put the color on her hair, I did her pedicure,... then got set up for her tips. Did the cuticle care and such,... got the tips sized,... took a break and got food. Returned and started prepping her nails for the tips. I screwed up a few times on steps,... but quickly corrected. I wasn't sure about 2 of the nails, but the rest looked really good. I had a couple comments by girls that would walk by, saying they looked really good. One compliment was from an instructor :o) Made me feel good. The client wasn't able to get her highlights done yesterday, so will return this morning. She was happy with her nails when she left, I can only hope she'll still be happy when she returns today. I told her I didn't mind constructive criticism and that if she had any problems to tell me so I can fix it. We'll see how that goes huh??

Had a GREAT weekend this past weekend. Got home from school Friday afternoon and opened the kitchen door (leads to the garage) and this big cloud of garlic wrapped around me :o) Mmmmm!!! Cousin CC was over fixing us dinner!!! We had so much fun!!!! Jessica helped cook, when Gina and family showed up Hannah helped out too. Seemed I had to run an errand or something? but I can't recall for sure. It did seem I got out of a LOT of helping LOL CC stayed the night that night,... got to sleep in Sydney's bed since Sydney was staying the night with a friend and going to a fair the next day. I got up to go to school,... house was pretty quiet,... did what I had to do and left. When I got home,.... we were missing 2 more kids. Jessica and her friend went to town to see a movie. I was SOOO worried about that. Her friend had been driving on a permit for a long time, and now had her license. Her friend is a good girl, but I was still paranoia momma. They both had a good time though :o) I'm glad they were able to go and do something fun like that. I had Jessica text me at every stop and when she was back to her friends for the night. Geoffery had gone with his Grams to the chili cook off in town,.... and later he called asking to stay the night!!! So,... we were kid free. At least until after 5pm when Sydney would return. Hubby and I ran to the gas station,... he was dying for a coffee Monster... then we went to Subway and got dinner for he and I and Sydney. Went back home and vegged watching some tv. I enjoyed that day a lot :o) Then CC came over later,... with a present for Jessica!!! She had asked prior,... but wanted to get her a new mattress because the one she had sucked. It was something I had hoped to buy for her once I was working,.. but this was SO SO sweet of Aunt C. She got a queen, so it's larger than her box spring and all LOL We all flopped down on it to try it out :o) OMG so much nicer!!!!! We made it up and hoped that Jess wouldn't notice right away. Later we watched a movie and LAUGHED our butts off. Bridesmaids was the movie. Totally awesome!!! Watched some LA Ink on Netflix,... then I went to bed around midnight. That's LATE for me. Sunday I was up by 7 and had the dogs outside,.... CC again stayed the night, and tried out Jessica's new bed :o) LOL She said it slept GREAT!!!! She remade the bed sloppily so that it looked sorta like before,... I couldn't WAIT for Jess to come home and see and try it out too!!!

CC was up about 7:30ish and headed to Gina's by 8am. We had plans to go to the drag strip in Paragould. I woke Chris at 9:30 who forgot we were even going ROFL He got up and got ready and we waited on Geoff to get home and had him ready,... then took off for Gina's and headed over to the strip. They had a car show going on, plus the drag strip was pretty active. Was a fun fun day :o) Came home and cleaned up a bit .... even had a short cat nap before everyone came over and we grilled up some burgers for dinner and watched the race. Err.... Gina and CC grilled up the burgers for us,... I was booted out of my kitchen!!! LOL

All in all it was a very busy and FUN weekend. Not sure what's in store for this weekend,... but am hoping the weather holds out and we can grill for Sunday at least!!!

Best shove off and get a little more study time in, I've got a test today. Last 3 tests I've aced!! I hope to do the same this test.

Another day,.... another dollar,.....

2011-09-21T04:50:00.000-07:00

So,... I have completed my first month of school now. It's been going very well. I'm still very excited about it. I look forward to going and learning and DOING. I want to be the BEST I can be with this. I really hope to do very well once I have my license. Am just really excited to be working!

I think since I've gotten to the floor,... (as of Aug 31st per Facebook status) I have probably made roughly $30 in tips. I think that's pretty good considering it's a school, and most of the clients that come in are on a fixed income. More times than not, I get tipped $1. Hey, it's a dollar more than I had before right??? Not to mention, dollars add up!!! And then the kids take them away *sigh*

I can't even begin to count how many pedicures I've done. Way more than manicures. Although, from an already licensed nail tech, she said that she'd much rather do pedicures than mani's because you get more for them. Good point!!! I don't mind either though. I've really gotten used to doing pedicures though. I actually did one on the already nail tech and she gave me an 8/10. I liked that :o) I'll be sad when she leaves,... which is this month some time. I hope to pick her brain more before then. She's given me a lot of advice.

Yesterday was rather *grrr* Because too many were not doing anything Friday or Saturday, they started a "daily assignment". The daily assignment must be done if you have no clients,... must be done before you do anything on each other. Well, being that I'm part time, I don't have a lot of free time to do what we have to do for our monthly sheets too!! After we got out of class, it was just after 10am. I got started on the assignment, and by the time I finished and had it checked it was 12:30. Enough time to snarf down my lunch and get ready for my 1pm client. Once I was done with the client, I had to beat feet outta there!!! It was already after 2pm.

The good thing though is that this assignment is basically what I will do for the practical board exam, when I go to get my license. Everything we're doing, is what I will do there. So, the more I do this at school, the better I will be for the final exam. I guess that is a good thing,... just that I still have like 5 more pedicures to get finished along with a ton of manicures before the end of the month.

Another GRR moment was when a client wanted to borrow a polish of mine,.... and the girl that sits beside me was doing her pedicure. I had a NEW polish,.... hardly used.... and she spilled it all over the client and the floor. Grrr. I was so pissed. *deep breath* I will be very happy to be graduated that's for sure. I can't stand unprofessional people. We are in a business,... put your professional personality on please!?! Dang. BUT I am in a school of mostly 18yr old girls. Oh the dramas.

YESTERDAY :o) Was my 14th Wedding Anniversary!!! FOURTEEN YEARS!! :o) I've now doubled my prior marriage time. It just really makes me excited, and happy. I can look back,... sure I remember a few icky times,... but ya know,... the GREAT times far out weigh those. I have a beautiful happy family, a husband that is my best friend. He takes such great care of us,... of ME. I am very fortunate. *sigh* makes me all emotional just thinking about it all.

I've got a lovely cold, so sadly our evening together wasn't spectacular,... but we were home, together. Sure beats the fact that he could've been working nights!! That would've sucked. I hope to make it up to him this weekend,... I know we'll go to dinner Saturday night,... looking forward to that :o) But I look forward to some quality time Sunday as well.

Anyhow, I need to go get my lunch ready for today. Run the dogs outside,... all that fun stuff.

Happy Anniversary to US!!

My first week of school!

2011-09-07T05:15:00.000-07:00

I have completed day 3 of manicurist school! Yay me!!!

Day one: it was rather ick. I was extremely nervous that morning, I couldn't even begin to think of eating breakfast! I worried about getting the kids to school on time and ME to school on time, I worried about hubby being home alone without me and having to deal with the puppy.... I worried that I wouldn't know what the heck to do when I got there,... all the little things LOL The drive over I was anxious,.... slow drivers, road work, etc. I thought for sure I'd be late. You've gotta be there by 8:30!!

Well, I was there right about 8:15! I was very proud of myself. I went in, and found out what to do,... go into the office, sign in, get your time card and punch in. Then wait until 8:30 and we'd have roll call. I think that's odd, roll call considering you all just signed in???? Go figure. Anyhow, after we did that, I learned that myself and one other girl started same day who is also a nail tech. The other 4 girls that started same day are cosmo girls.

Myself, and the other new girl, and a girl who's been there 2 weeks already went into a smaller office with our instructor. It was kinda hectic as she was having to answer the phone as well as teach. We just did book work. It was all pretty basic, a lot of easy stuff like bacteria and infection control. Science kinda things. I like science!!! We took a short 10min break, by then I was hungry and went ahead and ate what little bit of lunch I fixed,... then we went into another area, all the new folks, and had orientation. We reviewed a lot of stuff you get when you enroll, and some other things. Then we got our kit. THAT was fun!! It was like Christmas. All the goodies we got :o) Big black bag full. China Glaze polishes and nice manicure kit, etc etc. We had to check off to make sure we had everything. By then it was time for me to go home. I felt a bit overwhelmed but I did have a good day. I survived!!!!

Day Two: Pretty much the same deal,... got there early enough to talk to the owner, and asked about reworking my contract to part time only and about the payments since Nucor will cover most all the fees. I remembered to sign in and clock in,.... I can't tell you the last time I had to clock into a building!!! Waited for 8:30 to go into the classroom area for roll call. Then went into the little office for more book work. I then found out that I had a test the next day!!!! TEST???? GAH!!!!! I can't tell you the last time I had to take a TEST!!! *EEK* Then we went into the room where we had orientation, desks, and work areas to practice. We were shown how to set up a manicure table, and then the new girl and I both did manicures on each other!! Yay!! I got to touch a real person!! I couldn't wait to tell the girls because both of them had asked me after my first day of school if I did any manicures LOL I did a french manicure on her,.... and it was awkward at first, especially filing,... but I think I'll get the hang of that part okay. Her nails turned out decent enough,... so I couldn't complain for my first attempt LOL

I got home that afternoon, couldn't wait to let the puppies out as they'd been in kennels from 7:15 - 3:45ish I guess it was. Surprisingly Phoebe did GREAT!!! No messes!!! I had NO idea that a puppy this young could hold out that long. She's been so wonderful! Just love her to bits!!! The other two are still very jealous :o\ I hope it doesn't take long, then we'll see them running around playing together. I already had dinner cooking in the slow cooker so I was able to sit down and play with the dogs and get a few things done around the house. I swear though, these EARLY hours are killing me. I was sooooo tired!!! But I worked on studying some,... as much as I could. But by I think 9:30 I was ready to fall into bed. So, that's what we did.

Day four: Test day!! EEK!!! I hope I do well. Was up bright and early with hubby again, got myself ready to go,.... and was to school in plenty of time that I sat down and went over a few things in my book just to refresh my brain again. I was very tired, but anxious to get this test taken. We ALL went into the classroom area and took our test. I thought it might be multiple choice or something, but it wasn't. More like fill in the blank and explain stuff. Once we were done and handed it in, we sat and waited for her to grade it and tell us our grade. Those that did really well, she said out loud. Those that didn't she called to her. I guess one of my answers had her in question, so she borrowed my book to double check it,... then she called me up there :o\ Great, first test and I do crappy. I head up there, a bit nervous at what I'm going to see. Out of 15 problems, I missed 3. I had a 90%!!!! YAY!!!!!!!!! I passed!!! You've gotta have a 75% or better. If you score lower, you pay $5 to retake the test. Yup yup, I was a very happy camper :o) WOOOOHOOO!!! I don't really remember what we did after testing. Think we did manicures. The cosmo girls had to work on them and all,.... so we taught them what to do more or less. It was a great day!!!

Well sadly,... I got distracted or interrupted or something and never did get to finish this post. So,... I'm going to end it with saying that I've been going to school nearly a whole month now. Sept 16th will be a month. I'm still enjoying it too. I've had some interesting clients as I'm now on the floor!!! I was very nervous the first few clients. I think I'm doing better now though. Since I've moved to the floor, I've made a whole $20 in tips!!

Well,... it's that time, gotta get out of here for another day. Until next post!!!

Have a great week!

Last Summer Friday.....

2011-08-12T08:12:00.000-07:00

Yup, today is IT. The very last Friday of Summer 2011!! Wow. Hard to believe that the kids will be returning this Monday for a whole new year. I'll have one in 5th, 8th and 11th!! Crazy!!!

I think we're all ready. I've got most all the school supplies I know they need, and think they WILL need. I never know exactly what the older 2 need until they come home from their first day of school. That's always nice. (not really)

Cousin did Sydney's hair for her the other day! She looks so pretty!!! It's not AS blonde as it looks, but it's pretty blonde!!! She LOVES it,... especially all the layers! Oh and she's got a few feathers in her hair too,... that's the latest hair trend for girls these days.

Sydney's new look

She's anxious for school to start, I'd say she's really missed her friends. It's so hard to get together with friends during the summer. If we're not doing something, then the friend is. She's spent the last week of summer going to school to practice for band. She's enjoyed the week that's for sure. Today they get to go to the movies after practice. Nice way to finish off the week!

Jessica has been slowly reading her English assignment and doing the work for it. I think (hope!) she's about done. The joys of taking an AP English class is that you get summer work. Bleh. At least the book wasn't HORRIBLE. There were SOME good parts to it she said.


Awww cute girls!

We've been slowly gearing up to our school routine. Going to bed earlier, getting up earlier. I know that it's still going to be horrible come Monday. Sydney's been up by 7am all this week, but after I get home from taking her to the school, is when I wake Jessica and Geoffery. Lately, Geoff has been up when I get home, which is good although, he's not happy about it. This morning I told him he needed to go eat. At 8am he said he was NOT hungry. Um. Monday, it will be like 6:30am, so you'd best go eat. Yeah, gonna be a rough week ahead for sure!!!

Geoff and Phoebe playing

It's been a lot of fun having a new "baby" in the house. I have forgotten how demanding they are LOL I almost look forward to naptime too!! She really is something else. Funny and sweet and well, all the wonderful puppy stuff!!! Yes, we've had some accidents in the house, but really for the most part, she does very well. Helps that I'm quick to run her outside after she wakes from her nap. She held her bladder all night last night, so that's a plus too. I guess I worry about her when I start school and she's kenneled for the day when no one's home. That will be an adjustment for her for sure.

She thinks this big tote full of yarn is a great place to nap

Ares and Xena still don't know what to make of her, I've yet to really get any pictures of them together. They sort of try and play with her, but at the same time, they want to keep away from her. Xena is very jealous,... that won't ever change. She's jealous if I give a kid too much attention in her line of sight LOL Ares, he wants to play,.... not with the toy you're trying to play with with HIM, he wants the toy that you're playing with, with Phoebe. Goofy dogs. I look forward to when Phoebe's a bit older and they will all play together. I know Ares will LOVE it. He's way more playful with toys and things than Xena is.

Spoiled, pretty Xena

When Phoebe sleeps, she sleeps so hard that you can put her in various poses! It's really funny. Her whole body just goes limp. I had fun messing with her the other day....

I'm trying to sleep here!

Modesty? I haz it?

All in all it's been a pretty good week. Busy at home, getting things ready for next week. Hubby's been working nights all week, and will work Saturday night as well. That pretty much sucks because when he's off, we'll all be going to school. Kids return Monday, I start Tuesday. Should be a very interesting adjustment to say the least.

I will leave you with one last puppy pic! This is probably my favorite. I plan to mow soon, so had to make sure I got one of these. She LOVES to roll around and hide in the tall grass. Her coloring and the green of the grass, nice contrast I think!! She's not fond of outside really. Especially if it's hot. We have to walk her out into the yard just so she has to run back to the porch. Usually during that run, she will stop to potty LOL Spoiled girl. If we're out awhile, and it's hot, she will cry to go inside!! She had enough of our high heat indexes and all to last her a long while it would seem.

Off to finish up laundry! Have a great weekend!!!

Sweet Phoebe

Catheters

2011-08-08T20:40:00.000-07:00

Mmhmmm, a very weird title isn't it? But I had to blog this before I forgot. Youngest, Geoffery ordered a video game from Game Stop. Needless to say he's counting down the days until it arrives. We're not even sure when that will be honestly. I pray soon.

A commercial came on tv. Catheters. You know the one, have them shipped directly to the privacy of your home. He pipes in saying that he has 2 things that are better than catheters. I said you do??? Yeah,... one will be here prolly Weds he says,... mmmhmm... you don't even know what a catheter is do you??? "Nooo." So, I explained as simply as I could. It's a small thin plastic tube that some people need to go to the bathroom. He gave me a look that said "huh?" so I said, it goes inside of them. With a disgusted face he says "Ughhhhh,.. yeah, my 2 things are way better than a catheter!"

What's the other thing you ask???? Let me show you!


Phoebe George - Border Collie 6 weeks old

This sweet little girl is all mine!!!! isn't she lovely??? Sunday afternoon, we had my wonderful cousin and her family over for Nascar-fest. She fixed us an AWESOME lasagna!! we had bread and a OMG wonderful peach shortcake she made from scratch with fresh peaches!!! Was a terrific meal. I was stuffed for the rest of the night!! Good stuff.

So, while kicking back, watching the Pocono race, Gina and I both on our smart phones surfing around,... especially Facebooking. She came across a deal for "Yard Sales" in local areas. Someone had posted the sell of 3 border collie pups. 1 girl, and 2 boys. $100!!! Holy cow!!! I've wanted a border collie for a LONG time. But I didn't want to get one due to the fact that we don't have a fenced yard. $100????? *SIGH* We don't NEEEED another dog,.... do we?

Well, after short discussion,... hubby sayin to call,... I figured it wouldn't hurt to try??? Chances are, at that price they were gone anyhow. The picture posted, they were really cute! I called,... and they still had all 3 of them! NOW WHAT?? Well, I got details,... the fella was really nice,... told me how he'd bred them in the past but got out of it when he was having chemo treatment. Recently started breeding again. Said they were pure bred, didn't have papers because no one around there really cared one way or the other about that. BUT said for $25 more, he could get them for me if I wanted. HECK YEAH!! I mean,... "Honey???? are you suuurreeee???" Well,... I told the guy I would call him back, needed to make sure I was sure too.

Cousin was telling me "don't forget you're starting school,... " lots going on, kids in school, me going to school, hubby's weird hours. BUT I'd be out of school by the time she really gets crazy active. I think this will work out okay!? The other BUT is will I even LIKE her when I see her???

I made a HUGE mistake when we got Ares. I love the lil guy, but he sure is a handful sometimes. He's larger than your average yorkie,... when I picked him up at the breeder house, and cradled him,... he HATED it!!! his larger brother didn't mind, but he was HUGE! *sigh* I felt bad, the family needed the money, and they told us the papers hadn't arrived yet, they would send them out to me. We paid them, took Ares home,.... and never did get papers. I didn't want to make the same mistakes again.

Cradling is something I'd learned from some breeders when I lived in Hawaii. If you can cradle a puppy and they don't mind it, that's the puppy to get. It always seems to work. Xena is a great example. Smart and focused when you're working with her. She really listens. Ares?? Hahahahaha!!! Not so much.

Anyhow, long story short, I drug cousin along with me,... we made the hour drive in what seemed like no time flat :o) The folks were super nice!! Got to meet puppy's momma and step sister and I think an aunt? I dunno. All of the females were pretty and smart! The puppies???? CUTE!!!!!!

I scooped the lil girl up, cradled her and she just laid there in my arms like a baby. Mmmm so sweet. Perfect little face, loved her markings. The boys were all over the place chewing on our feet and all. I sat down in the grass and let them all climb on me and just enjoyed :o) I watched the lil girl as she watched her momma run around, and her brothers. She likes to sit and watch a lot. Too cute!!! I couldn't wait to bring her home!! The kids had NO clue what I was up to.


Already spoiled!

I pulled into the garage, and the kitchen door opened,.... I hid her as I didn't know who it was. It was my honey. He got to see her :o) But, sadly she was outdoors,... so she was flea ridden! Poor thing. I wanted her in the sink ASAP so the other animals didn't get em. Holding her close, I was rooting around for flea shampoo and honey was asking the kids if they wanted to meet Phoebe. Sydney says "I don't know what a Phoebe IS...." LOL Well, Hannah comes around and I turn slowly.... and she *GASP!* "a puppy!!??" LOL I turned more and Sydney saw "Ohhhhh it's so cuuutteee,.... it would be even cuter if it were OURS" ".... it IS" I said LOL Her eyes about popped out of her head. Jess came in and it was the same thing. It was too funny.

Playing in her new yard, with her new daddy

We all had fun outside with her,... watching her romp around. Coming from being outside all these weeks, when it's been soooo terribly hot, she favors being inside now LOL Didn't take long for her to get spoiled. I took her out today, and she cried. Found that funny. She's been super good. Only a couple indoor accidents. I've gotten good at the whole eat sleep outside routine with pups. Hopefully it won't take her long to get housebroke.

I'm really looking forward to watching her grow up. They say Border Collies are the smartest breed out there. "They need a job to do..." Like hubby said, need to buy her a frisbee! I can't wait to do that. LOVE LOVE watching agility trials and such,... not that I will get into that,... but the whole frisbee thing I would love to do :o)

Yup yup, our new baby. What do Xena and Ares think??? Well,... they're not too sure. Right now Ares just wants to play and doesn't understand when we're playing with her why we don't throw the toy for HIM lol Xena is jealous of anyone that tries to hog any attention away from her. I can't even snuggle up to hubby w/o her getting in the middle LOL

Xena says "It's picture time?"

They'll both warm up to her eventually. The cats don't care one way or another really. They had fun watching her, trying to figure out what the heck she was,.... but it's kinda old news now. They stay away but aren't running to hide. I think once she's a little bigger, Ares and she will be fast friends and playmates.

Well,... in other news. This is the last week of summer break! Wow huh?? It's sure flown. The kids will start school the 15th and I start the 16th.

We're up early this week though, Sydney has marching band practice *yawn* so I should head to bed. Getting up at even 7am is killer right now.

Night night!!!

Tax Free Shopping!

2011-08-07T07:53:00.000-07:00

For the very first time in Arkansas, we had Tax Free Shopping!! It ran from yesterday morning until late this evening. My cousin and I with kids in tow headed out at 7:30 and went and did our school clothes shopping. We got everything we needed and were done by 10am! We wandered a little bit after that, but by the time we loaded up in the car to head home, the mall was beginning to get crowded. Hubby had Sydney with him as she had piano lessons that morning. He said he was cussing me when he got to the mall to pick up her shoes, that he had to park out in BFE! ROFL Ooops. Sorry honey!! But he wasn't there long after we'd headed home, so just shows how busy it really got!

I'm set to start manicuring school Aug. 16th and am very excited about that. I still need to get one or two more pairs of scrubs though. I'll be going PT, from 8:30am - 2pm. Should take about 22 weeks to complete the course. Great news is that hubby's company will be reimbursing us for most all the tuition fees!! Awesome!! I'm really looking forward to getting through with it all and start making us some extra money. I hope that I'm good enough that people flock from all over to have their nails done by me :o)

Going to have some lasagna today, have family over and enjoy Nascar. I suppose I should get off my lazy rear and get some housework done.

Have a great day!

I should be cleaning.....

2011-06-29T07:32:00.000-07:00

But who REALLY wants to DO that??? I know I don't.

I need to get the house ship shape though, as Jessica will be having a friend here for a week,... I'll be waking the summer time sleepy heads to help out shortly too. They'll totally love me for that!

So, yes, friend coming in from Wisconsin, they've been online friends for probably 3 years now? and are very excited to see each other in person. They do skype a lot which is really neat. I hope to keep them pretty well occupied with going and doing.

Geoffery's 11th Bday is Tues, July 5th. In the morning, he and Jessica both have dental cleanings! Yay! Happy Birthday Geoff LOL After that, I think we will take the kids to IHOP for breakfast. Geoff can eat his weight in pancakes, and with all the fun ones they have, he's sure to be very happy about that.

Not too much else been going on. I guess I should get up off my rear and do something :o)

Hope you're having a lovely summer!!!

Nothing new....

2011-06-14T09:28:00.000-07:00

Good Morning!

It's still 11am so I can actually say that. I've been up awhile,... hubby was back to work this morning. I didn't bother falling back into bed as I wanted to fix the kids a nice breakfast. I found this awesome french toast casserole recipe and tried it out when daughter had a friend for the night. Needless to say, it was a big hit!! To me, it's almost like a bread pudding. VERY yummy!! I thought maybe cousin would bring her two over this morning before she went to work. However, yesterday afternoon we had some severe weather, which included a tornado just outside her house!!! Thankfully no major damage was done, but there are still power outages all over the place. Ours was out for about 2 1/2 hours yesterday. She didn't know if the salon had power this morning and whether or not her early client would show or not,... so things got jumbled up. No worries,... I bet Sydney will eat the whole pan by herself ROFL

The weekend was pretty nice. Quiet. Friday morning hubby got off work,.... slept most the morning and into the afternoon. I took youngest to see cousin for a major haircut! He was lookin pretty shaggy. When I got home, hubby was up. I grilled us up some burgers for dinner,... they were bigger than the bun!! YUM!!! Rest of the night was quiet, hubby was still pretty tired, he slept.... I goofed online.

Saturday morning was piano,... took Sydney for that, ran in/out of Target for coffee and GameStop for an EQ2 card. Back home to grill us a nice dinner of chicken with baked beans and a HUGE salad that oldest fixed. I was STUFFED to the max. Chris was enjoying a glass of wine and decided he had to share with his cousin and took off to go see him. So, I watched some tv and played online. Until my stomach rebelled against all the food I'd eaten. I read for a good hour, and considered falling into bed, but just before 10pm hubby returned and we watched a show then I fell into bed.

Sunday morning, was pretty sleepy as hubby couldn't sleep that night. He was up and down and up and down,... bleh. I had been smelling something early in the morning hours,.... even got up around midnight and sprayed some Oust! spray hoping it would help. Is our septic having issues I wondered??? Hmmmm... toilet flushed okay.... *shrug* When I came out of the bedroom, could smell it more.... okay.... started cleaning, looking through potatoes or anything that might be out and spoiled,... I couldn't pin point the smell. Cleaned out the inside fridge, then headed to the garage fridge,.... opened that door and *WHAM* stink!!!! Maybe hubby hit a skunk on his way home??? Smelled like something had died though. Geoff said it smelled like hamburgers,.. Sydney said it just smelled funny. The fact that they could smell it, meant it WAS something. So, I opened the garage door to air things out. Once hubby was up I asked him about it, he said he could smell it last night too when he got home. Hmm.....

Gina and family were coming over so I was finishing up the housework, got a shower, and went to scrub the grill off. We had a MAJOR sandstorm blow through Saturday night while grilling the chicken,.... plus the bbq sauce that gets all over the sides of the grill was getting gross. I was washing it off,... when I noticed two things,.... the 2 far right burners were turned in the ON position,... I didn't even USE those burners Saturday night,.... another thought was check the tank. It was open. I was in a hurry to get outta the wind/sand Saturday night I grabbed the plate of chicken and dashed inside the house. Before hubby left, he put the grill away for me. He didn't think to turn the tank off, because I usually do that before leaving the grill. So, THAT and the burners left ON,... #1. we had no propane to grill with #2. THAT'S where the stink was coming from!!!! #3. Hubby smokes. Usually in the garage. Had he done that Saturday evening,.... well... Kaboom! So, we both agreed that whoever puts the grill away, needs to double check the tank.... ALWAYS.

Hubby was home yesterday, we laid low, didn't do a whole lot. I finished my book *sigh* I always hate that,... hate having to wait for the next one too. Although, rumor has it, it should be out next month! I can't wait!!! I've also got Sookie Stackhouse to read,.... and a couple others,... but I do enjoy reading one after the other :o)

Today, I think most everything I wanted to get done is done... might throw in a load of laundry, but we'll see. I should go out and weed through my sunflowers, and move some around as they're bunched up on one side. That sounds too much like work though..... maybe later. Oh, I do need to run hubby's truck to get some gas and get our new atm/debit cards activated,.... prolly see if Dollar General has hubby's Monster drinks,... yup yup busy busy ;o)

Guess I'll get off here and run those errands real fast!! Hope y'all have a great day!!!

Hello June....

2011-06-02T07:37:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I really am a suck ass blogger.

School is now over for the year. Kids did pretty well grade wise. I'm peeved about the whole benchmark exam that we have to have here. Our school (and I'm sure other schools as well) focus so hard on that stupid exam that it seems they lack on actual school work. Geoff has a super hard time with math. I hope one day that a light comes on and he just "gets it". Until then we struggle through with him. Benchmark exam they said he scored proficient which is great,.... but why does he have an F on his report card???? *sigh* Other than that he did great. Very proud of all 3 kids. Hard to believe next year I will have a 5th, 8th and 11th grader!!!

In other news,.... I know I jabbered about going back to school and doing nursing. After talking with a gal that is going through the program herself, I realized that it's going to take me more than 2 years to get through it all. I will have to do the pre-prerequisites for the classes I would need for nursing. That sucks.

So,... going back to my original plan when my cousin moved here. Nail school. I will go to school and get a license to do nails!! I'm really excited about it. I've always had a thing about my nails, enjoy cleaning them up and making them look nice. I still remember mom getting me a little bag filled with fun nail goodies. I was maybe 12. When she would sit in the living room doing her nails, I would do mine too. Our hope is that once Gina really builds up a clientele then we can open a salon together!! So, we'll see. I hope that I can start this school sometime late July or early August. Be done around Dec or so. I really like the idea of setting my own schedule and being my own boss. This way when hubby is home, and we want to make plans, I can arrange that. Rather than having to make sure I can get time off.

Yup yup, that's the plan now and I'm sticking to this one :o) I'll keep you posted!!

Summer is near!

2011-05-09T09:06:00.000-07:00

Happy Mother's Day a day late!!

I had a lovely day. Honey had to work nights,... but he showed up Sunday morning with a dozen red roses, a beautiful card and DONUTS! "Yeah, you can come in" I said :o) Was really sweet, and the perfect start to the morning for sure! I was putting the roses into water and getting hubby's food heated up when Geoff came out to bring me his present! He made something in art class. I could hardly wait! I'll have to enclose a picture later,... but ummm it's pretty? LOL It fits in the palm of my hand,... will serve well to sit on my night stand and hold my rings or things. The bag was all decorated nicely and he made a card as well. Very sweet :o) He couldn't wait to give it to me, so that made it even more special. I then went and crawled into bed with hubby and slept for a good hour or so more!!

My girls on the other hand,..... Jess came out around 11:30 or so, I got a hug and a "Happy Mother's Day" from her,.... Brian called and we talked for about a half hour which was really nice,... Sydney..... well, I had been in and out of her room periodically,.... no "Happy Mother's Day" or hugs or anything,... I told her that she could clean her room for me :o) THAT would be an amazing gift!!! ".... I would rather draw" she said. Hmm... I never got said drawing either. It wasn't until later that she finally wished me a Happy Mother's Day. BAH. KIDS. :o)

Really though, my day was very nice. I did ONE load of laundry,.... so that I was sure the kids would have clean jeans to wear to school in the morning. I read and read and read..... I grilled some chops and chicken breasts,.... the weather was GORGEOUS!!! So hubby had a nice meal before he had to go to work. The girls and I had grilled chicken salads,.... Geoff used up the leftover bacon for a sandwich. The rest of the day I spent reading more,... watched a little tv,....

So, last week (or week before last?) I updated my resume and went to the clinic here and turned one in,... still need to turn one in to the school, but now,... I'm not going to bother. When I turned the one into the clinic, the office manager came up and spoke with me.... really nice gal. She said "aww I need a nurse" *groan*

When Brian was about to graduate, I had the notion to start school and become a nurse. BUT after thinking what it would cost to send Brian,... I knew we'd not be able to send ME too. So, I tossed that whole plan out the door. Last night watching tv, I was watching a sweet commercial,.... I thought it was going to be for St Judes,... but it was a Johnson & Johnson commercial for nursing. At the end it showed a link for nursing. I went and checked it out, and there are LOTS of links for more information. Plus some for scholarships!

I read through nearly all the 32 pages of available scholarships,.... and quickly saw that the biggest thing is that you need to be enrolled in school. I went to the ANC site and checked out the program,... but still yet, where do I start??? Do I need history? english? all those silly prerequisites??? Texting with hubby about it the whole while, we both said "call tomorrow". I was very excited about this whole prospect. If we can set the money aside so I can take 2 classes come fall, we can get it reimbursed from his work, and I can take 2 more in winter!! Just had to know where to start is all. I could hardly sleep last night as I was thinking so much about this. I'm very excited :o)

I called this morning, spoke with a really bubbly girl. Gave me all the information I needed. I do have to have a couple classes before I can start the nursing program. A math and a chemistry class. 2 classes!!! Then I THINK I need to have or be taking the anatomy/physiology class prior to the actual nursing program. I am gearing up to start in the fall. I need to get a study guide for the Compass exam,... entrance exam for the college,.... GAH. I looked at an online practice and I sucked hard. I hate math :o( I will have to really study up this summer,.... go take that test and get ready for the 2 classes I have to have. Or more if they require it.

In any event,.. that's my plan. The gal is sending me out a packet this week,... should have it next week and I can look it over and go from there.

In other news,... there are like 3 weeks left of school. The kids can't hardly wait. All 3 have colds,... or are getting over a cold. Geoff's is lingering. He tries to fake cough and whine about his throat hurting,... last night he asked if we could go to the Dr LOL He just wants to stay home and play on his computer. Don't we all???

I think June 2nd is the actual last day of school,... so we're all counting down!!!!

Well,.... I guess that's all for now! Have a great day!

It's Me Again....

2011-04-04T07:48:00.000-07:00

Wow, seems it's been awhile hasn't it??? I don't know that there's a whole lot to report, but in any event, I thought it was high time for an update on things.

Everyone is doing quite well. School is going pretty good. I always have my gripes about things, but with the gov't involved, I don't see that there's a whole lot anyone can do. I calculated that I will be 50 yrs old when Geoff graduates. So, yeah, just 8 more years of the crap we put up with.

Lets see, Brian is still living with his dad,.... he's still working "hard" to find a job,.... at least I can only assume he is. He tosses around the idea of moving to CA and living with Uncle Aaron, but I think he's a bit scared to make such a big move. We'll see how that all plays out.

Jessica spent Spring Break in TX with her dad, it started out rough but ended up pretty good. She's looking forward to returning for Summer if she's not got a job by then. She's half halfheartedly looking. There aren't many opportunities here in town, so don't know that she'll actually get anything anytime soon. She's doing very well in school, very proud of her. Some things she could try harder in, as I am very hopeful that she will get a good scholarship all on her own when graduation time nears.

Sydney is involved in a few things. She is in band in school, which she loves,... playing the flute,..... then she's taking piano lessons. We do that every Saturday. Weds after school she takes an art class with her principle up at the school. I guess before he ever became principle, he was an art teacher. She really enjoys his class since they actually DO art, compared to her art class during school hours. Go figure huh??? I look forward to the art show they'll have at the end of the year :o) She'll be playing piano for nearly a year this summer!! She really does well there too. I enjoy listening to her practice. Then Weds evenings she's been attending a Pentecostal church with some friends. I like that she's able to explore other religions and maybe pick one that she feels best with later on in life. Her grades are surprisingly good this year, I just hope that next year will be the same as she would like to take some PreAP classes. Those are significantly harder, and I'm not sure if she can pick and choose which to be in. I think it's all or nothing,.... so I have to look into that for her.

Geoffery is his same happy self. Enjoying Pokemon, and Star Wars, and video games in general. Also loves to read!! This makes me very happy. He's read and re-read the Diary of a Wimpy Kid books a few times now,.... and now he's working on some Judy Blume books!! I remember those :o) His grades are so so,.... always has a hard time with math,... but this last report card seems social studies as well. Just have to keep hounding him and working with him, and we'll see how it goes come the end of the year. Other than that, he's doing really well.

Chris is working hard,... he took 8 days off,.... (4 vacation days wrapped in with 4 off days) we didn't do much, but that's okay. Got to lounge around and relax and enjoy some quiet afternoons together. We started a "no carb" diet on 3/31. It's going okay. I would just like to lose 15 lbs if at all possible. From what Gina said, it's like 10 lbs in 2 weeks. So, maybe 3 weeks and I'll be where I wanna be??? I do miss carbs though. But it's JUST 3 weeks right????? :o)

I've been playing Everquest 2,.... keeping with the house, kids, etc. Nothing else major I suppose. Rather looking forward to summer break when we're not up at the crack of dawn and can be extra lazy :o) Really hoping we can manage to get a pool again, as we had so much fun with the one we had before. Guess we'll see :o)

Anyhow, I suppose that's about it for here.

Have a good one!!!

Cut Backs.

2010-09-27T11:00:00.000-07:00

I honestly don't know how long these candy bars have been around, but as a kid, it was a favorite of mine. Maybe because I was a kid, it seemed like it was a fatter candy bar??? I really thought there was more of the crispy crunch to it than there is today. Have they slimmed down the bar to save money??? I wonder???

I'm finding a lot more cut backs on things,... went to Starbucks inside Barnes & Noble with hubby, and we get cold coffee's,... I always get one of their little sleeves,... (which were also scaled down in size btw!) and the sleeve helps it to fit perfectly inside the trucks cup holders PLUS absorbs the moisture. We get into the truck, I set my drink down,... and well,.... it doesn't fit as snug as it used to. Yup, they've slimmed up the cups! What I wonder is, are they taller now??? Are we still getting what we used to or is it actually less and we're paying the same???

Just food for thought.

Cleats.

2010-09-24T17:49:00.000-07:00

So, hubby returned to work last night. It always feels so weird when he's been home for so many days, and then the house is empty again. Yes, I say empty, because while the kids are here,.... his spot on the couch is empty and sure I get to hog the remote for the tv and all, it's still much more fun when he's home :o)

Yesterday was grocery day,... so while hubby slept (sorta) that's what I was off doing. Gina and I got goodies to color my hair,... going a bit lighter, BUT we got stuff to do highlights!! She's going to do multi color highlights,... I can't wait to see how it turns out!! Hopefully do that tomorrow. Between my running around and hers, we'll have to see how it goes LOL

I picked up Geoffery some cleats for soccer. He has his first game Monday evening. He's pretty excited about it too. This morning as I was taking Chris some breakfast, Geoff came down the hall, fully dressed and holding his soccer socks in his hands..... ???? "whatcha need Geoff?" "I wanna wear my cleats today" "Uhhh..... nooo" LOL I took Chris his food and relayed this bit of info LOL Goofy kid.

I went down to his room to explain that cleats aren't meant to be worn in school, or on the hard concrete/classroom floors. They're made so you don't slip around when you're running on the soccer field *sigh* Goofy boy. Glad that he's looking forward to playing. I just wonder how much playing he will do,... he is more of a visitor. Sits around, chats with his friends,.... game? what game???

Tonight, was the school's Fall Festival. Due to the construction this year, it wasn't as great as it's been. No bingo. The one year I decide I'm gonna play and what happens? No bingo. Oh well. The kids had a good time though running around goofing off. Doing the slide and bounce house. I got to talk with some friends,... was a quick 2hrs for the kids to run around and play.

Tomorrow, Sydney has piano at 11am, so will be up and gone by 10 for that. Will pick Jessica up on the way back home, as she's at her friends house tonight. Tomorrow evening, Sydney is going to a party for a friend, and has the option to stay the night,..... but I need to call and double check on that. Yup yup, busy kids. Sunday should be nice and quiet at least! Minus all the laundry I'll get to do.

Anyhow.... I think I'll go scrub down the kitchen and bathe the dogs.

Have a nice weekend!

What A Weekend!!

2010-09-19T14:21:00.000-07:00

My honey took some vacation time this month. Just in time for our 13th Anniversary ♥ TWELVE WHOLE DAYS!!! Vacation started on the 11th. We enjoyed a few quiet days together as a family. The kids were out of school for a long weekend from the 9th - 12th. That was pretty nice :o) All of us home and relaxing. I think? I honestly can't recall exactly what we did that weekend. *mental note: need to blog more*

Anyhow, kids went back to school on the 13th. We had been trying to decide what we were going to do for our anniversary??? We had thought going to Hot Springs for the weekend. Supposed to be really nice up there, lots to see/do. Not to mention lots of great food to eat!! But the more we thought about it, the more it seemed not so practical. We knew we could have a kid free weekend at home and enjoy the time together just as much as we would there.

Boy have we!!! Cousin Gina said she would take the kids Friday night, so after I dropped the kids off at school, came home, and we were ready, we took off for Jonesboro and went to eat lunch at The Brickhouse Grill. We'd never eaten there before and have been wanting to for awhile. We each got a big burger. Mine was the California,... (of course? lol) It was loaded down with lots of veggies, incl. avacado! YUM!! It was VERY filling. I couldn't even eat the whole thing. The steak fries were awesome too!! Was a wonderful lunch. Chris enjoyed a couple of darker beers too.

Not dark enough for his liking, but still good enough that he had two!

We left there and went to wander around the mall awhile. We got the kids each a little something. Sydney a Paramore Tshirt from Hot Topic, and Jessica the book she's been wanting,.... Richelle Mead's "Spirit Bound"

I had already gotten Geoffery's surprise and stuck it in his backpack Friday morning. One of his Pokemon Adventure Series comic books :o) He liked that! Anyhow,.... we got coffee from Starbucks and headed home,.... picking up ribs from Couch's BBQ on the way for dinner later :o)

Got home, and flopped down,.... still full from lunch, and watched some Smallville,.... we had picked up season 9 a few days ago. We finally ate dinner around 7:30 and later fixed some Espresso Martini's that we had seen Giada fix on FoodTV. While ours came out rather strong, they were still really good. We decided that rather than the 10oz of vodka, maybe make it 6-8oz instead. Look at how pretty they are! And hubby got to use the shaker mom got him too!!

Tastes as pretty as they look!

We finished drinking our martini's and watched one last episode of Smallville and crawled into bed. *Yawn* Was a really nice day together! Eating, talking, laughing.... *sigh* I love my honey!! ♥

Now, Saturday,.... we got up, showered and stuff. I decided to just pull my hair back and throw clothes on and we took off for Jonesboro and went to eat at Cracker Barrel for breakfast! By the time we got there, it was lunch time, but we still got breakfast food!! YUMMY blue berry pancakes :o) He got an asst of food. Grits, eggs, meats, biscuits, gravy... the works let me tell ya! Was very good, and filling.

From there, yes,... back to the mall. We had been looking for Lord of the Rings video game, it's supposed to be co-op play, but we haven't yet found it for the PS3. So, thought we would look again for that. We ended up in Dillards, and found Chris some new shirts. They were having their end of season sale, so we really racked up :o) Got like 5 shirts for about $13/ea. I love a good sale :o) LOL He was pleased too!! We looked around at the "ladies" section,.... but bleh,... just not much I could find on sale that interested me. I also learned that Reba McIntire has a clothing line. Some neat stuff too.

Wandered around some more,... ended up back in Barnes & Noble and got coffee's again for the ride home :o) YUMMY!!! By this time, Gina had already dropped Sydney and Geoffery off with my MIL Linda. All was moving along well. We headed for home so that we could get ready for our evening out with Gina and Glenn. We had reservations for 7pm at Omar's Steakhouse.

Thanks to my mom, she put the taste of salmon in my mouth/head, so yeah, we HAD to go there for sure. I needed their parmesan encrusted salmon!! Mmmm. We were all looking forward to a nice dinner out.

Got to Gina's around 6, she wasn't quite ready so we visited with the kids and Glenn while she finished up. Then we were on our way!! Thanks to our chauffeur Glenn, we knew we could enjoy the night and not worry about getting home in one piece. So, once there, I ordered myself a White Russian! YUMMY!!!

Cheers!

Was rather surprised at how quickly that went to my head. I mean, really I ate nearly ALL my pancakes when we had breakfast (that is a LOT for me) so didn't think my stomach was that empty!?! Well, it was alright, I was in a GREAT mood and enjoying the evening. By the time dinner arrived, I was on my 2nd drink and pretty darned giggly. Gina had ordered the lobster tails, and I actually go to sample!! I've never had lobster like that before. It was very good, but I love my salmon!!! *drool*

While we were sitting there waiting on our creme bruele for dessert, Gina got this idea to go and get tattoo's!?! I don't know where it came from, but hey, sounded cool.... she suggested just a simple star,... matching,... on the tops of our hands. Well, hubby says "whatever you girls wanna do..." Cool!!! So, we ate dessert, surfed the web on my phone to find something that was like what we wanted. Chris had already called the place we would use,.... The Zen Factory. They would be open until Midnight. We ate and headed that way!!

Gina wanted to look around a bit,... but we still decided upon the stars that we'd found online. Then we had to wait as they were rather busy,.... but the artist took the time and drew up a nice design for the both of us. We had decided on a large star, with stars to represent our kids. So, 2 little ones for her, 4 little ones for me.

Here we are waiting our turn,.... it's WAY past Gina's bedtime!

Is it our turn yet??

Hubby thought we should have a picture of our virginal hands....

Virginal hands?? ahahaha!!!

Gina said left hands,... which was fine with me,.... might seem lame, but since it's the hand I wear my wedding ring on,... well, your wedding ring hand,... just kinda seemed to tie it all up ya know? Hubby says "yeah, and the ring you can take off when you do the dishes" Bah. It seems right in my head LOL

Finally when it was time to go back, Gina wanted to go first. This is her first tattoo ever!

Who's idea was this???

Right here, he's just getting everything prepped up. She looks pretty nervous to me!!

Why did I suggest this idea?????

Here she is,..... she doesn't look very happy does she??? She really said it hurt LOL I don't know that she will want another one or not now??? She had thought about getting this awesome sun/moon deal. Hmm... guess you'll have to stay tuned to see how that turns out ROFL

Then it was my turn,.... I was a tad bit nervous thinking that maybe this area of the hand was more tender than my shoulder tat??? Maybe it WAS going to be terrible????


Piece of Cake!

Or maybe my poor cousin has a REALLY low pain thresh hold??? LOL Poor girl. Yeah, of course it's not pleasant,... and there was one part that hurt, but it never lasts so long that ya can't stand it.

The final products!


Turned out great!!!!

So, I think it was a wonderful idea,.... and well worth the touch of pain,.... not sure if Gina feels the same LOL

We got home after midnight, took the dogs out and all that,.... by 1:30 or so I was dead and went to sleep.

All in all, it's been a WONDERFUL weekend. Dinner was superb!! The time we've had together has been so great. I so enjoy vegging and watching tv together, the trips to Jonesboro,... laughing, talking.

Almost hard to believe it's been 13yrs!! I am truly blessed with a husband, that is my best friend. I am grateful for how well he takes care of me, and our family. It's been an incredible 13 years and I look forward to so many more!!!

I love you honey!

♥♥♥

9/11

2010-09-10T20:49:00.000-07:00

REMEMBER

Damned if you do,.... damned if you do.

2010-09-08T10:33:00.000-07:00

So, yesterday, had a major dental day. Dentist SCRUBBED my bottom teeth. We're doing this in sections. Bottom, then left top, then right top along with tooth repair. Fun stuff.

Because of this, I was sure to fix hubby something simple for dinner as he was working last night. Frozen pizza. Piece of cake, preheat, throw it in,... no fuss no mess right???? WRONG.

As I went to put the pizza into the oven, a waft of smoke came pouring out. CRAP. I had forgotten that we had dripped juice into the bottom of the oven from when we were doing our ribs last weekend. Huge stinky mess. Lovely. Hubby ran to Sonic and got some burgers instead. I made a mental note to put the self clean on on the oven before bed.

About 9:30 I was wrappin up to head to bed,.... turned the oven on, said good night to the kids etc etc. Crawled into bed. Right about 10 the house alarm went off. I figure one of the cats did something to set it off, knocked something over etc. When I flew outta bed to shut it off,.... the house was full of smoke and cats were freaking out. 2 were tryin to rush into my room! I was like screw this, shut the alarm off, and then the oven. Turned the stove vent on HIGH to see if it would help clear the air some.

Then I crawled BACK into bed, my eyes were tearing up from the smoke. Took a good while to doze back off again. Then about 11:30ish I wake to an alarm. I fly out of bed again, turn off the house alarm and I'm thinking something is wrong with it, because it's just making a single beep sound,.... loud but beep, beep, .... I wasn't all the way awake, so I had no idea what was going on. Then realized,.... it was the carbon monoxide detector. GAH! I pulled it down,.... tried to muffle the sound under a blanket, then tossed it into my room,.... still wouldn't shut up. Pulled a battery out and ran into the living room to open doors. The air was still very warm, we had no breeze of any sort. For a good 15 mins I had front and back doors open in hopes of airing things out. I popped online to see about self cleaning modes producing carbon monoxide. Surely this was some weird fluke???? Well, little did I know, when burning food bits in the oven like that, it can turn into carbon monoxide. GAH!! I swear. Try and do something good and this is what happens???? *sigh*

Closed up the doors,.... opened up the two windows hoping that it would help. Crawled back into bed and text hubby about the whole ordeal. My eyes burned from smoke still,.... and then I had mosquitoes in the house. Lovely. I dozed off waiting for hubby to text me back. It wasn't until 1am that he did. Wasn't much else we could do, everyone and everything seemed fine after all that. I went back to sleep. I had cracked the bedroom door so the cats could come/go since the house was still smokey and smelly. I woke at least 2 more times in the night, paranoid I guess.

Hubby got home just before 6:30. I had already gotten up around 4 and closed the windows up and turned the alarm back on, so the alarm being turned off woke me up. Talk about a long rough night. It's 12:30pm and the house still stinks. Not a smoke smell, the smell of self cleaning oven smell. Just yucky. I've sworn off self cleaning, and am sticking with Easy Off from now on.

Back to School

2010-08-25T10:37:00.001-07:00

August 19th, the kids returned to school. Jessica isn't in this picture because she was over at Cousin Gina's getting ready. She wanted help with hair and make up :o) She's turning into a real big girl *sigh*

Anyhow,..... first day of school. Sydney & Geoffery. They were both very excited. Can't you tell? LOL In all honesty, Sydney was looking forward to seeing her friends, but starting "Jr. High" was a bit scary to her. She felt like she wouldn't know anyone, or where her classes were or any of that scary stuff.

Let me paint a picture for you though. The school is one big cluster of rooms. You have sections though, but they all adjoin to each other in one way or another. I forget how many students hubby's class was when he graduated, but it wasn't many. Not compared to where I went to school. Sydney's graduating class might be 100 and that's probably pushing it. My graduating class was 300+ if I recall. The cool thing with here, is that there's one elementary school, one middle/jr high school, and one high school. All put together. So, that also means that the kids you went to 1st grade with, will join you in 6th grade, 9th grade etc (provided they don't move outta town) Are you getting all this? LOL I tried to explain to her, that she wasn't going to be sitting in rooms with totally new kids. There would be plenty of students she would know. "I might KNOW them but I probably won't LIKE them" *rollseyes* Yes dear. She can be so stubborn/negative sometimes LOL As for finding her classes,.... well, she's not far from where she had classes before, so I didn't worry about that either LOL Silly girl.

Geoffery, he was thrilled to get back to school. In 4th grade he would be going from class to class more so than he did in 3rd. More than anything though, he just wanted to see his friends again. He is the most social of kids. I still think he will either be a comedian or a politician . Stay tuned to find out ;o)

Their first 2 days went very well. Schedules were a bit messed up for the girls, but Sydney's was taken care of quickly enough. They had her in beginning band class, and she's now in the senior band class. Big difference. She was glad to have that moved around. Since she's now in "senior band" there's a lot more going on. Generally there's beginning, juniors and seniors. 6th grade is beginning,... then 7th & 8th is Jr,.... all high school would be senior band. He lost a lot of seniors last year at graduation, and there just aren't enough kids to for both Jr and Sr bands. She got bumped up!! *gasp* Means she is learning to march!!! This is fairly new for our school,... Brian's last year was really the first year they started marching.... so fall of 2009 they were working on it I think it was. She's not sure how much she's going to enjoy marching, but she's not said much negative so I think she'll manage fine :o) She likes all her other teachers,... even her math one. I hope that lasts through the year as math is her weakest subject.

Jessica on the other hand. I hope things get cleared up quickly, as I am waiting on a call from the counselor. She spent a semester I guess it was in Texas with her dad. Upon her return and getting classes here, things were really messed up. Here, certain grades get certain classes. She had taken one of those classes there, so they gave her the other one in its place. She was in a class w/ Jrs and Srs when she was a freshman. Because of that, this year, things are still messed up. A class she's already taken is being replaced with one she needs, spanish I guess. But she's also in yearbook club, and has to have a class for that. The only place they could put her is with the Senior yearbook class,.... her teacher told her yesterday she'd not get credit for the class. I guess because she's not a senior???? While her classmates that are in yearbook are in the sophomore class (when she's in spanish) will get credit for taking the class. Yeah, not too thrilled about that. So, we'll get that sorted out. I'm hoping as hubby has said, that it's just a misunderstanding on Jessica's part.

I think Sydney has already come home with a cold and has given it to me. My head has been stopped up since last night. I thought allergies at first, but not so sure now. Yeah, school is back in session.

One in 4th, one in 7th and one in 10th. Where does the time go???

In other news, Brian is doing well in Texas. He says/thinks? he has a job working at a nearby theater. He said he's to start working there soon??? Guess I'll have to follow up on that to be sure.

Well,.... just thought I would do a bit of catching up here. Maybe I'll stick with it? lol I'm not holding my breath.

Parenting....

2010-05-26T15:25:00.000-07:00

Can really really suck.

I wish I had a wonderful guide for all those little things that we have to deal with. You know what I'm talking about,.... messy rooms.... boyfriend troubles,.... cell phone calls that use up all your minutes for the month, or how about loss of scholarships and wanting to have a boy you've never met but only online to visit you over the summer??? Yes, there really should be a guide for all these wonderful trivial things.

It's been awhile I know since I've posted. Lots to jabber about :o)

My cousin and her family are working on moving out our way. They even made a week long visit here,.... they're from Las Vegas. Moving to Arkansas,... CULTURE SHOCK! lol It's been a long process since her husband not only is driving loads out this way to put into storage, they need to find a rental home, and he needs a job. Busy busy!!! BUT they hope to be headed out of Vegas by the 15th. I'm really looking forward to it. They're very nervous about starting over again. Sure can't blame them. I want them to have a new and better life here,.... with ME! My cousin is more like a sister than anything to me. We were VERY close growing up. Pretty well inseparable. She has a daughter Sydney's age (year younger) and while they were here they got along beautifully!!! It was great! Kinda like when we were kids :o) Very exciting.

Since I'm not sure how she'd feel about me posting pics of her and the kids here, I'll refrain,.... but we had a great visit that's for sure!!

What else?? The school year is nearly over :o) Looking forward to that!!! Maybe I'll get to sleep in some???? Wouldn't THAT be great?? :o) The kids would be getting out in two days but we have snow days to make up, so now it's 7 days. Well, 6 since today is over.

Brian is already done with school. We went last week and got his transcript in hopes of sending it in so he could get his scholarship reinstated since he bombed so bad the first semester. He paid for the second semester. Well, he bombed again. SOooooo he not only loses his scholarship for good,.... but he lost the money he paid for the 2 classes. I'm so disappointed. He's not been able to find a job here, not to mention that he blew his car money on those classes that he won't ever get back,.... so he has no car. Just a mess. His plans now are to go live with his dad in TX. He'll be within walking distance to places that he can apply to, so it will be a good move. I hate it, hate that he's leaving,... but I know this is the right thing for him. I'm also grateful that his dad and step mom are willing to help him out.

The girls already know he's more or less leaving,.... but aren't realizing it's "for good" but Jess is looking forward to having his room. LOL I can't blame her. Sydney is a slob. Jess isn't a neat freak by any means, but she's a whole lot neater than Sydney is.

Oh, and while I'm talking about Jess. She met a boy in a chat room (she's an anime freak, found some kid type chat place) and she tells me how he's got some beanie babies he's going to send her as he doesn't want them anymore. Todays news is that he wants to drive up here this summer to SEE her. HUH? How OLD IS this boy?? 18. Riiiiiighhhhttt. You're 15,.... this is SO not going to happen. We're just 2 1/2 yrs apart,.... Mmmhmm..... what part of this is SO NOT going to happen did you NOT understand??? LOL

Sure I tossed it around, maybe I'm being too strict??? "I'll talk to Chris about it,.... but don't hold your breath" Maybe it was false hope I gave her??? But I couldn't make it anymore clear to her that I didn't like this idea even a tiny bit. "you would never be alone with him,...." "he is NOT staying at our house" ROFL That sort of thing,..... to which I got "I know.... " "I know...." no,... she did NOT know.

Text hubby about it,.... "Tell her to tell him not to waste his money" :o) LOL Good way to put it,... so yup, that's exactly what I told her. I'm sure she's bummed out about it big time, but eh, she's 15, she'll live :o) Lots of time for boyfriends when she's older right????

What else can I share????

Took Geoffery to the Drs last Friday. He'd had this up/down low grade fever, sore throat, wanted to rule out strep since its going around at the school. While there waiting, was a sweet little blonde headed baby girl with her parents. She was in her mom's arms and watching Geoff and I. I waved to her which in turn she waved that cute little baby wave back. Such a doll.

"Isn't she cute Geoffery?" he was playing on his DS, pokemon game of some sort,... ".... hmm? yeah..." in his "whatever" sort of voice. "Don't you want one???" "A BABY??" "yeah! Shouldn't we have another one???" "....NOooooo!!" *giggle* I was pretty amused.

"Babies are like puppies,..... they always chew on things... don't they?? and whine...." ROFL!!!

I cracked up. I've always told people that having a baby is like having a puppy. You're cleaning up pee/poop, vomit,.... you've got the whining/crying thing going on,.... the teething stage is always fun,... Dr visits for shots or illnesses you can't treat at home,.... yup yup you want to experience having a baby, get a puppy first.

Granted once your puppy is house broken,.... having a puppy in the house is tons better. You don't have to hear the whining about why they can't go over to a friends house, their room isn't THAT messy,.... or "ewwww do I have to eat THIS for dinner??" Well, I could go on and on and on with that one,....

Yeah, there really should be a parenting guide for all the little things that we don't know how to deal with. Just say NO! I think will be my motto from here on out.

1 Question - 3 Answers

2010-02-05T08:04:00.000-08:00

Very frustrating I tell you!

It's tax time!! We filed and got our money already!! Yay!!! We've paid a ton of bills already and our one big splurge this year, is going to be a pair of iPhones!! YAY!! We've both wanted one for,... well,... since they came out??? But of course we'd already bought our phones, and couldn't do it for the upgrade price until recently.

Well, I am eligible for upgrade, which we can't figure out since when we paid for our new phones last time, we got them together, so technically if I'm eligible, so should hubby. But no, he's not eligible until March 3rd.

Surely we can get this taken care of right?? I can plead with the reps that I really want to get my husband this phone for Valentine's Day. So, I call AT&T directly.

I get this woman,.... I can only assume that it was a woman,.... she had a bit of an accent,.... as soon as she spoke, my eyes rolled to the back of my head. OHHHH NOOoooooo. *SIGH* Grin and bear it and put on my best polite voice and hope to God that she's with the program to do what I'm asking.

"Hello, I'm wanting to get an iPhone for my husband for Valentine's Day, only he isn't eligible for an upgrade until March 3rd, less than a month away,... I was hoping that you could help me out, by doing an early upgrade for us?"

She said a LOT of stuff that I couldn't understand. But the jist was that no, she couldn't do this,... that sure she could put him in for an early upgrade, but he's still going to have to pay full price.

Umm.... then what's the point??? To her the point is, that do early upgrade, you can then buy a new phone. Well, if you're paying full price in the first place, what's the point of doing early upgrade at all?? Any Joe Blow can walk in off the street w/ the money and buy any phone he wants right?? This was just not making sense and as much as I tried to explain it to her,... the less I was able to even understand her. I decided she was talking with a mouth full of bricks,.... but now I'm thinking it might have been more like rocks. Defiantly rocks. I gave up and hung up,... I didn't say thank you, I didn't say good bye, I just hung up. Rude I know, but I had had enough,... and I sure wasn't going to say thank you for her help,... because she didn't help!!! ARGH!!!!

All the while, I'm trying to call the local AT&T store,... nice new fancy store that opened up right near our new fancy mall. But I kept getting the message that all the reps were busy at the moment. I just kept redialing,....

During this time, I'm popping into the "Online Chat" that the AT&T website provides,.... surely this person can understand what I want and I won't have to hear some horrid accent that I can't understand right????

It really went along quite well. I could understand her, she could understand me. Good deal!!! However,.... she too said that we'd have to pay full price for a phone, even though we're like 26 days from his actual upgrade date!! This makes NO sense at all. We've been with them for umm.... gosh,.... too many years now!!! This is just ridiculous!!! I did thank her for her time, considering she gave a lot of detail and explanation.

I still wasn't happy. See, once upon a time, I dropped my poor old clam shell type cell phone into a toilet. Yeah, was great fun. Short story is that the phone was pretty well dead,... wouldn't hold calls etc,... I called AT&T and got an early upgrade, I could go into any store and purchase any phone for the upgrade price. Piece of cake. So, they're telling me that in order for him to get early upgrade, he'll have to flush his phone???? *sigh*

I finally got through to the local store,.... I explained and the gal put me on hold to verify if they could help or not.

She returned,... promptly I might add, and said "So long as you're within 30 days of upgrade, we can assist you"

To be clear, I asked her "and we can purchase him an iPhone 3Gs for the upgrade price of $199.00 correct???"

"For the 16gb yes, that's the price"

TA DA!!! I knew I could make this happen, I just sure didn't expect the long major ordeal. Such a pain in the rear.

Welcome February!

2010-02-03T11:31:00.001-08:00

We have kissed another month goodbye! Hard to believe. Time flies when we're having fun????

Speaking OF fun,... the 29th was my 41st Birthday. Wow huh?? Yeah, I know. Who would ever guess that? LOL I dunno, most days I don't think I'm THAT old. Other days, my body says I'm older ROFL!!!

So, the plans for my Birthday?? Enjoy a nice quiet day by myself as the kids would be in school, hubby at work. He was going to take off, and we would go for lunch or dinner, but you know,.... bills and all that??? So, we planned for dinner on Saturday night :o) Olive Garden!!! We just got one here in our area!! Mmmm Mmmm!!!

Well,.... OF COURSE it's my Birthday and all, so we had a nice threat of some lovely weather. I do say lovely sarcastically of course. The 28th I went and got groceries, and prepared for the worst. I bought batteries and flashlights, I bought cans of soup we could easily heat up with the propane deep fryer, I got lots of milk, bread and sandwich meats. Yes, we would NOT have a repeat like last year!!!! I would NOT allow it!!!

Hubby went to work Thursday night, made sure he took my truck as it has traction control, he and his buddy prepared Thursday morning and bought some de-icer stuff for the windows etc,.... so yes, we were prepared for the worst right???

I stayed up until about midnight, watching and waiting to see what was going to happen. I was hearing sleet coming down starting around 8pm and it didn't quit!! But still nothing was posted online about whether or not school would be open or not????? I gave up and went to bed.

I woke at 5:30am, pulled up the site, and TA DA! NO SCHOOL!!! Cool :o) I peeked outside and it was pretty white looking, and if I remember right, snowing??? (hey, I've slept since then, give me a break!) I went back to bed and got up with the alarm at 6:30, shoo'd Sydney back to bed who then told Jess that there wasn't any school. I patiently waited for Chris to get home, I knew with all the sleet the roads would be terrible.

I wasn't wrong. When he finally got home, it was about 7:45. A good 45 mins + more than usual. He pulled into the garage and good grief!! The ice on the truck was a good 1/2" thick!!!! Dang. It was solid. I wish now I'd taken a picture LOL

He came in and vegged for a bit before going to shower. He was wore out from the drive home. I don't blame him!!! He popped out to have a cigarette in the garage and found that the ice was melting off the truck, and puddling up really good. We have the girls twin beds out there from when Jess left and we put the full sized bed in for Sydney. One of the beds was getting wet!!! GAH!!!! Quick thinking, was grab towels and plenty of them.

HA! There was probably about 10 gallons of water stuck to the truck,.... a few towels no matter how big, were NOT going to save us. Sooo.... Chris backed the truck out, and Brian and I beat on the thing w/ brooms to knock as much ice off as we could. It was snowing at this point REALLY good!!! We were freezing, but we got it done :o) Then they moved the mattress to a dry part of the garage and we were done!!!

Plans were, he would shower, sleep till about 3 and was going to stay home :o) Sounded like a GREAT idea to me :o) Sure didn't want him driving in that mess!!

Well, he woke up about 2:45pm, and called the guy he was to work with, and found that HE was going to work,.... so Chris couldn't hardly stay home :o( Bleh. Friend also said he'd pick him up, he had 4wheel drive :o) So that did make me feel better. Just BLEH. I couldn't wrap my head around him going in LOL I jumped up like OHHH I need to feed you!!! (duh Shannah) Got him some food going, got a few things ready before hand so he would be ready to go.

Chat for a few,.... and towards the last, he asked if I thought he should get the fireplace ready??? Hmmmm nahhh.... I'm sure we'll be okay..... well, maybe we should JUST incase,... we already had the power flickering earlier,... so he ran out and turned the propane on and went to light the pilot, and dang if we couldn't get it lit!!! His ride came, told him no worries,.... that we could live through the night :o) LOL Off he went.

The day had gone pretty good. I had a nice pkg from my Aunt and my Mom :o) My inlaws had given me a few goodies the day before,.... plus a yummy chocolate cake :o) I had Brian fix dinner for us LOL Frozen pizza's. He also served me :o) Yup yup,.... I did as little as possible Friday.

I watched my soaps,... I think I had 3 episodes,... then I watched Desperate Housewives, been Netflixing that :o) LOVE it!!! Once I finished watching those, I was going to watch Mercy,.... by then it was around 9:30.

The power flickered.

The power went out.

The power came back on.

The power went out.
.
.
.
.
The power did NOT come back on. Yes ladies and gents,.... THREE years in a row, I have no power on my Birthday ROFL I'm picking a new Birthday.

I got the kids their flashlights ready, called my MIL to make sure it wasn't just our general area,.... which it wasn't. I then called the electric company, the recorded message guesstimated around midnight for the power to be back on. Well, not terrible I suppose.

The kids were all wound up,.... once they calmed down, the girls were huddled in their room doing whatever, Geoffery fell asleep in the recliner while I read (thank God for booklights!) and who knows what Brian was doing.

At about 11:30, the power came back on :o) YAY!!!!! I led Geoff to bed, did a few things and headed to bed myself.

It snowed all day and night,.... when Saturday rolled around, Chris got home and was walking through our driveway in snow that was knee deep!!! We had some wind as well, so it was drifting high around the house. It was pretty darned cold too!!!

It was enough snow/ice that the kids didn't go back to school Monday or Tuesday!! Nice long 5 day break LOL We're wondering now if they'll have Spring Break?? Or will the time off cut into their Summer break??? Hmm... guess we'll see!!!

Since everyone was either at work/school, I got off my lazy rear and got some major cleaning done!!! I still have a few more things left to do, but wow the house sure needed it :o)

Well,... I guess that's it. I've got some pics and a video to put up soon,... will have to get to work on that :o)

Have a good one!
**HUGS**

Sydney turns 12yrs old!

2009-12-27T19:27:00.001-08:00

This year, she wanted to do her party at home,... do a sleep over. She invited her 7 closest friends,.... 5 of them were able to attend. 4 were able to stay the night. We had 6 girls total for most the evening. *phew*

They hung out in the bedroom for the most part,... they came out and had pizza, goofed around with the cats and dogs,... they had some cake and icecream and hurried through opening presents,... then played on the Wii and the Xbox 360. They put on make up and played with the Littlest Pet Shop stuff, they painted nails and laughed and teased and made a lot of girlie noises LOL

Poor Chris, he had to work the next morning, so by 11pm we told the girls, they needed to tone it down,... they had decided to all cram themselves in the bedroom to sleep,... some in the bed, others on the floor.

Chris and I were snug in bed with lights/tv off by midnight. I dozed off,... but kept an ear to the door listening for girls. I woke a couple of times,... the last time I recall it was around 1:30 and they were still opening/closing doors and giggling.

The alarm went off far too early,.... 4:30am. We crawled out of bed, and I came into the livingroom,... heard the bathroom door shut and the bedroom door shut,... girls were STILL awake????? OMG!! I found out later it was Sydney,.... she had announced that she was going to bed as Chris was getting out the door to work LOL

Thankfully he slept through all the girl noises. Although, we were both pretty dead tired LOL

I talked to the girls later that morning and found they had a great time playing, and that most all of them stayed up really really late. So, I suppose the party was a great success :o)

Chris and I later decided that that many sleeping over,.... won't happen again LOL It was just pretty crazy. We are glad that they all had such a wonderful time though :o)

Here are a few of the pics from the party :o)

Happy 12th Birthday baby girl!!!
Mommy and Daddy love you so much!!!
xoxo

Geoffery's Christmas Program

2009-12-27T18:58:00.000-08:00

Geoffery was Ralph the Reindeer in his Christmas program this year. A real speaking part!!! We went over his lines often,... he had them down to a "T" and was very excited about his big role.

It was great fun watching the program,... and I was thrilled that Chris was off work so he could attend too :o) We were so very proud of him as he did such a GREAT job!!!

Here are a few pics, and the video of his big performance!!

I think he's a natural at the mic!!

Holidays!

2009-12-27T17:15:00.000-08:00

It's hard to believe that we're so close now to 2010!! This has been a pretty rough year for a lot of people. Us included. Granted, I know things could have been so much worse, but still yet. I'm sure hoping for a much better year ahead!!!

Thanksgiving was quiet, we spent it with Chris's folks. Chris had been working nights if I recall, so it was a long rough week for him. We usually will take a turkey and deep fry it for ourselves later on to eat. This year, neither of us were in the mood to mess with all that.

It was a nice Thanksgiving though, relaxing. Enjoyed some quiet. I think that was also the weekend we vegged and watched some Harry Potter. I'd not watched all of our DVD's so that was pretty fun :o) Good movies.

The month of December was filled with activity. We were trying to get a little bit of shopping done, which we managed to do online. Chris is great with Ebay!! :o)

Anyhow, on the 8th I think it was, Sydney had her band concert. They have a large beginning band,... she was crammed in the center, first row on the stage, with the teacher right in front of her. So, I didn't get to SEE her much,.... not to mention the stands in their faces too.

They played really well, and it was a great concert as always. Very proud of her for taking up an instrument. Only thing I ever really wanted to play was violin, but in school I was too shy to even consider taking band. I hope that she continues through the rest of her school years, as it would be really good for her. She would like to learn to play the guitar, and I hope that somehow this might help her or motivate her to learn.

Sometime after the concert,... one early Saturday morning, we headed to the school auditorium for Breakfast with Santa!! Geoffery was very much looking forward to this, he brought his LONG list,.... and couldn't wait to see Santa. We got in, and his number was 49. We went over and he got a cinnamon roll and a cup of milk. We went to the table where he could write another letter to Santa, and he ate and contemplated whether or not he wanted to write a letter. He finally "gave in" and scribbled out a letter. He kept saying that he HAD one with him,... he didn't NEED to write another,... but I knew he needed to kill some time. Santa hadn't even arrived yet!

He wanted to sit with a friend of his, so we did that,.... they both impatiently waited for Santa's arrival. Then they had to wait for their group of numbers to be called. During that wait, they both gave in and went and got their faces painted :o) His friend got called up to go see Santa before he did. Poor Geoffery was so anxious.

Finally it was his turn!!! Here are a few pictures from this day :o)

Then we go into the class parties. These are always the last day of the school year. This year, on Sydney's 12th Birthday. Dec 18th.

Sadly, I was informed by Sydney that she did NOT want me to attend hers. *cries* I couldn't believe it. She doesn't need me anymore. "It's embarrassing" she tells me. EMBARRASSING???? "I'm embarrassing????" :o( "I didn't say YOU were, just that it is embarrassing when you're there" *cries* I don't dress silly, or talk funny, or hug and fawn all over her,..... hmm okay, maybe the later part I do a little bit??? :o) Ahhh well, I knew this day would come eventually.

So, we're driving to school, when we realize she forgot her soda. Dang. Doesn't that just figure??? My plans were to drop them off, go home and get ready and go up for Geoff's party. Well, now it would be: go home, get ready, grab Sydney's soda and drop it off to her first, then go to his party. Meant I got to sneak in there anyhow HA!!! I win.

Or so I thought. I got there,... and the hall was quiet,... the kids were all in their rooms. Hmmm odd. I know they've changed things around a lot there, but sheesh. I went into the office, and waited,... finally got to drop off the soda and told them the "She doesn't want me here at her party" story,.... also mentioned how it was her Bday,... found out that they weren't doing the whole big party like normal. They were just having fun class time, having some food, exchanging gifts,... simple. So, I didn't feel so bad :o)

I headed over to the elementary building,.... and enjoyed Geoffery's party. He is such a character that kid. He was so very excited about his party. We had already had a long talk about being thankful for whatever gift he might get. A $3.00 limit on a gift doesn't buy much, and he is usually always disappointed.

Here are a few pics from the party... lots of good food,... kids had a great time,....

Well, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to see that he was not pleased with his gift. I took this picture, and inside I was giggling. How I managed to capture this so perfectly,.... I looked at him sternly and put on a smile to remind him of how he was to behave. *sigh* Sadly though, even through his fake "I like this" smile, he was pretty upset. He's not been into trucks since he was very small.

Once in the truck, we had another long detailed talk about the art of giving and receiving through the holidays. We also talked about the art of regifting!!

In the end, the day was great since it was the last day of school, they got out early, it was Sydney's birthday!!! so much excitement for one day!!!

Of course, I did fail to post about Geoffery's big performance!!! I'll do a different post and show pics and video of that next :o)

A tad bit late, but Halloween pics!

2009-12-27T16:56:00.000-08:00

This year, it was just Sydney and Geoffery to take out trick or treating. We had initially planned on going to the big church here in town. They always have a big fun deal for the kids. Since Chris was working that day, we thought it would work out perfect. He'd get home from work, kids would be set to go,... and we'd go down there and let the kids run around and play games and get candy.

Sadly, the church started and ended much earlier than past years. After finding this out, it was too late to try and hurry the kids up to get ready to go. I ended up getting them ready and took them trick or treating. We got home just after Chris had. Spent a good hour walking around a neighborhood getting all kinds of yummy candy!!

There were a couple of really fun things though. Geoffery year before last, was a HUGE Star Wars freak. We went to a house, and out front in the driveway, was a man dressed up to the hilt as Darth Vader. He had the saber and everything. Totally decked out. I watched Geoffery, as he stood there in awe.

He's gone from Star Wars, to Sonic the Hedgehog and now Pokemon. Still yet though, this man dressed as Darth Vader was a bit much,... all he could muster up to say was "Holy smoke" He didn't even go up to the folks to get candy he was so dumbfounded LOL It was totally classic!!

From there, we came to another house, it was such a nice evening,... that most everyone was sitting out in chairs on their porches or driveways. This group was lined up against their garage door,.... they had chalk outlines on the driveway, flashing lights, eerie music,... and they were dressed up big time,... I couldn't see everyone, but there was one up there that freaked Geoffery out enough that he was like "HECK NO" he wasn't goin up there to get anything from them :o)

It was so much fun, I laughed and just enjoyed being with them that night. It's great fun to look at things through kids eyes.

Here are a few pics I took at the house,.... Sydney was a "Pumpkin Fairy" and Geoffery, the character from "Scream"

Let's talk about hair

2009-11-15T07:01:00.001-08:00

Once upon a time,.....

Mom and I went to the mall, Southland Mall in CA, and I went to "Command Performance" there to get my hair cut. My hair just so you know is VERY thick,.... at the time it was fairly long. I had to have been around 16 or 17 maybe??? Anyhow, I've gotten used to sitting down in the chair and the hairdresser running her fingers through it saying "Goodness you have a lot of hair" (or something along those lines)

As she was cutting, she commented on the color of my hair,... "Did you know you had some platinum in your hair??" Umm... no, I honestly didn't. At that time, I thought "Cool!! I have some blonde in my hair!!!" Mmm hmm....

By the time I was 21 I was coloring the GREY out of my hair. Granted it wasn't much,... but any grey at that age is unheard of right??? Seems my mom's side of the family grey's early. Nice. Thanks a lot. *SIGH*

Ever since, I have been coloring my hair. Usually a color that matches what my haircolor is normally. Well, I'm 40 now, and "THEY" say that you should start going lighter, makes you look younger and all that crap.

When mom came to visit, we did a haircare day. Went to a salon and got pampered,... I had some highlights put in and it was wonderful. I really liked it. BUT maintaining it.... that's another story. I just can't see going in every 6 weeks or whatever to get it redone for $100+. So, instead, I found a haircolor that closely matched and have been doing the all over color. It's lighter than my natural color for sure. Decent enough, but I do miss the look of the highlights.

Soo,... while getting groceries the other day, I NEEDED haircolor,.... (hate when these nasty grey roots start showing up) I came acrossed this

For Lt Brown to Dk Brown hair,.... and for LONG hair as well. I pondered over the box,.... even called my cousin to get her 2cents on the ordeal. Told her what was in the box,... cap, things to pull the hair through the cap, this rinse that other stuff,... blah blah blah. Well,.... she seemed a tad bit skeptical, but that yes, it would blend in the grey,..... SOLD.

I got 2 boxes. Just because something says it's for long hair, doesn't mean MY long hair,... my THICK LONG hair.

Today,... I'm going to attempt to try doing this. I'd do before and afters, but I think I'd rather not LOL I'll just let ya know how it goes instead ;o)

Wish me luck!!!

Oh yeah, I still plan on posting the kids Halloween pics,... and giving the run down from our trip around trick or treating. It's quite funny :o)

Teenage Frustration

2009-10-24T10:37:00.001-07:00

And I'm not talking about the teenager being frustrated. The mom is frustrated with the teen.

*pulls hair out*

I dunno what I've done wrong, or how to correct the situation, but it seems he's just lazy and doesn't give a crap about much of anything.

I feel like he's for sure not giving 100% at school. Going to Comm. College so he can continue on to a 4yr college and get a degree in gaming design. Sounds wonderful doesn't it?? I mean, great in that he has a goal.

If there was a meter here to show where he was at in reaching that goal,.... well, the meter wouldn't read much of anything.

He doesn't study,.... he's confessed that he's skipped some classes..... hey, I did too when I went for a full semester,.... but he has a goal!!! I didn't.

His room is most always a mess,.... yesterday he came out and asked me "If I clean up my room, can I go hang out w/ my friends" What I thought was sad is that he's 18 and asking if he can do something IF is room is cleaned. Well, at 18 shouldn't he BE keeping his room clean???? I guess not.

Then today,... he's gotta work,.... he's got a seasonal position at Game Stop,... like his dream job,.... he's worked 1 day a week since he started a few weeks ago. He came in to ask me a question,... all dressed and ready to go.

He was a wrinkled mess. Looked like he'd slept in his shirt or worse!!! Just looked horrible. Grrr.... I went off. Nagging mom ensued. I hate being the nagging mom,.... but every time I turn around,... well, he just gives me plenty to nag about.

Told him he needed to either go change or iron his shirt. "Nothing else fits" Well, that's a lie,.... I know for a fact he's got other shirts that fit just fine. ARGH.... knowing him they're either in a pile and dirty, or in a pile and clean.

I'm just frustrated that he doesn't care more about himself. His job. His schooling. Nothing.

I know he has it easy here,.... free room/board. He's got internet, cellphone, gaming,.... it's all right here. Who'd wanna leave that??? I just don't think we ask too much of him. Go to school, do well, work hard,.... various household duties,... we want him to get a decent job so he can start saving towards a car,... but I don't even think he cares about that.

I dunno. Just needed to rant I suppose.

I do have a plan! He has no school on Fridays. So, this Friday, will be job hunting day. He'll go with me in the morning and anything along the way, we'll stop off and get an application, he can fill it out right then and there,... turn it in. Something has to pan out. I'm tired of him being so lazy and not caring about things.

We'll see how this goes I guess.

Enough ranting. I have dinner to start for the littles. They want to go to this Halloween Carnival that a family is having. Should be fun :o) Best get us ready!

**edit**

I just hung up with said lazy teenager. He was about to leave work and head home. He was excited to tell me that he got an achievement at work today... ??? Umm... okay?? what??? "I'm on the board for doing good deeds" "Ohh, that's neat, what was your good deed?" "I alphabetized the whole half of the store" "ewww, bet that was fun" "ohhh yeah..." "well, that's really cool honey" *sigh* All that ranting and look what he goes and does. Damn kid. LOL

You know it's time for home schooling when....

2009-10-19T15:25:00.000-07:00

Your daughter gets into the car after school and the first thing she tells you about is how her teacher sorta melted down.

The class wasn't cooperating is what I gather,... finally a student answers a question, and the teacher thanks her and proceeds to sit down at her desk and tell the students that she gives up, that they can do what they want and she'll sit at her desk and just relax. She sat down and removed her glasses, and had to wipe her eyes. Sydney said she was crying real tears!?!

To add insult to injury, one of the office workers comes in and tells them all that they're going to get zero's but nooooo.. they don't CARE about zero's do they????

I'm sorry.... is this teaching???? I'm confused.

I'm very frustrated. I send youngest to school w/ notes in his folder for the teacher, and never get replies. Just a simple "I got your note" or SOMETHING, ANYTHING would be great!!

Then there are the papers he's to return,.... they sit in his folder and I wonder "did she see these??" "did you turn these in??" to which he says yes, "did she see them??" "I think so?" *headdesk*

Communication is lacking lately. If I didn't think I'd have no hair at the end of a week, I really would give home schooling a shot,.... and like hubby says,.. the kids need the interaction with the other kids. He is right about that, especially w/ Geoffery. He's VERY social.

Oh well, what can we do?? I know teaching isn't EASY, but there just seems to be something amiss here.

The Draft

2009-10-13T14:06:00.000-07:00

I know that we've not reinstated the draft,.... I know that it will probably never happen in my lifetime right??? I feel pretty confident in that. I mean, really,.... would they ever force our men to go to war again??? Could they??? Should I pack Brian's bags and move him to Canada now???

I picked up the mail today. Brian had a weird letter. Used his FULL (he has 2 middle names, so yeah... when you see all that you become alert) name on it too,.... hmm... school something or other maybe??? I waited until we got home so he could open it.

It was a letter reminding him that he was an 18 year old male, and that per the law he had to register for the draft.

Hit me like a ton of bricks. I mean, I know that boys are supposed to. I remember thinking how weird it was that boys did and girls didn't when I was close to being 18.

Now that I'm a MOM,... having my baby boy (okay,.... so he's not a baby anymore,...) have to register for the draft, well, just puts a lump in your gut.

Standing there in the kitchen, the kids are all snarfing down mini Oreo cookies for snack. I look at Geoffery who will have his turn to register in 9 years. This happy go lucky and yes Inky, always in smiles boy.... all I can do now is pray that the draft never goes live,... ever.

Fun times at Pumpkin Hollow

2009-10-13T07:31:00.000-07:00

Last week, we went to Pumpkin Hollow with Geoffery's class. This is the annual 3rd grade field trip. Second time we've been. The first time was less than stellar so I wasn't expecting much, but was glad Chris had the day off so he could go along. That always helps :o) Geoffery was VERY excited about his field trip. What kid isn't???

Here are some photos of our fun time there.... it did end up much better than anticipated.

When we first got there, the kids watched a short video that would explain where we were going, what we would see,.... they all look so thrilled don't they? lol

Daddy got picked to hand out the feed for the goats,.....

Here's Geoffery feeding one of the many goats they had

After feeding the goats and running around, going to the restroom,... it was time for the hay ride!!! Here's Geoffery with his best friend Kristopher :o)

At the top of the hill,... there was a nice pond, the kids were each given a quarter to get feed to feed the ducks, the turtles and the catfish that were in this pond

Daddy and Geoffery at the pond

Kris and Geoffery bein silly before walking through the corn maze

Here, we're waiting to go down to the pumpkin patch.... these large bails of hay were great for climbing on,... and proclaiming that you're the "KING OF THE WORLD!!!!!"

Down at the pumpkin patch, there were so many pumpkins to pick from,... rather sad that they only let the kids pick such small ones,... they're hardly suitable for carving.... but hey... they're having fun right??? Daddy is helping find the best one ;o)

I think this is the one......

YUP! This is THE pumpkin for me!!!!

Ahhh finally lunch time!!!! Can we go home now??? (someone was looking forward to getting home so he can play his videogame on the Wii)

Before we headed out, we did sample some fresh pumpkin pie and pumpkin roll,... omg delicious!!! I could've eaten the whole things :o) We also went over to the fish pond and got our picture taken before going home.

All in all it was a very nice day :o) The weather was perfect,.... considering the day before we had had rain and I fully expected us to be muddy messes,... it wasn't that bad.

Since then,.... things have been fairly quiet around the house. Chris worked nights,... getting a few things done around the house,... getting ready for cooler weather so going through the kids clothes. I have BAGS upon BAGS of clothes and toys that will go to a gal where Chris works. She'll take it to her church where the items will go to those that need it most. I usually do Goodwill, but ya know, if you're HAVING to shop there,... you don't have a whole lot of money in the first place,... so yeah... am glad that the church will see to it that people who need it will get the stuff,... FREE.

Geoffery brought home a sheet to sign up for basketball. One year that Sydney was cheering, I was quite sure they had "pee wee" teams for 3rd graders. I swear they were playing each other. Maybe I'm wrong??? anyhow.... I thought what a great deal for him, then when 4th grade rolls around, he'll be that much better!!! (to play against other schools etc)

Geoff announced Friday after school that he had basketball practice Monday!! ?? Umm.... what time??? "I don't remember" "which gym??" (there are 3 at the schools) "Dunno..." *SIGH* Yup, so far this was organization at it's best huh??

Monday I called up there to find out,.... and even the office wasn't sure. She didn't sound thrilled about it in the first place as football was still going on, and the practices would be over lapping. Well,... this bodes well already doesn't it?? She gave me a cell number of the guy doing the coaching,... I called, left a message and he quickly returned the call.

Which is when he explained that this is a sort of try out for the 3rd graders. Normally basketball doesn't start until 4th grade,... but if any 3rd graders show potential, they'll put them on the 4th grade teams. A try out??? How can 3rd graders try out for something they've not ever done anything with??? I mean, Geoff has NEVER played any form of basketball outside of PE. Yeah, I felt this could've been handled so much better. You know,... a notice sent home to all 3rd grade parents,... Geoffery thought he would be ON a team,... so we had to tell him otherwise. Just go out and play your best, and have fun,...

Chris took him last night, and he said he did pretty good,... he can dribble the ball pretty well,... Geoffery had already been bragging on how well he can do this,... but shooting the ball,... hmm.. not so much LOL He had a GREAT time though, so that was good :o) He'll have like 2 more of these practices where the boys are watched and evaluated. We aren't expecting much, but maybe this will give him an idea of what to do for 4th grade :o)

In the mean time, we're waiting for the sign ups for soccer. At least soccer is something he CAN be on a team for.

Jessica's 15th Birthday is Saturday. Hard to believe she'll be 15. I hate that she's not HERE with US. I'd like to do something fun with her. Have her friends over,.. that sort of thing. I don't know what she has planned,.... but I just finished boxing up all her goodies to send off this afternoon :o)

I guess that's it for now. It's sprinkling outside. I had delusions of going out and weed eating around the house LOL Riiiiggghhhttt... I've got plenty to do inside, so going to get off my rump and get that done :o)

Have a great day!!

Feeling down...

2009-09-30T09:36:00.000-07:00

I am trying to stay motivated and clean up the house. While hubby was home, I did very little, so now it's like playing catch up. While I'm cleaning, I'm trying to declutter areas. We're bad about tossing stuff on table tops and leaving it there, and it piles up more and more..... then there are drawers. You get the idea.

I got Chris's side all straightened up, took a break, ate some food, and watched the season premiere of Medium. I'm so glad that the shows are back :o) I'm so glad we have a technology that gave us the wonderful thing called a DVR.

Once that was over, I set off to clean more. It was my side of the couch,... my end table, top and bottom.

Under the table I have a huge photo album,... and a box. I bought the box a long time ago,.... it had smoked salmon inside. The box is wooden with a metal plate, an image of a fish on top. It looks very Alaskan for art. The salmon has long been gone of course,... but fishing makes me think of Dad. I use the box to store the letters that I'd received from him over the past years.

From time to time, I like to pull them out and glance through them. Today was one of those days. I always cry when I do this,.... it makes me miss him so much. The letter that was on top held a picture of him. He was in the VA program to help get him on his feet, and while there, it was his Birthday along with several other VAers that month. It was a picture of him standing there w/ a mic in his hand.

I can only imagine the things he might be saying,... he loved to talk. He could be quite funny, so I imagine there were several laughs to be had.

Always in his letters, he would tell me how much he loved me, and how proud he was of me. There's still not a day that goes by that I don't miss him. He's been gone now for 8 years. While it doesn't feel like just yesterday that we said good bye to him,... it sure doesn't feel like it's been 8 years.

I guess I will go back to cleaning now.

So, what's new with you??

2009-09-29T15:06:00.000-07:00

Been awhile since I'd posted,.... thought I'd jabber a little bit. School is still plugging along for the kids. We got progress reports on Sydney,... less than stellar,... but she's got 4 weeks to bring her grades up before we remove her laptop from her room. *crossing fingers she brings her grades up* One of her grades is math, it's always been hard for her,... the teacher commented about tutoring. Of course they don't offer such things AT the school, so I asked her teacher for suggestions. Seems her older daughter can tutor Sydney,.... we're still waiting to hear more about that. I will also see if she can work with Geoffery each week as well.

I've torn apart Sydney's room. Now that Jess isn't here,... no point in the two beds year round. Was sad to do, but at the same time,... it sure has made Sydney happy :o) She has her OWN room. Rearranged, cleaned,... all that good stuff. It took me 2 freakin days to get it done. I'm still wanting to sort through the closet as it's still full of junk she never plays with. I do have a pile of toys and bags of clothes to be given away.

Chris took well over a week off,... from Sept. 16th - 27th. He was sure to be home for our Anniversary, and he defiantly needed the break. Work was really getting on his nerves LOL We enjoyed a lot of at home quiet time. We went for coffee in Jonesboro one day,... wandered around the mall,... was really nice :o) On our way home, we popped into the furniture store we use,... Gamble Home Furnishings and spoke with Jeremy there. He's a good guy. The whole family is really. Anyhow, we went in to see about ordering Sydney her full sized bed :o) We found the perfect bed, matches her existing furniture! Got that ordered,.... and well, Chris loves his toys... especially the electronic type. He was in the TV area. We love our tv now,... but Chris was determined to see a better picture, and to do so, we needed one with the 1080p ability. So, he wheeled and dealed with Jeremy and we got our new tv the next morning LOL The bed frame and all will be here in a couple weeks I guess.

Sept. 20th was our 12th Anniversary :o) We celebrated by leaving the kids at home with Brian and going to the 501 for dinner. Mmmm was sooooooo good!!!! I had a nice salmon dinner. I already knew what I wanted before we even got there :o) Was delish!

We went out for coffee another day, wandered the mall some more,.... but for the most part, while he was off, we vegged at the house, played online game called Guild Wars,... some friends from my PSP group also play so we had our headsets and got to talk with them and their husbands,... just a lot of fun :o) Watched a couple movies and things too. Very relaxing and just nice to have that time together.

Brian,... he finally got a job,.... which was like his dream job :o) Game Stop!!!! What better job for a future video game designer???? Sadly,.... he had his one day at work,.... a Saturday morning,... for like 4hrs of training. He called the next day for his schedule, only to find that the store is having to reduce it's hours, so he's not even on the schedule this week. He said he'd be on call for Fri and Saturday. *sigh* I told him that he needs to visit WalMart, and see if he can't get on there. He'd still have electronics, and discount,... whatever he could need would be there. I know he doesn't like the idea of working there though. I can't seem to get it through his thick skull that he NEEDS money,... we won't be paying for movies, lunches, etc. He also needs a car,... badly. I hate nagging. I guess he'll figure it out eventually??? Can't do much of anything without some cash in pocket right??? *shrug* He's a big boy now. Time for mom to cut the cord ;o)

On that note, cutting this now,.... need to get dinner going.

They grow so fast....

2009-09-17T13:53:00.000-07:00

So,... we're headed home from school this afternoon. Geoffery asks me if it's okay if he calls a friend when we get home. Well, no, not until after homework and chores are done. "Yes, I know that already" Mmm hmm.... "What friend are you calling today??" The other day, he called his friend Kristopher, and they would talk like 30 seconds and Kris would say he needed to call him back,... they must've done this like 5xs until I finally put a stop to it.

He wanted to call his friend Sydney,... said that he needed to get a girlfriend. He then proceeded to tell us about how his girlfriend in 1st grade was a user.

A user??? Where do they come up with this stuff??? I mean, he's in the 3rd grade!!!! Should he even KNOW that there are girls out there that will use him??? Wait.... he's in the 3rd grade,... should he even be worried about HAVING a girlfriend??????

Sheesh. I swear, the boy cracks me up, and at the same time,... I am scared for what's to come. I've already raised one son to 18yrs old, and I don't recall going through this stuff with him,.... ever. The poor thing has had one real girlfriend ever, and she ended up moving away. Maybe I should worry about him more? LOL

Oh well.... there are bigger things to worry about right now,... like teaching Sydney how to crochet!! I hope I have the patience for this LOL

Labor Day Weekend

2009-09-05T10:01:00.001-07:00

High in the pine tree,
The little turtledove
Made a little nursery
To please her little love.

"Coo," said the turtledove,
"Coo," said she;
In the long, shady branches
Of the dark pine tree.

Hubby is working nights this week. He got in around 6:30 this morning. I always get up, shut the house alarm off, visit with him before he heads for the shower & bed.

Because the kids are back in school, the dogs have the school schedule down pat. No sooner was hubby in the door, bearing the fruits of breakfast from Mc D's for the kiddos,... the dogs were prancing around my feet, crossing their legs ready to go outside.

*sigh* "Okay, come on" I said. To which hubby says "be careful out there..." ?? "stray dogs running around??" "no, hunters" Eh??? in our backyard????? I peek through the blinds of the backdoor, don't see anything, so head outside w/ the dogs.

While standing there as they do their business,... I hear these *pop* *pop* sounds around me. Holy crap. I poke my head back inside and ask him "They're hunting in the cotton fields????" "yeah, this is the first day of dove season" "oh."

Back outside,... I'm amazed at the sounds going on. It was really REALLY weird. We've lived here now 3yrs,.. and I've not ever noticed this before now??? How could that be?? Obviously I wasn't ever outside this early in the morning on opening day.

All I could really think is "poor lil doves" I have sampled dove. Hubby's cousin brought us like I dunno... 5 cooked up doves. I could easily put all 5 in the palm of my hand, bacon wrapping included. I can't help but wonder, is it REALLY worth it??? You surely couldn't feed a family of 6 with dove. You'd have to kill 3 dozen of the things!!!

Poor doves.

I wish I was rich

2009-08-31T19:05:00.000-07:00

On the way to school this morning,.... I have the music on, relaxing as I drive the kids to school. I'm looking forward to returning home, to a quiet house,... get some cleaning done.... yep, I like school mornings.

From the backseat I hear Geoffery

"I wish I was rich"

"You do?? what would you do if you were rich?" I was thinking that he would say something in regards to not having to attend school or something. Instead his reply was

"So I can buy lots of video games and a new computer and computer games"

Ohhh okay.... well, get good grades in school, and get a GREAT job and you can buy all that stuff.

On the way home from school, we pulled up into our drive and Brian's friend was parked in the driveway. Both he and Sydney were "who is here??" They had a few comments about the white El Camino truck parked there.

"When I grow up, my car is going to be a limo" says Geoffery

I wonder what he will be when he grows up????

Summer Ends....

2009-08-30T06:52:00.001-07:00

August 2nd we drove the 3hrs to Little Rock airport to pick up Brian. He would be returning to attend ANC (Arkansas North Eastern College). It was wonderful to see him!!! I missed him a lot. Seeing him reminded me though, that Jessica was NOT with him, and would NOT be returning. That sucked.

All in all, at least I have Brian for at LEAST another 2 yrs as he works on his prerequisites towards a larger college. I think he hopes to transfer to San Jose State. We'll see how that all goes.

We made the long drive back home,.... and well, by this point, yes,... summer was indeed over.

I was having to shop for the various TONS of school supplies,.... 5 3 ring folders, 3pks of dividers, glue sticks, packs of pencils,... and the list goes on and on and on..... I admit, I don't like buying supplies like this for the entire class. Kleenex, hand sanitizer,... and even the dry erase markers??? Sheesh.

Back in the OLD days,.... you got your new binder, inside the binder you had your trapper keeper folders (if you were smart, you got those, they were awesome!) lots of binder paper,... the little plastic pouch held some scissors, crayons, some pencils, and new erasers!!! You would throw that with your lunch into your new backpack and ta da!!! You were off to school.

Our first day,... poor Sydney had a backpack full, plus two walmart bags full of crap as well. Geoff's backpack was full and one walmart bag full. Oh, and they had to carry their lunches!!!

But the great news is....

THE KIDS ARE BACK IN SCHOOL!!!!!!!

Brian started on the 17th, and seems to be going well with him. He complained about how easy his math was. One of his problems was something like 4 x 8. I reminded him about how "well" he scored on his ACT exam. He's as smart as Jessica,... only he decided to NOT apply himself. He skated through his last year of school,.... and after graduation, at the award program,... he realized "I should've worked harder and done more" YA THINK????? LOL

We're still proud, he's going to college, he's taken steps to find a job,.... and hopefully soon we can do something about getting him a car so he can take himself to school and soon work????

Sydney and Geoffery started on the 19th. The first day was rough. Neither one of them really wanted to get up. We had gradually started implementing the regular bedtime routine, but that left them laying in bed wide awake. Geoffery was the worst to get up LOL Sydney was looking forward to school,....

The first few days went well,... they like their teachers, they are happy to see their friends again. Things are looking good!!!

The first full week was last week. They were tired,... falling asleep well before lights out,... dragging themselves out of bed but able to be ready to go on time. The whole drop off and picking up procedure at the school is a major mess. They've torn down some of the school, (elementary areas) and it's caused issues with where to drop your kids off. They've started doing the whole "Kiss & Drive" While normally I'd not mind this, I don't like that I can't park somewhere and walk in and get my son,.... he's forgetful, and trying to convince him that it's in HIS interest to remember his lunchbag, (that they swore they'd use and not leave at school) and his homework,... etc etc.... it's tiring.

Normally I would wait in the cafeteria for him,... check his bag, make sure everything was there and if not, march to his class and get it. I need that one on one with the teacher. I hope that in time things smooth out and who knows, maybe Geoffery will get more responsible. HA! Who am I kidding???? LOL

I was pleased with this though,.... we knew Geoffery could read,... but I have to share :o)

You can see where his teacher wrote Good! with the smilie at his ONE HUNDRED THIRTY SIX wpm,... but personally, I think it's GREAT!!!! :o) LOL Nothing pleases me more than a child that can read. Seeing this,... I mean, sheesh, this is the beginning of the year,... what will his wpm be at the end of the year????? Very exciting!!!!!

Now, if only we can get math scores like this, we'll be in business!!!!

The rest of summer...

2009-08-30T06:33:00.000-07:00

Was pretty uneventful. I had picked up a few craft things for the kids to do,.. Geoffery was way more interested in playing on his computer,... Sydney would start a project, and never finish. Her "pompom" kitty keychains are still sitting on the bar unfinished.

The weather was fairly mild,.... we got a LOT of rain this year. My roses grew and bloomed a few times :o) I was VERY happy about this. I bought like 3 or 4 from WalMart,... they never did anything, in fact,... sadly we mowed like 3 of them down already. We also bought 4 from Sams Club, and they were MUCH hardier and only one didn't make it. I look forward to putting some more in the ground to replace the ones that didn't survive.

I think the best part of summer was that I read a lot of books, slept in a LOT,.... I let the kids do whatever they wanted. I mean, they stayed up till 3am and slept till noon or later!!! Usually I like to keep some sort of a routine, but eh,... it's summer. We didn't have any BIG summer plans,... we were doing baseball up until the end of June,... so this worked.

We DID however go to a local water park. It was the baseball "get together" and of course after all the HOT weather we'd had, they picked a day where it wasn't so hot. The water was FREEZING!!!! But the kids had a WONDERFUL time!!!!! As you can see from these pics!!!!

Don't they look COOOLLLDDD??? lol

It took a LOT of convincing that once they tried the water slides that they'd have a GREAT time,... and what do you know,... mom was RIGHT!!!!! They only had two slides,.... the other was red and covered,.... like sliding through a straw or something. They decided to give that one a shot after having done the blue a couple of times.

I missed this attempt,... and only heard the horror story of how Geoffery nearly drowned. It's not as bad as it sounds,... it actually cracked me up. You can see from the picture of Sydney sliding down, there's a guard right there,... if not ON the slide, standing in the water or very close by. Geoffery came out of the red one like a rocket,.... the red slide I learned later was MUCH faster,.... and he plunged into the water, and jumped up saying "help! help!" All he had to do was stand up LOL Anyhow.... he said he'd NOT ride that one again, but they had a great time going down the blue one again and again and again........

The waterpark is about an hour away from us, and is VERY cheap,.... I look forward to going back next summer as often as we can :o)

The morning after

2009-08-30T06:01:00.000-07:00

The time at the hotel with the kids was great, breakfast was enjoyable,... it all seemed so perfect. The ride home, the kids were sorry to leave, wanted to stay longer,... however, Geoff DID have his new Wii game to return to, and he was anxious to play on that!!!

We no sooner walked into the door, when the phone rang. It was my ex. The older kids were there for the summer,.... Chris had answered it. I was working on ushering in the kids, getting bags put in rooms, etc. Then taking the dogs outside. All the while trying to get an idea of what was going on on the phone.

It didn't take too long,.... I gave Chris a look of " ???? " and he mouthed "Jessica" First I felt alarm,... but the look on his face didn't say she was hurt or anything,... then it hit me. "She wants to move there." I didn't ask it, I just said it. Chris nodded yes.

My first reaction was NO!!! NO NO NO this will NOT happen. We had gone through this with Brian but he was younger,.... maybe not even Jr. High. When we talked to him at great length about it, he really didn't have a reason to leave,... he just wanted to. Well, with his age and all, I just wasn't ready.... and didn't think he was really ready either.

Jess was about to enter High School. Here the student class is roughly 80??? Classrooms are small and you do get one on one with the teacher,... the teachers KNOW their students. Jess is also a straight A student. Very smart,.... to the point of she never has to pick up a book and STUDY. I have NO clue where or how she got this ability, because it sure the hell wasn't from me!! LOL

So, I was pissed. My first thought was "Ohhhh right,... he wants HER because he'd not have to "raise" her... he won't have to worry about her with school,.... he didn't want Brian (long story there) but he'll be MORE than happy to take Jess."

I just wanted to tear stuff up,... I was so angry. I was hurt. I was in tears. I didn't want to lose my baby. That's how it felt. I felt betrayed. I was mad at her. How could she want to do this??? How could she want to do this and have never discussed it WITH us????

All these feelings took place in a matter of hours. After Chris had gotten off the phone, he explained. Jessica was spontaneous about the whole deal,... it was like she'd been thinking about it to herself for awhile, and only just announced this to her dad.

Her reasoning was that the school there, had wonderful classes that she was very much interested in. Canine sorts of classes,... animal types of classes. She wants to be an Animal Control Officer when she "grows up" and these classes are SO NOT available here. The school there is much larger,.... they're able to do a lot more.

HOW do you argue with a 14yr old who says she wants to live there because of SCHOOL ????? I just couldn't. I felt like my hands were tied on this. I relented. I hated it, I wondered if it was the right decision. Was I tearing my family apart??? Chris and I talked about this for days and days.... I had already given in,... but we were concerned about the decision for sure. We were blaming ourselves.... it was just so difficult.

I have to keep reminding myself that she's 14. A teenager. They don't think. They sure don't think things through. They definitely don't think about the outcome of their decisions and how it will affect others.

I think the worst part of it all was telling Sydney. I felt sick inside when her daddy held her close and told her, and she started crying. Did I make the right choice???? Is this all my fault????

Just to recap,.... as it's been nearly 2 months since this took place. I guess we're all "over it" now. Sometimes I still feel resentment,... sometimes I still hurt that she's gone,.... but she seems happy, and has started school. The school is huge and she's learning her way around,... she has a combination lock locker,.... (they don't have locks on them here) so that's a challenge in itself for her,... but she's enjoying her classes and her teachers. She's taking all honors classes, so I figure with a classroom size of 30+ students, it will be even more challenging, and I keep reminding her that it's just the start of the year, she will probably HAVE to study. I pray that she does well there. I would like to see her as an honor student. I know she would've been here.

She's happy,... so that's all that really matters right??? Sydney's looking forward to redoing the bedroom to suit her,... daddy said we'd get her a full size bed, and change things around the way she would like them. She likes that she doesn't have to share the computer in the room anymore too LOL Simple pleasures. She and Jess text, and Jess calls every once in awhile. I guess things are working out okay for all of us.

Still miss my Jessica though.

Happy 9th Birthday Geoffery!!

2009-08-29T15:33:00.000-07:00

It's hard to believe my baby boy is 9 now. His Birthday is July 5th. Do you know how hard it is to try and plan a REAL party right after a holiday???? I think we're going to REALLY try hard to plan his party for like the week before or maybe even for the week right after school lets out??? I have to come up with something, because it's not easy after school lets out.

Anyhow.... we strained our brains to come up with something that we knew he (and Sydney too) would enjoy doing. After all the comments from the two of them over time about hotels.

I got questions like:

"Do you LIVE there???"

"Is room service for real? like they bring you food to your room??"

"What is IN a hotel room??"

Comments like:

"I wish I could be in a hotel"

"I've never been to a hotel, I always wanted to do that"

I'm sure the list went on and on, but those were a select few that amused me.

Soo,... I mention to Chris,... "what about getting a room for a night, hotel w/ a pool so we can swim, that sort of thing??" "Do you think they'll like that???" "yeah, I think so,..." I mean,... why the heck not?? Not like we had to go FAR and not like we had to stay more than one night,... let them get the new experience of being in a hotel room,... we can do room service and the whole shebang right????

We did some looking, and we planned it out. One night in Jonesboro (biggest town near us) we'll do the swimming, we'll do the room service for dinner,... Geoffery LOVES waffles/pancakes, so we thought we'd do Waffle House or IHOP for breakfast,.... AND the awesome theater was real close by, we were going to take them to the new Ice Age 3, in 3D!!!

On the 4th we informed the kids of our fun filled day ahead. They were VERY excited, and Sydney wasted NO time at all in packing for her trip. I helped Geoffery make sure he had all his stuff. I also had a new pair of goggles for them for the pool. Yup yup, this was going to be GREAT fun!!!! I was thrilled to see them so excited about all this.

In the morning, they were ready to go, but check in was later, so we had time to do some cake and icecream and presents. Grams came over to help us celebrate as well.

Daddy with his 9yr old boy!

Happy Birthday Geoffery!!

Due to the "trickiness" of the candles, Geoffery called for reinforcements

Ahh the excitement on his face says it all,... Sonic the Black Knight for the Wii!!!

See the GameBoy Advance game??? He wanted that game for a LOONNGG time,.... since before Christmas. Sadly, it's no longer found NEW so I've been looking in Game Stop for it ever since, and amazingly, I found it!!! I had to find an empty case and printed out the cover art for it :o) Such a clever mommy if I do say so myself!! He was THRILLED over his new games though

Soon after the small party at home, we headed for the hotel,... the kids were very anxious to get there and check things out!

Of course, when we got there,... our room wasn't yet ready, and we got to wait just outside of it for a good 15mins or so. Rather irritating,... but the kids enjoyed watching as she worked, and tried to see inside the room like a sneak peek or something LOL

Little do they know, they're sitting upon their bed for the evening!!

Once they finished inspecting the bathroom, the drawers, the "awesome" flat screen tv,... our room upstairs (this room had a real 70's feel, I got the impression of a swingers type party probably went on here,... the adjoining door, the decor was very *cough* tasteful..) well, by now the kids were all set to go SWIMMING!!!!!

Fun in the pool!!

The kids had a great time in the pool, it was indoors... they made friends with some older kids and had fun playing a game of keep away w/ a beach ball they had. We spent a good hour or so there, then headed back to the room to order us some "room service" dinner!!!

Dinner consisted of burgers and fries, it was brought to us on a large tray with cloth napkins. The kids thought this was just the greatest thing. It was fun to see them so excited about such trivial things,.... but I will say, this is the first and last time we order room service like this,... holy cow, burgers and fries cost a LOT like this. BUT they really enjoyed it, so it was worth the expense. Don't you agree???

After this, our next surprise was to go over to the nice theater,... they have theater seating, and HUGE screens, not to mention the new 3D screens!!! We were off to go see Ice Age 3 in 3D!!

I couldn't resist snapping a picture of him in these glasses, so cute!!!

The movie was cute, but lacking in the 3D effects I thought. I still hope to maybe take them to see GForce in 3D as the previews sure made it look awesome!!! The kids really loved Ice Age though, so that was the important thing :o)

Now back to the room,... they didn't know that their bed was the pull out sofa they'd been sitting on. I kinda left that for the evenings "surprise" LOL Ahhh to be a kid again, when everything is so new and exciting huh???

Walking towards the room, they were both saying something like "I wonder what our bed is gonna look like???" Well, I was very happy to show them!!

And with that, we left them to their room, with their tv.... they didn't stay up too long. We were curled up in our bed over them,... and listened to the jabber,... and the tv until the wee hours LOL Finally I snuck down and turned the tv off.

Chris and I enjoyed talking about how well it went, and vowed that we needed to try and make more of an effort to do more things like this with them, even at the cost of it all. To see them so excited over little things, well, to me, that's always the best. I love to look through life through a childs eyes. This I guess is just a great age to view life through too.

In the morning, we did the hotel's free breakfast, and they had quite the spread. Geoffery got his waffles too!!! They were sorry to leave, but even a night away, I was happy to be home and back in our bed that night.

Happy 9th Birthday Geoffery.... glad it was the "most awesome Birthday ever" I hope we can top that next year!!!

4th of July!

2009-08-29T15:27:00.000-07:00

I'm just going to post a few pictures here,.... we did the usual,... buy fireworks, enjoy a nice show later in the evening. Visited with Chris's family a little bit,... was a pretty relaxing day, but the kids always enjoy the buying of and lighting up of fireworks!

Our pretty babies

Daddy with his kiddos

Geoff LOVES the tanks!!!! When we bought our fireworks, (from our lovely neighbors who run a tent each year, he informed them that tomorrow was his birthday, and she threw in poppers and more tanks for the kids lol)

Oooo!!! Ahhhhh!!!! Pretty!!!!!

Fathers Day!

2009-08-29T15:07:00.000-07:00

Each Fathers Day, I try and come up with a lovely craft for the kids to do. I often thought how sad it was that the kids are in school during Mothers Day, so teachers come up with neat things for the kids to make. Father's Day, school is out and Dad's don't get the wonderful crafted goodies from their kids. Sad. I think I've done pretty good each year,.... as they get older, the crafts are a bit harder to think of.

One year, and I think probably daddy's favorite gift? were the stepping stones they did. I bought these kits at Hobby Lobby for like $10 each, they came with these plastic split marble deals. It came with pretty stickers to stick onto the split marbles. I did one better though,... I bought silicone glue, and printed out various pictures of the kids. From baby ones to now,.... and we glued those to the marbles and added some smaller sticker ones and pretty colored flat marble deals (like you put in vases or fish tanks) and they stuck their hand in the center. They had a LOT of fun doing them. They're still sitting on the front porch for anyone to see when they come over.

This year, my creativity was lacking. Like I said, they're getting older and it's harder to come up with great fun kid crafts.

While in WalMart, with the kids as they were out of school. We wandered up and down the craft isle. Trying to come up with ideas, when I saw these nice wooden frames,... I thought there we go!!! Great summer craft for the kids!!!! Bought them each a frame and they picked out a cute wooden element to glue to the frame as well.

I planned a nice grilled dinner for hubby too. We also invited his folks for the meal :o) It would be a nice day for all.

The kids worked for 2 days making their frames just perfect, we took various pictures and I printed them out and had them all set to be wrapped up. Which the kids did as well. While at Target, they each picked out their own Fathers Day card,... which was a first for them as well. Usually I did the helping of the picking, but this year, I said "You pick the card that you want to give to Daddy" He was very pleased with what was picked out too :o)

It really was a nice day, the food turned out great,.... although, I've slept a lot since then, so can't exactly remember what all was prepared, but I know we ate good LOL

Here are a few pics that were taken,... and one of the frames the kids did :o)

Frames turned out cute!

Daddy and his kiddos!

Chris with his step dad Bernard

Chris's folks

Baseball Season

2009-08-29T06:57:00.000-07:00

Geoffery signed up for baseball this year,... very exciting!!! I remember with great fondness going to my brother's ball games. Sometimes it could be a pain in the butt, but for the most part, it was a lot of fun. I also loved going outside and playing catch with him. I knew for sure that my brother would be on a pro team in the years to come. He was a GREAT player!!!!

Now,... as a parent,... I wondered to myself,... did MOM feel like this??? When the coach would call and say we were having practice I would groan. "AGAIN???" *sigh* Our practices were usually games,... with another local team. I felt they really needed more work on fielding and such, but I wasn't a coach, and sure the heck didn't want to be,.... so I couldn't complain right??? Off we would go to these practice games that would never start on time, and never end when I wanted them too. Not to mention, that it would be FREEZING cold,... there was one time, where I didn't bring enough layers, by the time we finished,... I got into the truck blasted the heat and still took a good hour to warm up after we got home!!!! Geez I can't remember when I'd ever been so cold!!!!

However, Geoffery who isn't much for being outside and doing sports, I was thrilled that he was willing to give baseball a try. I felt he had the frame for it for sure. I can't see him doing football, I would be scared he'd get broken in half LOL

He struggled a lot. I never knew that a kid would have to be taught how to swing a bat,.... I thought things like that came naturally??? I was so wrong. Between hubby and I, we worked with him as much as we could,.... we were teaching him to swing, to throw (yes, that was something else that amazed me,.... how can you NOT know how to throw a ball??? LOL) we threw hard grounders to him and taught him to run up on the ball, to scoop it into his glove,... yes we worked with him a lot. It was fun too :o) And so exciting when he would hit the ball and it would go places,....

Geoffery was enjoying himself, he loved being a part of a team. He had some good friends on the team,.... he had some friends on other teams,.... and even if he didn't know someone on the other team, he would make friends with them. Yes,... Geoffery is a very social creature. He makes friends every where he goes.

In all the games and practices I can count on one hand that he hit the ball I think,... we braved the cold, the crap weather and we watched and cheered hard for our "Bad News Bears" sort of team,.... they had some awesome games where they were really close, and we had some horrible games where we were totally pummeled. The boys all had a great time, and we owe that to the coach. They were out there to teach the kids to play, to have fun,.... can you ask for more???

Here are some pics, and even video of some of the game time..... Enjoy!!!!

Go Team Bandits!!

When asked what number Geoff would like, hubby picked #3, gotta tie some Nascar into baseball ya know! lol

Geoffery got to try bein on the pitchers mound some...

He looks so smart, so serious, so professional,....

Geoffery brings bat twirling to baseball....

Geoffery Hits the ball!!!

He Swings!!! He Hits!!! He Runs..... to 3rd?????

End of Year Party

2009-08-08T17:47:00.000-07:00

At the end of the year, our favorite 2nd grade teacher always holds a wonderful luau for the kids and parents. I've attended 3. Sadly, this last one will be the last one LOL No more kiddos for me.

It's always a big deal for the kids, they enjoy performing and eating all the yummy Hawaiian fruits.

Here are a few pictures and video from the party.

Geoffery's 2nd Grade class, the last day of school luau

The boys do a deal with sticks (forget what it's called.. sorry) and the girls did a hula dance :o)
I only recorded the boys....

Geoffery and his best friends (also baseball teammates)

How adoreable is she???? Are pre-arranged marriages still okay??? lol

End of the year goodbye party!!

The kids had a nice picnic lunch outside on the playground after their party

so, I said to Geoffery "Look at me so I can take a nice picture of you"
*sigh* goofball!!

Handsome goofball though ;o)

Having fun on the swings w/ his friends

What a showoff :o)

And so ends the school year of 2009!!!

I've got much more to post, but will save that for tomorrow,... we have baseball, 4th of July, Geoffery's 9th Birthday.... and maybe that's it?? LOL
In any event, I'm long overdue in getting this blog up to date,.... so I feel better now. That's all that really matters right??? :o)

The time has come....

2009-08-08T13:10:00.001-07:00

... Graduation.

If there was ever anything that can make a parent more proud, and feel more old, I think it would have to be graduation. I couldn't believe the day actually came. My baby boy was going to graduate high school. It was so surreal. Wasn't it just "last year" that I graduated????? Yeah, right. Try.... 22 years ago! LOL Now my son was going to graduate. *sigh* Hard to believe.

I tried to document everything I could. I was excited, emotional,.... forewarned him I'd probably be a bawling mess this day.

Having some difficulty with the tie,... Chris was busy getting himself ready as he had worked that day,... so we were looking online to tie his tie LOL I don't recall if we managed to tie it, or if Chris ended up having to do it for him LOL I swear the day was a blur and a half.

He's excited!!

He's all set to go,.... this was just before taking him to the school, he needed to be there earlier than the parents to get things set up, pictures to be taken,.. etc etc...

Brian walking out to take his place at the front of the gym. *sniff* So grown up.

Near their seats,... waiting to sit down after everyone else files in

The Mom's are presented with roses,.... and I didn't cry!!!!!

Our proudest moment,....

Brian and I

WE DID IT!!!!

We're so very proud. It's still very overwhelming. I'm grateful that we still have him here for at least another 2yrs while he attends ANC, Arkansas Northeastern College,... he'll be taking his prerequisites there. His goal is to go into the video gaming industry.

Award programs and such....

2009-08-08T12:18:00.000-07:00

Lets see,.... not really sure where to start,... I think the Band Banquet was first,... each kid had an award program,... I was told Geoffery wouldn't receive any awards, so we missed that program. Of course he DID get awards,... Homework Club and Good Attendance.... Sydney I don't think got any awards to speak of,... she missed too much school from being sick,... Jessica got Good Attendance,... and Brian got stuff from Band and a scholarship award.

Here are those pictures...

All of the Senior band members that are graduating,... plus the teacher (in yellow)

Each graduating member received a statuette, the one the teacher is holding is Brian's,.. he played the flute. Each statue resembled the instrument the student played. Very unique idea, rather than doing a plaque or medal.

Each Senior gets a tag with their name and graduating year on it, the tag (which looks like a dog tag) is clipped onto the Lion's collar here,... forever remembered :o)

Brian with one of his favorite teachers,... mostly because he would bring in his Xbox for the kids to play LOL He did have a great time in band, and I'm happy he got the experience. He played for 6yrs!!!

Brian and Mom,... wow,... hard to believe this is the LAST banquet I'll attend...... with this kid.

Jessica with her friend at their award program,.... they were just filing inside the gym,... I snapped this before things got started

Jessica with her Attendance Award. We really think she was cheated out of Honor Roll awards. She took band for a few weeks, decided it wasn't for her,.. and dropped it. She had all A's in every other class,.... but band was considered academic, so that hurt her. She had a C in the class before dropping it. Bleh. It's okay Jess,... we know you're smarter than all those other kids ;o) We're proud of you!!!

Hmm... I thought I had a picture of Brian getting his scholarship award,... but I guess I don't. Seems I recall trying to use my cellphone to take the pic, and it didn't work so great :o( Dangit.

In any event,... he received a $12,000.00 scholarship from Nucor Yamato Steel, the company in which Chris works at. There are a couple different levels to this award. All employee kids are eligible, so long as they meet the requirements. General requirements are either writing an essay or doing some community service. Brian's grades and all I guess were good enough, that he didn't have to do either. We were so very proud for him getting this award. Very grateful that Nucor has such a program as well.

Geoffery's Field Trip, May 2009

2009-08-08T11:47:00.000-07:00

Lets see,... after the concert,... it was award programs, field trips, and oh yes,.... Brian's graduation!!!

Geoffery's field trip was to a nice park in Jonesboro,... within Craighead Forest area I think??? I get that and Crowley's Ridge mixed up.... in any event, we went there first, the kids played on the large playground and had lunch... there's a wonderful lake there, I'm dying to go fishing at!

Geoffery climbing the slide

More climbing!!

Yay! sliding!!

After the park, we went to Arkansas State University's farm,... they got to see, pet and hold lots of animals!!! This was a huge hit with all the kids,... as was the bumpy hayride!!

Holding a tiny black chick,... his class hatched I don't remember how many chickens earlier in the year, the kids were rather upset they couldn't hold or touch them,... I think this trip made up for it don't you think??

Geoff and duckling

Geoffery had a little lamb, little lamb...

Geoffery with classmates in the bunny pen

Geoffery in the pig pen,.... if you saw his room, you'd say this suited him well lol
He tried to pick one up, but the thing would thrash around and squeal, it freaked him out LOL

He enjoyed petting and feeding the horse

Big rooster that was tormented by all the kids chasing him,... pretty isn't he?? and BIG too

Giving the pony some lovin...

Geoffery and his best friend, on the hayride

Boys WILL be boys lol

Geoffery and friends...

Was a fun trip,... there were lots of 2nd graders running all over the place, with many parents tagging along. Was grateful for nice weather as well.

Brian's 18th & Nightwish, May 6th 2009

2009-08-08T11:46:00.001-07:00

May brought all sorts of fun. Brian turned 18 yrs old,... we went to see Nightwish in Louisville,... we had end of school year activities/trips etc.... *phew* May was for sure a busy busy month!!! MONTHS ahead of time, we bought VIP Tickets to see Nightwish. VIP??? Yup, we were granted a meet and greet with the band, where we could get autographs, drool and just make fools of ourselves in front of them. On with the show..... May 6th, 2009 Brian's 18th Birthday & Nightwish Concert

Happy 18th Birthday Brian!!!!
Relaxin in the hotel room before the concert

Chris checking status of the venue before we head out to the show

Standing in line at the meet and greet... Marco Hietala, Emppu Vuorinen, Anette Olzon, Jukka Nevalainen (you can't see him) and Tuomas Holopainen

Tuomas

Marco & I :o)

I got a TON of amazing shots of the band playing,.... it really was a great time,.... I'm going to post the slide show of the event here,.... I figure that would be tons easier than posting a bunch of pics, you can click on "View All Images" and it brings up the slide show larger view... ENJOY!!!

Sweetheart Pageant

2009-08-08T10:00:00.001-07:00

Our sweet, and shy Sydney entered the Sweetheart Pageant hosted by the local Kiwanis.

We went through the pains and labors of finding the perfect gown, and shoes and teaching her how to walk, and all that fun stuff. Aunt Teresa came over and took many pictures of her that day.... she had her hair done at the salon in town. Heather did a gorgeous job on her hair and make up!!!

Here are some pictures of that,...

This is Sydney when we were trying on different gowns,... this was the keeper!!

Here she is after having her hair and make up all done up!! Gorgeous dahling!!!

The poor girl was so nervous,... she didn't have a hair in her face, yet she had the nervous habit of moving it out of her face anyhow.... but gosh she looks so beautiful!!! I had tears in my eyes watching her.

Daughter and Daddy

The final contestant line up and awards

While she didn't win, we were very proud of her for trying. This was her first pageant, and she hopes to do another one. Especially now that she knows what to expect :o)

Sydney, our very own Princess

January 2009

2009-08-08T09:07:00.001-07:00

Hmm... I don't really recall much of the beginning of January,... think it was all pretty normal. Until our weather turned to major crap.

I know we had a snowfall early/mid January... at least pretty sure. As the kids got lucky and got to leave school early :o) Yup yup, the love that!!!!

Here are a few pictures of our yard....

These three shots are sorta panoramic view,... as you can tell, it seems our yard is the only one with snow on it LOL Go figure.....

Xena decided to find a spot outside of the snow to potty

Later in January,... we had one heck of a storm. So much ice that we were without power for about 5 days. Thanks to Nucor and their assistance, we did manage to get a generator.

Stupidly, I didn't take any pictures of that storm and it's aftermath. I did find a blog HERE though that shows many pictures, it really was incredible and suck ass. I've never seen such a mess.

Everything around us was out, no power for ATM machines, grocery stores, ... I could go on and on and on. We were seriously without power for I think 3 days.... we're debit card users,... and because our bank is local,... nothing was updating,.. we couldn't get money out!!! Thankfully, we had a stash of cash (thanks to Brian and his job) so Chris and Brian headed out on my 40th Birthday, and went into West Memphis area to see if they could scrounge up some food. They returned with the most awesome Birthday cake :o) One of those icecream cakes. Let me tell you,.. I ate on that for breakfast lunch and dinner :o)

At this point, we were using the grill and the fish fryer to cook on. We had soup, and grilled cheese, we had grilled spaghetti LOL You find out how resourceful you can be in times like this. When we got our generator, it was like a Godsend. We were using our propane fireplace for heat,... so all of us were huddled in the living room to sleep, read, etc.

With the generator, we were able to pull all our food out of the coolers and run the fridge again,... we had lights in the evenings before bedtime,... we even had TV and COMPUTER!!!! I was having some major withdrawals from my PSP group.

Yeah,... it was a week I'd rather not relive,... but at least if it DOES have to happen again, we've got a generator ready and waiting for us.

Christmas 2008

2009-08-08T08:32:00.001-07:00

This picture here, should've been posted on Mom's birthday post,.... she busily baked several pies for Christmas,... Mmmm they were soooo good!!!!! I also got several kitchen gadgets outta the deal too LOL That handy dandy little pastry cutter??? yeah.... I own it.

Christmas Morning 2008

Sadly I waited far too long to post all this,.... hard to recall what time we were all up and what not. I know I felt like a kid again, having my mom here :o) Seems like I was up fairly early.

Jessica opening some stocking stuffers...

Yeah... all those early morning Christmas pictures mom and dad would take,... looks like I got her back huh?? Merry Christmas Mom!!!

Mom and her Grandpuppy Xena Christmas morning

Christmas Kisses

Geoffery Christmas morning

SONIC PLUSHIES??? Nooo WAYYY!!!!

Geoffery had a very Sonic Christmas this year,... how often do you see a kid READ on Christmas morning? lol

Merry Christmas Brian!!

Huh?? What's that sound???

Geoffery would've said: "OH - M - Gee"

WOOHOOO!!! I got a CELLPHONE!!!

Later, we had a wonderful dinner....

Mmmmm.... makes you hungry thinking about holiday food doesn't it???

We took several pictures by the tree,...

Chris and I before the grand present opening,... think this was Christmas Eve...

(yeah, slightly outta order huh? LOL)

My pretty girls, Dec sometime....

Our pretty babies

Family Christmas 2008

Me, Mom, & Chris

I told you we took a lot of pics in front of the tree!!

Mom and I

Mom and our scruffy lookin Ares lol

Was a wonderful Christmas,... I hope that we're able to do it again!!!

I am.... photographer.... or I try to be anyhow

2009-08-08T08:07:00.000-07:00

Mom's friend Gene, got her an awesome SLR camera for her Birthday/Christmas. He gave it to her early so she could learn how to use it, etc, and have it for her trip to see us.

We took some time out and ran around the area to take some pictures.... I had a great time doing this with her. I think we both enjoyed it a lot. Here are some of the pictures I took.

Down the road from us, there's this old stone looking house. I have no idea on it's age, but all these weird boxes are piled ceiling high inside the porch area. Upon further inspection, we find that they're "bee boxes"

Closer view of all the boxes....

I love this picture,... I've done it in black and white and the detail is amazing,... I'll post that one later on if I remember.

Found it!!

This is at the back of the stone bee house

Inside the back porch

Some sort of tractor used in cotton farming,... poor thing has seen better days I think

Mom in the cotton field

The artist at work.....

Mom likes to take pics of weird stuff,... this is a cow pie... yeah... weirdo. As a kid, I remember her taking pictures of a couple of ducks in the lake,.... they were mating. I was sooooo embarrassed.

Here we're at another location,... mom loves old barns,... and I thought of this one. It's like right out of Little House on the Prairie or something :o) Wonder if Pa is inside muckin out the stalls???

another view of the barn

Mom taking her pictures

Hmm... doesn't look like Pa's inside,.... but look at the neat view outside,... all the rows from the last cotton season.

The tree up closer,... I like old trees.

Out in the backyard,... pretty rainbow for Dec weather huh??

Wonder if someone found the pot of gold??

Was fun scouting around for areas to photograph,... I hope that we're able to do it again, and in better weather. It was pretty cold and windy this day. At least it wasn't raining or snowing though LOL

After our fun time out and about,... we came home and dug into LOTS of BBQ ribs from Couch's BBQ in Jonesboro
Yup yup, I meant it when I said DUG IN. Mmmmm so good!!!!

Mom comes to visit!!

2009-08-08T07:57:00.000-07:00

My mom lives in Idaho now,... she has for many years. In the 12yrs that I've been living here,... she's been to visit 3xs. I treasure those visits greatly. Nothing compares though, to this last visit where she was here with us for Christmas!! Finally, my mom got to spend her 61st Birthday and Christmas with all her grand kids!!

Happy Birthday Grandma J!!

Mmmm chocolate cake,... our favorite!!! NO, you do NOT see 61 candles,... I think that would've been considered a fire hazard *giggles*

hmmm maybe she needs a little help??

Geoffery is more than willing!

Sydney helps get the job done too!

The last time I baked my mom a birthday cake, she was like 34yr old. I had help from my Grandma Elsie,... it was chocolate with yellow icing dabs w/ Happy 34th Birthday on it LOL I will have to dig up the picture to share. I was very tickled to do this for her,... but it sure brought back memories too. I'm grateful for the new memories we've created though, that my kids could be a part of this.

Happy Birthday Mom!!
XOXO

Dec. 23, 2008 - 61 years young!

Now, where was I ??

2009-08-08T07:19:00.000-07:00

Oh yes,.... December 2008,... seems like it was so long ago!! Oh yeah... it kinda was wasn't it???? *sigh*

Anyhow... left off at the wonderful Breakfast with Santa with Geoffery. I still think of that fondly. He is just at such a wonderful age,.... REALLY believes with all his heart that Santa is real. I sure wish that would never change.

So, after the Christmas party and the Breakfast w/ Santa,... we had Sydney's 11th Birthday!!! *sigh* My baby girl is 11yrs old. She used to be this VERY shy little creature. She's come out of that shy shell a LOT. She's also realized she's got her daddy wrapped around her finger LOL Not that daddy minds in the least ;o)

Here are a few pictures from her party,... she had a couple friends over and had a good time goofing around being pre-teen girls :o)

The Birthday girl and friends

Daddy presents the cake

What will she wish for???

Huff! Puff! Blow them all out..... or not?

Hahaha!!! Trick candles!!!

And you thought BOYS were messy lol

Present time!!!

I think she had a really nice birthday,... she got some fun gifts, and enjoyed having her girlfriends over. Hard to believe she'll be 12 this year. Really getting into the teen years now aren't we???

To Do List....

2009-03-15T08:51:00.001-07:00

A list of things I really should do....

1. Finish resizing/uploading pictures from Christmas

I really have a lot of interesting pictures outside of the traditional family ones. When mom and I went wandering around taking pictures. She got a new camera for her Bday/Christmas, and we put it to good use!!

2. Add more pictures to my digital frame!!

My old SLR camera used the big bulky memory card, and since we don't use the camera anymore, I am using the card for my digital frame my honey and kiddos got me for Mother's Day. I just LOVE the frame!!! If you don't have one yet,... well.. what the heck ARE you waiting for??? LOL

3. Continue working on my scrap kit for my other blog, and making more tags in PSP. I could probably sit here all day/night long playing in PSP. Whenever I get really involved in doing something, I most always get interrupted. Very frustrating let me tell ya!

4. Hmm... I know there was more I wanted to get done.... but atm all I can think of is cleaning off my desk, and finding our dining table, it's under the junk in there somewhere!!! I KNOW it is!!!

So, on that note,... I should get some stuff done around the house, will be taking Geoffery to his first baseball practice this afternoon. No idea how long that will take.

Hope you have a GREAT day!!
**HUGS**

.... yeah.... I know....

2009-03-04T14:36:00.000-08:00

Here it is,... March... and still haven't finished uploading pictures from Christmas. LOL Pretty pathetic.

In the meantime, thought I'd jabber a wee bit. Oldest, Brian.... will be 18 in May. He's one of those rare kids who never had an interest in driving. It could be because Mom will drive me where I need to go (even to the Jr Prom!!) or because he's quite happy staying at home playing WoW or XBox Live all day/night long.... whatever the reason, he just had NO interest in driving.

We pretty well had to MAKE him study and take the written test. While he was at his Dads over the summer, he was enrolled in a Drivers Ed course. From the way he made it sound and how it all worked,.... well... it was crap. He came home that summer with paperwork that said he could get his license after I think 6 months wait. It was basically drive around on this paper for 6mons, turn it in and TA DA you're legal. Sadly,... when he took the written here, he failed it 2xs before passing!!! He didn't know a lot of the rules or things that seemed common sense after taking that class. Waste of money if you ask me!

We've been letting him drive around town off and on,.... but now his permit is due to expire the end of this month. GAH!!!! SOooo.... I'm being a good mom and giving up my keys to him in the mornings and afternoons. He drives us to school, and home. This is only day two of doing this. He does a really great job, only have to remind him to move to the left a bit or remind him about his blinkers once in awhile....

But the funny part.... on the way home today (this was the first time driving us home) we stopped at the Post Office, and the store. As we pull away from the store, he heads straight and stops at the stop sign. We've lived in this town nearly 12yrs now! He says "Which way??" "well, we're going home.... so which way???" "left" he turns on the blinker and turns right. Yes,.... I said right. Ahhhh yes..... that was a shining moment for me. So proud of my teenage son,.... nearly 18, graduates this May.... yup yup.... the first thought that came to mind was....

"The left hand now knows what the right hand is doing".

Your former President of the United States, George W. Bush.... as he called his left hand his right hand and his right his left. Yup yup, proud moment indeed.

CHRISTMAS!!!!

2009-01-09T21:05:00.000-08:00

Well,... I just suck don't I? I've been really wanting to try and do better at keeping up with things here. I've never been good at a journal. Why would I start now? LOL

I can't recall every little thing that happened in the month of December, so I will just fast forward to the week before Christmas!!!

Dec. 13, a cool Saturday morning, hubby and I took Geoffery to the High School auditorium for "Breakfast With Santa" Boy was he anxious and excited. When we walked in, they had all sorts of things going on.

First stop was to write out your letter to Santa. Which is what you see here...

His big wish was to get Sonic Unleashed video game. You can almost make that out can't you?? LOL From there, he went to make a little paper ornament. He wasn't too into doing that,... he was there for Santa!!! But wait,.... they DO have face painting!!!!

From there, he got his yummy breakfast and we sat down.....

He really didn't care about the donut,... he just wanted SANTA!!!!

After a bit of a wait, and watching them herd the kids up onto the stage in groups by numbers.... it was finally Geoffery's turn!!

He could sure talk Santa's ears off!!!! Santa told him that if he was good, he would try really hard to bring him Sonic Unleashed for Christmas!!!

He really was a VERY happy boy. When we were leaving the building,... he said that it was the best day ever! *sigh* I can only hope that this Christmas can be as wonderful and exciting for him. I hope this isn't the year he stops believing.

A few days after that,... was Geoffery's class Christmas program,... I didn't get to attend this,... we had had bad weather, so it got rescheduled,... thankfully, hubby got to go and watch!! He snapped this one picture of Geoffery with one of his classmates.

Hubby was really impressed with the whole program,... seeings how he misses most of the programs due to work, I was VERY happy he got to see this one, and that he enjoyed it so much :o)

Then there were the Christmas Parties!!! I went to Geoffery's which is always fun with his teacher. She's so awesome!!! I've had her with Brian, Jessica and now Geoffery. She really is wonderful.

They did a gift exchange,... boy/boy and girl/girl. His teacher insisted they EAT first,.... that she was very hungry and hadn't eaten all day.... but a young boy reminded her of a brownie she'd eaten earlier LOL I guess he felt that was good enough.... lets get to the presents already!!! LOL She tried and tried to convince them that EATING first would be best,... none of them bought into it LOL So, with a fun game of "musical presents" they got their gifts and sat down to tear into them...

He really looks as though he doesn't like what he got,... but actually he REALLY did,... he couldn't wait to open it up and play with it. After presents, they ate cookies, sandwiches, cupcakes, chips... soda.... well,... not Geoffery on the soda part. He took a cup with some ice, went to leave the room, when his teacher asked him "where are you going??" "to get some water" "Ohhh okay..." Geoff doesn't do soda LOL He had fun making me take pictures of him with his friends, and I made sure to get one of him with his teacher too!

Soon, it was about time to head out... when what do you know,.... the Big Mooch wandered in LOL

Brian can smell food from miles away LOL He lives to eat anymore..... darned teenage boys! LOL Of course, he's always MORE than welcome when he walks into that room. We helped clean up and put tables, chairs and desks back in order, wished her a Very Merry Christmas and headed on our way home. It was a really fun time for the kids :o)

On that note, I'm exhausted,.... I'm going to wrap this one up and try and continue with the rest of our week tomorrow evening!!!

Night night!

My PSP Addiction

2008-11-29T08:19:00.001-08:00

Yes, that's what I am these days. My DH would sure nod his head vigorously at this comment LOL I have to say though, it IS his fault LOL Ever since goofing around in Subeta and learning to make signature tags, he got us a copy of Paint Shop Pro 9 and well, I've been learning and growing in the PSP world ever since :o) I do love it, it's a wonderful form of creativity that has a lot of outside resources.

The friends links I have right now, are all a part of my PSP family. Well, except for one atm LOL (Inky, she's a big time quilter *drools*) My goal of late is to work on learning how to make scrap kits for PSP, I have created a few small elements, but nothing really major to speak of. I have a LOT of learning to do.

I am trying to come up with a good blog name for just PSP'ing. I would like to have a separate blog to post my elements and other psp items on. I have a few ideas.... but the right name hasn't really grabbed me. This blog was just out of the blue sort of name.... I love the beach and one day while missing home, and the beach it just hit me LOL I keep hoping for that to happen with my PSP blog. So far, no such luck.

Here are some of the names I've thought of, and others have thought of.... I had thought to try and tie the name in with this blog.... I love Joanne's blogs... the names reflect each other more or less.

Tropical Designs
Fun & Sun Scraps
One Scrap @ A Time
Scrap @ A Time
Scrap This!

There are a few others, but anyhow.... so far "One Scrap @ A Time" seems to be well liked... just that it's not really grown on me so much. Until something does, I will wait to create the new blog. Would love to get some more input on names though!!

Anyhow, I did want to share some of the work that I have done, this is by no means everything. I've got tags and Subeta profiles comin out of my ears LOL I also have a huge collection of beautiful tags that were made for me by my friends.

I figured that a lot of folks that might happen by my blog, or family that peek over here are rather clueless for the most part as to what it is I am doing in PSP all the time LOL

Anyhow, below is the slideshow of various tags I have done,.... hope you enjoy the show!!! If you click on one of the images it will take you to the full view.

Some Catching Up

2008-11-14T06:12:00.000-08:00

How sad is it that I've got this great blog, and don't use it like I should??? I mean, how hard would it have been to do????

Chris and I had our 11th Anniversary, and we went to Florida for a nice 4 day vacation. Even now, I think about the time we spent together, *heavy sigh* it was just so wonderful.

We left Memphis and arrived in Tampa on the 18th of September and returned on the 22nd.

We had a terrific time!!! We did a LOT of walking around, saw Dark Knight at the IMAX (that kicks butt!) ate some wonderful meals at the various restaurants at the Bay Walk, did a dolphin tour, and met up with our online friends Desi and Shannon. I have known Desi for gosh,.... I'm really not sure how long now... 5yrs? So, it was just awesome to meet them both in person!!!! We had a GREAT GREAT time!!!!! I laughed so much my cheeks were sore LOL We drank so much, that well, hubby said the night of our Anniversary, that he didn't think he'd EVER seen me so drunk,..... man that was fun LOL I am so glad that we had the opportunity to take this trip, to do all the wonderful things we did,... and to meet these two wonderful gals. I want to thank Shannon big time for opening her home and her family and friends to us the night of our Anniversary. The BBQ was great!!!! We really enjoyed it all!!!

Our last day, was the dolphin tour,... and then that evening was our big concert,..... NIGHTWISH!!! We'd been dying to see them since we got hooked on their music. What a great way to spend our Anniversary!!!! The opening band, Sonata Arctica really kicked ass. I was pretty impressed as I'd not heard a whole lot of their stuff,... they put on a GREAT show!!! Nightwish ... man.... was amazing. They're awesome live!!! They're all so very talented!!! I just could gush on and on, but I will refrain. The killer part was, that hubby had told me earlier in the night, that the drummer Jukka, would toss one drumstick out close to the stage, and always threw another far back. Well, I watched at the end as he tossed the first out, and then the second came flying out towards our right.... I looked at hubby before he threw it, I wanted him ready to catch!!! He was fiddling with the camera on his cell to catch them take their bows.... *GAH* I'm looking, watching as this drumstick flies through the air, end over end.... I swear the couple that jumped for it, they weren't 5 feet from us,.... hands and fingers stretched upward trying to get this stick,.... by now I'm in such a panic because it was OURS!!! it was like major slow-mo "NNNNnnnnoooooooooooo..." I watched as the stick bounced from their fingers, (seriously, this all happened so quickly, but it seemed like it took 2 mins to me, everything was going so slow) it fell down towards the ground with a wood on concrete sound *PLINK!!* I was stunned.... as it rolled a couple times (I swear I could hear that sound too, but hubby laughs saying no way, place was far too loud for that) I lunged down, grabbed it up, as I rose up, I caught a glimpse of the couple that missed and they didn't look too happy lol I turned right into Chris's chest holding it tightly between us, my heart was just racing. I got the drumstick!!!! OHMYGAWD!!!!! I GOT IT!!!!!!!! Chris said that the couple were coming at us, he gave a quick stern shake of his head like "back off" and they did,... I of course didn't see this, I was saying "Let's get the hell outta here" LOL I was on a major high for the rest of the evening. Could our trip have ended any better than that???? We had a real trophy from our trip....

Between meeting Desi and Shannon, being out on the water to see the dolphins, and having a terrific time at the concert,.... well, it was a trip I won't ever forget!!!

Here is a slide show, full of pictures from our time spent

In other news.... I forgot to mention that we tried like hell to get VIP tickets to this concert. Sadly, by the time we realized they were even available, they were sold out, and even worse yet,.... they were never supposed to of had a VIP event!!! So, those that did manage to score those tickets, did get to go backstage, meet the band, pictures, etc.... the whole works. Sure made us ill. Then, get this,.... our concert was the last one that Nightwish was able to perform as Annette became very ill and had to return home to Finland!! So, while we missed out on VIP, we still got to see them perform, and got the drumstick :) It was really our fate that all that took place I think :) I know, sounds silly.... but I really believe that it was all meant to be for us.

Well, last month,... Chris was working nights, he text me saying that Nightwish was going to be in St. Louis in May 09. Better still was that they had VIP tickets for sale!!!! Go see them AGAIN????? You didn't have to ask me twice!!! LOL MEET THE BAND?????? Does a bear poop in the woods????? It being so much closer to home, and Brian being a big fan, we worked it out, and got 3 VIP tickets!!!! The concert takes place ON Brian's 18th Birthday!!!! What an awesome 18th huh??? We're so very excited about going!!!! Going to be freakin awesome and what pictures I will have to share then!!

Lastly,... we have a new addition to the family. Our little Ares. He is a UKC Yorkshire Terrier. When you look at the pictures you'd think he was a poodle LOL He's got the thick wooly wavy coat. Took him to the vet yesterday for his boosters, and at 3mos old, he already weighs 5lbs. He's gonna be a big boy compared to our little Xena. Who at 7lbs seemed big to me at times LOL It took awhile for Xena the Princess to warm up to him. She is highly jealous and so very spoiled, I really didn't know when and if she would get over it all. She would growl and snap at him when he would try and sit on my lap with her,.... everything belongs to HER,... my toy, my bone, my mommy.... sheesh. I was glad when it didn't seem to take that long, and they were running around and playing together.

Ares at 10 weeks old

Xena and Ares sitting at the front door, watching me while I fold laundry LOL

Had to share this, Xena in her Ladybug Halloween costume,.... yeah, she hates it LOL

A New Award!

2008-11-08T18:59:00.000-08:00

Sweet Tika over at Traquil Kaos gave me an award!!! This is a pretty neat one too!!

The rules are:

Anyhow The rules are I have to tell 7 things that I love and then pass it along to 7 other bloggers:

1. My husband Chris, he is truly my best friend and a wonderful husband.

2. My 4 kids, Brian, Jessica, Sydney and Geoffery, each so special in their own ways.

3. My Mom ... because of her, I am the woman I am today.

4. My critters, (4 cats, 2 dogs) they make me laugh, they give good snuggles!

5. My computer, it keeps me busy on the quiet evenings or afternoons when hubby is working.

6. PSP and the whole Cherished Angels community! I have such terrific friends there!! It's so great to pop in there, laugh, and have girl chats or whatever!!! Thank you to all those wonderful ladies!

7. My DVR LOL I LOVE being able to record my shows and watch them one after the other as I save them up for when hubby works nights :)

The 7 Bloggers I will pass this along to are: **GAH!! I don't have 7 to pass it on to :( So,... I will pass this along to the ones that haven't already received this award :)**

Inky

Michelle

Tanya

Thank you Tika!! I enjoyed doing this one :) ***BIG HUGS***

Letting Go

2008-10-18T09:08:00.000-07:00

It's been such a busy week. Well, it's been really busy since we returned from our Florida trip, which I still haven't blogged about!!! Shame on me. I really am going to try and do that this weekend, as I am looking forward to a fairly quiet one for a change. I have wonderful pictures to share, and stories to tell :o)

In other news, Jessica turned 14 yesterday. Hubby and I bit the bullet and got her her own cell phone. Poor Brian had to wait till he was 16 LOL Needless to say, she's beyond stoked. We had such a hard time ordering it online, I was getting pretty peeved. AT&T site really blows for adding a line onto your plan. I had to have some online C/S person hold my hand through the process LOL She was really patient with me, even after I screwed it up and had to go BACK through the process LOL

In short, she will be receiving the Pantech Duo cell. I was pretty creative with her gifts. She opened her cards etc from her friends, and of course we saved ours for last :o) I got her a pair of "Happy Bunny" slippers, and filled them with various small things,... wrapped LOL The cellphone case was down deeper in the bag, so once she was done opening all the little things, I was like hmm I think there might be something else down in that bag,..... she opened the case and was like *jaw drop* LOL I had printed out a picture of the phone and slid it into the case so she would know what she was getting. Hubby brought her out a much better picture so she could REALLY see the phone. Hubby and I have the AT&T Tilt phones and paid a chunk,.. her's is well, nearly like ours only much cheaper!!! Figures LOL She's so excited, even this morning she was saying "I can't believe I get a cellphone!!!" :o) So, thanks to hubby, we scored big with her this birthday LOL

Then there's Brian. *sigh* Yesterday, he gets into the truck, and says "Mommy..." now, what 17yr old boy do you know says "Mommy" w/o wanting something???? Right. My reply.. "What do you want??" His friends were wanting him to go with today to the movies, pizza and trip around the mall. I've yet to really cut the cord,... it's been stretched a lot, but not totally CUT. I asked a few questions, and ended with "we'll see." LOL My boy, goin off with friends, a friend who DRIVES,... and going to a town a good 30-40 mins away???? *sigh*

After we got home, I mentioned it all to hubby,... who later talked with Brian. I was busy getting the party together, so didn't know what the outcome was,... later asked Brian and he said that he could go. *cry* "Okay, cool..." *sigh*

He was headed out this morning,.... and I was like "be careful!" "yes mom" "did you balance your checking so you know how much money you have??" "yes mom" "Have your wallet??" "yes...." "your ID???" LOL yeah, it was hard to see him walk out the door like that.

So, in short, I've stretched the cord more,.... I refuse to cut it just yet LOL Maybe when he moves out?????

Tanya Wants To Know...

2008-10-13T08:16:00.000-07:00

Tanya has asked a few questions,... in which when I answer, I will pass this on to 3 others :) Thank you Tanya!!!

1. How long have you been using PSP, PS?

Well, to be honest, we had a copy of PSP6 and I dabbled with it a lot for photo editing, then later some VERY basic sig tags for some online gaming the hubby and I were doing,... I think it was either 1997? or 2000?? I would really have to ask hubby LOL I've got a piss poor memory. Since then though, we've upgraded to PSP9, and that's only been within the last couple years, where I have learned to do LOTS more than photo editing!

2. How did you get into making tags, scrapkits?

I frequent a virtual pet site called Subeta. The site has a lot of free reign where you can create wonderful, fun layouts, or sig tags for the forums etc. Using my points at the site, I would purchase these items from others. Well, it was around then that we got PSP9 and I started dabbling,... from there I was given some great tutorial links from Michelle that helped,... hubby joined this PSP group that was wonderful for a beginner,.... then I joined Cherished Angels and have learned a lot more, and call that my PSP home :)

3. Who`s your fave artist?

Hmm... I have several,... right now I'm really big on Charlene ChuaCharlene Chua, but I love Garvey, Janesko, Woolcott,... so many wonderful artists out there!!!

4.Who`s your faveourite Scrap Designer?

Wow,... umm... I have soooo many scrapkits LOL I think by far I love the work that Clarey does,... I think another favorite is Sophisticated Scraps I really have a TON of kits though,... hard to pick just one person when there are so many talented kit makers out there.

5. Which three blogs do you visit everyday?

Hmmm not many blogs really, but when I do it's usually Joanne's For the most part, you'll find me hanging around at Cherished Angels :)

Again, thank you Tanya!! Hope you learned a lil bit more about me through this :)
I'm going to send this along to

Michelle
Sue and
Tika

Happy Birthday to my Dad

2008-09-09T07:31:00.000-07:00

He would be 63 today.... I've got a poem floating around here somewhere that I'd written for him,... but I can't find it at the moment. I did however find a post that I'd written awhile back,... so I thought I would link it here...

My Dad

Not a day goes by that I don't miss him,... especially on his Birthday, and of course Father's Day.

It's A Mom Thing...

2008-08-27T17:20:00.000-07:00

Yup, and I didn't even know it either!!! What am I talking about??? Why,... dinner of course.

I wasn't sure, but it was just confirmed, I'm not the only one that does this. You go to start dinner. Something simple since it's been a hectic day filled with running around. Hamburgers. Easy, fast, hubby and kids love em. You're makin up the patties and *crap* not enough for everyone. Not enough for not just ANYONE.... not enough for Mom. *sigh* Sometimes I hate when that happens,.... tonight isn't one of those nights,.... not that hungry.... and a hotdog smothered in mustard, relish and tomato works just as great Mmmm sounds really good right now LOL

But, it was refreshing to know that I'm not the only one that will do that :)

Summer Ends...

2008-08-18T09:03:00.000-07:00

Today was the first day of school for our kiddos. After a long summer,... of staying up WAY late, it was sure a hard adjustment for them all last night and this morning. I think they were all pretty excited and happy-ish to be there. Geoffery was nearly inside the building before I was even out of the truck... carrying all his supplies LOL I can't wait to hear how the 1st day went :)

Brian and Jess were at their dad's the whole summer, so not really sure on the schedule they kept. Sydney and Geoffery, were up later than we were some nights!!! I know Sydney would tell me she would stay up till 2:30am or later even!!! Night owls like their daddy.

Anyhow... I have a few pics to share :) short stories to go along with them too I suppose LOL

This is Xena on 4th of July :) Her face hairs are growing out a lot, I need to get her back into the groomers, but thought she looked so cute with her little blue bow.

WE GOT A POOL!!! The kids and I spent a lot of time in this this summer!!! We really enjoyed it,... hoping for a few more days of use before we have to let the water out and put it up for a year.

Daddy and kids

Geoffery floating around

Sydney floating around
This is Sydney asleep the day we got up early, ran to the mall so she could get a freebie pass for Build A Bear online. I think it's called Bearville,... really cute online site for kids... anyhow.... Daddy said she could BUILD a bunny (what she was really really wanting was a bunny critter online, but the freebie just gave you a bear from what she had been told) Anyhow... her late nights, and this early morning trip to the mall plum wore her out LOL I woke her taking this picture.... boy was she ever pissed at me! For nearly the rest of the night!!! LOL She'd love to know I posted it here huh? *giggle*

See Michelle, not all American's have great teeth ROFL Geoffery bought these nasty things at the Dollar General store. Ewwww!!! Show this to your kids, tell them this is what happens when you don't brush your teeth LOL

Because I got outta the blogging world for awhile, I never did get to post about Brian's Jr. Prom!! This was such an event LOL I mean, it seriously felt like just yesterday I was going to mine. It was such a rush rush day/evening, that I didn't get really emotional until I dropped them off and left the center they had the dance at. *sigh* (yeah, mom had to take them, she was a Sr without a license, and he a Jr without a license.... we're working on that this year though LOL) He looks so handsome and they had a great time too!! Was a very proud mom.

Mom and Brian, Jr/Sr Prom 2008

Brian and Jada, Jr/Sr Prom 2008

And lastly.... Brian all ready for his first day at work. We are working hard at kicking Brian in the pants to get motivated for the things to come after he graduates this year. With him leaving each summer to his dads, it made it difficult for him to find a job... a few days after he and Jess returned this summer and a couple days before school was to start, the local grocery store called for an interview... talk about great timing as we were going to go out and about to get/redo applications!! He said the day went well,.... he worked 4-10pm. I look forward to him getting a few more hours each week, and looking at a real paycheck :) I know he will be proud of himself for that.

This is Skipper,.... lots of you know that he was pretty sick about a couple weeks ago. Really had me terrified. As you can see, he's doing tons better and enjoying my desk. "What? my tail is messing up your optical mouse...*shrug* I dunno what to tell you" Yup yup.... he owns the house, and everyone in it LOL He is probably one of the most photogenic cats we have,.... swear he poses for the camera when you pull it out!! LOL

So, that wraps up all the updates and events and whatevers that have been going on here lately. I am sure I could dig up more pics,.... but these are the ones that matter most :)

I would like to thank.....

2008-08-14T15:40:00.000-07:00

Joanne for awarding me this wonderful surprise!!

In all the years I've been sporadically blogging,... not once was I ever given such a sweet award!!!! Many thanks Joanne!!! **BIG HUGS**

The rules of the 'I love your blog' award are:
1.The winner can put the logo on her blog.
2. Link the person you received your award from .
3.Nominate at least 7 other blogs.
4.Put links of those blogs on yours.
5.Leave a message on the blogs of the girls you’ve nominated...

I nominate for the 'I love your blog' Award

a few old friends... (not the one foot in the grave kinda old... although.... lol)
Inky
Michelle
Sue
and new friend
Tanya

**HUGS** to you gals!!!!

Exciting news!

2008-08-13T12:54:00.000-07:00

Day before yesterday, we had a call on the ID that we'd missed. It WAS at like 8:15am, who the heck is up that early during summer vacation? LOL Anyhow, it was our local grocery store. Our town is all of 3k people. One grocery, one P.O., a General Store (Freds) and a Dollar General.... we have Sonic, (fast food) and Subway.... a few other odds n ends, but that's IT.

Anyhow, was like hmmm... why the heck did they call??? No message was left,... so I called,... hubby mentioned that maybe they were calling for Brian, for a JOB INTERVIEW!?! Wow, that would be GREAT!!!!!! It was my mission this year, to see that he got a job!!! 17yrs old and hadn't worked a real job yet??? Unheard of!!!! Hubby was right!! The manager asked if Brian could meet with him today after noon,.... so 12:30 we headed up there.

Of course Mgr had left for lunch, so we did a few things and went back and after about 15mins max,... he came out smiling :o) HE GOT THE JOB!!!! I'm so proud. He has no idea how much independence this will give him. Especially being his Senior year of school. Yay Brian!!!!!

Thank you Joanne

2008-08-11T15:30:00.000-07:00

So, I have been outta the blogging world for awhile,.... when I first started this blog, it was a lot of fun to make new friends within the Blogger world. It became tiresome to try and keep up with it,... I didn't have that much new stuff to share,... or was just too lazy or involved in something else to care.

I've gone from online gaming (Everquest, DAoC, Everquest 2, Wow,... I think I'm forgetting a couple) and playing on the XBox 360,.... we really are gaming nuts in this house,.... all 6 of us LOL

To online pet sites,.... started out with Neopets,... and then moved to Subeta,... I still have active accounts there, just don't visit much. Through Subeta, I started dabbling hard with Paint Shop Pro, making profiles and siggies and such. Due to that, and some help from fellow PSP'ers I've grown to have quite the addiction to it all.

I joined a couple wonderful sites that help with tutorials and my stupid questions, which has only helped my addiction to grow and I think develop even more....

Many thanks go out to those people at both Paint Shop Stop and Cherished Angels. I have learned so much from all of you.

Joanne gets mega kudos today,.. as with her help, I now have a whole new beautiful blog look!!! I'm very proud of it, and of her for all her hard work and time taken to help myself and others out to get their blogs lookin just as gorgeous.

You can visit her awesome blog here She has wonderful PSP goodies,...as well as several new blog layouts, all of them very pretty!!! So, go grab yourself one today, and make sure to leave her LOTS of love and tell her that Shannah sent ya!!!!

Resolutions....

2008-01-07T08:22:00.000-08:00

Happy New Years everyone!!!!

My friend Inky said we needed to have a resolution this year to start posting more. Well, don't hold your breath of course. I don't want to be liable to your passing out, hitting your head on your desk and laying there with the dog licking your face for hours :D

I did think I would post a bit of a funny.... well, it wasn't so funny at the time of course. I can sorta laugh about it now though :)

Friday Jan 4th hubby and I took off to Memphis Airport to pick up the older kids as they spent the holiday with their dad. Of course the lady at the ticket counter wouldn't give us escort passes. I don't know how many years we've been doing this now,.... neither child has had the "escort ticket" except maybe once since they started flying, and we've always been given escort passes to greet the kids at the terminal. No, not this time. She really was being a wench. I told her we've always gotten passes in the past, was this something new???? She spoke with the ticket agent beside her who said "well, we shouldn't but do whatever you like" Meaning, it's not going to hurt her feelings if she gave us passes. She didn't give us passes. Wench. No, that's not the funny part. I'm getting there.

Hubby and I vegged out watching people, I played a bit on my DS as the kids flight was running late. It was late in leaving when they were headed there, and late coming home. Figures.

Finally they landed and I anxiously awaited for them to walk up the long hall,... seemed to be taking forever!!! Behind us was a rather large sweet looking lady, wearing a habit and collar,... I didn't know that women wore collars??? She was wandering around and obviously waiting for someone. We watched a large man in a pink shirt, and collar go down the escalator towards baggage claim,.... hubby spoke with the lady who said yes she was waiting on someone, and hubby mentioned seeing the man in the collar,.... "Ohh yes, was he wearing a purple shirt??" Hmm..... I swear that shirt was pink,.. okay fuscia covers both :) She hurried down the escalator after him. Then we had 3 guys walking that way as well,.... very redneck lookin,... one in shorts (and it's cold out) wearing dark socks that come mid calve and these funky black shoes LOL I commented to hubby that they looked like real winners :D I do enjoy people watching,.... but upon closer inspection,.... we soon realized that the guy in the cowboy hat was the member of Damage Plan, he was Vinnie Paul. That was pretty neat :D

FINALLY our kids came walking down,..... PHEW!!!! We got luggage and headed back out, and along the way I was starving and needed to use the bathroom. We decided to pop in and eat there at the airports Backyard Burger. I hit the bathroom first. They have the great fun toilets that flush when you move. I was sitting there peeing and it was flushing the whole while. I love those toilets. NOT. Upon finishing I'm pulling up my pants when my cellphone clip pops off and yeah,.... cellphone straight into the toilet. My only saving grace was that the toilet had already flushed, but fear set in,.... what if that darned toilet flushes AGAIN????? I dove for it,.... keep in mind, this all happened within seconds. I wasted no time at all grabbing for the phone and rushing to the sink to get towels and start drying it off.

Sadly, it was far too late. Cellphones and water do not mix. Now to tell hubby this one. Oh yeah, I knew he'd love it *sigh* Hubby couldn't believe it, and oldest says "Only you huh mom?" Yeah, thanks. Geez. I grabbed some napkins and kept working on drying everything out and praying that the phone would work. No luck. It wasn't until Saturday night, I was headed to bed. Picked up the pieces of my phone laying there,... thought ONE MORE TRY. It was totally dead, so maybe a good charging would help?? The condensation was gone from the small outer window where the time and all shows,.... surely it would work now?? I plugged it in, and it actually came up saying Charging Battery.. !!!! OMG It's going to work??? I let it set there awhile and used oldests new cellphone (we got him one for Christmas, and sadly it was looking like I was having to take it from him until we could get mine replaced) and called my phone, it rang!!!! I let it charge all night and it's been working pretty good ever since. I am a tad concerned that the battery isn't holding a charge as well as it used to though. But at least it's MY phone. I can replace the battery hopefully cheaper than the phone (one would think!)

So yeah,.... the story of how I killed my cellphone and it came back to life again. Nice start to the New Year Resolution to post more here :D I hope you enjoyed!!!!

School Starts Tomorrow

2007-08-19T08:26:00.000-07:00

Yup, we have finished out another summer. Older two spent the bulk of their summer with their Dad in TX, and they saw a ton of rain. I guess they had a good time,.... they did get to swim a little bit, think they saw a couple movies, but other than that hung out at the house playing on the computers. The older they get, the more *eh* summer seems I think.
On the 9th we got to pick them up from the airport. I'm always excited to see them,.... it felt like it had been an extra long summer and boy did I miss them terribly!!! They looked pretty scruffy when they came out the walkway. Both needed major haircuts or something LOL But they were HOME!!!! *sigh* Yup yup life was good LOL
The younger two were sooooo excited, even Sydney said that she was looking forward to having her big brother pulling her hair and squishing her hard where her bones felt like they could break. Yup, she missed them huh? :o)
I had already bought a few things for school for the little ones,.... now I needed to cram and see what the bigger two needed. School supplies are always the worst. I think we have everything they need and clothes wise, I will pick up more here and there as the weeks go along.
Tomorrow I will drop them off at school, and come home to a quiet house and enjoy it with the hubby as he will be home tomorrow and Tuesday as well :o) Yay!!!!
A few pics I had taken when I took the littles to the park,.... thought I would share :o)

My Mom's Visit

2007-06-09T18:39:00.000-07:00

Yup yup had a great time with mom. Lets see,... she arrived Friday, May 25th, late afternoon,.... With all the restrictions in airports, we of course couldn't stalk her at the gate, and didn't even know when the plane had landed, as the terminal there was too cheap to have any sort of monitors!! I was watching closely, and when I saw her coming, I hollered at the kids COME ON!!!! I rushed over to her, and hugged her so tight and didn't want to let go!!! Kids?? What kids?? LOL We headed out of the airport and I took a wrong turn and she got to see Riverfront Drive area, and then some LOL Got to the bridge and made it home without a problem,... stopped in Marion for Wendys :o) YUM!!!

Saturday morning, everything just seemed so surreal. MOM WAS HERE!! It was weird LOL Hubby got off work that morning, and visited.... poor guy was falling asleep on us some too. We had plans to go into Memphis, at the Peabody to a nice salon and get our hairs done. 9am the salon called and said that the gal doing mom's hair, her son was ill (Keep in mind this was memorial day weekend too) and wouldn't make it in. They obviously didn't have someone they could call in. I was pissed. I still plan on writing them a nasty note. So, that got screwed up. We looked online at the other locations, and chose the one in the mall. We got there in great time!!! I was VERY pleased with myself,... having not really driven around Memphis :o) I was very proud. We even had time to go through the Starbucks DRIVE THRU!!! (I'd only heard tales of these!! didn't think they really existed!!) got into the mall,... looked at a few things, headed to the salon. We both stopped short. Had we been 18 wheelers, you'd of smelled rubber lemme tell ya. The place was tiny, the chairs were all full up, and people standing around to spare, we were there right on time, and it sure didn't look like they were ready for us. As mom put it, it was more of a "Drive Thru Salon" NOT what we were wanting for our Mother Daughter Hair Day. I canceled our apt, saying we didn't have time.... and we went shopping instead!! (like that hurt our feelings any??? LOL) I came out of the mall with a cute pair of sandles, some comfy "thongs" (flip-flops) I got the girls some thongs as well,... plus some really nice wine stoppers for Hubby and the DVD Slingblade :o) I felt like I did real well :o) Not to mention I was shopping with my MOM!!! The highlight of this trip???? I got ROYALLY lost. I was so screwed up it wasn't even funny. We were seriously on our way to Little Rock. It was horrid. I panic when I get lost,.... Hubby I know was kicking me in the head (mentally) for not letting him buy me the GPS, but I was sure with our maps and all, I'd be JUST FINE!!! I think the next holiday that comes around, I'll be getting a GPS. We didn't get home until 9pm. It was awful. I think we'd left Memphis 'bout 4 or 5pm. It should've taken us about 1 1/2hrs to get home. Pathetic. Mom took it all in stride,.... she saw parts of Arkansas neither of us had heard of,... like Earle LOL *sigh* I felt like a total dope.

Anyhow..... Sunday we had planned to drive to Dyersburg (1 1/2hrs away) for a picnic with my Great Aunt and Uncle. I've not seen them since I was around 12yrs old or so. I went with my Nanny, Grandpa and cousin Frank to Oregon to visit them. Nanny and Grandpa both have since passed away. We got to the park,... really REALLY nice,... Okena Park in Dyersburg if you ever happen to go there LOL It was big and great play areas for the kids. We were right on time I think, and set up our table and waited and watched for them. Aunt Shirley had said they had a green car, a big sedan type. So, we were looking for a green big car. Eventually a car was driving along, slowly..... mom was sure it was them,... only the car was dark grey, NOT green. Hmm...... old age huh? LOL It was them. When I saw them, I recognized them,... I sure didn't think that would happen!!! It was a wonderful visit. They are odd people, but family :o) Uncle Bill wasn't standing there beside me for 30 seconds when he started in on his medical history. "....I thought it was a single hernia, but it ended up being a double...." Uhh... yeah.... TMI dude. We made the drive back home.... didn't get lost even!!! :o)

From here on, the days get a bit scrambled. We didn't have much planned after that I guess. One day we vegged around the house, another day Mom took the girls to see Shrek, while Hubby, me and the boys went to the mall, got Hubby and youngest haircuts,... We had some friends and their son over for dinner one night which was really nice..... grilled some steaks and chicken.

I think it was Thursday Hubby, Mom and I went to Memphis to Beale Street so mom could get some souveniers,... we also ate at the infamous Rendeavoux for some RIBS. OMG they are sooooo awesome!!!! They were really great people there too. The guy had pulled out a menu from under the glass on the table,... I handed it to mom, said she should take it home with her :o) "They won't mind??" "They won't know..." Chris didn't think it a good idea... so when the guy came back to the table, I asked if she could have it,... he said he could do better than that, he'd get her a new one and he'd sign it as well, and get another guy to sign it :o) (Their pics/history were on the menus) I thought that was awesome :o) We had a wonderful time tripping around there :o) Hubby surprised Mom and I both (I knew he was getting one for mom, but not for me!) and bought us mallard duck silver charms from Peabody for our charm bracelets. I thought that was awesome. Nice way for us to always remember this time together :o)

Friday, oldest had his ortho apt,..... so we went for that, then went to Waffle House and had breakfast Mmm it was good,... but dang they had it so cold in there, we were ready to order hot chocolate!!!! We left there, went to Kohls for some shopping :o) I got 2 cute pairs of capri's for cheap!!! They were having a nice sale. Oldest got 2 new shirts he was very happy with that. Mom got some capri's too :o) Ran into Target where I snuck around and bought mom a iPod Nano as a late Mother's Day gift to really spoil her :o) *hugs hubby for letting me do this* That night, the kids all went to Hubby's folks, and the 3 of us went for dinner at the 501/Omar's Steakhouse. We had a drink,.... and mom was silly and fun to be with. We laughed and while we were trying to figure out what to order, I set the wrapped present on her menu. "What's this????" "I dunno.... you gotta open it and see!" LOL She did and couldn't believe it,... she cried and got up to hug us both :o) She was sooo tickled with it. It's a pretty pink one too!! I also got her a nice case to go with it. Wanted her all set for her flight home. Hubby that afternoon, had set her up some music to get started with too :o) Our meals were GREAT. Mom and I both ordered some salmon. Different preparation, so we sampled each others. Man it was awesome!!!! Hubby got the usual :o) Cowboy Steak LOL The chef on duty that night did a GREAT job though. Whole night was wonderful. On the way home, Mom put her ear buds in and listened to her Janis Joplin that Hubby downloaded for her :o) She was totally loving it :o)

Saturday morning we were up and ready for our hair apt in Jonesboro. We grabbed a coffee on the way, got to the salon and they got started on us. I got my hair lightened and some highlights too. She did a great job on the cut and color :o) I was very pleased. We got there at 10am and left there around 2pm. Long ass day. Ran into Circuit City...... got us a new DVD player... Mom was needing the FM tuner for the iPod for her ride home from the airport in Idaho. We got home,... and then the fun began with my packing for the kids and all that fun stuff. That night we did movie night with the kids, and got Night at the Museum PPV, mom couldn't last through the entire movie,.... but it sure was cute :o) We enjoyed it lots. Sunday we took some pictures, (finally) and had everything ready to go, left 'bout 11am for the airport, got there in time to get some coffee and wait a few mins and Mom boarded the plane :o( Was ontime, 'bout 2pm. It was awful saying goodbye. Then went to the kids gate, and had to wait until about 3:30. Theirs was late due to bad weather in TX. That sucked too. Headed home, got the other 2 kids and that was it.

Spring is here!

2007-03-21T20:37:00.000-07:00

Today is the first day of Spring. I love Spring the best I think. I enjoy the smells, the sound of the birds, how cool it feels in the morning and how nice it warms up by afternoon. The temperature is usually perfect. Or at least it was today. I can only pray that it holds up, as Spring Break is next week for the kiddos. I really REALLY want to be able to shoo them outside to play.

This evening, I took little Xena outside.....

Temp at like 9:30pm was around 65 degrees. With wet hair and shorts/Tshirt on, I was a bit chilled, but it felt good, and smelled so good.

I stood there for awhile, just listening. I love our house. I love where we're at. We're far enough away from town that it's so very quiet. Yet not too far from town that it takes hours to get the kids to school. There are some trees that are about a good block away, they stand gosh,... 30+ft high?? When the wind blows through them, it's like they're talking to you. It just sounds so relaxing. I guess it kind of reminds me of the days being at the cabin as a kid.

The moon is almost just a sliver in the sky,... it looked rather orange,... but so bright. Everything is brighter here. The stars were all shining,.... not a cloud in the sky. Just a gorgeous evening. I wish I could capture it on camera and show you.... but I thought I could at least blog about it.

Hubby is working tonight,.... one more night to go after this. I will be grateful to have him home for 4 days after this. I'm hopeful that the weather will be as nice as this so we can sit out and enjoy it together.

I guess on that note,... I'm going to bed. I've spent the last 3 days painting. The walls in the dining and kitchen are no longer the off white or almond looking color.... they're sage green :o) It looks pretty darned good. I just need to clean up everything,... and boy do we need to get some nice pictures or something on the walls. We've lived here a year this July and the only room that has something on the walls is Geoffery's room,.... some super hero posters LOL Ahh well.... plenty of other things to do first I guess. I want TREES. We don't have a single REAL tree in our yard yet.

Okay.... I'm beat. Have a great night all!!!

Been awhile!!

2007-02-16T20:36:00.000-08:00

Hello!! Has anyone missed me??? ha! Didn't think so :o) Hubby asked me the other night if I'd messed with my blog any, and well, I said nope. I really hadn't thought much about it. Since we moved, we were without internet for a good few months,.... talk about withdrawls!!! I kinda thought, I should post some pics of the inside of the house,... and maybe try and jabber a bit. It's getting late, and I am tired, so we'll see how I do :o)

Livingroom/dining room

the boys rooms

the girls room (well, 1/2 of it)

Just a few pictures, I've yet to take any of the master bedroom/bathroom. It still amazes me that we're here sometimes. It's SOO big!!! Waking up in the morning in our big room, you'd almost think you were in a hotel room :o) It really is great!

Soon after moving in, we got to pick up the older two kids from the airport and bring them to their new home. Yes, they got to miss out on the packing and actual moving in. Lucky ducks!! Granted, I still needed their help to bring some of the junk to the new house, but the major moving was done. They were very happy,..... we all love and enjoy the house :o)

Kids started school,.... Oldest is in 11th, oldest daughter 6th, youngest daughter 3rd, and youngest son 1st. They're all doing really well too. I'm very pleased with them all the way around. Good kids :o) I'm not just saying that because I'm their mom either! :o)

Lets see,.... we've had how many holidays now??? 4th of July,.... ish,... the mosquitos really killed that for us, but we did manage to let off some fireworks here at the new house just before our actual move in and stay the night :o) We're so far away from the town, that it gets good and dark here. We're pretty well next to cotton fields. A new house was being finished just after we moved in, a new one over the fall/winter finished up this year acrossed from us, and an older one (few years?) down from us a bit. The rest is all fields. Very quiet here. Plus, because we're aways from town (3 miles) we can't get DSL. We're on wireless internet,... while it has its moments, we are NOT complaining!! Being without for a few months really sucked!!!

Thanksgiving,.... was really nice. We did the usual and go to hubby's family for lots of good eats :o) But we did another Thanksgiving here, with friends. That was really nice too.

Our 1st Christmas though, that was wonderful. The whole morning and afternoon was just great. We just didn't rush,... we took our time and let the kids enjoy their morning then we got ready and went to hubby's folks. It was just great being here. So much more room :o) Next year though, I'm using the BIG tree. I opted for the smaller, because the lights are already on it,.... and hubby was right,... the bigger one would've looked MUCH better. It sure didn't look that small in the old house LOL Oh well..... live and learn :o) Although, by now, I should know, hubby is always right!! LOL

What else??? I'm getting really tired. I do have to share though,.... Valentine's Day hubby was home. I already knew what I was getting, as we went to see her on Tuesday :o) A wee yorkie!! I'm so thrilled. She's just the cutest little thing!!! I'll post her picture too at the end of this. We get to bring her home Thursday as then she'll be nearly 9 weeks old, and will have had all her puppy shots and good stuff :o) I was very happy as hubby was home Valentine's Day, and I wanted to make it extra special. With his hours the way they are, it's hit or miss as to when he'll be home. He was working for New Years :o( I hate that. Anyhow, I had already given him one thing,.... on Tuesday,... since I knew about the puppy, I gave him his homemade gift early. I had taken a bunch of pictures of myself and put them on a card. He LOVES it :o) Made me extra happy. That morning though, I woke him with some chocolate covered strawberries, and a mimosa :o) Mmm!!! Sounds good right now even!!! I gave him his bag of goodies,.... and later fixed us a nice breakfast :o) Really was just wonderful to have that time together and enjoy the day together.

Anyhow, I'm going to add this picture and go to bed.

This is me with our Xena :o) Isn't she a doll!??!!