There are NO words!

They say that the American Dream begins with home ownership. Nathan and I bought our first house almost 10 years ago. Our first house we lived in for 7 years and we had NO problems. It was new when we bought it, it was 1247 sq ft. We OUTGREW our house. We found our dream house about 10 minutes away. We bought this house and we do LOVE it, but in the short amount of time that we have owned it we have:

replaced 5 windows

replaced 2 air units

had a new roof installed (insurance paid for this)

and now this kitchen situation.

My American dream would be to save some money! I love my house but wow! What a mess and to have this in the kitchen and the Laundry room-well you may as well fire me as being the cook and laundress! Perhaps a Vacation will work in well at this time-so long savings hello Hawaii!

OK that was a quick trip, I forgot, in an effort to be SuperMom-I signed the kids up for Cub Scouts. They think that in being a Cub Scout they will go on adventures and shoot stuff with a bow and arrow. Little do they know what we will really do is tie knots and sing camping songs. But that is OK, just more quality time out in public with me throwing ugly looks trying to get them to pay attention to what is happening. Yippee for us! Although I signed Nathan up to help as well seeing that he is an Eagle Scout and all.

What a Weekend!

We had quite the weekend. Saturday started with a BANG or more of the dulll drone of the wind tunnel that is my kitchen-so escape we did, we headed to the YMCA for a quick workout. Then Melissa called and we got with the Young family and headed out (all 8 of us in my van) to the Wilson County Fair. I love a good fair, I love to see the arts and crafts, the quilting and things that take some kind of effort. Those things that make you feel completely talentless and nothing like the home maker that I am.....I thought that it would be a "learning" experience for the kids to know that you show cows, make clothes and make pottery. We watched one round of the cows and they were complaining of the mature -oh yes, my kids do not know that it is manure! I on the other hand LOVED the cows and Melissa and I picked the winner and got it right. I should have been a "Cow Judge". We spent most of the time at the rides, with the carnies (you know who carnies are, the people that work the rides that have not teeth and do not know that second hand smoke is harmful.) and listening to the requests of the FOUR boys that we had. Then we headed to the MAIN EVENT!

We went to the Demolition Derby! Oh yes, me, Shannon Summar went to the most red neck thing that I have ever seen. I have been to a tractor pull, I can help on a farm but I have NEVER seen anything like this! It is Redneckdom at its best. And it was hilarious-not only for the idea, but for the people that actually had family members involved! OH MY, they were passionate about their beat up cars. The kids had a ball. Now that is good wholesome (with your ears covered) family fun.

On Sunday marked another special and sad day for our family. It was mom and dad's 45 Anniversary! But Sarah and Jason decided to have Baby Elizabeth baptised. We had a wonderful time at church, we all went to the chancel rail to see her get "sprinkled" and shed a few tears. She is such a special gift and we are so lucky to have each of our kids, no matter that we would like to kill them from time to time. After church I had the family get together for lunch. Kristi was kind enough to open her house at the last moment since mine is well, loud and wet. Everyone had a nice time.

Today I was back to First Grade. Then the man came back to check on my water situation. I really thought that we would get off easy. I could not see that my wood floors were cupping, or that the HVAC system would need to be cleaned out, or that the hard wood would need to be ripped up so that the sub flooring could dry. I think that we are in for it. They are coming to "rip" up the hardwood in the kitchen and the hall today or in the morning, then they will have that dry and then who knows, new wood, new finish new house?? I will let you know when I do . In the mean time check on your insurance policies and make sure they are paid up to date.

Good Stuff

Attention Men!

Generally speaking we know whom takes care of the house, you think that the women do. And you are correct, we do. However-the HOUSEHOLD is a completely different situation. And by household I am talking structure and all that is contained in it, on it or with in the walls and studs and insulation and whatever else you use to build a house. But my point is, I can clean, dust vacuum, polish, scrub-but when something breaks-don't walk out the door, state something about that being a problem and head off to work.

So in explanation - I woke up this morning to my refrigerator hissing. This is funny because normally we get along fine. I asked Nathan what was happening with the fridge (he gets up early and had been sitting in the same room with it for over an hour) he wanted to know what I was talking about. I told him the thing that we get food from, is hissing what is happening? ((Crickets)) then I lean down to inspect-there is water coming from this hissing monster. Well what do you do? I went and got a towel, told Nathan and he still sits. Anyhow it is Friday and the day that everyone has to go to work, school or work at school. I call Daddy T on the way to school and ask what I do, Daddy T is my father in law that knows everything about everything. He says I should call my insurance company.And when I am done with school Daddy T comes over and we get the water shut of, clean up the standing water,discover that it has gone under the wall and into the laundry room and I call USAA they tell me they are sending out the .........

Water Mitigation Team! What? I just have some water and I thought that you only mitigated in a courtroom. They come-climb under the house in the haz mat suits, take picture, and finally set up a wind tunnel in my kitchen and Laundry room. They leave stating that they will send someone out on Monday to take a look....If I had an infant the white noise would be a welcome visitor, now it just hinders us from hearing one another.

And you know what? I handled it all myself, with a generous helping of Lend a Hand from good ol Daddy T! And Nathan did have a good day at work, thanks for asking.

Choir

So I mentioned last night that I was looking forward to the kids getting back to Wednesday night suppers and choir at church. And recall when I said that I would like to take a class. Well I found my class.....

My class is the Kindergarten and First grade choir! I believe that we are called the "Singing Angels" YEP! And it really would not be a BIG deal other than the other mom's all have girls, and you know who they look at when the corner of boys starts misbehaving, well they look at the mom that has two boys.

So I was stuck in the corner with a bunch of nasty little boys for a half hour. And you know what I learned? My kids are not that bad and I am REALLY glad that I do not teach any kids in school!

Sorry that it has been so long!

Sorry for the delay in posting to my blog....I have been a busy person!

We just got home from the Baseball field and it is 9PM. I do not know who thinks that 7PM is a good start time for a six year old's game but- 7PM is closer to bed time than start time. Ethan scored a run! I am so proud!

I had scrappin on Friday night. I love my group! We have such a good time with one another. I made a couple of cards and laughed my way through the night.

Saturday brought quite a few tears in our household. It was my Daddy's 65th birthday. I wish that he could have been here to celebrate with Sarah whom turned 32 on Friday.

Sunday was lunch at MeMommy's house and then we went to play with Noah and Carson! What a fun way to start the week!

We have also had another loss in the family. As most of you know we take pet ownership VERY seriously in our family. And when one of our pets dies, it is a loss for all of us. Sarah had to put her cat down today. "Hightops" was truly Sarah's first baby, he was raised on the bottle and remained a steadfast friend through all of his 15 years of life. But I know that Grandaddy is loving having Hightops in heaven to spoil.

Also in the news-Christopher started Kindergarten! Watch out for the BIG man on campus. We are so proud and happy for this new beginning for Christopher and his family!

We start Choir again as First Graders at church tomorrow night. We love Wednesday night supper. It is such a nice time to catch up with family and our church friends. I think this session I may take a class. I really enjoy Wednesday nite classes as well.

I will be e mailing out baseball schedules soon. I hope all is well.

Chao!

Food for thought

OK-the real post is below this-

We know how I am lovin' the baseball thing correct? (for those of you that do not know, I DO NOT love the baseball that my kids are playing)

I have an observation:

If you (coach) cannot manage to put your baseball cap on straight and centered on your head- your IQ goes down at least 10%

Food for thought for my peeps!

Ok so now that we have that done-

Ok so it is a fact that I do not know how to post pics and explanations. Therefore-I shall post many pics and try to explain myself as not to look like a complete moron that just goes out looking for nature and snaps pics. Oh I believe taht you may call them a nature photographer.

SO the first pic is my rabbit hole. They are gone and I, their rabbit mommy is sad. However I keep my eyes peeled and the garden ready for whenever they would like a nibble.

The next picture is the kids in johns room pre-paint. And I pose this questions, how come I take their picture for the bare walls effect and they take the best picture, I take OH a Christmas picture and they are enemies? I would just like to know. So this MAY BE our Christmas Picture.

The next pictures are post paint. John has blue walls and EE has the brown walls. I think that it turned out wonderful. The kids are excited and Nathan is still alive- good news all around. I will take more pictures once we have all the pics hung, furniture in place and whatever.

The final picture is of ANOTHER hummingbird whom thought that their idea of cross continental travel included a trip thru M'boro and in my garage.

Well I have to go, I am waiting on the appliance man to come get a door stop out of my drier, don't ask, it is my fault-perhaps I will take some pictures of the kind man and blog about it later.