Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a fun & safe New Year's Eve. We spent it at home with John's mom and step-dad. A nice quiet evening at home munching on pizza, bacon wrapped little smokies, Ro-tel cheese dip and various other junk food. I look forward to the boys being a little older and letting them stay up to ring in the New Year...but that time has not yet arrived. :) I did get to enjoy some big 4th of July style fireworks from our back window. I'm not sure who had the display but they were great!

This afternoon John's sisters, Evan, little Jake, and Joanie's boyfriend Steve came for lunch. Nothing fancy, just sandwiches, hashbrown casserole and leftovers from last night. It was good too see them all again. And as I am typing this, it is just John, Zach & I here. Drew went his grandparents to see "The Tale of Despereaux"...and actually Zach is taking a nap...and John is downstairs watching football. Which means - Quiet House!! WOOHOO!!! I plan on heading off to try and do some reading...something I haven't done in a LONG time. :)

Which means, I am going to push off an update yet again! I think I will try and take my laptop with me to the old house on Saturday when I run there to do laundry (still don't have my new washer/dryer in yet). I don't have internet, but I can work on typing up an entry to copy/paste over after I get back home.

For now...I will just say HAPPY 2009!!!

Merry Christmas!!

Just a quick note that we are still here!! I have been burried under moving boxes and Christmas baking and am even REALLY behind in checking my email. *cringe* And also visiting with family.

I hope that all my on-line friends and my family have had a WONDERFUL Christmas! I will try to come back before the end of the year with a full update. Until then....

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Packing...Packing...and MORE Packing!

I don't have a long entry. We have been busy moving boxes as fast as I get them packed. Every evening we have been taking a load over in our mini van. Since the kitchen is the only place that has shelving up, that has been the only boxes we have been able to unpack yet though. We do have our Christmas tree up at our new house though. :) John put the tree up and then Drew and I hung the ornaments. So no furniture in the house yet (other than one bookshelf) but we have our Christmas tree! lol Since our fridge will get in next Tuesday and we have the phones, internet and satalite service being installed/turned on Friday, Dec. 5th we hope to move the furniture in on Sat., Dec 6th. Which means we need to get busy figuring out what we are going to do in the bedroom closets and get that installed! We are still hoping to be able to put the "For Sale" signs up for our old house sometime in early January.

In other news...as I am typing this we SHOULD be driving to my parents house for Thanksgiving. Only problem is Zach ran a fever the last two days and has a doozie of a cough and runny nose now. We are going to see how he is doing in the morning and decide if we are just staying home. We just don't want to share this stuff with little cousin Tyler. So it is looking like I might be making a run to the grocery store in the morning to pick up a little turkey and the fixings for us to have our own little Thanksgiving with just the 4 of us.

Ok, nothing new to really share. So I guess I need to go get back to packing! There is still a TON of that waiting for me. *cringe*

Hope all of you from the USA have a very

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!

Quick Update

I am taking a little break from packing boxes to give a quick update. Things are mving right along with the new house. John went down and got all the utilities switched and our new fridge should be arriving on Dec. 2nd. Since all the appliances in the new house are black and all the appliances in our current house are white, we decided to leave our old white fridge (which is still in great condition) in our current house when we sell it and by a new black fridge. While my parents were down visiting, John and I ran over to Sears to check out what they had on Friday evening. I went in looking for a black side-by-side and was set on NOT getting the glossy finish (can't imagine trying to keep handprints off of that!). In fact I had a specific one in mind that they showed the previous weekend on Extreme Makeover: Home Edition...a Kenmore Elite with not only crushed and cubed ice, but also shaved! Cool, huh! Only thing is, its not available yet (even though what I could find online said available in November 2008)...and John wasn't crazy over it's price. Well, John liked the french door ones with the freezer in the bottom. So we came out with a French door bottom freezer in black....glossy black...that is actually MORE expensive than the Kenmore I went in looking for *laugh* *cringe* Ah well at least I got a new fridge. :)

We now have an offical closing time and date: Friday, November 21st at noon! We asked for an earlier time or even one after 12:30...or better yet 3:30 or later. They said that noon was the only available time on that date and someone was even staying over their lunch break to do it. Since it is a foreclosure, I guess we are kind of forced to do it whenever the bank wants it done...and of course they don't want to wait to close until the following week. So this probably means Drew will be missing school for the day. But, that might actually give us a chance to run down and check out the preschool in our new town and drop a load of stuff off at the new house afterwards. Have to wait and see how long the closing actually takes. Since the place we are closing isn't too far from Drew's school we might be able to still take him a little late.

We are currently just pretty focused on house stuff! Trying to get things picked out and order that we need to have done to move in (which won't probably completely happen until sometime in Mid-December...we will take loads of boxes down between now and then when we can). We are hoping it might warm up a little bit so we can get the decks at both houses and the fence out our old house sealed before winter completely sets in for us...they are actually calling for a high of 66 tomorrow only our pressure washer won't be here in time and we don't have the sealer color picked out. lol Maybe we will actually get the 50 degree weather Sunday-Tuesday next week that they are currently calling for and get it squeezed in then. :)

Ok, since I have only succeeded on packing what we don't use day-to-day out of our kitchen, I think I better get back to packing! It really isn't completely my fault that is all the farther I am :) I ran out of boxes! I had picked up 12 from U-Haul last Saturday to get us started. Today I was just able to get 4 apple boxes and 4 cantalop boxes from the grocery store(gotta love the free ones!). So now I need to go get busy filling those.

Photos of the New House

Here are some picture of our new house. Our closing has been moved up, so it now looks like we close on this coming Friday!

BIG News!

Ok, since my parents are now on there way down here, I am FINALLY able to share some big news with you all!! No, we are not expecint a baby...we are done with all that...unless I ever convince John to adopt some day ;)

We are going to pack my parents back in the car as soon as the arrive here in a half hour or so and take them down to see this... OUR NEW HOUSE!! or at least in about a week and a half it will be ours. ;)

To start at the beginning of this story....
Last week, John put an offer in on the land we had been looking at. It was less than the asking price, but he sited a bunch of reasons why it was a less amount (ie. the cost it would take to repair the pond, the fact that only about half the 10 acres was usuable, the fact that the road of the little subdivision actuallly ran through the property...etc). The guys said he was not going to negotiate and the price was as he stated. So, John decided to look at foreclosures in the area. He came across two homes in the same town as the land that the bank had foreclosed on the builder. So last Sunday before evening service we ran there to look at them real quick. They were both VERY nice HUGE all brick homes. And they were asking a good amount less than they were worth. And a bonus, they each sat on 1/2 ac lots (double the size of our current lot where our house is). So we went home and talked about it and went back Monday evening to measure some things to see if either of them would work for us. By this time we had really started liking the above pictured one, but were informed there was an offer in on it. We went home again and talked and John called the Realtor back and said we would like to put a back-up offer in. Long story short (and BIG negotiating between the Realtor & John - glad I wasn't there for that I hate arguing ;)), we found out yesterday afternoon that our offer was accepted!!! With it being a foreclosure we were able to get it for WAY less than it is worth. And...we close the Wednesday before Thanksgiving...so a week and a half!! MAN are we going to be BUSY!! lol We will need to get everything packed up and moved...then we have a few more things we need to finish doing at our current house so we can get it up on the market. It has been pretty CRAZY around here to say the least. ;) There are also a few things we need to have finished on our new house...the builder didn't complete the closets (which is fine by us b/c now we can do them how we want), the deck was never sealed, plus the back patio was never poured (there is just gravel down right now). Not major things, but still a little work. :)

My New Toy

I finally have a new cell phone!! *CHEER* No iPhone this time, but I am still having a lot of fun with my little BlackBerry 8130 Pearl! John brought it home Wednesday evening and I spent a good part of yesterday playing with it. They have an unlimited data plan (the phone is actually through his work), so that means I can now text, AIM, email, surf the web as much as I would like (and as long as my battery will last ;) ).

Today, the boys and I are having a "free day" (Drew's term) at home since there is no school. This means we just bum around the house in our PJs for the day. Although I do need to do some cleaning since I found out the other day we will be having family stay with us this weekend. Drew is very excited to not have to change out of his PJs for the whole day. I asked him yesterday on the way home from school what he would like to do with his day off...if there was anywhere he wanted to go. He said he didn't want to go ANYWHERE, and just wanted to stay in his PJs ALL day. lol (Please excuse the slightly out of focus pictures...my poor little broken Cybershot is having problems focusing now. I really need to sit down and look through compact cameras and decide what to replace it with.)

Land Update: We found some land we like, but have been trying to double check some things with it before putting in an offer. A part in the covenents stated you had to have your house built by the man who developed the area. John called and left him a message and he never called back (not the kind of person I want building my house if they can't even return a simple phone call!). After talking with the current owner of the property we are considering, we found out the man isn't even building homes any more, but we just want to cover all our bases! John also has a friend of his who is a lawyer looking over things for us. This afternoon, John will be meeting with someone from a bank regarding financing. So...in the next couple of weeks, we MIGHT just be able to say we have purchased property! Then it will be on to working on house plans. And then maybe in the next year or two we will actually be able to start building.

Hope you have a wonderful weekend! I am off to try and get some cleaning done - ugh. :)

Beautiful Fall Weather!

I have been loving the weather the last couple of days! It has been sunny and in the 70's - perfect in my opinion. This sounds like it will soon be coming to an end though as they are calling for BIG thunderstorms this evening and a significant temperature drop.

I have been wanting to get the boys out in the tons of leaves that have over taken our backyard. In the past years, the trees in our yard have gone from green to a brown with slight yellow...just not very colorful. This year has been a different story! Every tree has had a period where it has been a brilliant yellow. Not my favorite of tree colors, but still gorgeous. I had planned to take the boys out in the morning yesterday, but Drew woke complaining of a tummy ache and soon even had to make a visit to the bathroom. :( I figured my outside plans were off for the day and that I would be taking care of Drew for the rest of the day. Instead I spent the day trying to keep Drew down and resting! He was struck by nausea every once in awhile, but for the most part was fine. So, toward the end of the day, I took the boys into the backyard for a little bit for some fresh air. I loaded a few other photos into a little slide show if you care to view them. :)

And Drew is doing just fine and went back to school today.

I Voted....

have you??

I was attempting to pull on the parking lot of the school we vote at a few minutes before 6am this morning. I figured that would be a good time to go since the polls opened at 6am. WOW! WRONG!! I had to wait a couple minutes in line to even get on the parking lot to attempt to find a parking spot...I think I got one of the last ones. Cars were lined up and down the street leading to the school and there was a LONG line out the door with people waiting to vote. CRAZY! Almost 40 minutes later I was pulling back off the parking lot and they were still lined out the door. I have never had to wait more than 5-10 minutes to vote before!

November Already?!?!

What happened to the last week of October? Goodness! It flew right past me!!!

We have been pretty wrapped up with looking for property to purchase by the end of the year and beginning the process of deciding what we would want in a house when we get around to building it. So every Saturday we have spent almost half the day driving around the area...the poor boys are getting quite sick of it I think. Thankfully our van has a DVD player so that makes it a little less painfull for them. After all this searching, the trip to St. Louis for visits should seem like a breeze to them. :)

Last week started with us having an extra little one around the house. Sunday afternoon until Monday morning we had our friends' little boy (who is a week younger than Zach) staying with us while they were canditating at a church in Texas. Drew LOVED having another person to play with, but Zach wasn't too sure what to think about it.

On Saturday, Oct. 25th, we made a Jack-o'-lantern pizza again. Drew really enjoys getting to help make the pizza. :)
On Monday, October 27th, Drew, Zach & I cleaned out the pumpkin to get it ready cut our jack-o'-lantern. Neither of the boys wanted to just stick their hand in and pull the guts out.

Then when Drew got home from school on Tuesday, he decided on the design and he and John cut it out that night before he went to bed.

On Wednesday evening, Oct. 29th, our church had their annual Fall Festival. We went right when it began so we could get Drew home and in bed early enough since there was school the next day. He didn't get a lot of candy, but we enjoyed visiting with friends and he had fun with the few games he played. Zach went as a tiger and Drew was Anakin Skywalker (Star Wars: The Clone Wars) Drew did outstanding on the balloon darts! He was 3-for-3!

To put a damper on our week, Zach woke around 3:30am on Thursday morning wheezing and coughing. THANKFULLY I had some Albuterol in the house and was able to give him a couple puffs from the inhailer to help him breath. Since he had shown no signs of being sick up to that point (no fever, no runny nose, no coughing, no sneezing) and I'm a little jumpy after what happened with Christian, I took him to be checked out on Thursday morning. The doctor said that he had a virus, his nose was a little gunky inside and his throat was a little red thanks to the drainage. He then had a little fever early Friday evening and by Friday afternoon was sneezing and had a runny nose. So it was completely backwards from normal. Since then he has shared it with John and I. Drew started sneezing yesterday so we figure he is next. :)

Thursday, October 30th, was Drew's Fall Party day at school. I was so bummed that I didn't get to go be with him for it, but he said he had a LOT of fun! They made apple costumes (Drew was a yellow apple, there were others that were red and some that were green as well) and got to play all sorts of Fall themed games. They had a race with rolling little pumpkins, a water relay (they fished little pumpkins out of water with a net and raced to the other end to put it in a bucket), they played ring toss, and a guessing game (they had to guess which item their teacher had taken away out of the group of orange items). Since his preschool is run by a church, they steered away from the Halloween theme things. They ended their party with a parade outside with everyone in the apple outfits. :)

Friday was of course Halloween. Since Zach was in full blown cold mode, he stayed home with me while I handed out candy and John took Drew around a couple streets in our neighborhood. He still didn't make it through the whole neighborhood, but this time he made it through 3 streets...which is about double of last year. And he made a HAUL with the candy! I can't imagine what he would have come home with if he went through the whole place!! Is anyone looking??

Saturday, November 1st started with a trip to the park again so I could get some photos with the pretty fall trees - they say we still aren't at the peek of the color...but since it was gorgeous we took advantage of the weather! And of course we had to feed the ducks again. The ducks were chasing Drew to try and get to the bread in his hand. :)

After that we went to look at the property we are thinking about putting an offer on, as well as look around the area one more time. This time we walked the property so I could get a closer look at it.

And that pretty well sums up our last week. :) And with that I FINALLY bring the closure of the LONG post!! ;)

Interesting Reading

For those of you who read this that are in America, I hope you remember to VOTE this coming Tuesday!

I have stayed away from political talk on my blog, because I just don't like to get into the debates. I don't like arguing and quite frankly, I get sick of the talk and junk thrown at us via TV, print AND phone calls from BOTH parties!

But I wanted to share a link to an interesting article a friend sent me this morning regarding the Mortgage Crisis we are currently in. This friend is one whom I worked with in the real estate business, so I'm sure he has felt the effects of the crisis. If you have a few minutes, and care to look HERE

Pumpkin Cake

Last week, Drew and I took on a baking project. I had received an email on how to make a pumpkin shaped cake...so Drew and I thought we should give it a try. :) Mommy measured out the ingredients and Drew did the pouring and mixing of them. The cake had finally cooled and He was able to start icing it right before bed time...Mommy had to finish it up though since it had gotten late. It was a fun project, but I realized just how horrible I am at icing cakes. lol And even better, this little project is one we have gotten to eat! YUM!


**Note: I didn't go all Betty Crocker here...cake mix came from a box and icing from a jar ;)**

Update on Christian

Christian was able to go home yesterday afternoon. So they are all back home and VERY thankful to be back home! Christian is at home resting comfortable and just trying to regain some of his energy and strength. They said he still has some of the 10 pounds of water weight he had gained during the whole ordeal, but is really doing SO much better from last week at this time! Thank you all SO much for praying for the family!!

Jump Mania ~ 10.22.08

This past Wednesday, the boys and I joined some other mom's and their kiddos at our local Jump Mania. It is a building that is filled with inflatable slides and obsticle course for the kids to jump and climb around on. I have been meaning to take the boys ever since it opened this past summer, but never got around to it. So when my friend, Angela, called Tuesday night to ask if I wanted to join them and some others from church, I "jumped" at the chance to check it out. ;)

It ended up being myself and 4 other moms with our 7 kids...and of course other moms & kids were there as well. Both the boys had a REALLY good time for the hour or so we were able to stay. I had hoped to stay longer, but since non-thinking me had put both of them in long-sleeves they were both hot and sweaty and I had to get Drew home to get a shower before school. I originally thought that Drew would be the oldest and all the others with us would be kids around Zach's age, so when Drew's friend Trey showed up too, he was SO excited. It also created a problem with leaving though since he didn't want to stop playing with Trey when we had to go. :) Anyway, a fun morning and we will certainly have to go back again sometime when we have longer to stay. Drew was off running with Trey most the time so I didn't end up with many pictures of him. I also got to experience one of the inflatable courses first hand when I had to go help a stuck Zach. UGH! Out off all the kids there - I am the one that came out injured! lol I ended up pulling something in on of my thumbs (that I am still having problems with) and got a plastic burn on an elbow. lol I am just WAY to old to be going through things like that! :) And BOY am I glad that the only pictures taken of myself going through the course were taken with my own camera which Angela was holding for me! At least I then had the power of the delete button!! We were the first ones in the place (it had just opened for the day), and the boys didn't quite know where to start first. Drew going up...
and coming down. Zach's turn to climb up... and come down. He LOVED it! Drew trying to give the stuck Zach a boost up. It didn't quite work... so this was where Mommy had to go in to help. Of course the only way out was to complete the course. UGH!

Zach also got a little lost in one of the obsticle courses. He was in the thing a little more than 5 minutes before Mommy finally got him to follow some other kids out. :) Drew had gone through too quickly for him to keep up.


I was also so glad to be able to spend some time with a friend of ours who had moved to Montana and her son (her husband was out golfing with our pastors and the other missionary men). They will be missionaries to the Middle East soon and were in town for our Missions Conference at our church.