Getting A Little Better

Okay, so blogging once every three or four months isn't good...but it's better than once every 9 months. I have got to get better about blogging. We have had so much going on, mostly just house projects, but they are so time consuming.

We had a great Christmas. Christmas break was so different this year since Parker is in school now. I really enjoyed him being home during the day! Christmas Eve with Jeremy's parents was very enjoyable. We went for lunch, opened gifts and sat and relaxed while the kids watched Toy Story III until it was time to leave for the candlelight service.

We did our usual Christmas Eve traditions with the kids and went to bed. Parker woke me up at 6:30AM...momma, wake up...It's Christmas, I got a bike...come see! He was so cute. He was very patient while he waited until almost 9:00 when Jeremy and Brooklyn woke up.

Giving me big smiles! :)
In Brooklyn's pink hippo tent.

The Monday after Christmas Amy, Craig and the boys came down for a few days and then were off to Frisco to see Craig's family. Gene, April and Grandmom also came down so we had such an enjoyable time with family.

The house is really coming along. The floors are done in the entryway, fireplace room, living room and Brooklyn's room. Jeremy has done alot of work and I absolutely love them. They look so good! I have a few before and after pics...

ENTRY WAY

FIREPLACE ROOM

KID'S BATHROOM

The kid's bathroom still has a ways to go. I have painted the walls, but am going to have to paint again so the textures will match. We had a problem with the paint peeling off in alot of areas. We still don't have cabinet doors or a vanity. It is functional though.

LIVING ROOM

KITCHEN

The dining area is small so the half wall in the picture on the right is going to come down...eventually.

Brooklyn's room is done too but I need to clean it up before I take pictures. :) Hopefully it won't be another 3-4 months before I get those on here. Well, I better get to bed. It is almost 1:00 AM and I have to go up to the school tomorrow and help with Parker's class.

Life

I was going through my blogs, that I at one time checked, and came to mine and realized it is now September and I have not blogged at all this year. Life gets busy and poof...a year goes by and it is hard to remember where all that time has gone.

Well, let me think...

My summer was busier than usual. We spent a week in June with grandmom in Ft. Worth and did tons of fun stuff there with the kids. We went to a water park, the stock yards, the zoo...I got so many cute pictures of the kids. It has been so long since I have spent more than just a weekend at grandmom's so I enjoyed that time with her!!

My awesome brother earned a trip through his work and took my sister and I to Salzburg, Austria in July. We were gone 8 days and other than the time spent on the plane, we filled every minute with sites. Amy did alot of research before the trip so she had a list of things for us to see. I think I ended up taking about 700 pictures on the trip. There is so much history there. One of our tour guides said that all of the buildings there are considered to be new unless they are more than 200 years old. Here are a few pics...

Mirabel Gardens. Part of The Sound of Music was filmed here.

Gene being a goober...Dwarf Gardens (a part of the Mirabel Gardens)


These are actually taken in Germany. The first one was in the bus going up the mountain to Hitler's Eagle's Nest, which was given to him on his 50th birthday. The second pic was taken once we were on top of the mountain.

Schonbrunn Palace in Vienna which is the capital of Austria. This palace has 1,441 rooms, we only toured about 50 of them.

One of the many beautiful churches. I can't remember the name of it, there were so many. Those are only a few of the many pictures that I took. We really enjoyed the trip!!

The following month we got to go to Utah to see Jess and Jody for Jessica's birthday. Had an interesting trip up there...flight was delayed, connection flight missed, spent the night in Denver airport...good memories. The weekend was great, of course. I hadn't seen Jess in so long. We hung out, did a parade of homes, caught up, got to visit with her family. It flew by way too quickly though.

We bought a house in town which we are currently updating. Either Jeremy or I (mostly Jeremy) spend several nights during the week over there doing stuff. It was Jeremy over there on Monday and I went yesterday. Got a few walls painted...that's about it. It is so hard to get anything done over there since I have Brooklyn at home with me. So, we are going over there in the evenings and working weekends so it seems like it is moving slowly. My first project was the kitchen cabinets. They are all painted and I have gotten half of the doors antiqued like I wanted them...thanks to Heather giving me a little tutorial on what to do. I still have alot of work to go to finish them up. Jeremy's latest project is demolition in the bathrooms.

Front of the house. The second picture is of our swamp in the backyard. There are so many nasty frogs in the pool. I'll have to get a picture of them, they are seriously the biggest frogs I have ever seen in my life.

My cabinet doors. I just did the brown on the edges of the cabinets and left the big surfaces the tan color.

Gene is engaged now. He proposed to April the weekend before last I think. I'm excited for them. The date is April 30 and she has SO many details already figured out. I don't think it'll take long and she will be done with the planning.

Parker started Kindgergarten and absolutely loves it. The weekend after his first week was hard on him because he was so bored. He kept complaining about not having anyone to play with. He has Mrs. Brown and is in my mom's pod so gets to see her throughout the day. Jeremy takes him lunch on Fridays which they both enjoy. This Friday is his family picnic. We will all be there for that! Brooklyn is excited, she loves Parker's school.

Parker sat in the back of the class by himself. I made him get up and go sit by a kid that he knew. He is so silly. He was being shy the first day. There are 4 kids in the class that he already knew which I knew would make it easier on him. I was so anxious to see how his first day went that I got there so early to pick him up. Of course there were probably 20 cars in front of me.

Well, I guess that pretty much wraps up the past 9 months. Hopefully it won't take me 9 more months to blog again.

Wow...December Already

It's so hard to believe that it is already December, the year has flown by. We've gotten the Christmas decorations up and will go this weekend to get our tree. I love this time of year.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving in Georgia with Amy, Craig and the boys. Gene and mom were able to come too. Dad even surprised us and showed up. He flew in on Wednesday and I had no idea he was going to be there, it was a nice surprise. The kids had a good time playing together. It was so good to have everyone together. We'll be able to enjoy family again for Christmas. Everyone will be in Dayton, grandmom and April will even come down, I'm so excited!

Hope that everyone had a great Thanksgiving!