Oldies but Goodies

Now that we're finally widdling down all of the junk we've stored and accumulated over the past 6 years of marriage, we have found a few OLD pictures that we've laughed about. Some of them will go up on the attic with the rest of our old school pictures, but a few of them are so big we'll throw them away (I know, I know, I am like the world's worst for not being emotionally attached to things). Anyway, thought my blog readers would like a good laugh at my expense.


This was taken August 2001 in one of those "artist" photo booths at the mall... just a week after Drew got back from bootcamp. My dad used to call this our pooping picture because he said it looks like we were both pooping...LOL.

This was taken May 2001, on the evening of our 1 month (dating) anniversary. I was a freshman in college. Can you just say BABIES?!?! I can't believe this was almost 10 years ago.


The greatest thing about these pictures? Knowing that I still have just as much fun and love this man more than on the days when they were taken. Thanks for making my life sweeter Drew!

Weekend in Review

Well, this post is posted a little later than normal because I seriously have run around today (Sunday) like a chicken with my head cut off. But rather than start at the end of our weekend for my weekly weekend in review, it seems necessary to start at the beginning of this oh so crazy weekend that we've had here at our house.

If you don't remember, earlier this week I had left the freezer door open to one of our deep freezes in the garage, which caused us to lose several pounds of beef and the equivalent to about 2 processed deer, plus some other frozen groceries (box of waffles-- from Sam's, so it was a big box-- some fruit, frozen pizzas, etc). Thankfully I have a gracious husband. Well, the next day, after transferring what could be salvaged to our other deep freeze and our indoor freezer, I realized the stuff in our indoor freezer/fridge was not freezing completely. A call to the tech and two service calls later, we realized our fridge had a slow leak and needed to be replaced. Like, that day, which was Friday... AFTERNOON. Problem was, Drew was planning a camping trip on Friday and Saturday with two of his good friends. So, after B woke from his nap on Friday, I lugged him around to the two different appliance stores searching for the recommended fridge. Called around to several other stores to price match, went back to the first store I went to, and purchased the fridge by myself and arranged for delivery on Friday. Neeedless to say, after an hour of running back and forth, B was NOT happy. Since our food was all either frozen or semi-warm, I decided I'd treat me and B to Chick-Fil-A. Great idea, other than the fact that B thinks that we should just PLAY at Chick-Fil-A and not EAT. So for the first 10 minutes or so, he literally screamed nonstop, SO loud. It was awesome (please note my extreme sarcasm). Thankfully he finally died down and ate his kids meal, and then I let him brave the rampage of wild, unattended children in the play area, where he thought the wild, unattended children were the best entertainment since Veggie Tales was invented. It scares me to think what he will be like when he is at that age ((((SHUDDERING)))). I got home right at bedtime, washed him off quickly, and enjoyed the rest of the evening of peace and quiet to myself.

Saturday I woke up thinking we'd have warm milk, but to my surprise the refresh of freeon that the tech had given our fridge the day before had worked a little, and actually FROZE our milk solid. SO, we still had to go get donuts since we had frozen milk. After eating donuts (Brayden was MUCH more enthusiastic this time about donuts, and ate half of a glazed donut and a whole chocolate glazed with sprinkles... I think we've found his new fave breakfast!), we headed to a local festival before the heat of day set in. Unfortunately nothing was really up and running yet, so we took a good stroll around the downtown area and then headed home. Saturday afternoon the new fridge was delivered, and wouldn't you know it was in the middle of naptime, and as my luck would have it they had to take the door off of the hinges. This meant that B was woken from his nap, and he was CRANKY PANTS magoo all afternoon. I somehow managed to clean the house up considerably before Drew got home later that evening (between technicians and fridgerator deliveries, my floors were DISGUSTING, so I HAD to mop and vacuum). I still didn't have anything to cook, so we went to our local mexican restaurant and ate dinner as a family. Despite being tired, Drew and I both revved up enough energy to make a huge dent in our front room. For the past 6 years the front room (office/guest room/junk room) has collected an enormous amount of CRAP. I am not attached to ANYTHING, so I have gone through and thrown away a TON of stuff. We plan on putting some of the stuff in a garage sale later this fall, but the room HAS to be finished soon so that Brayden can move into the room and adjust a bit before Connor is born (in the midst of everything else we have going on this fall!). We actually were so productive that we cleared out our executive style desk and moved it all to the living room to our computer armoire (we purchased that several months ago off of craigslist before we had even found out about Connor, but never moved anything to it). Now the front room just needs to be moved to the trash or garage, and then I need to finish sorting stuff in the closet and rearranging the rest of the house to fit everything. As much as I HATE going through stuff, it feels good to get rid of JUNK. I kind of wished we did it annually just to stay on top of things so we didn't get attached to stuff/memorabilia/etc that we don't really need. In a house that's only 1300 square feet, it's almost necessary, especially with two kids!

Believe it or not, today (Sunday) was the craziest day out of all of them for me. This morning I volunteered doing setup for a local consignment sale we have twice a year. It's where I get all of Brayden's clothes, so if I volunteer I am able to get in early before the public. It was actually a lot of fun meeting other moms and getting a little break from Brayden. After 4 hours of that, I went home, ate lunch and changed, and then headed to a baby shower for my friend Andrea, who is having baby Rylee in about 6 weeks.


Part of the spread-- the food was SO yummy!

The other half of the spread... they also had a chocolate fountain... pretty sure I ate most of those strawberries!

The cute cupcake tower-- all of the colors matched Rylee's room!

Andrea with one of her many cute gifts. Can you believe that she's 34 weeks pregnant? I swear I am way bigger than her and I am 8 weeks behind! RIDICULOUS I tell you!

Andrea's MIL got her this super blinging Kalencom diaper bag. If you are looking for a good diaper bag, I HIGHLY recommend Kalencom. I have one and it is AMAZING (if you can even describe a diaper bag as amazing... LOL!).

Isn't this canvas ADORABLE?! There's a local gal here that makes the CUTEST canvases. I LOVE her writing-- if only I could write like that!

One of my BFF's Alaina. She's due 6 weeks (technically 8, but she is induced early for her pregnancies) after me with baby #3 (a BOY!). Finally my boys will have another boy to play with!!! I swear all of my friends are girl FACTORIES!

Another BFF Candice. Candice and I have good laughs together since her little girl Laci is just as active and strong willed as Brayden. Laci and Brayden definitely feed off of each other's energy when they are together!


After the shower, I headed home, cleaned up the house just a bit, fed B dinner, and then we headed to community group. I didn't get home until about 8:45pm, so basically I was gone for 12 hours straight! CRAZY! I plan on taking it easy tomorrow and trying to get my house back in working order before our big labor day weekend. Hope everyone has a good week!

Things I've Said Lately...

... yes, "dis" is your penis. Let's not pull it ok?
... "doe doe" is right! Don't feed the dog your sandwich.
... can you kiss baby Connor? No, I said kiss, not hit.
... please don't hit the dog.
... did you poop AGAIN?
... we do not throw our toys.
... please do not hit the furniture with your toys.
... is mommy pee peeing on the potty? yay for mommy!
... yes, that is uncle "weff". no, weff is at work. we can't call him right now. sorry!
... do not stand on the furniture!
... do not get on top of the table!
... let's not eat the kleenex ok?
... spit the dog food out NOW!
... we do not play in the dog water. do not put your feet in the dog water.
... we only go outside with mommy and daddy... close that door NOW!
... please don't stick your finger in the socket. thank you.

What have YOU found yourself saying to your kids lately?

Friday, Murphy and Five Question Friday

I am so glad it's Friday. Murphy (as in Murphy's law) has tried to move into our house one too many times this week. Let's recap shall we:

Monday, bought bread. Didn't shut the freezer door all the way (or it bounced back or something) and didn't realize it until 9:30pm on Tuesday night. All of our deer (approx. 40 pounds of ground venison, plus a box of waffles, some frozen blueberries, etc were all dethawed). We lost all but about 5 pounds of the deer, plus all the other stuff in there. AWESOME. Not to mention, the water was tainted with deer blood, so our garage and freezer now smell like a rotten meat locker. We have bleached, scrubbed, aired out and scrubbed some more. It's getting better, but still STINKS (Both literally and figuratively). To make a bad week worse, we realized this morning that our freezer on our fridge is not freezing. SO we had to call our appliance tech guy out today. I wasted most of the day waiting around for the tech, which frustrated me since the weather is absolutely gorgeous and we're pining away to get outside as much as possible right now. After a thorough evaluation this evening, the tech said that our fridge needs coolant. SO we have to wait until tomorrow to get the coolant replaced, which means everything that was in the freezer inside needed to go outside to our OTHER deep freeze (the one I did not leave open and that has 1/2 a cow in it). It's like musical freezers around here. I'm just praying this is the end to the series of unfortunate events around here.

Since it's Friday, that means that it's time for Mama M.'s Five Question Friday. I finally like all of the questions this week, so it was fun to answer these!

I hope everyone has a safe and fun weekend!




1. How many pets do you have?
We have 1 pet... Toby the super dog.

He's a Cairn Terrier, one of the best breeds of dogs out there. We like to say he has the heart of the lion but the body of a mouse, which isn't completely true, since he weighs in at 18 pounds (might be more now that he gets grilled cheese sandwiches and bites of hot dog from B-man!). He is SUPER compliant, LOVES people and other dogs, and would probably play fetch until he wore his paws off (he's actually done just that before, so we have to be careful... he has a REALLY high pain tolerance we've decided. What is it about my kids and high pain tolerances?!?!).

2. If you could switch places with anyone in the world for one day, who would it be?

Well, I like my life a whole lot, so I am not really sure how to answer this question, especially with the thought that it would mean I wouldn't have Drew and Brayden. Sometimes I wish I could change places with Connor. I mean think about it... he's warm, cozy and gets everything he needs right there in my belly. Plus, he's completely innocent... doesn't know what it feels like to be hungry, have a dirty diaper or deal with all of the drama in the world.

3. What is your favorite money saving tip?

Don't make rash decisions. A lot of the poor financial decisions we make are ones that are made out of emotions rather than well thought out plans. Drew and I rarely, if ever, make decisions without praying about it and thinking about how it will impact us days, months and years down the road. Doing this will keep you out of a lot of trouble and heart ache.

4. What do you want your kids to be when they grow up?

Happy. No seriously, I want them to do what makes them happy. Within reason of course, since life isn't always a walk in the park. I want Brayden to do something that makes him feel complete and accomplished. I don't want to put pressure on him to be something because Drew and I like it, but rather something that he truly has passion for. I think that our society places too much parental pressures on children and you have parents who are trying to live vicariously through their kids. That only makes the parents AND the kids miserable, in my humble opinion.

5. What is your favorite quote?

Oh geez. Do I have to pick just one? I have so many! Here are my top 3 (or 3 of my faves, in no particular order):

"The best minds are not in government. If any were, businesses would hire them away."

-- Ronald Reagan

"God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him."

--John Piper

"I believe that for the sake of the Kingdom, we must despise apathy more than we fear failure."

--Gary Thomas

NINJA!

Last night while we were playing outside after dinner, I put a bandanna on Brayden's head and told him he was a ninja. I guess the way I said it was funny, because he died laughing. I kept saying Ninja, and every time I would say it, he would just chuckle. It was pretty funny. So without further ado, I give you, Brayden, the NINJA:






Of course, when Daddy gets home, Ninja goes out the window, Brayden comes back, and we have an all out implosion until he can get to Daddy. Does anyone else feel like chopped liver when Daddy gets home? LOL.

Tumble Bumble

This summer I enrolled B in a moms and tots class at our fitness center. I was a bit skeptical at first; I mean, let's face it, I don't do well with singing and dancing in front of other people, and half of this class is doing just that with your toddler. Not to mention that I enrolled B before I found out I was preggers, so as the weeks progressed the class got harder and harder for me to do with him because I am just not very agile! Thankfully Drew moved offices and it happens to be right next door to where we are at, so he was able to come for atleast part of each class and help out. Today was our last class, and I have to admit that I was kind of sad. Despite my skepticism Brayden has really thrived in the class. He's learned to walk backwards, stomp his feet, follow instructions from a teacher, and his favorite part: TUMBLE. He seriously would get so giddy when the teacher would take us from the stretching room to the tumble room. Drew even has gotten him to walk on the balance beam (with a little help of course!). It was a really fun experience... not sure I'll re-enroll him this fall, as my belly really restricts what i can do with him, but I might do it again in the spring as some special time for us (the fitness center offers childcare that I could drop off Connor at). Here are some pictures of our last day today.


You have to focus hard on the balance beam!


Going up...

Up....

And then you get to TUMBLE!!!!

He LOVED the parachute. When the class first started, he really wasn't sure. But by the time we ended the class, he would get so giddy when she brought it out, and would just laugh and laugh while we sang songs and did the parachute!

Ridin' on the scooters

Around the Garden

After finding these guys

I decided I should pull out my macro lens

Just to get a few shots of the garden

We're still producing tomatoes like a tomato factory. Some are green...

Some are almost ready...

And some will never come to fruition because of the nasty buggers we found.

That's just what happens... around the garden.

Girl Talk Hop: SHOES!

I have to be honest, I was a bit intimidated by this week's blog hop topic. I mean, let's be honest. If you've seen pictures of me, or if you know me personally, you know I am about as far from a fashionista as they come. But then I thought, who cares if my shoe post is not about FASHION. At this point in the game, I am all about COMFORT. So I thought I'd share my 3 go to pairs of shoes.
My 3rd runner-up: Boat Shoes.

(Image from sperrytopsider.com)

Recently a friend told me that she loved her boat shoes, but she felt like she looked weird in them. I think they are SO cute, so comfy, and can be dressed up a little if you wear something casual, or just worn with shorts. When I was working, we weren't allowed to wear open toed shoes, and these were my go-to shoes. Sadly, Brayden busted an entire case of freezy pops on my pair of boat shoes, so I need to go and get a new pair before winter hits. I get off brand boat shoes, and so far they have held up really well.

2nd runner up: Birkenstocks. I wear both the sandals and the clogs, depending on the season.

(Images from http://www.birkenstockusa.com)

Seriously, the most comfortable shoe ever. They are great for your feet... you can read about some of the foot health benefits of birks HERE. I buy brand name birks... off brand just doesn't cut it, and honestly you end up spending the same amount of money since name brand birks last 5 times longer than any store brand I've ever tried!

And my top shoe of choice: Old Navy classic flip flops.

(Image from oldnavy.com)

If it's warm (and sometimes even when it's not), you'll find me in a pair of these babies. They are so comfortable, they are easy to match with outfits, and they are CHEAP. I seriously wear them into there are holes in the bottoms, and then just go back and pay another $2.50 for another pair! This summer, I've worn my flops so much that I have callouses where they rub on my feet (in between my toes and then near the heel of my foot where the strap rubs). 

And those are my top 3 pairs of shoes. Obviously I have a brown and black pair of heels and close toed shoes, but this is what you'll find me in the most. Be sure to check out Girl Talk for more entries in our SHOE blog hop this week!

i heart faces: lovin' the beach

The beach is by far my favorite place to be. It's just so relaxing to be at the end of land, and sit still and listen to the sea. Sadly, it's been a few years since I've graced a beach. Hopefully that will end next summer when we plan on taking the boys to dip their feet into the ocean for the first time :) This particular picture was taken just a few months after I got my digital SLR, so the quality is kind of subpar, but it's such a fun shot of my sister Megan. Be sure to check out all of the other fun beach entries by clicking on the i heart faces logo.

Weekend in Review

Well, this weekend didn't end up being as eventful as I had thought, hoped or planned. Friday night was a very lazy night for us, where we just hung out in the backyard and talked and let B play. Drew and I have been very thankful football season is finally here. Preseason or not, it's fun for us to watch (even though I am admittedly the bigger football fan in the family). So we finished up Friday by watching some preseason NFL.

Saturday we had a baby shower to attend. WITH B. DURING his naptime. It's like a DOOZ of a combination. We decided to keep Brayden up later than normal in the morning, then put him down for a nap in hopes that he'd take a longer AM nap. The plan backfired. He still slept only an hour, and was kind of fussy. We got to the shower, and he actually did pretty well. The only problem was that they had glue sticks and kindergarten scissors set up for the adults to do a little drawing competition. Apparently Brayden likes to sniff eat gluesticks. Who knew? Oh wait, we did, since he nothing seems to turn his nose. So we chased him around most of the time. It was fun though, and Drew even won the competition where the adults had to chug punch in a baby bottle. I left my camera in the car so we didn't get any pics... sorry! We had plans to leave the shower afterward and go to the county fair. Unfortunately Saturday was the day our hellacious temps (read, it was 98 degrees), so we ended up skipping the idea since Brayden was pretty tired, and I wasn't sure I would make it (you know, me being pregnant and all, I tend to break a sweat if the temp is anything above 65 degrees! LOL). Drew decided to study Saturday afternoon, so when B woke up from his nap, I decided to get out and do something, which had to be indoors. I decided to take a risk and bring him to Chuck E. Cheese. I kind of thought he'd be too young, so wasn't expecting much. Oh my word. The kid was in LOVE. He LOVED all of the rides, and he even danced in front of Chuck E. after he warmed up to the idea of a big dancing mouse :)



His favorite ride was the carousel. It had these mirrors on the middle part, and he would start smiling SO cheesy, and laughing at himself. What a ham!


This ride cracked me up, because Chuck E. Cheese talks to the kids during the ride. Brayden couldn't figure out where the voice was coming from, so he looked so confused the entire time it was on.

Checkin' out Chuck E. Not so sure about it yet.

I honestly thought he'd be looking somewhere else during this picture, since this was the second ride he rode on during our trip, and he still was checking everything out. He may not be smiling, but I promise you that he had a blast!


When we got home, we played outside, and B-man hung out like a big boy in his chair.



This morning Drew and B got a little one on one time while I got ready for church. B wanted to lay with Daddy AND Toby on the couch, so I decided to snap a picture of my 3 boys. When I asked Brayden to look at the camera, this is the smile he threw me:

LOL. I love that cheeseball!

Today was our service day at church so B had to go to two services. He really has enjoyed his new toddler class, and hasn't had near as many breakdowns. Which makes me glad since I always hate being the parent of the child who threw a fit the entire time. This afternoon we took a family trip to Target for some popcorn, soda and good ol' window shopping. When we got back it was dinner time, and I started singing the hot dog song from the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. Brayden immediately wanted to watch the youtube video. We ended up playing the youtube video of the hot dog song about 30 times during dinner. We don't even have cable, but for some reason, B LOVES that song. I mean, dancing, grooving, clapping, laughing... the whole shabang. It's like crack for kids or something. WEIRD. We played outside after dinner, and I shot some pictures. I am trying to play outside as much as possible because I know in a few months it will be a different story, with us not being able to play outside due to extreme cold. B now says his version of 'outside' too, and it's pretty hard to resist a cute blonde headed boy saying 'ousa' and then signing please over and over. He sure knows how to tug at my heart string!



OK, so people might be offended by me saying this, but I just have to say it. I never knew that the obsession with the crotch area started so young in boys.

He also has an affinity for things that can be used as swords and daggers. Pool noodles make great swords... even if they are 10 feet long. LOL.