weekend

I was asked to help set up a display table at church on Sunday that had to do with Christ and visiting teaching. These are the things that I used. I had a little round table and a beautiful table cloth. I put together some jars of treats for my new girls that I visit with little messages to each of them. Chocolate should be a known as a national ice breaker/peace offering. I know I love it.

I went and bought Cole his new school clothes. His school is uniforms and they can wear any solid coled collared shirt, so shopping for him was a breeze. I still need to get him 2 more pair of shorts, shoes and his classroom supplies. Cody so far has underwear and socks. He is going to be harder to shop for since it's not uniforms. I'm suppose to be taking them out today to get that done. Should be entertaining. This is a little miracle that happened over the weekend. The guys all worked on the garage and got it clean enough to squeeze my car in. I'm so excited! I've NEVER been able to park in a garage and I mean NEVER! It's the small things that bring me happiness!

Some of the other things we did this weekend...

• Date night-dinner out
• movies with the boys
• shopping
• couples game night-so much fun!
• sleepovers
• bridal shower
• church
• BBQ
• garage
• errands
  

Can you tell what my next project is? Yep! painting! I'm sure you can guess what room by the picture. It's the guest bathroom next to my scraproom. I had left over green paint from in here so that's what I'm using. It will be perfect since that bathroom is decorated with outhouses.

My niece Nicole had a beautiful baby girl. I will share more about that on my next post. What does that make me to her baby? Great Aunt? I don't know.

helicopter crash

Today is a very sad day in Arizona as we lost 4 well respected men in the news business as their two helicopters collided in Phoenix this afternoon as they were following a stolen vehicle police chase. I've shed many tears while watching it all unfold. It's heart breaking. My thoughts and prayers are with the families and the colleges of these pilots and photographers. Such a tremendous loss.

Channel 3

Scott Bowerbank - pilot

Jim Cox - photographer

Channel 15

Rick Krolak - photographer

Craig Smith - pilot

They will be dearly missed by many!

Dust storm and rocket derby

This is a glimpse of what I drove through yesterday on my way home from picking up my nephew Kayce for a sleep over in town. Late afternoon during monsoon season you run the risk of this...especially on the 16 mile stretch of desert highway to get to Maricopa. I had my little camera in my purse, so I had Kayce take pictures for me. It was pretty thick, but I've driven through much worse and didn't have a camera then. I just try not to drive in the late afternoon if I don't have to. We did get quite a bit of rain following this, which resulted in my back yard being pure mud. I REALLY need some grass.

Cole had his rocket derby tonight. After getting 5 boys through years and years of scouting, we've made 17 pinewood derby cars not including the ones I've helped other scouts build , but I have never had to build a rocket, so it was a learning experience. It had to be wound 150 times each time he raced. Mark helped wind it up when Cole got tired of winding. He won 3rd place, so he was thrilled!

I've started reading the book "Bleachers". I really like it so far.

Baby Mark

On Friday I got to take care of Mark while Brek and Brittany got some things done. Cole and I went and picked him up after running a few errands and having lunch together. It was fun to get some one on one time with him. Planning on doing something with just Cody this week....then Kyle. Cole and I did take baby Mark to Target to pick up some baby gifts for women in the family who either had a baby or who is having a baby very soon and I had to get him a couple of little outfits and a new toy too. I plan to pass on my love of barns to him. Next will be a John Deere tractor. :o)

My sister in law Tammy had a beautiful baby boy on Thursday. This is her third and she doesn't ever go into labor so she has to do c-sections. When the doctor cut through the first layer they were very surprised to see that there was NO muscle to cut through. They could see the baby through the very thin uterus wall. After the baby was delivered they had to to do some repair work by pulling over and up muscles to stitch her up, so she is pretty sore. They planned on this being their last baby because she has such hard pregnancies, and the doctor said that there is no way she could carry another one so they tied her tubes. I'm so grateful that Heavenly Father was watching over her. It was very dangerous for her. I went to the hospital with my sister in law, Cam to visit Tammy and welcome little Rowan Luke George to the family. It made me get even more excited for my next grandson to arrive. Speaking of which...last week Brittany was having contractions every 15 minutes, then when she woke up the next morning they had stopped. She went to the doctor on Thursday and she is dilated to a 1 and 50% effaced. The baby has dropped as well, so things are moving along and hopefully it will be soon. She's not due until August 7th, but I would like July. :o)

P.S. Happy mail day came on Saturday!!! I got 3 books in the mail from Deanna with handwriiten sticky notes that made me grin from ear to ear. I'm so excited to read them. Thank you so much Deanna! When I'm done with these, I plan to work on that long list of great suggestions.

P.S.S. Nicole...I need your address to mail you a baby package. Can you email me please.

I'm up and running...not literally. :o)

Just look who I wrangled to help me with bountiful baskets on Saturday. Cole, my nephew Jeremy, and Cody. They were actually great help with sorting all the produce. Poor Jeremy has been at our house since Friday. He's getting a little home sick I think, so Mark is taking him home in the morning. Right now they are in the kitchen making sugar cookies...smells pretty good!
Cole went to cub scouts and built a mini candy dispenser like my big one...so cute. First thing he said is "mom, you're gonna wanna get out your camera" He was so anxious that he grabbed it and took his own pictures. He's obviously proud of his work. He also brought home a rocket that we are suppose to make by next weeks pack meeting...no pressure.

My very smart computer dude came over and got me all hooked up. I appreciate him so much! This windows Vista is a bit different and some programs are not compatible with it because it's so new...like my QK silhouette. QK is suppose to be coming out with drivers soon. Resizing pictures is not as easy as before and the new keyboard is harder to type on. I have way more typo's now. I know there's a lot to get use to, but just look at it!...It's beautiful and I love it!...is it wrong to love a computer, because I do? As you can see in the picture, the old one is still in here because we still have some stuff to transfer over. Soon I will have more room. Next, to try to install my clip art and hope it cooperates.See what happens when boys pester the computer dude too much while he's working. :o)

Get a rope! LOL!

Anyone watch Big Brother? I have watched it every season. For some reason I'm hooked. I just have to say that I hate Jen. She is a wicked mean girl! That's all I've gotta say about that.

Thank you all so much for so many great book recommendations. I could feel your excitement and love of books through your comments and that got me excited too. The first ones I'm going to read are the ones Deanna is so kindly sending me. I'll let ya'll know how it goes.

Books

My old computer is taken apart sitting on the floor and the new one is out of the box, but still no computer dude to come set me up, so here I sit at Mark's computer, now with no way to do pictures...at least for a few more days until I get some assistance. The new computer is Windows Vista. I have no idea what that means or how to use it. Do any of you know anything about it?

The title of this post is BOOKS because I'm going to admit to all of you that I do not really read books. Shameful and embarrassing, I know! Sure I've read lots of children's books, but as an adult I haven't read a book from cover to cover and I'd really like to. My question to all of you avid readers out there is what books would you recommend to someone like me? I want something that would suck me in so that I wouldn't want to put it down and give me pure enjoyment, but not so deep that it would be a hard read. Any suggestions are welcome.

I'm off to go make dinner. On tonight's menu we are having pork chops, stuffing, baby white potatoes, and honey butter glazed baby carrots. I'm starving!

P.S. I got my tooth fixed today so I no longer look like a hillbilly. :o)

Bye-bye bike and hello new computer

Well Mark sold his most favorite bike and now he's down to zero! I'm broken hearted about it because I love this bike. It actually fits my whole hiney comfortably. His other bike did not. I pay attention to other couples who ride bikes and I do not want to be one of those women who have a big chunk of hiney hanging off each side of a teeny seat. Not only is that painful, but I don't need to be showing off my rear end to anyone.I did get a little something special out of the deal. Mark was sweet enough to get me a brand spanking new computer that has all the bells and whistles as well as a new all in one printer. Gotta love that man of mine! I can hardly wait to get it all hooked up. Our computer dude is coming over on Saturday hopefully so we can make it a smooth transition from the old to the new. I'm sure there will be a lot of frustration on my part learning how to use the new one, but it's a challenge I will gladly take on. I was in desperate need of an upgrade. My computer is so full that I can't upload any new programs, so I'm more than excited to get acquainted with my new baby. I will be giving my old one to Kyle. He is thrilled and has been clearing a spot in his room for it. With what's left from the sale of the bike, Mark is buying a cheaper motorcycle, and we are paying off a couple of debts, so even though we both miss that beautiful motorcycle, we are able to do more with the money earned.
Mark also got me a new bottle of Tresor by Lancome. I so LOOOVE this stuff! It's the only perfume I wear and I wear it every single day. My last bottle just ran out, but it lasted 2 1/2 years, so I think that's pretty darn good.
Before I go...to answer the question about taking good fireworks photo's. I used my Canon Rebel XT and I put on my external flash so that the manual one wouldn't pop up automatically. So no flash!...that's my only secret with that.
Almost forgot to mention that this morning while I was in the shower I noticed that I chipped my front right tooth. NICE! Have NO clue how that happened. Wouldn't you know my dentist doesn't work on Friday's, so I have to be insecure about it for the entire weekend. I won't be smiling big or holding long conversations with anyone. I've already been dealing with some pretty serious self esteem issues lately, so this didn't help. What added fuel to the fire was trying on bra's in Victoria Secrets in front of a ginormous mirror. I don't recommend changing clothes in front of a mirror of any size but especially not one so freaking big. It's a little bit too enlightening. On a good note, I have been exercising the past couple of days and I'm really feeling the burn. It's a good feeling!
Have a great weekend everyone! Gotta get up early. Saturday morning is bountiful baskets day! I'm taking some boys with me this time to help sort the produce. Can't wait to see all the beautiful fruits and veggies.

better late than never

Oh my gosh! My pictures finally uploaded! I've been trying everything on both computers to get some sort of cooperation for days, but nothing. I've messed with my tools until my eyes hurt but I still can't log in to blogger on my computer. Now I can post these pictures on Mark's, but for some reason as I type it's underlining everything. Not sure why, but beggars can't be choosers. So bear with me with my very late holiday pictures and underlined words.Miss Brittany, who can hardly wait to have this baby. She looks pretty cute though.

Julie, Rene', and me (yes, my eyes are closed and yes I hate standing next to teeny tiny in pictures)

The little family

Baby Mark took to Kindra right away.

I love this little boy! So dang cute!

The boys who just came back from the blow up obstacle course. There was so many fun things for them to do and plenty of water features to cool down. I never went to them, so I baked all day.

Baby Mark gives the biggest wet kisses, but Cole doesn't seem to mind.

I thought it would be hard to keep him on the blanket, but it turns out the grass totally creaped him out so it was no problem.

Kyle, being the ever so cool teenager

Taking baby steps with Grandpa Mark

The Sheriff's department played the bagpipes and drums and did an awesome job. I was very impressed. I wish my mother in law could have been there to hear and see them.They had the Karate studio students do a demonstration too. I'm pretty sure their enrollments went up after that.
Can you see the blow up movie screen in the background? We were suppose to watch the sand lot, but oddly enough the projector motor couldn't cool down in 116 degree heat. It was a good idea though. We all voted and they decided to start the fireworks show early. For such a small town they sure put on a nice show. I took tons of pictures, but I'll spare you and only share a few of them.

So pretty! Did you oooh and ahhh? hee...hee

P.S. I had NO control over the different fonts, colors, underlines though out this blog....so dumb! Technology apparently hates me as much as I hate it. Boy do I want a new computer! I sure hope you all don't think I'm intentionally ignoring your blogs. I'm really not...honest. This thing lets be get to a couple everyday and my list is quite long. I promise to catch up. ***edited***when I published the underline was gone, but the colors are different.

I'm back!

Hello everyone....still coming to you from Mark's dumb computer because mine is still being retarded. I have all these fun and HOT 4th of July pictures uploaded to photobucket, but I can't get them to up load them here. We dang near melted but it was a really fun evening. After the 4th celebration we woke up early and headed to the mountains to a friends cabin. They let us borrow it for 4 days so we had a bunch of the George family join us. I think there were 28 of us that made it and 18 that didn't either because they couldn't get away or they live out of state. Boy do I ever LOVE being in the pine trees. I took tons of pictures, but when we got home I was looking at them on my camera and the first 2 days worth of pictures were gone. I freaked out...cried....had a pity party for one. Then I went to try to upload what was left on the card to my computer and it wont let me. I saw in the window thingie that the first picture I took was still in there, so there is hope that they are all still in the card, but none of them want to come out, so I'm have a love hate relationship with all technical things...actually it's more of a hate hate thing. Why is nothing working for me lately? It's so frustrating!
Most of our time at the cabin was fun and relaxing and cooler than here, but there were a few glitches. The main one being that Mark fell on the stairs and landed on his back before he came tumbling down the rest of the way. The stairs are very little and your whole foot doesn't fit on them. We are pretty sure he has a cracked rib or two. He won't go to the doctor because he says they don't do anything for you anyways and time has to heal it, but it hurts to breathe, get in and out of bed or the car, he can't lift heavy things. He's pretty much a mess.
I've had a headache since yesterday which turned into a screaming migraine. I drove to town to go to the chiropractor. I always wait to long to go see her. By the time I was on my way back home I could hardly see and I was sick to my stomach. The pain was too much to handle. This was probably the worst migraine I've ever had. I felt lucky to make it home. When I did arrive I put a cold rag on my face and cried myself to sleep. I'm still not 100% but better than I was earlier.
I got a very cute altered letter "J" in the mail from Valerie today. It's white, yellow and blue with ribbons tied on and an adorable little duck at the top...so cute! Thanks Valerie...you're very sweet. Speaking of ducks, Chad said he got a box of ducks from Andi. He laughed A LOT and said we're a bunch of weirdo's. LOL! He wanted me to pass on a big thank you to Andi. ..and a thank you from me too Andi for making his day brighter. Can't ask for more than that.
****EDITED TO ADD**** for those of you from out of the United States who have tried to mail Chad ducks without any luck. All I can say is that is the only address I have for him. It doesn't send it directly to Afghanistan. It's a military address that gathers all the military mail and sends it all off at the same time. So Chad's mail really goes to New York before being sent onto to him. It actually makes it cheaper for us to mail stuff. Here is a link to read more information about it. If you still have trouble mailing, then email me and you can send it to me and I will send it on to him. Thanks so much!
Since I have no pictures to share I will share a funny little Arizona weather log with you. There are a couple of curse words in there and I'm really not a cusser. (***disclaimer*** unless I'm really mad, then watch out.) I did do a teeny bit of cursing under my breath this weekend...shhhh. :o) I just don't want to offend anyone.
This really does make me wonder why the heck I live here.


This just in from a friend in Arizona
ARIZONA WEATHER LOG

May 30th: Just moved to Arizona. Now this is a state that knows how to live!! Beautiful sunny days and warm balmy evenings. What a place! It is beautiful. I've finally found my home. I love it here.

June 14th: Really heating up. Got to 100 today. Not a problem. Live in an air-conditioned home, drive an air-conditioned car. What a pleasure to see the sun everyday like this. I'm turning into a sun worshiper.

June 30th: Had the backyard landscaped with western plants today. Lots of cactus and rocks. What a breeze to maintain. No more mowing lawn for me. Another scorcher today, but I love it here.

July 10th: The temperature hasn't been below 100 all week. How do people get used to this kind of heat? At least it's kind of windy though. But getting used to the heat is taking longer than I expected.

July 15th: Fell asleep by the community pool. (Got 3rd degree burns over 60% of my body). Missed 3 days of work. What a dumb thing to do. I learned my lesson though. Got to respect the ol' sun in a climate like this.

July 20th: I missed Lomita (my cat) sneaking into the car when I left this morning. By the time I got to the hot car at noon, Lomita had died and swollen up to the size of a shopping bag and stank up the upholstery. The car now smells like Kibbles and shits. I learned my lesson though. No more pets in this heat.

July 25th: The wind sucks. It feels like a giant freaking blow dryer!! And it's hot as hell. The home air-conditioner is on the fritz and the AC repairman charged $200 just to drive by and tell me he needed to order parts.

July 30th: Been sleeping outside on the patio for 3 nights now. $225,000 house and I can't even go inside. Why did I ever come here?

Aug. 4th: Its 115 degrees. Finally got the air conditioner fixed today. It cost $500 and gets the temperature down to 85. I hate this stupid state.

Aug. 8th: If another wise ass cracks, 'Hot enough for you today?' I'm going to strangle him. Damn heat. By the time I get to work the radiator is boiling over, my clothes are soaking wet, and I smell like baked cat!!

Aug. 9th: Tried to run some errands after work. Wore shorts, and when I sat on the seats in the car, I thought my ass was on fire. I lost 2 layers of flesh and all the hair on the back of my legs and ass. Now my car smells like burnt hair, fried ass, and baked cat.

Aug 10th: The weather report might as well be a damn recording. Hot and sunny. Hot and sunny. Hot and sunny. It's been too hot to do shit for 2 damn months and the weatherman says it might really warm up next week. Doesn't it ever rain in this! damn desert? Water rationing will be next, so my $1700 worth of cactus will just dry up and blow over. Even the cactus can't live in this damn heat.

Aug. 14th: Welcome to HELL! Temperature got to 115 today. Forgot to crack the window and blew the damn windshield of the car. The installer came to fix it and said, "Hot enough for you today?" My sister had to spend $1500 to bail me out of jail. Freaking Arizona! What kind of a sick demented idiot would want to live here??

Will write later to let you know how the trial goes."

Crud!

GRRRRR....I still can't blog from my computer and I've been trying for a couple of days to blog from this (Mark's) computer, but it's not letting me upload any pictures STILL. Ya'll know how I feel about posts without pictures on my blog. Makes me nuts! So as your reading this boring post just try to imagine the cute pictures that could go along with it. :o)
Kyle finally got his drivers permit. Poor guy failed it twice and was too upset to go take it again. He put several months in between each test. While he was in the room doing the test my stomach was so nervous for him because I knew how important it was to him and how it would crush him to fail it again. He just really has a hard time with tests. My prayers were answered when he walked out with a HUGE smile on his face. I was so happy for him. There was another boy in there taking it for the third time as well and he passed too, so it was a good day for the both of them.

(imagine a cute picture of Kyle holding his permit)

Friday Mark and I went to go get in the new car for date night and the remote wouldn't unlock the doors. He used the key to unlock it and the alarm went off. He tried to put it in the ignition to disarm the alarm and no power whatsoever. We tried everything. We are still not sure why the anti theft was activated, but putting the key in should override it. Mark called Chevy and talked to several people over the next 2 hours...most of which had no clue what they were talking about. One lady actually said "maybe your battery in your remote is dead. They really don't last very long" Mark was like "Lady! The car is 2 days old, do you really think both remotes would die at the same time. My suburban remote is 10 years old and it still works. Put someone on the phone who know what their talking about." UGGG Seriously....nobody could help us. Finally they decided to send us a tow truck to pick it up. By this time Mark was livid from continually being disconnected every time they tried to transfer him to someone with knowledge. Plus it didn't help that the neighbors were ticked off because of the alarm. He finally disarmed the horn and we headed to town. The tow truck driver came and towed it to Casa Grande because it's their policy to tow it to the nearest dealership instead of where you purchased it. Since we were gone when he got here, Cole took pictures of it on the truck.

(imagine picture of new car on tow truck)

The driver locked both sets of keys in the car and there it sat all weekend in front of the Casa Grande dealership while I had to drive smelly carpet cleaning van again. They finally cut a new key for it on Monday and brought it into the bay. It started for them. I couldn't believe it. They hooked it up the the diagnostic thingie and it didn't show that there was anything wrong with it. So when they went to take it out of the bay it wouldn't start for them and the alarm went off. I was so glad it happened to them. They hooked it back up and there was a pinched wire in the steering column that wasn't allowing the signals to be sent out to the car. So now it's fixed and we picked it up last night, but the shop has actually had possession of it for longer than we have. CRAZY!
Saturday we went to my sister Coleen's house for a family BBQ. My niece and nephew,Kindra and Kayce (Julie's kids) just got here from Tennessee.I can't believe how much they've grown. It was great seeing them. I love listening to Kindra talk. She has the cutest southern accent. I love it! Coleen set up a huge blow up water slide in her back yard and the kids had a blast on that thing.

(imagine picture of tons of kids on water slide)

Saturday Mark sold one of his motorcycles. I could tell that he was a bit heart broken. He is glad to have the money to pay some bills, but he loves his bikes and misses it. So many fun memories for him. It's the one that he would let Chad ride and we'd go on double dates with Chad and Sandy. So sad!

(imagine a picture of all 4 of us on the 2 motorcycles)

Yesterday me and the little boys went on a field trip to Target to get bedding for their rooms. Cody had a bunk bed so we needed 2 sets for his room, but his was on clearance so we got a great deal. Going to Target with boys is not nearly as fun as going alone, so I don't recommend it. We've been cleaning house and setting up their rooms today. I haven't taken pictures of their rooms yet, and I'm tired of making you imagine pictures so I will share those later when and if I get some computer cooperation. After we're done cleaning we're going to pick up Kindra and Kayce for a sleepover. My whole family is coming to Maricopa to celebrate the 4th of July here. It should be a blast, except for the little fact that it's suppose to be 117 degrees, so if we don't melt, you'll be hearing more from me later.

P.S. A couple of you asked what kind of saw I was using to cut the flowers. It is a scroll saw. That one is a Ryobi. I really prefer my Delta scroll saw because the blades are a little thinner making it easier to make sharp turns, but the Ryobi is a little easier to change the blades. A scroll saw is really the only kind of saw crafters use because you can cut details. It's a lot like sewing, with the added fear of cutting a finger off. :o) I've put in thousands of cutting hours and have never been cut. However I have almost removed my fingerprints with my belt sander when a piece of wood went flying out of my hands.