Perfection - It's The Little Things

Let's go backwards a week shall we?  I'm making a really short story really long here, so read if you want, or you can just ignore me.  Either way is fine really, I'm used to being ignored!  So here we go.  Last Saturday, Robert and I decided we needed a new couch.  I guess we needed something to go with our freshly painted ceilings!  Ha  Who knows, but whatever gave us the idea, we decided to go with it.  So off to Abilene we went, all 5 of us.  If you know us, you know this NEVER happens.  We very rarely go anywhere together as a family.  After hitting up several furniture stores with our perfect children, we decided since it was almost 2:00 we should probably feed them.  Robert wanted to go to Red Lobster.  Me, not so much.  If you know me, you also know that I am severely allergic to shellfish.  BUT, being the awesome wife that I am (enter a little sarcasm here) I decided that maybe if we went it might not kill me......this time.  So as always, I gave in and off to Red Lobster we went.  Kase was excited, he loves fish.  Koy was not.  I'm doing good to get him to eat mac-n-cheese!  Tara, well Tara isn't much fun to take anywhere to eat these days.  She's at that "I want to do it myself" stage so all she ends up doing is making a mess and then she's still hungry!  So, we walk into Red Lobster and there are tons of people waiting and they give us one of those flashy things to hold.  Great!  We sit and we wait, and when it lights up to tell us our seats are ready, we have to give it back.  I'm expecting a huge fit from miss priss because of course a 1 year old is not going to want to give the flashy thing up right?  Wrong.  SHE handed it to them!  We followed the girl to our seats, sat down and ordered our drinks.  So far so good!  The remainer of the time we were there continued to go great.  The boys ate and didn't fight, Tara ate great and even let me help her and no one spilled anything!  There were a couple of ladies sitting at the table next to us and when they were getting ready to leave, one of them looked at me and said something.  I heard exactly what she said, but I guess I was in shock because with my mouth full, I said "what?"  YES, I know better, but like I said, I was in shock!!!  She repeated herself.  "Your children are beautiful and very well behaved."  I finished chewing, told her thank you, and they left.  My day just got a lot better.  We finished up and of course the boys needed to go to the bathroom.  As soon as we got up from the table and started walking off, I see this woman almost running towards me.  I don't know where she came from but she was on a mission!  She stopped me and told me that she just wanted to let me know that she was a teacher and she had been "observing" my family.  She said she could not believe how well behaved my kids were, especially the little one.  Then she told me that I had done a good job.  That really meant a lot to me that someone took the time to tell me that, and the fact that she was a teacher was just icing on the cake!  So while I am fully aware that my children are not perfect, or even close to perfect 99.9% of the time, for 45 beautiful minutes, they were indeed, PERFECT!         

I know this really deserves a post of it's own, but I'll do it here anyway.  My baby boy turned 7 years old on the 11th.  We still weren't in our house so we just had a cake for him at MaMa's house.  Nothing to extravigant, but he enjoyed it and that's what matters!  I also took him to Walmart and let him pick out several toys so he was a happy little boy!  

Playing his new Leapster game

Sleeping...

Work in progress

Finished!

My Valentines! I love them so much!

Dance Yourself Silly!

Making Progress

We seem to have made quite a bit of progress in the last few weeks.

Tara's hair is finally long enough for pigtails...Well kinda.  Haha 

"Pretty good stuff, but don't you dare touch it!!!"

County Show has come and gone.  We didn't do as well as expected, but ended up with a 2nd and 3rd place.  I can say that we definately learned a lot and he's ready to go again next year.  We didn't have a lot of help from dad this year, but now that he knows what's going on, he's "in it to win it" next year! Ha 

Koy got to show too.  Too bad it was a goat!!!



I came home to find this under my carport, which means they are actually getting stuff done on my house.  So exciting!  After a month of living with MaMa, I'm more than ready to go home.  Don't get me wrong, she's been great and we are so grateful she is letting us stay there, but it's time to go home.  My whole family is out of whack, and I want them back!

This reminds me of E.T. for some reason! Ha

Any suggestions on what color to paint our bedroom???  It was this color when we moved in and we just never changed it.  Now we are at a loss about what to do with it.

Footprints on the celing....hmmmm.  I wonder if they stepped on it before or after they put it up!?!  Haha

 We, and by we, I mean I had to pack up the whole house and "move out".  I wouldn't mind so much if I could actually go somewhere else!  We are very quickly outgrowing our first house, but we will probably still be there for a while longer.

My boys have been out of school 4 out of 5 days this week due to ice and snow.  To top it off, Kase and Tara have had asthma/breathing trouble, Tara, MaMa, me, Robert and Kase (in that order) all had the stomach bug, and Tara has been running fever.  Since their doctor is 30 miles away and we pretty much have no choice but to stay home, we are just giving breathing treatments and tylenol and praying they all get better!  This was just a small chunck of ice/snow I pulled off my car this morning.  Robert and I have been going to work, so poor MaMa has been stuck at home with all three of them this week.  I think we all need to leave this weekend just to give her a break!

And last but not least, Tara has finally outgrown her fear of the carwash!  She still doesn't like it, but this is the first time she hasn't had a screaming fit.  Of course, this was the time I had my video camera ready, and nothing!

What a way to start the year!

First, to get caught up, go here. 

Got it? 

Great. 

Now, here we go again!  We have got to be the luckiest family on earth!  January 2, 2011, 9:00 p.m.  I was sitting at the computer and all of a sudden the lights flickered and then the computer lost power.  I thought I heard something scratching on the window outside, so I went to the front door and locked it.  Robert wasn't home, so I called him and told him to come home and look around outside before he came in because I thought someone was out there.  I picked Tara up and went into my bedroom, where I started smelling fire.  *Insert freakout and uncontrolable shakes here*  I thought it was coming from our air conditioner so I opened the closet it was in but didn't see anything.  I called Robert back again and told him to hurry, because I smelled fire.  I heard the "scratching" again, so decided to go outside myself and check it out.  Instead of someone, I found the corner of my house on fire.  I ran back in to start getting stuff out, but as soon as I walked in the door I stopped, stood there for about 30 seconds and turned around and walked out.  I've done this before, I had my baby on my hip and there is absolutely nothing in that house I had to have.  I called 911 about the time Robert pulled up.  He got the electricity shut off  and went in for his guns and clothes.  Tara wasn't wearing a shirt, so he went back in for some of her clothes too.  I moved my car out of the carport and put the kids in there with the heater running.  About 10 minutes later the highway patrol showed up, we stood there and watched it burn, knowing that any second it was going to really catch and start spreading.  Waiting, waiting, waiting, still no fire trucks, but then we finally see lights.....it's the ambulance.  Um, thanks but no thanks!  I'm going to stop there because we had horrible experiences with the fireman the first time, and this time wasn't looking any better.  Let's just say Robert had a few choice words with them after they finally got there (30 minutes later, in a VERY small town), poked him in the chest, and threatened to have him arrested for being on his own roof!  They finally got the fire out, and by they, I mean Robert's uncle, who isn't even a fireman.  The only damage was to the outside, except for a little water damage in our bedroom.  We are still in the process of getting all the insurance stuff worked out and getting everything fixed, and since we still don't have electricity, we are staying with Robert's mom.  I'm still kicking myself for not taking pictures of the last one, but I can say this, we are very blessed!

 



Besides all that, what we have going on, is pigs.  Only 2 more weeks until the show!

If you pray

I want to thank you because it worked.  God is good!  Long story short, the week before Thanksgiving I found a huge knot on my neck.  I already had an appointment with Dr. T the next week, so I just waited to see him.  Without going into icky details, lots of bloodwork, tests, worries, praying and several weeks have gone by, and I finally found out everything is ok.  I have been prepared to have my thyroid removed, but after talking to Dr. G, we have decided to wait.  Yes, the knot is still there, and some days it is huge, and some days you can't see it at all, but he said we will just watch it an wait for now.

So on to more exciting things! :)  Jesus' birthday came and went.....again.  My kids got way more than they needed.......again.  We had a great time with family.......again. 

Charity and I went on our usually Allen trip, so Tara stayed with Nana and Papa Dale.  I dropped her off at the library with Mom, and she LOVED climbing on all the same stuff I used to climb on!  Of course, the first book she grabbed.....Trucks!  Shocker!

Christmas Eve

It's been around 10 years since Robert and his siblings and their families have had a family picture so I MADE them do it!  This was the only time everyone would be together for at least another year.  We were going to take them outside but it was raining so this was the best we got. It's a pretty impressive group though!  I'm pretty sure it has tripled in size since the last one!  Him and his brother REFUSE to smile, but getting them there was enough for me.  I take what I can get!  This was a surprise for their mom and I just know she will be so happy when we give it to her!

These kids are my whole world.  I love them so much!

The best we could do of all of us.  Like I said, I take what I can get!

These 3 have grown so much in the last year!

Christmas Day

What does the little girl want to play with?  Well, first we had to put on her new tennis shoes, and then it was time for some football!  None of that girly stuff for her!

I'm thinking Kase was pretty happy with everything Santa brought him! :)

Off to Nana's we go, and Tara got her first taste of the famous boiled custard.  I'm pretty sure she liked it, she had a death grip on that glass!

And after 2 glasses, I wouldn't let her have any more......so she cried!

All the kiddos playing bingo for movies.  It's become a Nana Christmas tradition.



*I thought I had posted all of this ealier, but I guess I forgot to publish it!  So now I have more "exciting" news to share, but that will be later today.....



Where have I been???

Well, I've been doing a little lot of this....

Very little of this.....

(This is where he requested to sleep when we spent the night with Uncle Mike and Aunt Charity!  We stuck the tub under his so he wouldn't fall off.)

While the boys have been doing this...

(So glad they made good use of our fence boards, since obviously, the fence will never be finished!)

I've taken several of these.....

And I even snuck in a little family time for Papa Dale's birthday.

And this little girl....

Is now 14 months old, and has FINALLY decided to do a little of this on her own!!!



And lastly, we had Thanksgiving and it was wonderful family time as always.  Yes, I am a HORRIBLE person, I did not take one picture!  What is wrong with me!?!?!  (I can answer that too, but don't really care to share at the moment.  Maybe in a couple of weeks I'll be ready.  And just fyi, NOOOOO I am NOT pregnant again!!!  :)  But if you get a chance, and it's not too much to ask, please say a little prayer for me because we all know how strong the power of prayer is.  Thanks!)  Hope everyone has a blessed week!