Never a Dull Moment...

Christmas Happened Here too!

2012-01-24T09:40:00.000-08:00

Here are the 3 little Loops in their Christmas jammies. They got to open them on Christmas Eve.

I took this picture of the tree on Christmas morning, before the festivities began. The mass of presents was overwhelming the room. Santa sets his presents out in the open for each child to see. So far this hasn't posed any problems, but I can see this might in the future.... Maren got the princess doll house and Teagan got the American Girl Doll. Declan is in the clear with Lego's.

I actually took this picture of Teagan with her doll in matching dresses after the presents were all opened, so they are a little out of order. I'm artistic like that. In the foreground you see Declan, with his Legos and Maren is playing with her presents while wearing her new Ariel mermaid dress up.

This is when Declan first walked into the room and saw his Lego Pirates of the Caribbean Black Pearl ship. He was thrilled. And to think he doesn't believe!

Maren got princesses for the dollhouse. If it's princess, it's all good in her book!

Nellie (left) and Jack (right) heard that Santa has reindeer. They had to keep an eye out in the event that Santa made the mistake of landing them in our yard. They are both really good at chasing deer of all kinds.

Declan in in Lego fortress of happiness.

Turns out that watching for deer is exhausting. It's always good when you have a pillow to rest your weary head upon.

After Christmas we decided to get a new car. We'd had Tallulah the VW Passat for almost 12 years and she was getting tired. We sold her and got a new shiney pretty zippy car. I'll post a picture of "Lily White" tomorrow!

Thanks for coming by!

Some Halloween, a sunset and a Birthday.

2011-11-15T14:34:00.000-08:00

Declan was Jack Sparrow for Halloween. It wasn't initially what he wanted to be, but once we got to Target and he saw his options, this was the best one. I made his pirate boots out of felt. Surprisingly enough, he was the only Jack Sparrow that I saw while Trick-or-Treating in Georgetown. Cool make up courtesy of Greg, and I quick made the felt beard, braided with beads and stuck to child's chin with glue dots! When I would catch a glimpse of him in the rear view mirror, it didn't even look like him!

Teagan was Super Girl. She opted out of any make up, but rocked her cool costume with authentic red boots. I actually thought her costume was darling.

Maren chose to be a Ladybug. Up until the time I took this picture she was not going to wear the wings. Then decided to put them on for the photo. Greg drew her eyelashes on. She was thrilled!

Here are the 3 of them. Georgetown beware....

I painted the girls room lavender. I made the little butterfly pictures on the shelves. Their room still needs something else on the walls, but I haven't decided what yet.

I also upgraded Declan's bedding to more 'mature' plaid. He liked the car bedding he's had since he was 2, but I was ready for a change. I'm going to do something on the walls in here as well, but I'm thinking horizontal planking or something along those lines. I'll have to think some more on that...

Greg called me out to see this beautiful sunset. When we first moved in here, we busted our tail getting things done during day, in hopes of relaxing out on the deck before the sunset was gone. We recently realized that we haven't sat out on the porch and watched the sunset in awhile. I ran to get the camera, hoping to get some shots before it got too dark.

I love that I have a knack for catching a dog whizzing in many pictures. I should go back through to see if I can do a post of all dog whiz pictures. Won't you be on the edge of your seats waiting for that? LOL!

Then we celebrated Greg's birthday with Lemon cake. I tried to make the little blue candles into the shape of a "4" since I had a "5" candle. But the kids were quick to point out that I had 55 on Greg's cake. I love that they are old enough to start pointing out my faults.....

Been Busy Bees Over Here!

2011-10-27T13:48:00.000-07:00

Well. We've been sanding, drilling, prepping, painting. All the while taking kids to soccer practice 4 nights a week and games every Saturday. Toss a little (ha!) laundry, the occasional grocery trip, volunteering at the school (I'm the room Mom for Teagan's 1st grade class, and I run a book club in Declan's 3rd grade class) and general household chores leaves me no time for blogging.

But because I would like to see the progress we've made, here are some recent pictures of the house!

We have had the house/porch painted, new screens and shutters. This is looking down to the house from the garage.

At the beginning of summer I bought outdoor fabric yardage to sew my own pillows for the patio furniture. I am really good at sewing zippers in pillows now, after making at least 20 pillows. Many, many thanks go to my Mom, who cut all the fabric into the sizes I needed for the pillow forms I bought at Ikea.

Won't you come sit on my porch?

Remember when it looked like this????

I've also been busy decorating for Halloween. From years past you know this is a big deal for the Loop kiddos. I've been also going thru closets and donating unused/unneeded things. Seems like I always have a pile waiting to be taken to Goodwill.

You can see the "Loop Art Gallery" on the wall there, I took individaul pictures of the art and finally took it all down. It was up since summer, as were the tissue pom-poms I made for Teagan's birthday party in June.....

I'll be back with more pictures when I get a chance to take them, but thanks for looking for now!

An Obvious Hiatus...

2011-10-03T21:48:00.001-07:00

One day, once I catch my breath, I will blog again. I promise!

Just for fun!

2011-07-18T11:05:00.000-07:00

This is what our house looked like when we first saw it.

Teagan took this picture yesterday.

And just for reference, what the back yard/house looked like.

The Backdeck and Chickens

2011-07-18T10:42:00.000-07:00

We (read: mostly Greg) spent the past weekend sanding, fixing and painting the back deck. Many of the balusters needed to be replaced, some of the wood was raw, other parts were either white or green. We quit trying to figure out what the previous people were trying to do a long time ago. It really freed up some brain space to let go of that... Glad I remembered to get some 'before' pictures.

This back staircase goes into our masterbath.

I took this picture this morning, the mostly finished job. Major improvement if you ask me! Plus, you could walk out on the deck barefoot now (not that I recommend that out here....) without the risk of splinters or raised nailheads.

The entire time we were working on the deck, we had 'the gals' supervising us, openly discussing how I didn't tape the tarp far enough over and the house was going to get over sprayed (it did). They wondered why in the world my window is open right next to where Greg was sanding? Good point. They wanted to know what the paint tasted like, if they fit under the furniture, if they would get painted if they stood *right* there. You get the idea. We did discover that we have quite a few characters on our hands.

I know I said I wasn't going to name these chickens, but it's pretty hard not to, once you realize they have personalities. LOL!

This is Penny, a Rhode Island Red.

Maude, a Barred Rock. She has a thing for Greg...

Here, in the forefront is Donna, a Blue Andalusian. Behind her is Clementine, an Easter Egger, and the Brown Leghorn is behind them. I think I'm going to call her Harriet.

This is Blanche, a Delaware.

This is the Ancona, not yet named. She is really skittish, thinks I'm the Devil.

Here is Ellie Mae, she's a Cochin.

This is another Easter Egger, haven't named her yet either.

Well, thanks for coming by!

The Playset - ala'complete!

2011-05-26T10:03:00.000-07:00

I got the wild hair to paint it like the house.

Let's just jump right in ...

2011-05-24T09:36:00.000-07:00

With a snake picture! Apparently they like the nice warm weather too.

No big deal really, except that I had *just* gone down these steps 1 minute before. I turned around to go back up and there he was. The close up picture is actually taken with the mac-daddy zoom on my camera. I'm no where near this close to the snake. See the open door to the left? Yep, that's right where he went. Into the garage.... I just got the willies typing that.

We had a boy turn 8. This was at his party at Incredible John's. The Las Vegas like Chuck E. Cheese in Roseville. Fun was had by all!

We cleared an area in the back yard for a play set. There had been a wooden floor with cement footings here. Greg broke it all apart with the tractor and flattened the area.

The play set is cool, with the exception that none of the parts were labeled. It's okay, we just figured it out ourselves, measuring each. and. every. piece, then labeling with all of the post it notes we owned. After about 4 hours we had to cover it all up with tarps and head in because it started to rain.

No worries though right? Well, we didn't get back out there to work on assembly until the next weekend. Giving some critter plenty of time to chew all the post it notes off and build a nest under the tarp. Yep, we're giving like that.....

The instructions said this would take 2 people 10-12 hours to build. Hahahahahahahaha.... breathe. hahahahahaha. And we used power tools. The idiots in the video are screwing everything with the smart little tool by hand. The spiral slide is 2-3 more hours of nothing but pure. fun.

Glad to say that after about 1 month of working around weather, sore backs, and other activities, the play set is now complete! I will go take a picture of it today. We decided to put this up so that the kids had something to play on while we start to grade down hill for the garden. See the blue tarp off the right side of the above picture? That is the greenhouse Greg gave me for my birthday last year. That project should go just about as well, considering those boxes have sat outside for winter rain, snow, not to mention GOATS. They loved to run up on the box and chew on it until I almost got there, then tear off of it. *(&^% goats.

Well, off to clean things up to take to the children's consignment store. Wish me luck!

A few more fascinatingly interesting random things...

2011-04-06T08:34:00.000-07:00

Is fascinatingly really a word? Well, you know what I mean. By posting this fluff, I am avoiding posting Disneyland pictures. It's like Christmas to me, just way too many to weed through. But, if you're good, and don't talk back, walk on the furniture, or fight with your sister, we'll see what we can do.

1. I did my fingernails last night for the first time in probably a year. I did it after the girls were in bed so I could just do my nails.... it was worth the sheet imprint risk. All turned out good though because I use this awesome stuff by Sally Hansen that dries polish quick.

2. I think I burned myself out at Scrap Camp 2011, haven't scrapped a thing since.

3. I love birds. There are these sweet little tiny greyish birds that are in my lilac bushes. I *love* them. The big hawks that want to eat my chickens, not so much.

4. I'm playing Barbies with Maren as I type this post.

5. As much as I miss Otis, my life has gotten simpler since he is gone. He was high maintenance.... LOL!

6. g,ltrtglg;/j/jjjjjj;uu''y'hhk

7. Maren typed #6

8. I don't know how to french braid hair, much to Teagan's dismay.

9. I just set up the dollhouse for Maren to play with so I can finish this post.....

10. I've been diapering for almost 8 consecutive years. 2 kids at times.

Chicken Math...

2011-03-27T09:35:00.000-07:00

Lesson 1 Probability: If you get one, you will probably get more...

Lesson 2: Addition: If you add one, you will definitely add another, so no one is "lonely"

Lesson 3: Division: No matter your best intentions, you will need to divide your chickies into more individual groups than you originally anticipated, which won't work, so see Lesson #4 Multiplication

Lesson 4: Multiplication: Coops and brooders must multiply by 3, every 6 months.

Lesson 5: Algebra: X number of chickens will always produce Y number of chickens, of which Z amount will actually be claimed as "real" "countable" chickens.

Lesson 6: Calculus: If Z amount of chickens are not actual chickens, and only Y can equal Z, then R must equal two times S, which means A is less than B, ...and if A is less than B, then you still have room for more before you are considered a hoarder!!

I got that from SunnyCalifornia on Backyard Chickens.

With that said, get ready for some total cuteness! The following are the breeds, not their names. I'm not sure these gal's are going to have names, trying to not make 'pets' out of them. Just too upsetting if something happens to them....

Ancona

Barred Rock

Brown Leghorn

Blue Andalusian... jury is out, looks like a boy to me.

Cochin (has feathered legs)

Delaware

Dominique

Rhode Island Red

Ameruacana (Easter Egger) #1

Ameruacana (Easter Egger) #2

Gotta love chicken math...

Nermackerdoshious. AKA Otis.

2011-03-09T19:38:00.000-08:00

My little Co-pilOtis. Naughty Otis. Oter-rifriskris.

No one has velvetier ears than you. No one can do the 'gig' better than you. Man, will I ever miss you.....

Dec 2000 - March 2011

More Random Updates...

2011-02-21T10:27:00.000-08:00

I'm back from ScrapCamp 2011. Had a blast, good food, good friends, lots of talking..... I officially brought the least amount of supplies. That is my seat, and that is *everything* I brought. Turned out to be a productive time for me though, and I got almost completely caught up with Christmas!

This is my pile of completed layouts to be put into albums. Currently I am doing a layout of each kids Christmas and a one for a family album. None are the same, so this takes me for.ever.

Last week the weather kept threatening to get nasty. Finally on Wednesday it made good on the threat, opening up with a thunder/lightning/hail storm. Declan kept an eye on the chickens out in the yard. We thought they would head for cover as soon as it was thundering, but they waited until the hail started pelting them to get in the coop. Sassy (bantam Cochin who bites...) actually flew across the yard directly into the open door on the coop. Pretty funny!

Then school was canceled on Thursday and Friday due to bad weather and no power at the school. I thought I'd take the kids to the mall to poke around. I also thought I would buy trinkets at the Disney Store to dole out while on our trip to DisneyLand, but the store was closed due to the fire at the mall last Fall. So, instead I paid $8 for 3 kids to ride the carousel and bought pretzels.... While poking around I found the next car/SUV on my wish list.....

I actually have a funny story about this car/SUV. Back in the Fall when I flew to Arizona, Dan (dad) picked me up at the airport. While driving we were discussing where to go and what to do. We pull up at a red light and I see this exact SUV at the light. I tell Dan to look at it so he can tell me if it's just an overpriced sled. In literally a fraction of a second, the car behind us honks at us to turn. Dan said, "Welcome home! You haven't even been home 30 minutes and someone is already honking!" We must have laughed the whole way to my home away from home, Scottsdale Fashion Square.

Anywhoooo, it probably is just an overpriced sled, but at least it looks good. I'd be willing to give it a test drive, see if I can get 3 car seats in the back. I think Greg should have flopped for the 1st (convertible VW Beetle) or 2nd (VW Thing) car on my list, as I could get both of those for what this Range Rover sells for.

Ten Random Things....

2011-01-27T10:01:00.000-08:00

1. Greg said I can get more chickens in the Spring, I'm already planing which to get and where to put them all.....

2. I'm going to Scrapcamp 2011 in less than 2 weeks. I'm barely prepared at all...

3. I'm putting off laundry by updating my blog.

4. I don't like Shocktop Beer anymore.

5. I stress every morning about Declan and Teagan waking Maren before I can get them to the school bus.

6. I think my house should look like it belongs in a Country Living magazine all the time.

7. Once it's landscaped, I think someone should submit my house for Country Living magazine! LOL!

8. I've let Maren go out in her Jammies. Lots of times.

9. I wake up every morning thinking of how much I'm going to get accomplished, but never get anywhere near that much done.

10. I always pour one more cup of coffee than I actually drink, then feel guilty for the creamer I wasted when I pour it out later.

Thanks for coming by!

The "Spa" post

2011-01-24T10:06:00.000-08:00

Our spa gets it's own post today! When we bought the house the spa was partially covered and many critters lived (and died) in it. One day last year I got the wild hair to see if it worked. I did what anyone would do who has no experience with something.... I made a call to a repair man! Well, several repairmen actually. Turns out no one could come out right that minute. Me, being one that can rarely wait two minutes, I put on my rain boots (same ones I put on to kill the baby rattlesnake...) went out to figure it out myself. After finding out the make/model I Googled it and found the manual online. Out I went to drain and clean the spa! The living critters (frogs) were appalled at my idea. I was appalled at how many dead lizards were in there.

After cleaning and filling the spa, I switched the thing on to see what would happen. Well, I'll be... the dang thing worked! For 4 minutes. Then it turned off and had an error code on the screen. I drained the water out, covered it back up and figured I'd deal with it another day....

Fast forward to last Wednesday. Same wild hair reappeared. I think it has something to do with the sunshine. This time the repair guy I called could come right out so I had a good feeling about the whole thing. Turned out the valves were not all the way open, starving the pump of water, thus shutting the motor off. He opened the valves, cleaned the filters, filled it and turned it on - it worked! He offered to clean it and put chemicals in it, get it ready to go. He said I could be drinking my glass of wine in it that night. We had a deal.

To say the kids were excited is an understatement. They all came out in their swimsuits while he was still cleaning it! The water was 59 degrees. The water didn't heat up enough for us to go in that night. The excitement continued to build until the kids finally got to go in on Friday night. Declan stayed the night at a friends house on Saturday so Greg, the girls and I went in on Saturday night. After much pestering we let Declan and Teagan go in yesterday, but the fun was short lived as Declan choked on water and puked in the spa...... I'm still trying to figure out what to do about that.....

The big question now is what color cover to get. With the house being yellow, white trim and a green/black roof, I'd love to hear your suggestions for color. Here is a picture to whet your whistle for suggestions.

Thanks for coming by!

I think he wants chicken for dinner....or breakfast!

2011-01-22T09:56:00.000-08:00

So I go out one morning to let the chickens out and just happen to notice this guy sitting on the handrail by my kitchen door. I had no idea what he was so I went inside to get a better look from the dining room.

Then I got sneaky and peeked out the kitchen window to get an even better look. There was no sneaking up on him though, he's a predator! I think he was waiting for Sassy, my little biting chicken. Just to be safe I didn't let the chickens out. He watched as I helped newly 3 legged Otis go out. When I got too close he swooped off into a nearby tree and continued to keep his eye on us.

I've made the homemade pizza's a few more times and figured I'd post the recipe here for those interested. I use my bread machine to make the dough, add them in the order listed here.

Pizza Dough

1 1/2 C Water

1 1/2 Tbsp Olive Oil

1 1/2 Sugar

1 1/2 tsp Salt

3 3/4 Bread Flour *

1 1/2 tsp Active Dry Yeast

*Add 1 Tbsp of Vital Wheat Gluten per cup of flour. I mill my flour from hard white wheat berries. If you are using pre-milled flour, I'd look for whole wheat white flour, I like King Arthur.

1. Measure all ingredients except yeast into the bread machine baking pan in the order listed. Tap the baking pan to level ingredients. Make a depression in middle of flour and sprinkle in the yeast, making sure it doesn't touch any liquids.

2. Insert baking pan into bread machine and select DOUGH setting, press START. This takes 2 hours in my machine.

3. When done, remove dough from machine. Preheat oven to 400.

4. Make the dough into the shape you want, I have cut into 5 pieces so we each have our own pizza. Lightly brush with Olive Oil, cover and let sit for 15 minutes (oops, I have never done this!).

5. Spoon pizza sauce (BELOW) onto crust and add any toppings.

6. Bake 20 - 25 minutes or until cheese is bubbly and crust is golden brown.

Makes (2) 12 inch pizzas.

Easy Pizza Sauce

1 15oz can of Diced Tomatoes

1 6oz can Tomato Paste

1 Tbsp ground Oregano

1 1/2 tsp minced Garlic (I use fresh)

1 tsp ground Paprika

1/2 Tbsp ground Basil

1/2 tsp Sugar

1/2 tsp Onion Powder

I put it all in my blender and it's ready in 15 seconds. If I have extra I freeze it for next time!

And here is one last picture, Otis doing his very best pathetic look, so you feel really bad for putting the 'cone of shame' on him!

Thanks for coming back by!

I'm going to just skip over Christmas...

2011-01-21T12:24:00.000-08:00

For this post anyway. It's too many pictures and details to go over! I've only scrapbooked 1 Christmas for the exact same reasons. I'm getting ready to go to 'ScrapCamp' in a couple of weeks and my goal is to catch up on all of my Christmas layouts.

Aside from the holidays, we've been busy around the pseudo farm. Just before Christmas I sold my guinea hens. There were originally 12, but 1 got dead, and one got missing. So I sold 10 to a man from Elk Grove. Those poor neighbors. 2 weeks ago I sold my goats to the contractor who has been doing some work on our house. I was sad to see them go, but the difference in the amount of work has already been a relief.

Otis hurt his leg over Thanksgiving, pulled a muscle. He continued to re-injure his leg to the point that it was non-operable. So, two weeks ago we had his leg amputated..... I know! Add it to the laundry list of major expense this dog has been. Greg says we're not getting anymore pure breds! LOL! Now we have the zippiest 3 legged whippet around. He seems to feel much better and gets around fine with the exception of going up our wooden stairs. But honestly, I've seen those stairs slow down a human being.

We've also got a trip planned to Disneyland. We'd been talking about going for quite some time and I'd been asking my friends when was a good time to go (ie: not as busy). We booked the trip and I began thinking of a way to surprise the kids to tell them. Should I make a pizza like on a commercial I saw... would I make a banner? Well, Greg took that additional stress away by just walking in the front door and telling them! Phews.

Well, I've got a wild, currently unsupervised 3 year old heading upstairs, so I'd better sign off for now. Thanks for coming back to my poor, dusty blog.....

Man. That house is YELLOW!

2010-12-05T09:04:00.000-08:00

We decided to see what it would cost to have the house painted. I figured that since the "To Do" list doesn't seem to be getting any shorter that it may be wise to have the really big jobs done by the pros. We don't know if this is the original paint or not, but it was in bad shape. The trim was painted white and two different shades of green and the balusters on the porch were all green. I took this picture the day they started the prep on the house.

Here is our yellow house after! See, even the sky looks bluer!

They scraped the paint down to bare wood on most of the house. Those poor guys. The entire time they were working my 12 guinea's were squawking at full volume. One of the guys asked me if we were going to eat them. I think that was a hint. I tried chasing them all into the goat barn one day in hopes of shutting them up. I think I just entertained the painters. Have you ever tried to get 12 guineas to all do the same thing? Didn't think so....

The after.... too bad they didn't have to take the satellite dishes down to paint. I would have had them put back up somewhere else. Like on the roof. Where most other people have theirs. Although I have yet to see another satellite dish quite as LARGE as ours. Lovely.

This is down the hill outside my kitchen nook and master bedroom. We had some wood siding replaced around one of the kitchen windows few weeks ago. You can see the two different colors of green trim the best in this picture.

Here is the end result from this view.

Over all, we are very happy. I love the white trim. We are going to do the back deck as well, it just needed a lot more cleaning, repairing, and prepping. I have new screens on order. Most every screen on the house had rips or holes from the previous owners cats. In the spring I'm going to order some shutters for the front of the house too.

Thanks for looking!

Catch Up...

2010-11-09T18:21:00.000-08:00

The pizza extravaganza.

I should have taken pictures of the finished pizzas. Greg ate his, most of Teagan's and Maren's. He kept saying he couldn't believe I had made them. How's that for encouragement! LOL!

Next is Halloween pictures. Declan is Darth Vader, Teagan is Strawberry Shortcake and Maren is Cinderella.

A rare photo with me in it. Rockin the orange and my new boots.

We Trick-or-Treated in historic Georgetown. It was very charming, and we had a great time.

We've owned this house 1 year today!

2010-10-23T19:11:00.000-07:00

And in celebration, we're making individual pizza's from scratch! I'm taking pictures and will post as soon as I can!

Some House Pictures

2010-09-17T10:39:00.000-07:00

Here is the entry. We haven't done anything here, except clean. To the left is the family room, and the right is the dining room. Neither of which are in this post, I didn't take pictures of them yesterday. I have been dragging all of the Halloween decorations out and spookifying the house. One of my favorite things about this house is that it is neutral enough to change the accessories for the seasons. I have Halloween things through the house!

ETA: Here is a post I did when we first saw the house: http://looptloop.blogspot.com/2009/07/more-house-cont.html

This is the hallway off the entry that leads to the laundry room (also not in this post) and the kitchen. I'm looking for different wall sconces, or I may paint those white...

This is the little powder bath downstairs. It had the red gingham wallpaper that made your eyes go wonky. I painted the same color as my master.

Here is the kitchen. We have installed the cabinet doors (new hinges and knobs), roman shades, baffles on the recessed can lights and the ceiling fan. We still need to do base and crown molding, and I'd like to un-distress the cabinets.

Turns out that I love orange. Another who knew....

This is looking into the master from the hallway. Why, yes, that is a double vanity sink at the foot of my bed. There is currently a single pedestal sink in the master so we bought this at Costco. It's been sitting there since February and I think I'm going to miss it when it finally gets installed (possibly at the end of next week!!!).

We changed all light fixtures, painted, new carpet and window coverings.

We just got those 2 chairs at Cost Plus last week. Once the vanity is installed, I'd like to get a brown leather storage ottoman for the foot of the bed. Initially I wanted to have a 4th bedroom built in-lieu of the large master, but then I would have had no where for my scrap space. The girls will share a room until it's an issue

There's Jack Jack modeling the scrap space. No, actually Otis is taunting him with that bone in the picture above!

And for the last photos of this post, the front porch. Greg repaired several broken balusters and fixed and sanded many other areas. Then he countersunk all the nailheads. This was a huge job, as this was just raw wood. We cleaned it too, it was filthy. It may look dirty now, but at least it cleans up nicely.

Thanks for looking! I'm going to do another post with the family room, dining room and kids rooms once I straighten them up some =)

So I Found the PERFECT car!

2010-09-16T10:52:00.000-07:00

A 4 door CONVERTIBLE! I can probably even get 3 carseats in the back. Plus, can't you just *see* me driving it??? While wearing these cowboy boots and a sundress, of course.

I didn't even know what this car was, but I have seen a few of them around and finally saw that it was a VW. Now, I just have to find one that isn't up on blocks in someones back 40.

I'm honored to see that even after not posting anything on my blog for months that I have 9 followers. Who knew????

I would like to take some pictures of the house to upload here. You know, to show the progress of doing nothing but working on the house for almost a year. The funny thing about me though, is that I want it to be perfect and clean before taking the pictures. The logical side of my brain knows that: 1. you can't really tell if something is clean or not in a picture, 2. that none of you really care if it's clean and 3. it's probably clean enough by most normal people standards. Plus, I love to see other people's homes and imagine that you would all really like to see what all we have done around here. I will just move my piles of clutter and take pictures. Solved. Stand by while I do the above mentioned.....

It's been, like, forevah.

2010-09-07T17:30:00.000-07:00

I'm so behind on blogging that I don't even know where to start. There have been 3 birthdays, 2 kids starting school, one kid hangin with me, company, my Mom moved here, my chickens started laying eggs, we stained the front porch, I talked my mom into letting me 'borrow' her wicker furniture for my front porch....... ummmmm..... Let's see, I know there is lots more.... Greg and I took a solo trip to meet Bart and Carla in Denver to see Rush, we're talking about getting a tractor (and a truck...... ) the fan broke on Maxivan, so I have no air in the front vents, lots of mice live in the wood pile, we have a contractor coming to fix a few things and install the vanity in our master bath (finally) and I'm going to design a hall/linen closet for upstairs.

Phew. I'll come back to elaborate and add pictures as soon as Greg puts whatever showed up in the Newegg box today (because our big computers took a big crap at the same time).

Just a few more...

2010-06-03T16:19:00.000-07:00

We went to the Sacramento Jazz Festival this past weekend. Wandered around, got free salt water taffy samples and took a train ride. Here is a rare photo that includes me.

Greg drew the short straw and had to sit with the 2 wild ones. LOL! Well, one in particular is wild..... hint: she looks very sweet and innocent here....

Teagan's preschool had a graduation ceremony for the kids going to kindergarten.

So far no more snakes, but believe you me, I think they are lurking everywhere.....

A Few Things I've Learned...

2010-05-25T13:57:00.000-07:00

These guys are pretty cute.

Even if it is nearly impossible to get a picture of all 3 without at least one of them doing this...

They always behave like perfect ladies and gentlemen. *cough* No elbows on the table, and we never, ever, not ever put our legs up with a skirt on.

This is what a stampede looks like around here.

This one crows....

Greg can build a mean goat playset.
People from the burbs can look like rednecks after only 6 months of living in the country!
In our defense, we were watching the Tour of California from the end of our property. Lance Armstrong rode right past our house!

Lance is in this bunch. He rides for Radio Shack, but honestly, they were a blur, riding past at about 50 mph.

After the riders went past, there were several cars with replacement bikes following.

And last, but certainly not least..... it is a really bad feeling to see one of these. Especially while wearing cute little flip flops. A dead rattler is the only good rattler. And yes, after locking the dogs in the kennel, going down to the house to get my boots (albeit rain boots...), camera and shovel, I personally dispatched this sassy little snake. I hope his friends saw and move on.....

The post.

2010-05-04T10:53:00.000-07:00

Okay, so this will be a random catch you up to date type post. Well, in a brief, Cliff notes version, to save you from death by boredom.

We took the kids to an Easter Egg Hunt in Coloma. It was *perfect* exactly what I had hoped it would be, and look at the beautiful surroundings! They had it set up for the kids to hunt for eggs by age, but we let them all go together so we didn't have to split up and miss seeing everyone. The girls had a blast and Declan was a perfect gentleman, skipping past eggs if he thought someone else had spied it too. They cleaned up with over a dozen eggs a piece.

Next, moving on to the chicken tractor. This is a coop on wheels basically. Greg came up with the design and built it from that! I think it's pretty amazing that someone can picture this in their head, and then to see it actually appear.

It took us (ie; Greg working and me supervising.... and opening beers) just about 4 weekends of work. It began to seem like the chicken coop of the century, but I couldn't be happier with it. And most importantly, the chickens are safe and sound and out of my laundry room.
I sprayed it the same color as the house, which is a pale yellow with white trim. It turned out pretty pale though, and when we repaint the main house, I'll repaint the coop as well.
Here is a random picture of the typical quad ride around here. Kids, dogs, you know. They don't make dog helmets for needle nose whippets though so Greg just has to be careful.

We've had crazy weather, super warm sunny spring like one day, and overcast raining like crazy the next. It's made all the grass grow like mad and we've spent many a weekend cutting grasses, spraying grasses with Roundup and cursing the back 4 or so acres that are full of poison oak and thistle.

I've got the rest of my pictures uploaded onto the other computer that I can't access from the Netbook, so this post will have to be continued.....

Okay, I'm working on a post....

2010-05-02T11:39:00.000-07:00

Got lots of photos to upload and lots to talk about. Will be doing my best to update today or tomorrow!

And then the chicken said....

2010-04-07T12:11:00.000-07:00

whatchutalkin'boutwillis?

Well, it was inevitable......

2010-03-28T07:28:00.001-07:00

Okay, I realize that anyone who has known me for a really long time is probably thinking I have gone completely crazy. Where did the Mall Rat Teresa go? Long fingernails and makeup??? Cute sporty little car (sigh). Honestly most of those went to the wayside after having kids (and maturing some too). I was on the phone with my Mom last night trying to remember if/what I used to say about when I moved to the country. Was I just going to get chickens? Was it going to be chickens and goats? Can't remember.

On Wednesday I answered an ad on Craigslist for baby Nigerian Dwarf does (that's girls to you city slickers - LOL!). They were available to reserve as they won't be weaned and ready to leave their Mama until the end of April. EUREKA! We can be ready for goats by the end of April, right?! Well, we'd better be because 2 of these babies are coming home with us!

The little white one on the left is ours.

The buff one on the top of the wooden thing (I'm sure there is a techincal country term for it, but I don't know what...) is also ours. Some other people came to look at the babies while we were there, which put me right into decision mode......
Here are 2 of my brood of 3. Maren is on the outside of the fence because as soon as we walked into the pen the babies all stood up on us. The one in front of Teagan liked hair and chewed holes in my new Banana Republic shirt..... Hey, I can't *look* like a country girl. I knew full well that going to look at goat kids (that's baby goats for you city peeps) wearing ballet flats and my new shirt were potentially dangerous. I don't get out as much as I used to......

Ummm... look at that face on the one looking at the camera!!! I wanted her too, but she was already spoken for. I'm going to call the guy who has them today to see if/who the people after us took. I would hate for there to be just 1 left or something.....

I imagine you're all on the edges of your seats...

2010-03-17T13:52:00.000-07:00

awaiting the latest news from Green Acres. Truth be told, that it is a lot of work being a chicken farmer. LOL! With daylight savings starting (or is it ending?) it seems like before I know it, it's 6:00 and I haven't even given dinner a thought. The kids have been inching their bedtimes later and I've been inching mine earlier. Ultimately I hit the hay right after turning their lights out. Early to bed, early to rise on the farm.

I promised to add the pictures of Declan reading on the local radio station for Dr. Seuss's birthday. He read, "The Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly." The girls and I wandered around Georgetown and I bought a "Pasty" from a little shop there. I was looking forward to eating it for dinner for that night as Greg was out of town. Otis got it while I dropped Declan back off at school (in under 43 seconds). That was officially Otis's last ride in *my* car.

On to the topic of Otis... He has had separation anxiety since we moved to the new house, and I have been unable to leave him home. At all. When we did, he chewed the door trim on the laundry room door. The next time we didn't confine him, and he chewed the frame on the front door. So, I have been rarely leaving the house and when I did, I brought him. That all changed when we got Jack Jack (yes, I guess we're keeping him named that). Now the boys stay in a nice big dog run in the barn. Yay! Now I am no longer captive at my house. But believe me, going anywhere with 3 kids in tow is enough to diminish most thoughts of going anywhere. At least it's not 3 kids and a DOG.

The chickens are approaching teenage-hood. They are amusing to say the least. I'll hear some big crash in the cage and go to see what is happening, when I get there, they are all 4 standing there looking at me like, 'what?' They are feathered piranha's though, eating anything they can get in their beaks. I kept feeling like 4 wasn't going to be enough chickens so last week I went and bought 4 one day old peeps. Yes, now the proud Mom of 3 kids, 2 dogs and 8 chickens. What the hell happened to me? We're going to wait on the goats.....

This past weekend I turned old. I think I'll be 37 and holding for awhile. We had nice weather, which is good because now that I'm old, stuff hurts when it's damp out. I'm going to continue to work on my planter beds out front and enjoy the weather for as long as it holds. The added excitement is to be on the lookout for baby rattlesnakes. Apparently they like the nice springlike weather too. I'm going to have to get good with the shovel, unless anyone has a better suggestion that does not involve relocating them.

We went out for lunch and Greg made Maren some custom Bendaroo jewelry.

I've got to get running to Take D for his allergy shots. Thanks for stopping by!

Updates from the "farm"

2010-03-03T10:26:00.001-08:00

Meet Jack Jack. A 16 week old Australian Shepherd/German Shepherd mix. Guardian of all things to eat. He patrols the kitchen in search of anything potentially tasty.

Greg got a quad last week, to help with the chores around here, and to run 4x Ote's wheels off. Otis runs along side the quad, like he is grateful for finding something he actually has to get his gallop on to keep up with! In this picture Greg is giving Maren a ride on the quad, with Declan and Teagan running behind. Jack Jack was bushed and taking a nap inside. Turns out he quite the napper. If I were a kid or a puppy, I'm pretty sure I'd love growing up here!
The kids wanted to have a 'show' so we drew on their faces and they had a BLAST! The girls are cats and Declan is a dog.

Maren is giving me a very authentic growl here. Ohhhh, scary!

When the weather is nice, we put the Ladies out on the back porch. I did clean up the coop last week and put the 2 Welsummers (brown ones) out there. They pecked and scratched around, but then one of then squeezed out of the wire and so the fun had to come back into the cage. I'm just not ready to free range my little checks yet. There are a lot of hawks around here, and I'm not in the buffet business......

They are real characters! The Marans are more timid, but coming around. They all love to see me coming! Treat lady!!! They have started to jump to get the bread I'm holding, or to jump at each other. I let them roam around the laundry room and they chirp at me to let them out.

Yes, I know you are laughing.

Here is Opal (or is it Pearl?), giving me the eye. Whatcha got for me lady??

I've got some pictures of Declan reading on the local Georgetown radio station for 'Read Across America' in honor of Dr. Suess's birthday yesterday. I'll have to do that in another post since it's lunch time and the girls are playing wild in the house.

The Maren Get-up.

2010-02-24T21:33:00.000-08:00

Maren has been wanting to wear this princess dress every day this week. She starts stripping down and wants to get into right away. She wears it with a headband and Teagan's Cinderella blinking shoes, she even comes down the wood stairs wearing them - yikes!

Oh, and for the record, Maren *loves* the chickens. She checks in on them several times a day and wants to hold them. The ladies are so fun to watch too, they love to come out of the dog cage and run around in the laundry room. Maren will sit down with a towel on her lap so she can 'hold' one... turns out the country life might be for her after all!

You might be a red neck....

2010-02-24T12:10:00.000-08:00

if you have chickens living in your laundry room, and you enjoy it!

Okay, finally...

2010-02-22T21:03:00.000-08:00

I never did find the USB cable to my big camera, but I've taken several pictures with the little camera I keep in my purse. While I was at scrap camp a few weeks ago, I was on the hunt for little plastic floss boxes to make treats for the kids for Valentine's Day. I found them at Walmart at the last possible moment and then stayed up until 11:00 the night before making these for the kids. I got the idea from Jana Eubank. I think they turned out soooo cute!

The girls each got a ZhuZhu pet and Declan got a cap gun.

We made Declan's Valentine's for his class and they turned out cute, but they are on the other camera. I'll post them as soon as I find the cable.... =)

The *big* news around here is that we got 4 CHICKENS!!! "The Girl's" are 4 week old pullets. 'Opal' and 'Pearl' are French Black Copper Marans (black) and 'Ethyl' and 'Myrtle' are Welsummers (brown). Both will lay brown eggs. We will be working on sprucing up the coop over the next few weekends as they are too little to go out in the coop yet. Right now they are in a dog cage in our laundry room.

Teagan and Maren played outside yesterday afternoon, and 'the girl's' came out on the back deck to enjoy some sunshine and fresh air.

I found a really neat website for backyard chickens, where I've found out all kinds of useful info. Next we will work on the fencing and get goats! Maybe a sheep too?

In the meantime, here are some pictures of the work we've done outside around the house. We had some very spring-like weather last week and we were outside as much as possible. Greg cut down a large shrub/tree that was blocking the view from the kitchen nook window. Next we took out the bushes that were along the back deck and sidewalk.

I started working on the planters out front. There was nasty landscape paper that all the weeds were growing on, so that has to come out. There are also some rather pathetic rose bushes, haven't decided if they will stay or go yet. I won't have to worry about right now though, as we are going to be getting rain again this week.

Thanks for looking, and I'll continue to look for the USB cable....

If you were my camera's USB cable....

2010-02-16T09:54:00.000-08:00

where would you be?

Adding pictures.

2010-02-10T08:23:00.000-08:00

Here is Declan loaded into the ambulance, en route to Mercy San Juan. Just like last time, all I keep thinking to myself is that this does not look like a kid that needs to be going to the hospital in an ambulance. I drove in my car so that I had transportation after he was admitted. I ended up following the ambulance the entire way there. Declan saw me and we waved to each other at every red light.

I didn't take any pictures of him all hooked up to the half dozen things hanging off him. I guess I was in worried Mom mode and the thought to take pictures escaped me. After he was off oxygen I remembered. Maybe it's my own way of blocking anything less than perfect out. Who knows. At least this time I did get the ambulance ride. Last time I was in the ambulance with him.

I brought his little tub of Legos to the hospital and picked up a new set for him on the way one night. He had a great time talking to all the nurses and respiratory therapists. He rang the nurses button several times without me knowing, and when they came in he asked for Popsicles. Little turkey!

Even though he wouldn't admit it, I think he missed the girls like crazy. Here he is talking to Teagan on the phone. They talked for about 5 minutes! It was pretty cute.

I brought my Cricut in and we made Valentines to decorate the house with. He loved that. I was trying to think of things for him to do while sitting in a hospital bed.

Allergy testing and adding some pictures.

2010-02-09T08:50:00.000-08:00

Because you asked Amy, here are the other pictures I took of the inside of the house. We all agreed it was a strange house, but it worked perfectly for our retreat! I took this picture as we were packing up. I sat with my back to the door at the left (you can see *all* of my stuff still sitting out...).

This is the view into the family room from the foyer. Janice, Erin, Tanny and I stayed downstairs.

Here I took the picture from where I sat towards the kitchen.

Now onto the allergy testing. Declan had an appointment yesterday with the allergy/asthma specialist. Turns out he is allergic to several things. Mostly trees, including California Live Oak, which is all over our 10 acres and eucalyptus, which we had been burning in the wood stove. Remember when we bought the first cord of wood? Yep, eucalyptus. Among other things like various grass and molds, turns out he is *very* allergic to cats. He was sad to find out that he was allergic to "Pat" the feral cat that lives on our property.

He will be going for weekly allergy shots for 6 months, then we will re-evaluate. He is also on an inhaled steroid and Singulair. Bless this kids heart. I think he's been through enough for awhile, don't you?

Scrap Camp 2010...

2010-02-08T09:45:00.000-08:00

Was a blast. I can't believe it's already over.... *cry*

It's so nice to talk to grown ups!

Sorry to keep you hanging!

2010-02-02T08:31:00.000-08:00

The doctor released us late Friday night, because I begged! I think he would have liked us to stay through the night and go home Saturday. I took Declan into the play room for a few hours during the day on Friday where he played, colored and whistled. There was my clue.

We spent the weekend cleaning up the down branches around the back 40, and hefting the 350 lb double vanity up into the master bedroom. Good times!

I've got pictures of D in the hosptial to load, but I've got to get packing for scrap camp. I'll be gone for 4 days, and haven't spent but a few hours getting ready. May the force be with you Greg!

Well, today wasn't the day..

2010-01-28T14:30:00.000-08:00

Declan did not come home today. He has to be off oxygen, breathing room air for 24 hours before they will release him. His school called today to let me know there is a folder for him with notes from all his classmates, which I thought was sweet. The doctor said he will be at school on Monday, but I will try to go get it this afternoon to bring him this evening when I go back to stay the night with him.

Thanks for the well wishes. We are going to get him on a maintenance program so hopefully we do not end up at the hospital again.

With the Asthma again....

2010-01-27T12:07:00.000-08:00

Declan is in the hospital again, with difficulties due to his asthma. I forgot to take pictures of him when he was all hooked up to a million things, but I did get a photo of him in the ambulance this time. I hope he can come home tomorrow - send your good thoughts his way!

Challenged.

2010-01-19T08:53:00.000-08:00

I am blog header challenged. I can't figure out how to have the title of the blog show up in that frame up there. Drives me crazy. If anyone knows, fix me.

It's crazy windy here, stormy. I spent the weekend tearing up the landscape cloth from the planter beds out front. It was like pulling up sod, the grass was growing on the top of it like carpet! Problem is that I don't know what to do with it now, then it started raining. So there it sits. In the middle of the walkway, all muddy.

I'm working on my pictures on the big plugged in computer, and the time is limited before a child needs something so it's going slow. I've been using this adorable little netbook to surf the net on, and it doesn't need plugged it. Bonus since we are on electricity lock-down following a monstrous PG&E bill. Turns out the Christmas tree (that we'd had plugged in all day, everyday for 3 weeks) was a complete energy hog. Anywhoo, we're trying to conserve.

I'd like to put some recent house pictures on here. We've been working hard around here - hope it shows!

Heaven is a luckier place today....

2010-01-11T20:44:00.000-08:00

because of a little redheaded angel named Baylee Rose Tadlock. Please say a little prayer for my friend Sonda and her husband, so that their hearts may not be as heavy.

Christmas in Coloma

2009-12-15T11:10:00.001-08:00

It rained this past weekend, and we spent most of the time cutting the oak branches into smaller, more movable size branches. We wonder when we will walk around here without noticing all of the "project's" that need done. Our plan is to work on the inside of the house during the winter, then in spring start working on the yard. Or, umm, acreage. Yeah, that can't be a quick job (think tractor).

I dreamt about Sabalo last night. They had repainted all the walls and expanded a hallway (poorly) and put in cherry cabinets. Crazy that I even worry about what is happening at that house. They got to just move in and start living. We've been here going on 4 weeks and we still park outside.

After being cooped up in the house for several days we decided to take the kids to the old gold rush town of Coloma for the Christmas festivities on Sunday. The rain cleared around lunch, I dressed the kids in scrapbookable outfits and off we went to poke around. I *love* that the kids got to see Santa and Mrs Claus without having to stand in line at Sunrise Mall.

We ate lunch, then after blowing our budget on lunch Greg and Maren went in search of an ATM.

Declan, Teagan and I wandered around looking at the adorable little town. This was the bakery.

Here the kids are stamping their letters to Santa. They wrote their own letters. Ironically they both wrote the same thing, that they had been good this year. Neither of them asked for anything in their letters. I, on the other hand, asked for a tractor. The Pony Express picked the letters up. We met back up with Pony Express at the house where Santa was.

This is the little house that Santa and Mrs. Claus were in. It used to be the Coloma Post Office. The kids gave their letters to Santa themselves. That must be a riot reading what kids write.

Maren wouldn't have anything to do with Santa. Couldn't even be bribed with a candy cane. I had to hold her for a quick shot.

I think I'll do an update of progress on the house post next. I'll take pictures of how it looks now versus when I last posted pictures. This way we can see all of the things we HAVE done!

2009-12-07T15:39:00.000-08:00

This is what we woke up to this morning! We were really excited until we saw many, many broken branches on the oak trees to the right on the walkway. In fact, while we were outside, we could hear the branches cracking under the weight of the snow. Then, to make things just a little bit more exciting, we had no water... we figured the pipes must have froze. Turns out that a branch fell on the pump, breaking a pipe. $346 later, we have water once again ($6 in parts).... Ahhh, the finer things in life.

This is the backyard from the master bathroom.
This is from the bay window in the master. Just happened to catch a few deer in this picture.

I moved the van so a branch didn't fall on it. This was the view from the driveway back towards the house.

Goodbye, Sabalo Way!

2009-12-04T09:23:00.000-08:00

Declan's class had a Thanksgiving Presentation. He is in the back row, next to impossible to find. Bless his heart, he was so nervous!

Here is the Pilgrim, on his way to the stage.

I don't honestly remember how many attempts I made at getting a picture of all 3 kids with the 'For Sale' sign. This is just one of many, many things that I can't remember. October and November were a complete blur.

This is one of the dozen or so loads we made with our little utility trailer. I'm following Greg in the zippy Passat. The girls are squeezed in the backseat with Christmas wreaths between them.
The buyers of our house kept bumping their closing date closer and closer. In the end, we were completely out by the 16th of November. That was the day the carpet was being installed at the new house. We moved most everything into the garage at the new house and hired movers to help move the big/heavy things. We had them put it all in the dining room, since it has hardwood.

We slept in the pop-up at camp driveway while we worked on getting the house ready to move into. Mainly getting the heat working. This proved to be yet another exciting

Okay, my scrapbook gal's.... this is ALL of my scrapbook supplies (with the exception of furniture). I told my Mom this load could NOT go in the ditch. Turns out it took me all day to load the trailer then it was too late to take the load to the new house. My scrapbook supplies spent the night on the trailer in our driveway. I barely slept a wink LOL!

Okay, I'm going to post this and will be working on my next post....

Stand by.... looking for the USB cord....

2009-11-30T19:19:00.001-08:00

I will be updating soon. Just looking for the USB for the cameras......

End of October photos...

2009-11-04T14:20:00.001-08:00

This post is going to be random... I have about 11 minutes before I have to get the kids from school. I've been meaning to post some of these for awhile, so here goes:

Our 3 sweeties swinging in the yard. Don't let those sweet faces fool you, they can drive an otherwise sane person to drink 2 glasses of wine! Don't ask me how I know this.

We had 1 big storm a few weeks back. The girls wanted to go out with the umbrella and play in the rain. They had a blast!

We decorated Halloween cookies and ate them. Well, I let Maren eat mine since she licked all the frosting off it.

Halloween costumes: Declan - Optimus Prime, minus all of the accessories that give the indication that the costume is Optimus Prime.

Teagan - Cinderella. Complete with blinking glass slippers that gave her blisters. I asked her if the shoes were going to be okay for Trick-or-Treating and she told "yes Mommy, I just can't walk in them...."

Maren - Minnie Maren Mouse. Perfect for this child. Except she wouldn't wear her ears. She did wear her sparkly pink converse though!

Must run for now, will try to post some more after I pick up the wild ones!

Cha cha changes....

2009-10-26T18:17:00.001-07:00

This is what you see when you enter our property. I took this picture from the gate. To the left is the garage, then the driveway circles around and the barn is to the left (Maxivan is parked in front of the barn).

I took this picture back in the summer, when we first started this process. It is from the top of the steps down to the house. You can see the white lamp post just in front of Greg's car in the picture above.

This is how it looks now, this picture taken from the front of the house, back up towards the driveway. You can see the white lamp post the previous picture was taken from. Follow me? =)

I took out all those solar lights. They didn't get any direct sunlight to charge them. There must be 36 of them.

This is from the back deck towards the chicken coop.

Before:After:
They uncovered some treasures in all of that tall grass. I raked up 7 or 8 large piles of the downed grass. CRAZY amount of work for this city girl. My hands still hurt.

Greg wanted to paint the garage and epoxy the floor before we move in. So this past weekend, we sprayed the garage. 15 gallons of Kilz and 5 gallons of Semi Gloss. I swept up about 10 lbs of paint 'dust' off the floor. Greg also replaced the fluorescent lights with energy efficient CFL's. With the garage painted white and new lights, it looks like a brand new place!

Here are some of the before shots.

The only critters we've encountered are lizards and frogs. Apparently tarantulas are the most active right now, so the 1 that Greg removed must have been the only one dumb enough to show it's face in the day. The kids say hi to it every time we drive around the bend where Greg moved it to.

Sunday I spent the entire afternoon cleaning the upstairs hall bath. There is a reason I do not clean other people's houses for a living. I had the heebie jeebs so I just poured bleach on the floor, put on my rubber gloves and dove in. I think I will repaint the aqua to a prettier version of aqua and call it a day in there.

I'll post more pic's if I come across any other good before/afters.

3 Offers on our house!

2009-10-19T12:35:00.000-07:00

Greg and I just signed a full price offer this morning!! Please keep fingers crossed that there are no hang-ups. This seems to have gone so smoothly, I'm waiting for something to come up.... =)

Well, We didn't Close on the 16th...

2009-10-17T21:26:00.000-07:00

But we did sign our papers today. Now, the short sale banks involved just need to be paid (via our wire transfer) and signed off on.... Too bad that Capital One doesn't do wire transfers to Title Companies, and too bad that is the bank that we transferred all of the funds to to wire the money to the Title Company. Too bad we didn't realize this until Thursday eveing. Oh well, we had to wait on them right?! If all goes as planned, we should be closing this week.

Our house went on the MLS today... and had 4 showings today while we were out! Two more have called to show it tomorrow. Hopefully we will get an offer and be moving on with life. Cross your fingers for us please.

Out at the new house today Greg pressure washed the garage and I cleaned the baseboards inside. No critter encounters. Oh, except the black widow. But Greg drown her in his beer bottle. We're going to go back out tomorrow and go to the Harvest Festival at the kids new school. Hope to meet some of the country folk! Maybe talk chickens. Or tractors. =)

Green Acres is the life for me.... I think.

2009-10-09T22:19:00.000-07:00

I won't bore you with all the details. Lets just say we are jumping thru hoops to get our funding to go thru. We had to have the south side of the house scrapped and repainted due to the appraiser calling weathered wood and paint 'dry rot.' And we had to install the cabinet doors because he also mentioned that in the appraisal. The cabinet doors were in the process of being painted/distressed, and had all been removed. Then at the last minute the bank wanted a hand rail installed on the steps that lead down of the back deck. Okay. We're playing along because we want the house. It is weird though, to be making repairs to a house we don't own, and I don't entirely trust the lender.

Anywhoo, I took the kids out this afternoon to help Greg with the rest of the cabinet doors and while there I figured we may as well water something. Greg brought soaker hoses and we were laying them around the front walk area when Teagan sees this guy:

Greg flung it over to the other side of the street (which is a ways away) but the spider is probably back to it's home by now *shudder*

The kids were scared/fascinated. I was in flip flops. I think we'll be boot shopping tomorrow...

After that excitement was over, we got back to work. I think it looks great (except for the 6 cabinet doors I repainted yesterday with old paint, that is shiny... but we won't talk about that right now). I'm not as into the distressed look as I would have been about 5 years ago. So, they will get another coat of fresh paint, and they will match.

We put on new brushed satin hardware. Looks pretty with the granite. Bless Greg's heart, he does such a nice and perfect job on this kind of stuff. It always turns out beautifully! You can see the areas where they sanded the white paint back down to the oak.

The appraiser is going back out tomorrow to take pictures to show the bank we did the repairs they requested. Cross your fingers they don't ask us to do anything else. If all goes well, we should close on the 16th, 1 day after the seller's short sale deadline of the 15th. Amazing if you ask me!

We left after dark. The kids were too scared to go outside, in the dark. It's dark out there. Really dark. The front porch has lights, but the breaker is broken in the tripped position, so that needs to be fixed (item # 2613 in case you are counting). They had a lot of solar lights, but they aren't bright. We'll be adding some real lighting out there. So I can see the tarantulas at night. But it won't matter then, because I'll have on boots!

Lighting comes after we have the landscaping cleared and cleaned up. While I was there yesterday I had 'Nacho' come give me a quote to clear 100' fire/safety perimeter around the house, prune and trim. $1200.00. $300 more if we want it hauled away. Yipes. That comes after we have the lids for the septic tank dug up, inspected, pumped and add risers to the lids so we don't ever have to dig them up again. Most likely a lot of things will have to wait until we sell our house.

Oh, and speaking of critters. When Greg left last night, he followed Peppy La'Pue down the dirt road to Salmon Falls Road. Peppy got a little testy near the end there, and Greg swears he went into the bush and lifted his tail. We're having the 50 gallon barrel of Tomato Juice delivered, since we can't go pick it up in MaxiVan (just kidding).

Busy, busy...

2009-09-28T17:03:00.000-07:00

I'm posting to say I am too busy to post. Crazy. Our offer was accepted on the house, and the bank wants to COE by 10/15. We've got work to do on this house so we can list it, we've made 100 calls regarding 100 things on the new house. Many inspections. We get to pay for them all, of course. But overall, we are very excited! Will post more when I have the time. In about 4 years... =)

Before Summer Ended

2009-09-02T22:11:00.000-07:00

Greg took the girls for a bike ride in the trailer. It was Maren's first time! She was so excited. I think she is really becoming aware that she is getting to do things she has had to be a bystander for in the past. I think Greg said they went 12 miles or so. In 100 degree heat. Good times.

A few people have been asking if we have heard anything about the house, and no, we haven't. Our offer is good until Sept 11th. The bank postponed the foreclosure until Sept 14th to take a look at our offer. According to our realtor, we are in the best possible position. When we took my Mom out there, we could tell the house had been shown to other people. I had our realtor ask if we were the only offer they had, and there are back up offers on the property now. I was upset and fretted for a day, then decided that whatever happens is exactly what is supposed to happen. And then let it go. Maybe I'm just afraid of change. Maybe I'm worried we won't like it. Maybe I'm sad to give up my wonderfully perfect for me scrapbook space.
Who knows.

But then it was all good again...

2009-09-02T22:01:00.000-07:00

Teagan started Preschool this week. It's a small class, only 10 kids, 6 boys 4 girls. I hope more girls sign up, Teagan wants a little friend SO bad. She was excited to go, and I didn't cry on that day either!

She asked me to take 1 more picture before I left, and she posed for this one.

And then this happened...

2009-09-02T21:48:00.001-07:00

Yep. That would be a broken arm. Fractured just below her elbow. How could this happen you ask? Well, let's just say that I doubt anyone will be jumping off the swivel desk chair anytime soon.... Teagan got *lots* of snuggles and love from me and Nana (Greg was out of town). I almost worry that she likes the extra attention so much that she'll do things like this just to get more. Almost always smiling though, true to Teagan's personality. She told the girl that was wrapping her cast that her brother would like a blue cast. I asked if they could put it on his mouth.

I haven't let anyone sign it yet, I think that will make it look junky. She goes back to the Dr on Friday to make sure it's healing right.

Some photos of the 'Firsts'

2009-09-02T21:37:00.000-07:00

Big D started 1st grade on the 24th. Just in the nick of time too, as I felt like I would not survive another week of not knowing what to do with him.... We got a supply list from his teacher and he was excited to pick out his supplies. We ended up getting him a big boy backpack at Costco. I didn't want him to get teased for having a Spiderman one (sad huh?).

Since my Mom is here, I could drive him to school (at the butt crack of dawn might I add...) and wait there with him until he went into the classroom. I didn't cry this year! I was scared and excited for him. Looking forward to hearing about his first day. After school I took him to Cold Stone Creamery and had some one on one Mommy time.

The REAL Party.

2009-08-29T17:55:00.001-07:00

Greg gets the cutest little cakes at Sam's Club that have cupcakes around them. They are perfect for birthdays.

Maren agrees. Here she is driving a car on her presents. Greg wrapped that one, yes that is blue painter's tape...
This, my friend's, is the face of *pure* excitement. She is probably squealing too! Good stuff. I think it's a Jeep with a trailer and ATC. Perfection.

She had a blast, and got lots of cars. The Loop's really know how to throw a party.

Maren Turned 2!

2009-08-29T17:48:00.001-07:00

Nana flew in on Maren's 2nd birthday. Just in time for the table dancing festivities. I'm sure the Roundtable Pizza in Auburn really appreciates this... We actually celebrated at home on M's big day. Over the weekend we took Nana out to see the house in the country. After that we went to Auburn for lunch, the rest is history.

The Kids Were Playing Hospital...

2009-08-14T13:55:00.000-07:00

And guess who the patient was?

The little wicker table with the lamp and rocking chair in the background is Dr. Declan's office. He's 'making important notes' in his office when he's done administering medicine. Nurse Teagan was very busy tending to her patient. Of course, she was dressed for the occasion!

So, back to my grain mill.....

2009-08-07T23:12:00.000-07:00

I got a grain mill after taking the nutrition classes from Amanda. I've milled flour exactly twice. First time was to make whole wheat brownies (turned out about 1/4"thick and hard) bricks, then today to make whole wheat chocolate chip cookies. This time I used soft wheat berries instead. They are yummy, but about 1/8" thick. I bought several cookbooks about grains and how to use them. Then, out of no where, a recipe will call for All Purpose Flour. Well, they don't sell All Purpose wheat berries at Whole Foods, so I am out of luck! =)

Hope everyone has a safe and fun weekend!

Camping Pictures.

2009-08-07T08:31:00.000-07:00

We went camping with our friends this past weekend. I am glad to say that I actually took pictures this camping trip! I don't usually think to do it until we have camp half broken down! This is the William Kent campground in Lake Tahoe. The weather was perfect, which was good, since this was our first attempt at 'dry camping' meaning: no water or electricity. It went very well!

We were across the highway from a beach, but we drove to a sandy beach for the day on Saturday. The kids played in the water all day. Teagan got tuckered out and napped on Greg. Declan and Jamie played in the 'hot tub."

There were no dogs allowed on the beach, so we made sure that Otis stayed up on the chair... (there has to always be one that breaks the rules....).

ETA: LOL! After I posted this picture I realized Otis isn't on the chair.... whoops.

Are you ready for some serious cuteness?

2009-08-03T22:30:00.000-07:00

I took the kids to the local donut shop. You know, because I'm all about eating healthy... and they begged. Well, turns out that I got a better picture of all 3 of them than I did at JC Penney portrait studio. Seriously cute!

Teagan horsing around. Look at that skill.

I thought this was pretty cute too.

This is the windowsill in Teagan's room. Maren *loves* to line cars up here. This is what I found this morning. Maren was so proud of herself too. I personally like how some are stacked.

I met my friend Janice at free movie Tuesday last week. Yes, I was the crazy lady taking a picture of my kids in the dark movie theater. Hey people, you can't complain, it was free. We saw Space Chimps, and the kids had a blast (even the wild littlest).

Thought I'd impress you all with my cooking prowess as well. Maybe there is something wrong with me, taking pictures of food???? I should be making notes of what these recipes are so I can make them again.

This is Declan and Teagan at Adventureland (like Chuck E Cheese with bounce houses). This is what they would be doing on my sofa at home, so I figured we may as well go get pizza too...

Hello? Is this thing on?

2009-07-23T21:43:00.001-07:00

Did I so completely bore everyone to the point of not even looking anymore? =)

Here's Otis.

2009-07-22T14:44:00.001-07:00

Here's Maren.

Look at that tiny little bun!!!

Here's Teagan (and Sarah and Declan).

Teagan dramah.

Declan, at Adventureland.

Finally, some of the pack o'Loops.

Thanks for looking!

Teresa is turning into a foodie????

2009-07-20T16:01:00.000-07:00

I mentioned taking a series of classes from a nutritionist a few months ago. I was just gearing up when Declan got sick, my Mom visited, school got out, birthdays came and went and the dog died... In other words, when life happened. The main reason I wanted to take the courses were to learn how to cook using 'real' food. Food that is in it's original form, grown locally and organically if and when possible.

This has set a lot of things in motion at our house. Greg was on board for anything that will hold the impending heart attack at bay. He got the new appliances I posted about, he got me a grain mill, a sweet Kitchen Aid food processor, and he doesn't complain when I shop at Whole Foods. I've also recently acquired at least 10 new cookbooks (yeah, ME!) that are along the lines of eating locally, how to cook without a book, how to incorporate grains and lastly, how to bake bread daily. Phews. I spent the past weekend perusing the books, and compiling a shopping list. Like, a "I'm going to have to wait until the next billing cycle on the Am Ex" type of a list. I need a pizza stone, pizza peel, kitchen scale, oven thermometer, dough container and so forth. There is just so much to learn.

The kids start school in about 4 weeks, D will be in 1st grade, and Teagan in 4 yr old preschool. Crazy. I am still scrapbooking pictures of Declan when he was a newborn. It is amazing how quickly time goes by. It seems as if it were literally yesterday that I was completely panicked that I was going to have a 3rd baby. I mean it is insanity, but it was insanity that at that time, I could not even imagine.

Well, I guess I'd better be getting dinner ready....

The Definition of Life...

2009-07-19T20:59:00.000-07:00

My friend Pam forwarded this to me, I thought this was pretty cute!

The first day, God created the dog and said: 'Sit all day by the door of your house and bark at anyone who comes in or walks past. For this, I will give you a life span of twenty years.' The dog said: 'That's a long time to be barking. How about only ten years and I'll give you back the other ten?' So God agreed.

On the second day, God created the monkey and said: 'Entertain people, do tricks, and make them laugh. For this, I'll give you a twenty-year life span.' The monkey said: 'Monkey tricks for twenty years? That's a pretty long time to perform. How about I give you back ten like the Dog did?' And God agreed.

On the third day, God created the cow and said:'You must go into the field with the farmer all day long and suffer under the sun, have calves and give milk to support the farmer's family. For this, I will give you a life span of sixty years.' The cow said: 'That's kind of a tough life you want me to live for sixty years. How about twenty and I'll give back the other forty?' And God agreed again.

On the fourth day, God created man and said: 'Eat, sleep, play, marry and enjoy your life. For this, I'll give you twenty years.'But man said: 'Only twenty years? Could you possibly give me my twenty, the forty the cow gave back, the ten the monkey gave back, and the ten the dog gave back; that makes eighty, okay?' 'Okay,' said God, 'You asked for it.'

So that is why for our first twenty years we eat, sleep, play and enjoy ourselves. For the next forty years we slave in the sun to support our family. For the next ten years we do monkey tricks to entertain the grandchildren. And for the last ten years we sit on the front porch and bark at everyone.

Life has now been explained to you.

More House con't.

2009-07-12T17:10:00.001-07:00

This is the detached garage. 3 car, plus office. This is where 'Max' was confined. Didn't get a good look at the backside of it.

Front porch. 2 of the 3 little Loops.

This is the other secondary bedroom. It's larger than the other.

Kids bath. Also the only tub in the house. I actually really like this room. The floor is neat little tile, and the bead board is cute. This could be in a hundred year old house.

This is the master bedroom from the retreat. I would like to split this into 2 rooms, in order to have 4 bedrooms.

I think this may be the only room they completely redid. It's the powder bath downstairs. Cute. Wish the tile floor were not dark green though... Let's hope that little 'orb' in the picture isn't a ghost. Yeah.

Laundry room. Door leads to patio/deck. Door to the right is to the hallway just outside the kitchen.

Umm. Yuck. It needs help. It really needs some love.

Again, thanks for reading this far. I love reading this kind of stuff on other people's blogs. Guess I'm just nosey like that!

Changed name of post to hopefully stop spam!

2009-07-12T16:12:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd add a few (dozen) more pictures of the house. This is the entry. Family room is to the left, dining room to the right. Straight down the hall is the (really bad) laundry room that leads out the the back deck. Kitchen is to the right just before the laundry room.

Can you visualize it looking more like this:

Can you picture it looking like this:

This is the other side of the family room. Too bad they didn't build the bookcases all the way to the ceiling.

This is the kitchen. Some of the upper interiors are completely bead boarded, so I'd leave them open. The others will need glass doors. We did find the cabinet fronts out in the garage. Recessed can lighting and trim work is not finished. Cosmetic things really.

This is looking into the kitchen from the nook. Greg likes the wine chiller. I like the 3 month old bottle of Cabernet that is on the counter (gag).

I love white cabinets and wood floors. The granite is pretty in that it isn't really busy, or black.

Looks like it won't let me add any more photos to this post. So, I'll take the hint for now!

This door leads into the kitchen from the wrap around porch.

One of the 3 bedrooms.

Door swings the wrong way (grrr...) into the room. The people who design houses must not ever live in them. Of course, had they put the door on the other way, then it blocks the switches. These are functionality things, people.

It's no "Sierra Real" but it's pretty close!

2009-07-11T09:46:00.000-07:00

Okay, 'Sierra Real' is the street name of the house I posted pictures of a few posts back. The beautiful house and the glass of wine... remember? Well, someone nabbed it up while we were distracted with a sick kid and end of the school year and birthday parties and such. In other words... we're moving on from Sierra Real. Beautiful, but it was a little out of our price range, and no room for critters.

So now we're thinking more along the lines of 'Blue Sky Road' and here are some pictures of it.

It is a short sale =(

Greg and I drove out to look at it while my Mom was here and left the the twirps at home. Turns out that was a good thing, as the owners have vacated the property, but left "Max" a 200 lb rottweiler penned up by the garage. He 'appeared' to be friendly. The fence was waist height and I'm pretty sure if he were motivated enough he could have gotten over it.

This house is overgrown. Seriously overgrown. That sidewalk is probably about 4 feet wide. It looks like they were in the process of updating when they moved out. It has a big wrap around porch, and a country kitty that followed us all around.

This is the view from the kitchen window. Yes, that is a chicken coop, *with* a chicken. I think that is my very favorite part of the whole house. I could look out my kitchen window, across my huge cottage garden, into the chicken coop! I just heard some of you gasp! LOL! (amy...)

The cabinet doors and drawer fronts are all off (think glass doors), and they have put bead board up everywhere in the kitchen. It needs trim work, and majorly cleaned.

This is looking back at the house from the chicken coop. The area on the other side of the white picket fence was supposed to the lawn, it's all dried up and dead. The ladder is next to the kitchen windows and the master retreat is the bay window upstairs. The staircase goes up to the master bath. Complete with a urinal. Greg was in love.

This is into the dining room from the entrance of the kitchen. The wallpaper freaked me out at first, but I'm getting used to it. I think they had a red thing going on in here.

This is the family room.

View from the master retreat. When we went back yesterday with our realtor, there was a sweet little deer laying under one of the oak trees. Yes, I realize that deer love cottage gardens. And I realize I won't think Bambi is so sweet after destroying the fruits of our labor. That's why we have a Mossberg. **JUST KIDDING** sort of.

I think living in the country will bring all kinds of critters, and packing heat may be a necessity. Funny thing. I live in the burbs with a huge concentration of people, some of which intend to do harm. But I'm skeered in the country??? Bobcats, coyotes, skunks, raccoons, deer (hey, they can get vicious), mice, and who knows what else could be living out there.

Thanks for reading this far. We don't have any idea how it will turn out with this house, but it sure is fun!

Just a little more for today...

2009-06-23T17:35:00.000-07:00

I mentioned in my last post that the day that Declan ended up in the hospital, we had planned on going to Lowe's. Well, Greg went ahead and went, and ordered these beauties! All but the refrigerator were installed before I even got home from the hosptial one day. We can turn the dishwasher on anytime, it's so quiet we don't have to wait until we are going to bed. The oven actually works (anyone who has ever attempted to use my oven can attest to that). The microwave is purty... but that fridge. It's amazing!

I've got lot's more to post, it's just a slow going around here.....

I'm a 10:00 - 2:00 Kinda Gal...

2009-06-23T13:13:00.000-07:00

I am not a morning person. I'm not really an night owl either. I'm a 10:00 to 2:00 kinda gal I guess.

The evening of the last post I made to this blog seems like 100 years ago. That night Declan woke up burning up with fever, and had trouble breathing. I gave him a breathing treatment and Motrin and put him in bed with me. Hindsight is 20/20 for sure. He was exhibiting at leat 8 symptoms of distressed breathing, none of which alarmed me as much as it should have (and definitely will in the future...). We decided to wait and see how he was feeling in the morning, figuring that lying down was partly the cause of his congestion.

The next morning, he seemed tired, but okayish. Until he came upstairs to find me panicking that he could not breathe. I gave him another breathing treatment which I didn't think helped much and decided to take him to Urgent Care. The plan for our morning was to take D to Urgent care, get lunch at Chipotle and go to Lowes before Maren's nap (LOL!). After waiting at Urgent care for about 30 minutes, Greg decided to go to Lowe's anyway. After about 1 1/2 hrs wait time, the receptionist decided to mention to a nurse that D was 'having trouble breathing' and a nurse came out to the waiting room to take Declan's air oxygenation (90%) ummmm. Yeah, on room air, this child could not breathe. They immediately rush us into a room and put him on oxygen and start a breathing treatment. Then the Doctor decides he should be at the emergency room and calls an ambulance (which, by the way, came with lights and sirens for him).

I call Greg to let him know, and he thinks I'm kidding.

It's is moments like these that I realize I am not equipped to do this job. That my 'wait and see' approach to life could really bite me some day. I also realize that right now is not the time for *me* to cry, but no matter how hard I tried not to, I just could not help it. I told Declan how sorry I was that he had suffered and I had not taken more immediate action. He, on the other hand, is very brave. I know he is looking to me for clues about what is going on, and I'm sitting over there doing the ugly cry. Nice. Anywhoo, the paramedics get him all hooked up to their oxygen, load my tiny little guy onto the huge stretcher and out to the ambulance we go.

Our ride of maybe 1 1/2 - 2 miles was thankfully uneventful, the paramedic told me that no one will ever judge me for taking my child directly to the emergency room if he can't breathe. He was a 'code 2 respiratory distress' and a bunch of things I've since forgotten. The emergency room was waiting for us. This is where another experience happened for me... my cell phone would not put a call thru, so I had to *text* Greg what was happening. My text took me about 10 minutes to do, and each word was completely spelled out. Since I don't think I even have texting on my plan, I can't wait to see what that is going to cost. Really, I wonder what this whole thing is going to cost (shudders).

Long story shorter by a few paragraphs, Declan had asthma exacerbated pnuemonia, and had to be admitted into the hospital for 5 days. I think he liked the special attention he got, and that I stayed there every night with him. Greg and I would switch off during the days and I could go home to shower and take care of things only I knew existed. Thankfully during this time, my Mom came to help out. Thank GOD!

Declan was released from the hospital just in time for us to get to Teagan's last day of school party at preschool. Declan went one more week and was done the first week of June.

The first week of June was also when we laid our sweet Milo to rest. He declined rather drastically the week that Declan was in the hospital. Once we were back home and attempting to get back into the swing of things, is we began to notice how poorly Milo was doing.

Things have begun to settle down for us around here. Thankfully. I'm glad to have my boring old routine back, that is for sure! Hope you are all well!

So take a look at this beauty!

2009-05-24T21:12:00.000-07:00

Every Sunday for the past 3 months or so, we take a 'Sunday Drive." Greg and I try to have a plan of where to go, looking at different areas to possibly move to. The kids crab and complain and ask if we are going home yet. Occassionaly Declan asks me pull over so he can puke. It's good fun =) And since we are all confined in Maxivan, it counts as family time in my book. Well, this morning was no different. We headed out the door around 11:30 and spent the day tooling around the country hills.

I've posted on my Facebook page some of the houses we've come across. Most of them are either short sales or foreclosed. The past 2 foreclosed houses have been left unlocked, and we take a peek around. Well, today we didn't get lucky in that aspect, but we did gain entry to 2 gated communities that we would have wasted a trip out to the country for otherwise. Imagine my surprise when this is the house we pulled up to....

Hello LOVER!

Declan informed me it was 17 steps up to the front door.

I honestly could not decide which porch I would rather drink my glass of wine on.

I think it's been waiting for me to find it. It's totally the house I have in my mind. The only possible snag is that we don't think they allow any livestock animals... and since we would like to be as 'off the grid' as possible, we believe the house is not on a well or septic system. I've contacted our realtor to see what he can find out, he'll let me know Tuesday morning....

I think anyone that knows me would say this house is screaming my name!

Now, back to which porch for that much needed glass of wine...

The Country Life is for Me!

2009-05-22T09:12:00.000-07:00

Declan's kindergarten class had a field trip to the Sacramento County Fair yesterday. I took the girls separate since I don't have my fingerprints on file with the school district. So, really we crashed the field trip... Any how, it was a perfect morning weather wise to be at the fair. I think it was open yesterday for all of the schools to have their field trip there, as there was about 2.7 million kids there - good times!

I hung around with the Mom who Declan rode there with, as she was assigned to 4 kids. Another Mom who chaperoned gladly came with us as well. She only has 1 child and being assigned to 4 kids at the county fair was enough to put her over the edge! LOL! I told her that is how I feel at any given moment - she turned white!

When we went into the pavilion with the goats, sheep, cows, pigs and chickens it became obvious right away that Maren did not like the animals! She was terrified in fact. So, we closed the canopy on the stroller and all was good! The country life is not for her....

The other two enjoyed themselves and touched any/all of the animals that we could.

Maren's new stroller has a small platform for another child to stand on, this was a big hit with the kids. They all took turns getting a 'ride' on the stroller. Can't you see how much fun I was having too? Botox anyone? Maybe I should add that to my Facebook quiz as a good gift to give me.... I wonder if I always look like I'm telling kids what not to do?

My brave boy even tried to rope, and he did good. Maybe the country life is for him.

I had been holding kids up to look in the horse pens, yeah, me!

Little Miss, being unimpressed...

Question with a 5yr old.

2009-05-15T13:47:00.000-07:00

I saw this on Amanda's blog and had it on my Facebook page. Figured I'd put it here too, for the people who don't Facebook.

Questions to Declan:
1. What is something mommy always says to you? That you love me

2. What makes mommy happy? When I kiss and hug you.

3. What makes mommy sad? When I hit you.

4. How does your mommy make you laugh? By tickling me

5. What was your mommy like as a child? I don't know...

6. How old is your mommy? 35 (I was at the time)

7. How tall is your mommy? 1170

8. What is her favorite thing to do? Scrapbooking

9. What does your mommy do when you're not around? Gets us surprises sometimes.

10. If your mommy becomes famous, what will it be for? For being fun.

11. What is your mommy really good at? Getting fun toys

12. What is your mom not very good at? Racing

13. What does your mommy do for her job? taking care of all her babies

14. What is your mommy's favorite food? lasagna

15. What makes you proud of your mommy? When you hug me.

16. If your mommy were a cartoon character, who would she be? I don't know that one....

17. What do you and your mommy do together? go places

18. How are you and your mommy the same? we both have blue eyes

19. How are you and your mommy different? we don't wear the same shirts

20. How do you know your mommy loves you? because we do fun stuff together

22. Where is your mommy's favorite place to go? to Green Tangerines

23. Where do you play? at school

24. What will you be when you grow up? an atrist

Getting my Nutrition learn on...

2009-05-13T13:07:00.000-07:00

I've been taking a class on Traditional Nutrition and Eating Sustainably on a Budget. Let me tell you how much I am *loving* this class! Last night we learned how to plan meals and what staples to stock in the pantry. This Saturday we are meeting at the Local Farmer's Market, and the following class is at Whole Foods. Amanda, a Nutrition Educator has a website: http://www.mydailydiner.com/ where she posts her weekly menu and other great info.

I'm also taking a Parenting Class through the hospital. I just got done with the first 2 week class on "Getting Your School Age Child to Co-Operate" and this week we start a new series on "Setting Limits." I look forward to getting as much out these classes as possible.

The school year is winding down. I can tell the kids are getting ready for summer. Declan asked me if he can wear his jammies all day during the summer. I've got D and T signed up for a few little day camp activities so we don't die of boredom.

We have also been a little more actively looking for a homestead out in the country. With the majority of the houses on the market here being short sales, we're not holding our breath. We've been poking around out in Shingle Springs, and would like to head in that direction.

Well, I'm sure I could upload some recent photos, but I'd have go downstairs to get the cable and I just don't see that happening right now! So, sorry, I realize a post with no photos is boring.

Well?

2009-05-08T23:00:00.001-07:00

What do you think of the new pretties on my blog?

Maren's own post.

2009-04-27T13:31:00.000-07:00

Let me tell you about this little Maren we have here. Declan and Teagan call her "Missy" or "Miss Miss." She is smart. Scary smart. For Easter, she saw the eggs around the yard, and got the shopping cart to collect them. The other evening, Greg and I were sitting at the kitchen table and she comes by with the foot stool from the bathroom, so she can see into the drawers in the kitchen. T R O U B L E

When I put the 'blockade' up at the loft, if she didn't go over it, she climbed through it...

She just wants to be one of the big kids. I think she spent so much time watching them from the Excersaucer, she couldn't wait to be one of them.

She likes to play dress-up too. I saved the princess/fairy Halloween costumes so Maren can play too. She looks so cute, wearing her princess dress while pushing a truck on the window sill in Teagan's room.

I was putting clothes away in her closet when I heard all this commotion in the hallway. Crashes, grunting, but no cries. A minute later Maren comes walking past with no pants on. I figure they were too big and fell off while she was pushing the walker down the hall (and they were size 12 mos.). It only slowed her down because she probably tripped! A minute later she came out of Teagan's room wearing high heels.

Well, thanks for reading about Missy Maren. I noticed she is missing from many of the pictures I load of the kids. She is usually napping when I take pictures I guess.

This...

2009-04-27T13:22:00.000-07:00

Recently unemployed Stallion, looking for a 1 trick pony... *wink, wink*

When I got in the car to take the kids to school this morning, I saw this. I asked Declan why his Pinata was driving my car, with $12 cash in his hoof. He just rolled his eyes and told me, "Dad must have done it, Mom" sheesh. When did Greg and I get so dumb??? =)

The Par-tay...

2009-04-27T12:58:00.001-07:00

Do you like the photo I chose to sum up Declan's party? Let me point out the various reasons I picked *this* photo:

~I particularly like that the dog is whizzing on the tree.

~The boys pushing and shoving each other while attempting to get in line to hit the pinata.

~All the while, Declan is oblivious to any of it, getting his own little groove on!

I set up stations to decorate cookies and door knob hangers. The cookies were a hit, I think 1 kiddo made a door hanger.

After the pinata, we went to the back yard. I had put little squirt guns in the pinata, and the kids filled them up with the water from the sand & water table. It was crazy. Greg brought out the big guns and got all the kids wet.

Once that got a little too loud and wild I redirected to opening presents.

In the end, Declan had a blast, I was hoarse from trying to be heard, and the yard and house were a mess! I have a feeling they will remember this birthday though!

Ohhh yeah....

2009-04-23T21:24:00.000-07:00

It is officially spring in California. One day it's 96 degrees, the next is a high of 74 and windy. God knows I love the temperature, but save me the allergies. Puleeze. So we had an Easter egg hunt on Easter. It was basically over before Greg, Maren or I was up... I awoke to voices that sounded like they were in the back yard. Got me a little grumpy, to be honest......

Later in the day we went for a bike ride, I broke out the Lincoln Townbike... with the bike seat for Maren. Greg pull Declan and Teagan in a trailer on his bike. We *must* be a sight to be seen. I am beginning to embrace the fact that I have become entertainment for others. Anywhooo.... here is Maren and I on the beach cruiser.

I've created this barrier to keep (or at least slow down) the kids out of my scrap area. I had to move the gate from the loft to the top of the stairs. Although, there are days I think it would be safer to just leave the stairs open, and keep the gate at the loft....

Maren has only been walking for a few weeks, and she already climbs up on stuff, usually with something sticking out of her mouth, so she can impale herself on it if she were to fall.

The school year is winding down. Which reminded me that I had offered to make a scrapbook of the school year for Declan's teacher. Lord, why do I commit to these types of things??? I'm going to have to get busy on that. Other than that, we pass the days playing dress up, and battles with action figures. I found the harmonica that I had put away (for good reason). The kids had a blast with that. I took the new "Spring Kids" picture the day they were all playing with it. Hopefully no one is sick =)

We are having a little birthday party for Declan at our house (may the force be with me) on Sunday. I told D he could invite 5 of his friends, and we are pretty sure 4 of them are coming.

Other than that, I went to see a nutritionist speech last night. It was pretty inspiring. She talked about buying fruits and vegetables at the local Farmer's Market. I think we should live where I can ride the Lincoln Townbike (need to get a straw basket for the front) to the Farmer's market every Saturday morning. You know, along the coast... LOL!

It Suddenly dawned on me

2009-04-09T07:36:00.000-07:00

That Easter is *this* Sunday. Sheesh, where does the time go? So the 3 Loop Circus headed out yesterday morning. First we hit the donut store, picked up a dozen donuts. It just so happens that the donut store is in the parking lot of Kmart. I figured we could just walk to Kmart after donuts and get our egg dyeing kits.

I told the kids we would dye the eggs after Maren got up from her nap. After about an hour into her nap, Declan decided to 'peek' in on her, and thus that was conveniently the end of the nap. In retrospect, we should have done the eggs while she was napping, because she somehow got ahold of 1 egg, and pitched it onto the floor. I wonder why she was so cranky? Hmmmm...

I added a "follower" feature...

2009-04-03T10:01:00.000-07:00

So when you log into blogger, if I've updated, you will see it. Thank you Tammy for being my one and only! =)

Declan is done with karate. That was 12 quick weeks. They called to see about getting him signed up for a program, to the tune of $750 for 6 mos. Yeah, we'll see after night night. I think he does a really good job, and would have probably like to have kept going. Someone needs to clue the karate place into the current economic state.

Teagan decided that she wanted to go to ballet bad enough that it was worth going on the potty. She hounded me for about 2 days to call the ballet place (conveniently located just down from the karate place). She got to go to a free class last night to see if it was everything she had been dreaming it was.

For the first 30 minutes they did tap, and the 2nd half was ballet. I risked certain incarceration by taking the picture of her in the classroom...

I had the other 2 wild ones with me, so I was not able to watch =( Instead, we layed around in the grass out front. When we were all wheezing and itchy we went back inside.

We peeked into the ballet room Teagan was putting on fairy wings. I figured she was in fairy utopia and risked the picture. Then the next thing I know, she is crying, and the instructor is holding her. This could mean many things when you are a 3 1/2 yr old girl. Either someone was mean to you, you crashed, someone else got the color of wings you wanted, or... it could be that you were the only one with black shoes and didn't know any ballet. =(

I told her we would get her own shoes and she would get better with practice. On the drive home I decided I'd let her bring ballet up, and felt bad for her that it may not have been all she had dreamed it would be. I was surprised that she would have felt self conscious about having borrowed shoes. I realized I had totally underestimated her range of emotions. Poor kiddo.

Bye bye Lake Tahoe.. cry

2009-03-27T08:52:00.000-07:00

The girls weekend in Lake Tahoe was fabulous. It went *way* too fast. I planned for it for weeks, and it was over in a blink of an eye. My BFF Amy came from Arizona, and got to meet my Cali girlfriends. We loaded up the cars with easily thousands of dollars worth of scrapbooking supplies, and headed up the mountain! This is the house we stayed at.

We totally moved all the furniture around to accommodate the tables we brought to work on.

Here's Amy and Janice.

Michelle and Amy.

And here is Tanny.

The weather was perfect. It started to snow on Saturday afternoon. We went out to dinner Saturday night, and Tanny took pictures on her camera (don't forget to email those pic's to us!) We woke up to this on Sunday morning:

This is what traffic looked like when we got on the road...

This is what it looked like at the summit.

I don't think Amy was impressed.... =) Maybe it was that she was frozen solid in the backseat?

All in all, it was a great time, with great friends! I can't wait for the next one.... are we planning it yet??

The Nerve of Some People....

2009-03-16T08:40:00.000-07:00

Yeah. This lady had the nerve to be stopped at a red light *right* in front of me. In MY car, with the top down. Sheesh. And on my Birthday. She ended up going where I was going, and parked that car right up front.... doesn't she know that is how you get door ding's?

Then I had a good chance to check her out, you know so I can see what someone who drives that car looks like.... Just to make sure I fit the profile. We won't go into that, but let's just say that I think I would do the car more justice than she did. LOL! I would have said that no matter who got out though...

I got to meet with some girlfriends and get my scrap on Saturday Night (thanks Greg!) at Green Tangerine's in Rocklin. I was working on Easter layouts since before the Miss was born. It would be nice to be caught up on all the previous Easter's before this years!

My Mom and Amy come tomorrow!! I'm so excited! I've got a lot of work to do *think Howie Mandel* like clean this house at least 1 layer. I know neither of them will hold it against me if the house is messy, but dirty is another story.

Anyhow, I'm going to get moving, since I think I would sit here all morning otherwise!

I should have done the '29 yrs old and holding' thing...

2009-03-14T09:35:00.000-07:00

why didn't I think of that? Of course, I would have been caught by Declan. You can't pull anything over on that kid. He knew today was by 36th birthday, and I'm quite sure he's been sharing that with everyone.

Anywhooo... Woke up this morning already feeling older. And grayer. And wrinkleier. Plus, I seem to have this bronchial cough. And it hurts. I'm just chalking that up to being 36 too.

I'm going to Green Tangerine's to scrap tonight and may do some shopping on my way up to Rocklin. Old Navy has been missing me. I've got to do my stimulating the economy part there.

Just thought I'd pop on, and say thanks for the birthday wishes! It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy when people remember my birthday! =)

I'm gonna blame Facebook this time.

2009-03-12T09:36:00.001-07:00

Because I can check in there and see what a lot of my friends are doing, and there is a chat feature there. So I neglect my blog. Then I feel guilty, then I have to come up with excuses. So, this time I'm going to blame Facebook.

We drove to Phoenix in February during "Ski week" aka President's Day, turned into a week off of school for the kids. Where was President's Week when I was a kid? Greg had planned on being in AZ for work that week anyway. Was I going to stay home with kids out of school for a week, and Greg 'working' ? No thanks. Plus, there are great scrapbook stores in AZ. So why not load up 3 little kids and drive 15 hours???? You know you would have too.

We had a great time, and got to visit with *some* of the Arizona folks. It's a problem for us when we go, there is just never enough time to see everyone we want to. Next time we will see Kelly and Belinda (and Everett too) for sure. We spent a day at McCormick Railroad park with my Dad and Cheri, and her grand kids. It was nice to finally meet my step-nephew and niece.

My girlfriends and I are off to our scrap weekend in Tahoe next Thursday. I've been spending every 'spare' (LOL!!) moment I have packing and planning my scrap things. I've even been dreaming about it at night. I signed up for a crop this Saturday night with my friends from Mom's group.... it's all scrap, all the time around here. Riveting for those of you who don't scrap.

Let's see... other random things of interest. I happened to look down while sitting in the drive thru at Taco Bell (off all places) and notice this:

Maren enjoying her french fries with ketchup...

Well, thanks for coming by... hopefully it was worth your few minutes!

The 2nd Happiest Place on Earth pic's

2009-02-04T16:06:00.001-08:00

For those of you who (ahem Tammy) have been patiently waiting..... LOL! I realized that these pictures were horrible, the 1 picture of Teagan is completely blurry and Declan is so far away, only I would know that is my kid. The Maren pictures turned out alright, so I'll post those. I know everyone was wanting to see what a Dad at McD's alone with 3 kids looks like, but he ran away as soon as I got there. Not really, but I'm sure he wanted to.

Yep, good ol'fashion, germ infestation fun. It truly is the 2nd happiest place on Earth!

The weather in Northern CA is so cool....

2009-01-26T08:05:00.000-08:00

We had spring like weather this time last week, and for the past several days it has been rainy and overcast. Well, that is what it is supposed to be like in January in Northern California. I honestly can't complain, I like the change of weather. The only drawback that I can see is that the kids can't really play outside. Oh, and that Otis (whippet) refuses to go outside. I think he just pokes his tootie out the doggie door and does his business (into the garage) without ever actually going outside. We've busted him, but, being the brat he is, he really doesn't care. At all.

Declan got his white belt in karate last week. He is pretty proud of himself. The Sensei (sp?) had a little 'ceremony' for Declan and the other little boy that got his. Greg swung by just in time to see it. Declan took it very seriously, it was so cute! Grasshopper.

I went to scrap with some girlfriends yesterday at Green Tangerines. It was a completely unproductive day for me... well, except for running my yap. There were 4 of us, and 2 scrapped, and 2 yakked. =) Love you Deanna! I met Greg and the kids at McDonald's after the crop. He took them there to let them run wild after being in the house all weekend. Maren got to play too. I'll upload the pictures in a minute. She thought she was a hot shot, and I just hope no one gets sick....... ICK.

Hmmm... what else. I've been getting on Facebook a little more. It's addicting. You start thinking of people that you know, and sure enough they are on Facebook. Then the next thing you know, you have 200 friends (like my niece) and you didn't even think you knew that many peeps. It's an easy way to say hello to *everyone* you know.

It totally feels like Spring here!

2009-01-20T12:48:00.001-08:00

And it makes me want to clean the entire house from top to bottom. I've got the hallway upstairs lined with plastic tubs of the girls outgrown clothes. I've got the 'redecorate' bug too. Greg worked out in the back yard this past weekend, got the leaves all picked up. The bushes are bare or gone, and the grass is dead. I think of how much time I used to spend out there (before kiddos) and all the plants I planted.

Teagan and I went to the Wild Bird store and got some seed for the birds, so at least they come around! I got some shots of a Goldfinch in the bubbling fountain, and the hummer at the feeder. They are very fearful of us, but hopefully they will get used to us being around. I can rememebr springs in the past that the kids are out back playing and the birds are at the feeders.

Look at this sweet little bird!

I took the kiddos to one of the local parks yesterday. I dressed Maren in pants that I didn't mind her scooting all over in. That poor child has barely had any tactile experiences. She's never even seen dirt (well, besides the dirt inside my house! LOL!) She found soft dirt, bark and, loved touching the grass. She tasted a few things and scooted everywhere. There were a few big piles of leaves the kids had a blast playing in.

Maren got to swing too, which she thought was pretty cool.

It's 63 outside baby!!!

2009-01-15T14:59:00.001-08:00

And the kids are playing OUTSIDE!!! YESSSSS! I love days like this. I even saw a hummingbird at the feeder. I knew he was out there because he gives me all kinds of fly-bys and warnings from the trees when I'm outside. I fixed him some nectar (to make nice) and put the feeder on the fence outside my kitchen window. Bless his tough little hummingbird heart. I think I'm going to have to get some fresh thistle seed for the Goldfinches, they aren't touching the what I put out last week.

Maren has finally decided to walk. She started furniture walking the day after my Mom got here. She loves her new-found freedom and wants to walk all the time now. It's murder on the back though... good thing I have a good chriropractor lined up.

I think I had mentioned Declan started karate. I've been taking him 2-3 times a week. He's getting pretty good, and will earn his 'white belt' tonight. This is big deal time around here. I'm just hoping that the good lessons like listening and focusing will convey while at home too.....

My Mom went home on Tuesday =( and I've been trying to get back into the swing of things solo. With weather like this I should be taking the dogs for walks and the kids to the park. Everyday. I think I have "pissoneveryonesparade' syndrome, though. I start dissecting each little part of walking the dogs down to the point that I don't want them to go (pooping, picking up poop, carrying the poop type thoughts). Then the kids at the park is not a relaxing, sitting looking at my magazine type thing either. Usually one of them poops, or needs to poop too. Maybe I have 'uptomyelbowsinpoop' syndrome really. So we stay home. Or we occassionally entertain others at Target.

My girlfriends and I are planning our first annual scrapbooking retreat at a house in Lake Tahoe this March. We discussed the details at scrapbook night this past Saturday. I'm looking *so* forward to going. I think I'm going to start planning my pages now so I don't have to bring absolutely everything. It's fun to just sit and basically assemble the pages once I get up there. Plus, with all the chatting that we do, I can't be responsible for putting everything together from scratch. Plus, I think we are bringing wine. =)

Alright, I'd better go see why the kids have suddenly gotten so quiet....

So, a note to the 4 of you, who read my blog...

2009-01-06T08:42:00.000-08:00

I apologize. I get irritated when the blogs I go to don't have an update..... and then I quit going there all together. I am guilty of not knowing where to start, so I don't do anything. I scrap like that too, ya know. I like to scrap the day to day things, while the holiday pictures sit untouched. I got Halloween and Christmas photos printed so I can scrap the last 4 yrs worth.... It doesn't help that between 3 cameras, I have over 330 pictures of this Christmas...... *sigh*

So. In a nutshell, this is what the Loop Troop has been up to. The kids were out of school for 2 weeks for the holiday. We had Nana, Grandma & Mr. Lee, and Uncle Billy & Aunt Jayne here for Christmas. We had people sleeping on air mattresses everywhere. Good food and fun was had by all. Santa brought Declan a deluxe Matchbox cars track, that does like 4 or 5 tricks. Teagan got a bike of her own, and Maren got a pony riding toy. Pink, of course.

Christmas Eve

Maren's pink pony!

The Bean on her new bike.... the laminate floors are great for riding it in the house.

Bub taking a peek into his stocking.

We celebrated the New Year with friends Sara (Declan's future wife, only she doesn't know it!) and Nikki. We were the last to leave again this year, and were home by 10:30 or so. I was in bed before midnight. My Mom stayed home with Maren so she could hit the hay and we could have 1 less kiddo to be on the lookout for.

Declan started Karate on the 5th. This is the first organized anything he has done. Bless his heart, he is *so* cute doing his moves. He was so excited, and I'm glad we waited to do something he wanted to do. Teagan can do ballet once she is potty trained (I KNOW!!!). I can't even remember what it's like to only have 1 kid in diapers... we've been keeping someone in business over the past 5 1/2 yrs. And I can honestly say I have been up to my elbows in it. I have done my time. Sheesh.

Alright, I don't want to overdo it and burn myself out so early in the year... =)

2008-12-27T11:34:00.000-08:00

There is nothing which is more necessary and more precious in the experience of human childhood than parental love.... nothing more precious, because the parental love experienced in childhood is moral capital for the whole of life.... It is so precious, this experience, that it renders us capable of elevating ourselves to more sublime things--even divine things. It is thanks to the experience of parental love that our soul is capable of raising itself to the love of God. --Meditations on the Tarot

I know.. I know....

2008-12-05T08:40:00.000-08:00

It's been like foreva. And a major holiday. Well, let's see, the kids were out of school for the week of Thanksgiving. This entire week has been minimum days for parent teacher conferences, which means that Declan has gone to school in the morning instead of the afternoon. I'm not a morning person. The days that Teagan had preschool I drove back and forth to the school 3 times. Whew.

Greg has done a few more house projects, like adding shelves under the stairs. I actually took pictures so I could post the before and after, but the after part isn't done yet.

Another 'lost' dog made his way to my house. It was a little boston terrier, who Greg called "Spaz" and Declan called "Sebaz." Luckily "Oreo" did make his way back home, but he spent the night here. That was good times. Declan and I made a big "FOUND DOG" sign that we're just going to keep since all lost dogs come here. I'm sure Oreo won't be the last.

That's it for today, as I just realized the snack I packed for Declan's backpack is still sitting on the island in the kitchen.....

Applehill.... mostly pictures.

2008-11-10T20:29:00.000-08:00

While Greg and Bart tasted wine, I played with the kids on the beautiful yard at Boeger Winery. Maren was enjoying scooting all over the place. I had to take her socks off when they got soaking wet and freezing. She had a wondrful time, and I fear she is going to wear the bottom off all of her pants. Greg calls her "Scooter McLoop."

You know you are an adult when this is how you think...

2008-10-28T13:06:00.000-07:00

So I have this long email all typed out to send to my girlfriend V, and then suddenly it's gone. Poof. I was going to attempt to give her a giggle or 2 at my expense, and give her the blow by blow of my morning thus far. You know, the life of a stay at home Mom. Well, go grab a drink, and I'll see if I can remember that far back...

6:50 - Teagan gets in bed with us. Wiggles and squirms.

7:00 - Greg's alarm goes off. He gets out of bed, turns on the light in the bathroom (blinding me) and then goes downstairs (grrrr).

7:20 I can't take Teagan's wiggling and squirming any more so I get out of bed. I plan to get in the shower after brushing my teeth and putting my contacts in, but Greg gets in before I can.

7:25 - Here comes Declan

7:46 - Greg needs me to find a notary in the area (it's a long story...) so I take the kids downstairs and proceed to look for notary.

8:00 - We go out to take the carseats out of the van, and fold the seats flat.

8:06 - I notice 2 dogs wandering around across the street, of course because all lost dogs find their way to my house eventually (that is where Hamish would have ended up Cheri!). I recognize these dogs from our neighborhood, I've seen them at the park. Collars, but no tags. I proceed to spend the next 20 minutes attempting to capture and leash these 2 dogs who were rather enjoying their newfound freedom. I tie them to the tree in the front yard in case their owner happens to be driving around the neighborhood looking for them. I get a blanket for them to lay on and a bowl of water to drink. Then I decide to make a "LOST DOGS" sign to hang on the tree so that no one thinks I just tied my dogs to the tree in my front yard.

8:30 - I warn Declan and Teagan to stay away from the dogs as I don't know if they've eaten today, don't want them munching on one of the kids (who by the way have been unsupervised for the last 20 minutes). I leave the front door open so we can keep our eye on the dogs thru the screen door.

8:33 - Maren is up, so I get her breakfast going.

8:35 - Milo and Otis notice the dogs out front, bark like mad and Milo craps the entire way to the garage. good times.

8:36 - Begin the pick up/disinfect process of said poop.

8:37 - Wash hands and resume Maren's breakfast.

8:47 -Notice that one of the dogs has backed out of her collar. Is running loose again. I go tighten her collar a smidge and coax her back to the leash. I think she is insulted.

8:55 - Sit down to write email to V - the rest is history.

And now, as I sit here I begin to think. Maybe I should have just let the dogs wander on. I mean, I would want someone to get my dogs if they were on the lamb. But things like, what if one of the dogs gets hurt here, or eats a non-diet food while here. I mean the dogs look like they enjoy their chow. What if one is diabetic and eats a non-diabetic dog bisquit or something, and then the owner sues us. The UPS guy brought a box while I was in the shower, what if one of those dogs would have attacked him? And then he sues us??

Then I start to wonder when I got *so* cynical? When did I truly start to believe that no good deed goes unpunished? Let's just hope that I can figure out a way to return these dogs to their owner...

I am saying a prayer for you My Friend!

2008-10-24T13:12:00.000-07:00

This post is for a very dear friend, who is suffering a broken heart today.

I'm so sorry...

God Asked the Feline Spirit

God asked the feline spirit "Are you ready to come home?"

"Oh, yes, quite so," replied the precious soul. "And as a cat, you know I am most able to decide anything for myself."

"Are you coming then?" asked God

"Soon," replied the whiskered angel. "But I must come slowly My human friends are troubled For You see, they need me, quite certainly."

"But don't they understand?" asked God,"That you will never leave them? That your souls are intertwined, for all eternity, That nothing is created or destroyed, It just is... forever and ever and ever?"

"Eventually they will understand," replied the cat, "For I will whisper in their hearts - that I am always with them I just am... forever and ever and ever."

— Author Unknown

The Scooter...

2008-10-23T14:25:00.000-07:00

So this is how Maren chooses to get around (second to being carried of course!). I've been trying to get video of her whistling too, because this girl is not a 1 trick pony (*phews!*). Guess I don't need to worry about her burning the knees out of her pants, it will be the tootie! She's pretty proud of herself though, and that is all that matters!

Today was the big field trip to the pumpkin patch on the school bus day. Bless these little kids hearts, they were so excited. Declan couldn't go to sleep last night, he was up until 10:45! I went to take pictures of them getting on the bus. Once they were all sitting I got on the bus to take pictures and you couldn't even see them sitting in the seats, their little heads were below the seat backs!

Here they are lining up to get in. Declan is holding hands with his buddy Ian, and the little dude in the striped shirt behind them is another friend Mateo. Declan and Ian got on the bus together, but were separated once on the bus... I'm guessing they were a danger of getting wild. Hmmmmmm.

The windows are pretty dark, but Declan is sitting in the window directly above the "L" of "School" You can see his noodle, and he was waving like crazy to us. He told me he cried when the bus was leaving though because I wasn't going too *cry*. This is the first time I haven't gone with him to anything. My little dude is growing up....

Here is the fence down the side of the house. We're going to put pavers down and bring the garbage cans out instead of in our back yard. Aren't we thoughtful, conscientious neighbors?? =)

This is the front of the house. The new lights and the fence from the front. I think it's sad we've lived here for 10 years and are just now doing things we could have been enjoying all along. Oh well, what can ya do?

We've got a shed coming for the side yard, which needs leveled and pavers too. Then who knows what is next. The lights look really nice at night, and it's cool the kids can play out in the driveway after dark, because now they can see!

A few more fun photos!

2008-10-22T16:27:00.000-07:00

I took the kids to the community Halloween festival on Saturday evening at our local tennis club. They were so excited to dress up and go out. I bet they think that was Halloween. Declan wants to be Spiderman again this year (good for pocketbook, bad for scrapbooks). Teagan is a Carebear (no clue which one this is... please post if you know!). And Maren is a princess, of course! Here is the Loop troop:

Greg has been busy with 'projects' every weekend (I think he likes having an excuse to get out of the house and go to Home Depot and Lowe's alone...). He's added coach lights to the front of the house, and this past weekend we put a decorative fence up on the side of the house. I'll go take some pictures and load them here for you to see. We've also met maximum capacity of the overhead storage he did over the summer in the garage. I'm on my constant organize and purge crusade. Man we have a lot of sh!t. =)

A Little of this, a little of that..

2008-10-17T09:23:00.001-07:00

I took Teagan on her preschool's field trip to the pumpkin patch. It was a nice little group of *quiet* kids. Nothing like last year, when Declan was there with his preschool friends. I'm probably going to end up being glad I'm not going with the entire kindergarten class next Thursday. I pity the families that happen to go on that same day, but I digress. I did volunteer to do a class scrapbook for his kindergarten class, and I'll have no pictures to scrap from the pumpkin patch trip.... maybe I'll be able to help out at the party they have in the classroom....

Here are the girls, in their matching 'sparkly' shirts from Nana.

Maren was pretty interested to meet another of her brethren (I joke that the kids are billy goats - everything goes in their mouths). She thought she saw some resemblance...

The girls with their pumpkins.

Declan and Teagan are going to "Boo" a few neighborhood friends, so we made a few little bags with Halloween goodies in them to put on their front door. Declan *loved* putting them together and is so excited to give them out. I think we'll take a walk this evening and do it. I took a pictures of the bags...

We went to the Dollar Store last night to get things for the Boo bags, and swung by Taco Bell for a good nutritious dinner. Once Maren got ahold of the cup, there was no getting it away from her.
This is what a baby enjoying root beer looks like:

This is said baby after someone finally got the cup back.

Now, I know what many of you are thinking. Your appalled that we are giving the baby soda. Let me be the first to say none of the others got soda this young. Your thinking her teeth are going to rot before she even get them. But it hasn't ruined any of our teeth!

Can you believe that 13 yrs ago

2008-10-07T08:52:00.001-07:00

Greg and I got married??? It was our anniversary on the 5th. We went camping in Colombia for the weekend... in the rain. And the batteries were dead on the camera, so I don't even have proof. But it was FUN! Our site was PERFECT and the set up was great. I would have actually scrapped the photos had I taken any. Colombia is an old gold mining town that has been turned into a state park, and is basically a museum. Most of the buildings are open so you can walk through the town on a self guided tour.

The kids are in the school groove. Teagan's preschool class is going to the pumpkin patch next week, and Declan's class has a field trip coming up too. One where he will *gulp* ride on a bus. He also lost another tooth while we were on our way home from camping. Little bugger got $5 from the ill-prepared tooth fairy. I'd like to make a tooth fairy pillowcase, or pillow to hang on the door knob.

Alright, that's my update for now...

Never a Dull Moment...

Christmas Happened Here too!

Some Halloween, a sunset and a Birthday.

Been Busy Bees Over Here!

An Obvious Hiatus...

Just for fun!

The Backdeck and Chickens

The Playset - ala'complete!

Let's just jump right in ...

A few more fascinatingly interesting random things...

Chicken Math...

Nermackerdoshious. AKA Otis.

More Random Updates...

Ten Random Things....

The "Spa" post

I think he wants chicken for dinner....or breakfast!

I'm going to just skip over Christmas...

Man. That house is YELLOW!

Catch Up...

We've owned this house 1 year today!

Some House Pictures

So I Found the PERFECT car!

It's been, like, forevah.

Just a few more...

A Few Things I've Learned...

The post.

Okay, I'm working on a post....

And then the chicken said....

Well, it was inevitable......

I imagine you're all on the edges of your seats...

Updates from the "farm"

The Maren Get-up.

You might be a red neck....

Okay, finally...

If you were my camera's USB cable....

Adding pictures.

Allergy testing and adding some pictures.

Scrap Camp 2010...

Sorry to keep you hanging!

Well, today wasn't the day..

With the Asthma again....

Challenged.

Heaven is a luckier place today....

Christmas in Coloma

Goodbye, Sabalo Way!

Stand by.... looking for the USB cord....

End of October photos...

Cha cha changes....

*3* Offers on our house!

Well, We didn't Close on the 16th...

Green Acres is the life for me.... I think.

Busy, busy...

Before Summer Ended

But then it was all good again...

And then this happened...

Some photos of the 'Firsts'

The *REAL* Party.

Maren Turned 2!

The Kids Were Playing Hospital...

So, back to my grain mill.....

Camping Pictures.

Are you ready for some serious cuteness?

Hello? Is this thing on?

Here's Otis.

Teresa is turning into a foodie????

The Definition of Life...

More House con't.

Changed name of post to hopefully stop spam!

It's no "Sierra Real" but it's pretty close!

Just a little more for today...

I'm a 10:00 - 2:00 Kinda Gal...

So take a look at this beauty!

The Country Life is for Me!

Question with a 5yr old.

Getting my Nutrition learn on...

Well?

Maren's own post.

This...

The Par-tay...

Ohhh yeah....

3 Offers on our house!

The REAL Party.

Bye bye Lake Tahoe.. cry