Hilarious Conversation

This conversation happened in my classroom today between my two favorite boys:)

Brandt: "Come over today"
Brady: "Where do you live?
Brandt: "In the blue house"
Brady: "Where's that?
Brandt: "You know, it's just a house that's blue"
Brady: "How do you get there?"
Brandt: "You go straight and you turn, then you go straight and you turn and you turn, and you're there"
Brady: "Okay, I'll tell my mom"

This is why I love this job:)

I Pick Door #1

Nick and I moved into our home on Labor Day 2008. We'd been married about 2 1/2 months and I'd been working about 3 weeks. It was a crazy time. We had so much stuff. He'd moved into my duplex at the beginning of July, sort of. He moved in clothes and stuff and that's about it. We knew we'd start looking for a house pretty soon and this is the first house we ever looked at. We fell in love immediately. It was the lowest price (in our budget range) with the most ammenities.

In the year and a half since we've lived here, we've done so much work! Every wall was white, so we've painted everything except for the two guest bedrooms because I don't want to paint them and then in the near future, paint again when we turn them into nurseries. A lot of things were also outdated. Lots of gold fixtures. We've replaced every single fan with deep bronze fans and the light fixtures in the hall with deep bronze fixtures. There was dark green carpet in the front office, but we ripped it out last summer and put hardwood down. It looks amazing. We also have dark green carpet in the two guest bedrooms, we when we turn them into nurseries, we will rip it out and replace it, as well. Also, many things are just plain jane. Plain doors, plain doorknobs, plain trim. We have bought some crown molding, we just haven't had a chance to put it up yet. We are planning on retiling the bathrooms and the entryway, but we haven't done that yet, either. These things take time! And money! One thing at a time. Nick wants our house to forever be a project. He always wants to work on improving it.

Today, doors!!! He is in town getting us a new door, as I write this. He's only buying one so he can make sure he can do it himself; well with my help:) When he figures out how to do it, we'll purchase the others. I'm so excited about this. It will look so different! It will also be a lot of fun:) A project we get to do together to make our home more wonderful!

We are so very blessed to start off with the house we did. I can see us living here for a long time. That is so exciting to me. I imagine us bringing home babies here and having many birthdays and Christmases here. I am excited for what will happen to us in the next few years, but I'm really excited for what will happen today. Another chance to use the things God has blessed us with to improve our home.

Goodbye, Plain Jane!


Welcome home, new doors!


P.S. I will post when we get the doors done:)

A Week of Birthdays

This week has been so busy! Last Monday we headed to my parents house for my sister's birthday party. Her birthday was actually on Wednesday, but because of church commitments, we celebrated on Monday. My grandparents, aunt, uncle, and cousins were all there to celebrate with us.

Cassie's birthday has always been special because she was born on my dad's birthday. They always shared a bond that no one else could know. Since he's been gone, her birthday has become a time of remembrance. He would've been 50 this year! That's a big birthday. We wonder what kind of party we would've had for him, if he would've had gray hair, if he would've looked older, how our lives would be different...It's always a very neat time. Sad, but neat.

Yesterday, we celebrated a big birthday with Nick's dad. He turned 60. We had a huge bash for him. Tons of friends, tons of food, tons of music, and family. This was a bittersweet party for me. I wish I could've done that for my own dad. Such big birthdays and so many memories made.

What a wonderful time to reminisce!

Never Know What You Got Til It's Gone

As I start this post, let me first say, that this is not such a big thing that we lost. We only lost it for a day, but it is one of those things that we very much take for granted...

Our Heater!

On Thursday afternoon I headed to Joplin for a doctor's appointment. Since we didn't have school, I had put a roast in the oven and gotten a dinner ready for Nick's mom and step-dad. Nick's brother works for the University of Alabama and they were playing in a little game against Texas Thursday night, the National Championship.

When I returned home from Joplin at about 5p, I saw Nick staring at our thermostat. Not only that, he had a stocking cap on and he never wears one in the house. He then told me our heater was not working. Not only that, but when it did kick on, it would blow out cold air!

This is not good any time during the winter, but especially when it's going to be -19 degrees windchill. Yikes! Also, we had company coming over.

We decided to start a fire, plug in our two space heaters and hope that blankets, family, and a good game would help keep our minds off the cold. It worked for the evening. We put our space heaters in our bedroom about an hour before we went to bed, got a couple extra blankets, and drifted off to sleep. Oh, we also wore sweatshirts, sweatpants, and socks to bed.

I had to go to school for a few hours on Friday (without students) and our heater was supposed to be fixed by the time I got home at noon. It wasn't and our house was 49 degrees. It was freezing. We prayed that it would be a quick fix and not too expensive. The good Lord answered our prayer.

They came at 2:30, fixed the problem, and it cost us nothing! We were so excited and now we can leave our stocking caps, scarves and gloves in the closet. Yippee! Except of course, when we have to head outside.

All this to say, there are so many things we take for granted. We normally never have to worry about our heat coming on, our lights turning on, our cars starting...all this thanks to our Lord.

Remember to give thanks to Him today for the little things:)

The Apple of My Pie

Happy New Year friends!

Notice the above picture...this is me, my husband, my sister, and her boyfriend when we had Christmas at my house. We all got fleece pajama pants for Christmas. The boys are wearing their favorite teams, my sister and I are wearing "New Moon" t-shirts. For my gift, she created a box of fun. It was filled with all sorts of things and this shirt was one of them. She bought herself a t-shirt also, so we could wear them on Christmas:) Mine is "Team Edward". Hers is "Team Jacob". She's silly, but so much fun:)

Anyway, back to the subject of my post. I made a pie over the holidays. Actually, I made two of them. I got a new pie plate from my father-in-law's girlfriend. I love it and I really wanted to make an apple pie, so I did. I made one last Wednesday for a family dinner with my mother-in-law's cousins. I then made another one Thursday for New Year's at my parents house. I took pictures along the way because it was just so much fun to make.

Here are all the apples


Here is the pie crust


Here are the apples with all their yummy seasonings warming in the pan


Here are the seasoned apples in the pie crust


Next, the best part...the crumbles on top


Here's a better view of my new pie plate


And the finished product!


The first slice


It was so good. I was very excited about the way it turned out. Both pies I made were eaten all up:)

I will definitely make more of these pies this new year. I am so excited what this year will bring:)

Snow, Snow, Snow, Snow, Snow!!

Beautiful snow today means no school tomorrow!

I know I've had almost two weeks off, but it's been crazy. I have had little, to no, rest. I haven't even taken my Christmas stuff down, yet!

This, I will be able to do tomorrow.

I also haven't posted any pictures of Christmas or New Year, so I will be able to do that tomorrow, as well.

Praise the Lord for this extra day to get things done. It is much appreciated:)