Dark Hair

So what do you think?

No-Show

We had our first no-show on the house today. I had a lady call yesterday at 2:30 while the kids were napping and said that she wanted to come at 3:00. I was unfortunatly in the middle of dying my hair (I will post pics later of that!) and since both of the kids were down to sleep I was in no way ready for her to come see the house. We scheduled for this morning and she didn't show. At least my house is clean! It's been great not having to do dishes or sweep for once during the kids naps! I don't think I wrote this earlier but we had 11 people (families) come to our open houses last weekend. We are getting so much traffic and phone calls everyday but no offers. We have an open house tomorrow and on Sunday too. We will continue these until we get a contract!

Update on my dad

I got a call from him this evening and all of his blood tests came back normal!!!!! Praise God!!! He is so good! Thanks for all of your prayers!

Ariel Dancing

Ariel loves to play with this singing Elmo. She rarely gets to play with it because Caleb usually takes it from her as soon as she starts playing with it. The sharing concept is not easily learned!

Mother Moments

Wow, today has been hectic. I have once again cleaned my house from top to bottom. This is so hard when you are trying to keep two little ones occupied! Either one of them needs something (milk, paci, different cartoons, more snacks) or one of them is getting hurt (Ariel losing her balance while trying to stand or Caleb blowing things way out of proportion when Ariel takes something from him). But I did manage to get it all done before 11:00. At 11:00 it's like an alarm sounds and then the kids flip a switch and get soooo cranky (this happens at 5:00 as well). There was a mom in my spring bible study that called it the Parana Hour...SO TRUE!!! I feel as though I am just being gnawed at the ankles by these kids when it comes to meal time.

I have had the hardest time getting Caleb to eat. Last night was the first time in over a week that he has eaten a "good" meal. And for lunch today he ate maybe two sunchips and one or two bites of his applesauce (I fixed a grilled cheese sandwich for both of them to share, I gave one half to Ariel and then the other half to Caleb, Ariel ended up eating almost the whole thing since Caleb didn't touch it!) As soon as I sat Ariel in the highchair for lunch, she started screaming which she rarely does. I looked in her mouth and she has her first tooth in!!! FINALLY!! Lower left bottom. But she cried on and off in between eating the grilled cheese and carrots that I had served her for lunch. I ended up taking her out of the chair and then just holding her, that still didn't work so I ended up giving her some ibuprofen. She was rubbing her eyes a lot so I decided I would go and change her diaper and then try to put her down for her nap. When I was changing her diaper I had no idea that she had been in a dirty diaper for probably more than an hour (which may have been the reason why she was screaming in her chair). She had already had a little touch of a diaper rash but now it is raging. I feel like such a terrible mom. I normally rely on my nose to tell me whether or not she is dirty and since I have had this stuffy nose for almost three weeks I wasn't able to do the sniff test.

She screamed when I wiped her obviously so I ran to the bathroom and got a warm wash cloth and then just left the diaper off. I wrapped her in a towel and then rocked her for a few minutes and she went straight to sleep (she NEVER falls asleep in my arms so this was an amazing feeling for me). As I was sitting there rocking her Caleb comes in and wants to do his "Lesson"...the one that I shared with you about a few days ago. I told him that I was rocking Ariel because she wasn't feeling well and that I would get it for him when I put her in her crib...he threw a fit!!! Started whining and complaining so loud that it woke Ariel up. Needless to say I was mad! So I went ahead and was going to put a diaper back on her terrible red bottom but it was just oozing and I didn't have the heart to just cover it up again and not let air get to it. I left her in the towel and then placed her in the crib, bare bottom and all. She cried for a few seconds and then was out. In the mean time, Caleb went to his room and slammed the door...he went to bed as soon as I walked in the door. Nap time couldn't have come any sooner!! There are moments when all moms (and dads too) can do is just shake their heads and say...is this really worth it? I think it is worth it, my kids are everything to me, little red bottoms, meltdowns over "lessons" and all!

Saturday

We had an eventful day today. We got up and hurried to clean the "last minute" items in our house for our open house today. The open house started at 10:00 and lasted until 12:00 so I took the kids out and about. Caleb has been running a fever since yesterday and at one point yesterday he got so hot and had drank so much milk that he threw up. We were supposed to go to a birthday party this morning while the open house was going on but since Caleb hadn't been feeling well I decided I would just take the kids to the mall to return a few things and then go to Hobby Lobby. I was able to exchange some tights that I got for Ariel to Children's Place and that was it! Caleb started to look pale and his fever had come back and he just kept saying that he wanted to go home and go to bed. At this time it was only 10:25 and I couldn't go back to the house until 12:00. So I grabbed a blanket from the back of the van, put in a DVD and then gave Caleb some juice and he just sat in his car seat while I drove around for an hour and a half. Once we got home I put him down for a nap and when he got up he was back to normal. Not sure what he has but I pray that it goes away soon! I don't like having sick kids!!

The open house was not as great as last week. Last week we had an open house on both Saturday and Sunday and we had a total of nine people. Today we had one person that came to the open house. We had two other people come later in the afternoon and one lady is very interested in the house though so that is a plus. She is planning on coming back tomorrow.

On the way to the mall this morning with the kids my daddy called me with some news. Over the past year or so he has had severe abdominal pains on and off. The doctors have told him that they are just associated with a bacterial infection, he is given antibiotics and then sent home. Well, he had another episode that sent him to bed for a few days this last week and he decided to go back to the doctor again. They took his blood and they found that he has low white blood cell count, which means that his immune system is not working properly. The doctor said that it could be due one of two things: one being this virus that is reoccurring and weakening his system and two that it could be leukemia. I know that God's hand is in this and that Jesus is going to heal him and he and Les (his wife) believe the same thing. I am not worried in way about him but I would like all of you who read this to lift him up in prayer and pray that he is healed and that there would be no reoccurring pain in his body. He will have more results from other blood work by the end of the week.

On another note, Dan had our neighbor over today to talk to her about her faith as a Jehovah's Witness. Dan and I are in no way believers in what they believe but it is interesting to hear what they have to say and then try to back it up with biblical christian principles. Basically, I am not sure she really knows what she believes in because she could barely answer all of the questions that we had for her. Some of the things that they believe in are really odd and Dan and I were just trying to see if she could bring us some clarity on why they believe what they do. We are still just as confused as we were before!

We had hamburgers for dinner and then watermelon on the front porch afterwards. Came in, gave the kids a bath, played with them and then put them to bed. I am tired and I think I am going to go to sleep now. I will post a few pics tomorrow.

It's School Time!!

Well Monday marked the first day of school for most students in the area and I also decided that I would try to get some one on one time with Caleb everyday and do "Lessons" as he calls them. I bought several ABC and 123 activity books from Wal-Mart over the summer and since we have been so busy I just haven't been able to use them. After lunch everyday I put Ariel down for her nap and then Caleb and I sit on the couch or the floor together and do 2-3 pages before he goes down for his nap. He looks forward to it everyday and even asks me when we are going to do them first thing in the morning when he gets up.

I just love his face in this picture. This is the face that he makes when he in concentrating real hard on something.

He was tracing over the letters of his name in this picture. You can see also on the 3 there is a black line in the middle of it...he traces his numbers and letters as well.

The Most Common Question

Since we have put our house up sale, all of our friends and family are in aw of why it is that we are trying to sell the house that we have worked so hard on for 4 and a half years. Honestly we just can't afford it! We plan to downsize a bit and try to do an investment property (something like a duplex or commercial loft) and live in it a while and then potentially build a home sometime in the near future. We also like change. Moving to a new place sounds appealing to us and so does the profit that we will make from it. We love this house, but it is only a house, and we would love to sell it to someone who would love it as much as we do!

Here is a slideshow with the before and after pics of the house...there is a lot so it may take some time to see them all. Click on the slideshow box and then move your mouse over the pic to see the captions. Enjoy...we have come a long way!!

Red looks nice in our front yard!!

It's official, our house is now up for sale. We are so nervous and excited at the same time. I will have more pictures of before and after coming soon!

Ariel is 10 months!!

She is getting so big so fast! She is crawling around like you wouldn't believe and she is also pulling up...she will be walking before we know it. She still has no teeth but has been in the drooling process for quite some time now! She still loves to eat what we eat...no baby food for her...although she would still eat it if we gave it to her. She is sleeping through the night for the most part. She gets up around 5 or 6 am and wants a bottle but then goes right back to sleep. She has started clapping now and dancing a lot more. She says mama and dada. She learns new things daily especially with big brother around!

Family Night with Aunt Amy!

Caleb really enjoying his meal!! He had it all over his face!

Miss Blue eyes in Daddy's lap.
Ariel and Aunt Amy
The Spread: We had Hamburgers, baked potatoes and sauteed squash and zuchini and cantalope...yummy!

Little Ariel watching out for food thieves!!
Dinner on the patio!
Caleb's after dinner performance!

(if you want to pause the music go to the bottom of this page and press pause)

For You PAPA (my daddy)

Caleb was playing with this little black dog the other day. It was actually my black dog when I was a little girl but it has a huge sentimental value to it so I have kept it all these years. When I was about Caleb's age my mom and dad got a dog from a pound called the "Dumb Friends League" in Denver and it was a black lab mix female and they named her Chesa. She was the greatest dog ever and my dad had trained her and loved her as one of his own. A few years later, I got this little black dog as a gift and my dad decided to put a red collar on it since Chesa always wore red collars and the tag that was actually on Chesa's collar when we got her from the pound. Chesa passed several years back and this is a little reminder to my daddy on how much Chesa meant to me!

By the way, he calls the little black dog Chesa now and sleeps with it every night!

Crazy Little Caterpillar

Two weeks ago, Caleb was on the back patio playing and he came in and said that there was a big green worm on the concrete and he wanted smoosh it. I went out to take a look at it and it was this really pudgy Caterpillar. I decided to go in and get a jar and told Caleb that we would keep it in the jar until that evening and then let it go. Well I got distracted and the Caterpillar ended up staying in the jar all night. The next morning I looked at him and there were strings of silk coming off of him and he was stuck to the side of the jar. I decided that he was probably trying to cocoon himself and thought it would be cool to watch. Well the next day he was already in his tight green cocoon with silk coming off of him. We watched everyday and on Sunday morning he was a huge black butterfly...Absolutely amazing! I have never seen a Caterpillar go trough metamorphosis before, I only wish that Caleb would have been old enough to really understand. They did have an episode on Wonderpets last week about a little caterpillar changing into a butterfly, still not sure if he understood! And yes we did let him go. It was before church yesterday morning and all he did was hang out on one of our patio chairs for a few hours and then he was gone!

This was the day after we found him...you can kinda see the silk spinning off of him.

This is the third day that we had him after he had spun his cocoon.

This was two weeks later. Big and Beautiful.

Caleb looking at him.

This is his wing span.