Memorial Day

Yesterday, I took the kids to Caleb's best friend Ashlyn's Birthday Party. They had a blast playing on Ashlyn's new trampoline. We had a wonderful lunch and cake from Carbajal Bakery...WAY better than Rick's in my opinion...Shannon, Ashlyn's mom always get her cakes from there and they are SO delicious! Dan stayed back at the house to get prepared for his parents to come and help build the fence. By the time the kids and I got back to the house, Dan and his dad had already started putting the pickets up.

After the kids jumped on Granny (literally) for about an hour or so, Dan's mom (Rita) and I put them down for a nap and sat on the back deck (I LOVE IT) and sipped on tea and watched the guys work. They worked super fast. They got both privacy fences done by 8:30!!!

Rita, the kids and I went to Wal-Mart and got some flowers to go on the back deck, and also got pizza for dinner. She also paid for a full tank of gas for the van....SO nice of her to do that! After dinner, Dan's parents took Caleb home with them until Friday. It will be a nice break to only have Ariel.

I am planning on getting tons done! I have two paintings that I want to get done for Ariel's room, my friend Casey is having a garage sale this weekend so I need to go through everything and get prepared for that, I have two meals that I need to cook this week for my friends who had babies last week, I would like to spend some time with my friend Shannon since her girls are out of town with the grandparents as well, I need to go to Fayetteville and meet my friend Kara for lunch and give her her announcements that I have yet to make for her (ooops! guess I need to do that, too!), I would like to go out with my sweet husband, oh and my friend Patricia is coming in town with her husband from Chicago on Friday and I will be driving them to Eureka for a wedding that she is in. Wow...that's a lot to accomplish.

I don't have pictures of the deck and fence yet since it is raining so I will try to get some soon! Oh and the ebay and craiglist didn't pay off the first time for my paintings. I have a listing on ebay again so we will see!

What a wonderful day!

For some reason, weekends have been so stressful here lately. I am not sure if it is because we have so much going on each weekend or what but it seems that whenever Dan is home the kids get wild!! So today I decided to take a different stride on things than normal. I decided to stay home from church and just have a relaxed day with family.

Dan is still doing the paper route in the mornings so I try to let him sleep in at least a little on the weekends. Today he slept until almost 11:00...it's the latest that he has slept since he started the route in November. While he was sleeping, I let Caleb play PBS Kids games on the internet, which I don't mind him playing because they are pretty educational. I only let him play about once or twice a week so it was treat for him since I let him play for nearly an hour and a half today. While he was playing, Ariel played contently with her stroller and things on the floor. She has started this new thing where she will gather small objects, like the magnets off of the fridge, and her little people and put them in her stroller along with her purses hung from the handles (just like I do when we go shopping) and she will stroll it all over the living room and kitchen. It cracks me up because she hardly ever puts a baby in there to stroll! Anyway, while the kids were occupied and Dan was sleeping, I was able to get the kitchen cleaned...even the fridge wiped down!!

When Dan woke up at 11:00, he ate breakfast (the pancakes that I had made at 8:00!!) and then we all got ready and went to see my mom and Jim for about an hour. It was good to see them. It's amazing how well there landscaping gets each time is see their yard. They do such a good job! After we visited with them for a while (it was nearly 2:00 at this point...kids had no lunch (but I packed a lunch for them!) and it is usually their nap time for them) we took them to Tanyard Creek. The kids loved splashing and throwing rocks into the creek. Dan caught two craw-dads for Caleb and Ariel to see. Caleb wasn't sure about them but Ariel just laughed at them as they wiggled in Caleb's hand. We had a picnic lunch there and then soon after we ate, we headed home. Ariel slept on the way home but once we got to the house she was wide awake. Caleb skipped his nap all together.

Dan finished our deck tonight. Tomorrow Dan's parents are coming to help put the pickets on our fence. I will be so delighted to FINALLY have a place where I can just let the kids run! I will post some pics of the fence and deck tomorrow.

Since the deck was finished, I put the picnic table on the deck and after the kids went to bed, Dan and I enjoyed hamburgers and fried potatoes on the deck with candle light, the stars shinning over us and the lightning bugs in the distance. What a great day to start the summer!

Ariel and her stroller of things! Notice her purses on the handle!

Sweet girl!

I caught her reading Sleeping Beauty like this!

The "Tree Monster" at my mom's house...looks like it has a runny nose!

Caleb kissing the Tree Monster.

Truly a handsome boy!

Siblings in one chair.

She loved the water and throwing rocks!

Caleb and Dan trying to find Craw-dads.

(thought it was sweet that Caleb had his hand on his Daddy)

The boys found one!

Caleb Splashing!

Ariel touching the craw-dad

Selling the Paintings

Well I decided last week that I wanted to do a painting a week to get some extra spending money for the summer. The pool will be open next week so I know I will need the money for that!! So...I have posted a listing on both craigslist and on ebay just to see what happens. I have had the listing on ebay for almost 7 days and still nobody has bought anything. I have one person "watching" but not sure that will lead to anything. And I just posted a listing on cragslist yesterday. I have received two emails from that but they were apparently both spam emails, suggesting that I list my items in ebay under a catagory known as "junk and hard to find items"?? Anyway, I will let you know how it goes!

Freckles

It is inevitable that Caleb and Ariel will not live their lives with out freckles. Dan has freckles all over and so do I! Caleb is starting to get the big freckles on his back that his daddy has and he is also starting to get the really small ones across his nose. I just love small freckles on little noses. I am sure by the end of the summer he will have more!

Dave Ramsey Vehicles

For those of you who do not know this, Dan and I have just graduated from Financial Peace University!!!



What is Financial Peace University???? Click Here...

Basically it is a life-changing program that teaches you how to make the right decisions with your money all lead by an awesome leader named Dave Ramsey. FPU encouraged Dan and I as a couple to get out of debt and since January we have been able to get all of our debt paid off and have been able to save a good nest egg for ourselves. We plan on living this way forever now, and it is something that we encourage many other couples to try.



In order to get our debt paid off, we sold our truck and were able to get two vehicles and still pay down debt. We paid cash for both which was an amazing feat for us!! Dave talks a lot about people selling the vehicles that they own when first entering FPU and by the end of the program purchasing old beater cars, formally known as "Dave Ramsey Vehicles". So that is the name of the two vehicles we have purchased.



We have the van, which we paid cash for when we first bought it. We now have a 97 nissan sentra and a truck (get this...89 Ford F150, one owner and we had a mechanic look at it and he said that it was in GREAT condition!) which Dan needed for work (I will be able to explain more about his work in about a week or so....we are going through some exciting changes, but I can't say anything about it yet...just keep praying for us!) So we own 3 vehicles that all together value about $8,000! Crazy to think that but Dan and I are happy with no payments...and we REALLY don't care what the vehicles look like at this point. The most important thing to us right now is to get financially secure using cash only! We are excited to see what God has in store for us!!



One bad thing about these two vehicles that we got is that they are both standard. I can only drive automatic!! Dan tried to teach me a few weeks ago but I haven't been behind the wheel again since then. Yesterday we had to take the van in to have the cooling fans fixed so I have been stuck in the house and just pray that I don't have to go anywhere because I would not be safe on the roads!

This is Old Blue...the name will be changed to Black Beauty when she is painted flat black. Dan has ALWAYS wanted an old beater truck to paint flat black...oh joy...he got it!

Here's Caleb testing to make sure the hood is safe!

And here is the nissan. This is the car that Dan drives to work and to do the paper route in. Oh and no...that is not our boat, it's our neighbors!

Captain Jack

Updated Pic of the Kids

I took this before church on Sunday. I think Ariel is looking more and more like Dan and Caleb is looking more and more like me. They are so cute together! Oh and Ariel is sporting the pig tail look these days. Fits her personality to a T!!!

Malea's B-day Party at Aspire

Caleb was invited to Malea Shoppach's 4th Birthday Party at Aspire Gym. It was so much fun! Dan was able to watch Ariel for me so I could spend all my time with Caleb. It was nice because the last time we were there, I had Ariel with us and I wasn't able to jump on the trampoline or help him on the bars and the balance beam as much as I wanted.

Here he is on the tumble trampoline

And in the foam pit....which by the way isn't the easiest thing to get out of!

We did tons more, like, swing on a big rope and then fall into the foam pit, jump into the foam pit from a high platform, and jump on the really bouncy trampoline!

The Lewallen's

On Saturday I met some dear friends of mine (Casey and William Lewallen) at Bogle Park and took some pictures of them. They were needing a few particular poses to go in their entry in their home and they weren't wanting to pay a whole lot for them, so I was more than willing to do this for them. I think I did pretty good considering I am an amature at the whole photography thing. Thanks Casey and William for allowing me to practice!