Five For Friday Rewind

1. I never like finding new doctors, places to eat, and especially getting my hair done. Unfortunately it's inevitable to make new choices moving into a new territory. After asking around, I had several recommendations as to where I should get my hair cut. But, the bottom line for me is I don't like spending a lot of money on my hair. It's one of my least favorite things about me. Anyways, after making several phone calls and gasping at outrageous prices for hair (people I know are paying close to $200!) I settled for Sara. I went out on a limb this time and told her I wanted a Reese Witherspoon haircut. I normally never go for the famous haircuts, because truth be told they almost always don't turn out the way you envisioned them. Actually the last I did that (way back in New Orleans) I looked like Dorothy Hamill! I must say I was pleased with the results and really I can't complain too much since I only go twice a year.

ta da!

2. Friday was my dreadful trip to Sam's Club. I hadn't been in weeks which means I needed to stock up on several items, not to mention my lack of freezer space! It makes me crazy. However, after coming home and cooking up all of my hamburger meat (I do this to freeze it into bags) It makes it so convienent to grab cooked meat to prepare dinner. I couldn't help but realize how much I LOVE my gas stove. I was completely terrified at first of the thought of owning gas, but after I got used to it, it has been so handy. And cooks in less the time!

3. After himming and hawing for several weeks, I took one of my musically inclined friends over to play the piano I have been drooling over. I knew the outside was beautiful, but as most know the inside is the key to a good piano. Martha brought her daughter along who is an amazing pianst to test out the keys. Upon leaving she turned to me and said, "if you don't buy this I will!" With those words, I knew I couldn't pass up this steal. We brought her home on Saturday. I love that this room is starting to fill in. Yay!

4. Last night Doug and I went out for the first time in what seemed like weeks. We normally go out at least one night each weekend, but due to crazy schedules, vacations and what not it hasn't happened. He decided to take me to one of his latest most favorite restaurants, Firebirds. We ended the night going to see Eagle Eye. In my opinion it was entertaining, but pretty cheesy. We definitely need some good movies to be released, there haven't been any for sometime.

5. I failed to mention over our vacation that Jared has become even more infacuated with legos. When we were up at Craig and Esther's last weekend, my cousin Ryan had just about every Star Wars lego in a box that you could imagine. The look on Jared's face was priceless. I am kicking myself for not even photographing what he accomplished in just a short amount of time. He was beyond excited when Ryan allowed him to open up this brand new box of legos. Jared spent hours (2 straight days to be exact). Each minute he had he worked at getting it together. We caught him up with a flashlight at midnight! Since then Doug has figured out that you can get online and find various instructions how to build different ships, etc. Due to our big stash (can you see on the floor) we have plenty to concoct just about whatever you want. I have to admit it's nice to have Jared entertained for hours without hearing the words, I am bored mom!

Our lego boy!

The Whopper

Playing catch up on our family and thoughts that come in and out of my head are often hard. Much of the time you forget the little things that happen on a daily basis, so instead of posting several old posts I have decided to present the "whopper" post if you will. Last week we had our pinewood derby. Jared's car obviously wasn't the fastest, but I think he still had a lot of fun. And as most of you know the dad's were WAY more in to it than the boys. Doug was already talking about their next year car and how he would modify it to be faster.


Obviously, the house has consumed my thoughts, emotions, etc. I have been trying to be good about taking all realtor's feedback with a grain of salt. Most of the comments have been nice, such as nice well maintained home. One in particular (who came late and without notice) left a lengthy comment expressing how our home needs better staging. A week went by and I decided that our "kid" area really isn't practical to most. For us it works great, but in a market of people with "no imagination" visual seems to work best. Because I have the greatest friends (seriously) my house has now turned into a formal living area. Angie brought in furniture and other knick knacks for my house and rugs, Sara allowed me to borrow her mirror and sconces. My house has turned into more of a "model" home appearance if you will. Her is our newly improved design to sell look.........

(before)

(after)

more decorative touches

Unfortunately, since our staging makeover we have only had one showing. The interesting thing to me was they wanted a more open home. I thought my house was pretty open, but apparently my views are biased. What do you think??

the yummy Cafe Rio grub

Moving on to last weekend, the Gordon's invited a few families over for a delicious Mexican food bar. She made Cafe Rio pork and I brought in some restaurant tortillas (from Chuy's of course), along with some Cafe Rio tomatillo sauce. We may not have Cafe Rio here in Texas, but it was a pretty close tie I must say to tasting like the real stuff.

Nicole, Angie, Jenny and Ellice

Sadly, the rest of this week is a blur between baseball games, dance, renewing my temple recommend, Doug being consumed with high school physicals, and a head band party I am just happy that it's Friday. Oh, and I failed to mention I even passed up on my 2 year blogging anniversary! It's crazy to think it's been that long and 700 posts later. I hope to catch up with you all soon!

Whiny Wednesday & Good Mail

Our house has almost been up for 4 weeks. We have already lowered our price and added that we would contribute to some closing costs. I shouldn't complain, we have had about a dozen potential buyers looking, but no one has decided to bite. I think the hardest thing for me is most of the homes in our neighborhood sold in 3 weeks time, which often makes me wonder what is wrong with our house? Does is smell? Is it ugly? Granted the vinyl flooring in our kitchen is ick. It's ugly, dull, and has TONS of scuff marks (it's 10 years old) I haven't liked it from the moment we moved in. However, since we replaced the carpet, new flooring just wasn't in our budget and now, well it's too late. I figured if that was the biggest hang up we could throw in some incentive money at closing. We have a feedback website that I check almost as much as email when we have showings. The bummer part is not all realtor's leave comments, or if they do often times I get my hopes up. I can't change my floor plan (we have had a few that didn't like that). The upside of our neighborhood is it is a starter home with a lot of turnovers, and the cost of our home is quite cheap compared to some of our surrounding neighborhoods. I know it will sell in time, I just wish I knew when. Doug jokes that maybe we should get one of those obnoxious neon signs to place above our garage that blinks "buy me" Ha!

Taylor in action making a base hit!
(my camera skills suck)

Baseball season has kept us busy with 4 games a week and 2 practices mixed in. It hasn't been too terrible other than Jared's team just can't seem to make a win. I feel bad for the coach and the kids. It's discouraging on both ends. The baseball fields may seem like a second home to us right now, but there is a perk. At the beginning of the season they sold refill cups for $20 which allows you to fill up your cup endlessly until the end of the year. It was the BEST thing I invested in. Taylor has surprisingly enjoyed softball more than I imagined. She has even expressed interest in pitching. However, her games are long and painful. The first three innings aren't so bad because they are using the machine for pitching. The last innings on the other hand are the girls throwing wild pitches (and most don't throw strikes) allowing most to walk and then they steal bases to score the runs. Not very entertaining if you ask me.


This week is Fiesta in San Antonio. The easiest way to describe it is a Mexican party with a lot of food. I like to refer to it as a wanna be Mexican Mardi Gras. My kids even get this Friday off in honor of the Battle of the Flowers. Harsh, I know. But, New Orleans really just knows how to throw a party and Mardi Gras is actually really fun! Eating greasy food, hanging out with friends for an entire day, loosing your voice due to screaming for silly beads is my thing. Here they eat tamales (not my favorite), crack hollowed eggs filled with confetti, and have a parade. Sadly, Doug and I don't even consider parades anymore (or my kids for that matter) We have grown accustomed to having goodies thrown at us, stuffed animals, beads, candy, etc at Mardi Gras. Who wants to attend a parade just watching someone wave? Not me. Call me a Mardi Gras snob, I am okay with that.


Tonight is our pine wood derby. With, Wednesday being crazy carting Taylor around from 4-6pm, I don't even really want to go. I want to veg on the couch, ya know? Perhaps a little American Idol or Ace of Cakes? But, Jared has been anxiously awaiting this day to race this red car and if I wasn't there to support his first derby I would be that mom. Doug purchased the car pre-made, forgetting about the rules. For some that may seem as cheating, but in our defense most of our tools have been packed up and time sorta was an issue as well. Despite, all of that they were pretty stoked as to how it turned out. Doug feared it may be over the 5 oz or the "legal weight" but, I took it to the post office and they have about .8 to spare. I am interested to see what the other boys came up with.


Lastly, I received these to cards in the mail, one from Michelle and the other from Amie. My mailbox has been getting some major neglect since we have completely resorted to online banking. Which means we rarely get anything "worthy" except junk mail. These lovely's were sent last week on different days(which I failed to document) and truly made my day. It's always nice to get a thoughtful note from a fellow blogger. I love warm and fuzzy mail. Anyways, I think that is enough whining for one day. Is is Friday yet?

Five For Friday

Kitchen/Family Room area

1). All the stars aligned yesterday and we were able to go forward with the house!! Since the house was still in the “building” phase we were able to go to the design center to pick out tile, carpet, etc.

Talk about overwhelming! It was fun, yet exhausting. We were there for nearly 7 hours. And that is no joke. They had amazing floor models of full size kitchens, bathrooms, lights, you name it. I am just hoping that the little squares I chose will look okay once they are installed.

Taylor posing in front of San Tan Elementary

We are looking to close at the end of June. My kids will start school July 28th (I need to get them registered.) I am starting to gear up for year round school. I can’t believe how close that is!

2). My in-laws have seriously been saints all week. They have offered and taken my kids each day full time while Doug and I have been traveling back and forth to sign paperwork and get other things ready for his new office. Taylor and Jared have had a blast playing with cousins and learned a new game with their grandparents (toss-up). They have made bread, cooked ribs and a few batches of cookies.

Making cookies with grandma Dorothy

3). We made it out to the Easter Pageant Wednesday night. I invited my dad, his wife, Justin and my grandma to attend. It was a treat to be able to go since it has been nearly 20 years since I saw it last. It is pretty impressive to see such a large crew put on an hour show.

It was a live production of the church movie Jesus the Christ. I thought it was a great production, but got a little long towards the end. Due to the late start time (8pm) my kids were conked out before it was over.

Tired folk walking back to the car.

4). After driving around the past few days getting our barrings for our new area, I discovered we are only 10 minutes exactly away from my sister’s house, 10 minutes from a mall--Chandler or San Tan (depending on the direction) and 5 minutes from grocery stores. Another bonus is Janet has a pool—which we wont' have for another year. Yippee!

(Sunday before Easter)

5). I can’t believe we are less than 2 days away from Easter. I feel that we were robbed the month of March with three major holidays St. Patrick’s Day, Spring Break AND Easter. It will be bitter sweet this year since we will get to spend Easter with our family, the downside is we will also be loading back up in the car after Grandma’s egg hunt to drive home. BUT, this is the last trip we will be driving just to vacation. I can’t believe I am writing that June is right around the corner.

blessing: getting qualified for our house.

13 Miles, 27 Steps

I still need to take down junk off the fridge

I have come to the conclusion I have fooled all of you, including myself that I am a clutter free person. To several individuals I am the throw away/organize queen (not sure if this is a good or bad nickname) Anyways, I even have my kids trained to come home from school hand me important papers and discard everything else in the trash. The school sends home a ridiculous amount of unnecessary paper. I think we have thrown away a few trees. Sad. But true. Instead of packing up things and dejunking stuff right before we put the house up for sale I decided to do one room at a time. Baby steps. I thought I would pack up table cloths/place mats and other holiday decor. We won't be around for St. Patty's or Easter this year and no other holidays fall in between. I literally spent ALL day going through cupboards and throwing away stuff I no way would want in a new home or to move for that matter. And the disturbing thing is you can't even tell by opening up my cabinets. They are still, full, full, full. (no exaggeration) I did however pack 4 boxes. That is something right? Next up, my room (which is a SCARY sight)

Weston loves our rental car (so he says)
(Hyundai sonata)

I invited myself over (you have to do that with her) to Angie's for a day of hanging out/creating. I brought over some meatball sandwiches (yummy). Thanks for being the best hostess!


The kids get so excited about going to Maryn's because they get to pack their lunch. We are 2/2 on creative Friday's--woo-hoo!

Apparently it only took us moving 13 miles and 27 steps later in order to do that. You definitely can't say you aren't getting a work out on these babies!


blessing: having great insurance that covers a rental car! (we felt it was time to give back the suburban)