Spraying on the insulation

It sprays on just like paint, then it expands and grows and grows!

A sideways video...just tilt your head to the left... :)

No more water inside!

Notice the ropes! Bunch-a monkeys!

I am very thankful for those monkeys!

I thought for sure this would take about 4 men.  Never underestimate the might of a mexican construction worker!

Roof is just about finished.  It will be complete today. 

We will Rebuild!

Back of the house...the screened in porch is now up a foot higher to 11 foot high ceiling.

On top of the screened in porch we made our game room bigger and at 21x27 it's now the biggest room in the house with a 16 foot ceiling at it's peak!  Can you say testosterone?!!!

The white walls are walls that we were able to salvage after the fire.  They power washed them then painted with a special sealer (thus the white color).

The front of the house...we saved most of the attached garage.

We steepened the roof to the original blue print specs...no more Christmas lights on the eve!

Our House Fire

Wednesday, June 25th, 2008 at 3PM lightning struck our beautiful house and set it a blaze while Shannon and the boys were inside. They all made it out safely but the house did not fare so well. Here are some photos taken the day after the fire: sorry some are sideways....not a whole lot of time to perfect at the moment.

This IS My Reality!

When i was in elementary school, i signed up for basketball. All i came away with was that, with that darned ball, came A LOT of pressure!!! The less time I had it in my hands, the better off i was. Then and there I realized that I did not have the competitiveness or tenacity for team sports. So I found art and grew in that for a time, but i think if i had had a great art teacher that inspired me, i would have gone farther.

Instead I found ballet. I was in the 6th grade. A girlfriend of mine said she was going to sign up at the only ballet school in smallville. My fear of trying/joining new GROUP things started early. But curiosity helped me ignore my fear and my mom brought me to the school to register. Figures.... my friend never showed.

I had never "danced" before, so they put me in the beginner class. With the LITTLE girls. I was 2 feet taller than all of them, at least! I felt rediculous. But i fell in love with the teacher! She was beautiful! Her blond flowing hair fell down past her waist - her chiffon skirt floated behind her as she walked - every bit the dream picture of a true ballerina. She inspired me! And thankfully she told me it was only temporary, that i would have to be with the itty bittys. She just needed to see ..... basically how good/bad i was. Much to my ego's pleasure, i was told i had lots of natural ability and quickly zoomed up the ladder to a class of girls my own age. I fell in love with ballet, and didn't stop until the day i graduated from highschool!

My sadness at having to give it up for practical reasons was tempered with the thought that when i had a daughter of my own some day, i would have the pleasure again, even if only as a spectator and.... ok, maybe just a little source of inspiration. I mean i would still have my video tapes of me as the Snow Queen in the Nutcracker.... (a pa de dux and everything!) just in case she would ever like to see mommy in her hayday! And so that dream got put prominently on the "Looking Forward To" shelf in my head. I even saved 1 pair of many a beat up and torturous toe shoes, tights, and my favorite skirt!

Tonight..... 15 years later..... i'v just signed two out of my three all male children up for the Cal Ripkin Farm League Baseball, - their very first organized team sport.

(Go ahead, if you need to grab a hanky... I don't mind waiting. )

This is a very big step for me. At last i have put my little dream to rest, and faced my childhood fears all at the same time!! There will be no ballet class or recital. But that's ok. I'm not alone. Every parent has dreams they would have loved to dream through their children, but never got the chance.

This is a new stage. I have new things to embrace as a mother of three sons. It's time to turn the focus off of myself. I know virtually nothing about team sports, outside of the "blond basics". So i get to look forward to broadening my horizons. I really look forward to the cheering on. I look forward to learning even more about my children. What will this bring out in them? What will surprize me? I look forward to identifying with a new group of adults. And while it' s true that we have chosen to refrain from a lot of typical childhood activities for certain reasons, but yes to others .......

it's yes to baseball! Woooo hooo! I'm scared to death, but "GO TIGERS! OR DRAGONS! OR WHATERVER THE HECK NAME YOUR TEAM WILL HAVE!

Stay tuned for pictures!

Patio Hard Labor

We've been wanting to have a patio out in our back yard for some time...so when Dan's folks came down for their annual Spring break vacation...Dad fearlessly took on the project!








We put Dad's Land Surveying talent to good use! Those retaining wall blocks are about 25lbs each!





It took a little discussion (OK maybe a lot...) but Dad figured out a good system to get our wall at the correct dropped elevation.








This was the funnest part! Fortunately no house walls were damaged!





It took 36 yard of sand to fill in our sloping back yard.





Did I mention that this was the funnest part?





The sand compactor was awesome! After it was done our shoes didn't even leave a single track in the sand.





We estimated 27 yards was needed...but by the time we figured out that we were going to be short, the tractor had to go back. So the last 9 yards we had to manually move. Good thing we had some big strong boys to help us!





It wasn't all work and no play...





Dad figured out an ingenious way to level out the sand...although Dan's back wasn't sure about the ingenious part!





Those steps were not light...but on the second try we got them in their right place!





All graded flat and ready for the pavers...





How many more do I have to put in???





Shannon was the master paver....



Dad put on the final touches by custom cutting the last blocks that abutted the retaining wall.

The last paver...Shannon will ever lay...



Celebrate good times...come on...





Nice!





Relaxation and community is what the patio is all about!

Caleb's 9th Birthday

It's hard to believe Caleb has reahed 9 years old...but he wears it well!




We decided to all go bowling...Clay was our ringer!

Christmas 2007

Nothing like putting on the bathing suit and washing the car...in December!!!

...and a little family pickin' and a grinin' the Christmas Season favorites!

Grampa Sorenson turned 70 a week or so before Christmas. Grandma Sorenson turned 70 too just a couple months prior. They sure don't look it! They also celebraned their 50th wedding anniverserary this past summer.

Clay got a little boost in his muscles for Christmas!

Gosh...what did Shannon get from Dan???

Caleb thinks this is the perfect Christmas present...Coleman doesn't look quite so sure...

Thanksgiving 2007

We had an awesome Thanksgiving this year. We had a dozen family members around our old 130 year old oak table. Mom Farrier, Grandma Hamer, Uncle Chuck Smith, Aunt Jill & Uncle Larry, Mom & Dad Sorenson and our crew.

As you can see there was no shortage of food! Mom Farrier and Mom Sorenson made their own rolls...soooo good!

Dan cooked two 13lb turkeys this year instead of one monster sized one...yum!!! An apple in the neck and an orange in the rear! Can't you just smell it now?!

We love having friends and family join us Thanksgiving. Dan no doubt enjoys Thanksgiving more than any other Holiday. In our traditional fashion, Dad Sorenson read President Lincoln's Thanksgiving Proclaimation at the table before we asked the blessing. If you haven't read it in a while be sure to click on the link below.

http://showcase.netins.net/web/creative/lincoln/speeches/thanks.htm

Also each person had a small scroll that had a personal question (Thanksgiving related) for them to answer at the end of the meal (this creates awesome discussion and great learning!).

We hope each of you had a very warm and endearing Thanksgiving!

The "Summer Vacation"

Ahhh the water. Ahhh the cool nights! Now. Just a scoop of Northern Lights, and it would be perfect. Check that. Throw in an old jeep with the top down..... Now that's heaven on earth!




This was a "pinch me" moment. I was having a post endorphin rush (warm fuzzies from all the walking walking walking) sitting in a rocking chair on THE porch of the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island. For free!! We had an entire hour in those rocking chairs, just looking out at this view....only much much wider.





We took our annual trip to Northern (lower) Michigan to stay with Dan's mom and dad....aka the Free Resort. With all that free baby sitting, we tried not to leave burnt rubber marks on grandpa's drive way as Dan and I took a lovely day trip to Mac Island. For me, the porch was the hi-light. It's where it's at!

We didn't rent a bike. We didn't rent a horse. We didn't rent a buggy. We didn't rent a buggy taxi. We used our own two feet. Flip flop clad feet. But I looked good and that was the most important thing. We walked all over the south face of the island. Up high, and down by the water. The sun was warm and the breeze cool. The flowers were just incredible. It's almost magical. In a nut shell...PER FECT!

All good things must come to an end....

..... back at the ranch, the younger generation... the boy cousins got a few good rolls in down the hill. In the soft blue grass. There's a picture of trouble if I've ever seen one!



This is the "Resort".



This is the view from the porch of the Selkirk Lake. Thanks mom and dad F for making our summers so peaceful and refreshing! We love you!



Lest you think I've taken up a hobby of sipping garden mulch... I will tell you I have broadend my horizons and cultural experiences. I am sipping a very common Brazilian tea. It's quite an art. Tea is to Brazil what coffee is to Seattle. Can't say that I'm hooked, but it was fun. Dan's niece Ashley was an exchange student in Brazil last year. While we were home, she had a "Noche de Brazilia" (Brazil Night) with lots of yummy food cooked as close to fogo as possible.



Here is all Great Grandma Hamer's grandsons all together. Jamie Hamer, Dan, brother Dean, brother Dale. Pretty neat.



Speaking of cousins... back home in Texas, I made a visit of my own to see my cousin Tony Leal and his wife Kim. They have 4 boys the same age as ours. Lord have mercy when we get together.

Now if I could just get my sisters down here again....

Long Overdue

It' has been way too long since my last post. That's because too much has happened. But I will do my best to get everyone up to speed.

This was taken on my 32nd birthday at Palottas with the Gallemore's and the Vaughns. Viva Italiano!

In June we hosted 3 boys and a music/dance teacher from the Ugandan Children's Choir. They are all orphans from Uganda. They blessed us sooooo much! We will never forget our experience. In the center is Ivan.

This is Alan (accent on the second "a"). He is an extremely intelligent and tallented young man. Only in America can they play in an otherwise priceless commodity. In Uganda, the children must walk 2 miles to the community well to fetch the heavy buckets of water. They thought they had died and gone to heaven!

This is Vincent. He loved to give me hugs! He is 10yrs old. He was found begging in the streets.

Another discovery.... the camera. Each child was given a disposable camera. They had never seen such a thing. Many took pictures of their own eye balls by accident. So every 10 minutes they would come to me... "Auntie!! Take pic-cha...take pic-cha." How could I say no!! It was funny - they kept looking on the back of their own disposables for the screen they saw on mine.

This was the music teacher. Jamil (Ya-meel) You can bet your very last dollar that we had some lessons go'n on in our living room. Tribal dancing is HARD!!!

Then later in June we had some more foreign visitors. The Boncimino's came back from their temporary home in KL ,Malaysia for a whirl wind visit. So we managed to squeeze in an hour or two with them, but really it was a cruel tease. Love you Chyrl!

Hey surfer Dan! Catch that wave babe!

Over the 4th, we went to see friends in Panama City, FL. This beach was so beautiful, I had no choice but to stay long and fry like a chicken.

Look! It's Shamoo! Washed ashore. Nice bruise!

Summer?? Bring it on!!

For All To See

Just this week I stumbled upon an art gallery here in Houston, and it’s exclusive to just one artist. This gallery is little known, it’s not down in the museum district, it’s over off of West Little York. Of course all of this artist’s pieces were for sale.

So I got there, and my friend and I were the only guests, but the gallery was pretty full of employees – I counted about 7 doing different things. One gentleman was with us the entire time and gave us a guided tour.

It was different from your typical art gallery . It was mostly a warehouse. Picture a massive building about the size of Walmart. The entrance was obscure and unmarked. There were no velvet ropes, no canned lights. Only one little corner inside by the door was lit up with a few pieces of art actually displayed. The rest of the gallery/warehouse was dim and shadowy.

Every "canvas" was about 6’tall x 8’wide. Most all of the other “canvases” were grouped together stacked upright in racks. Each rack held between 6 to 9 canvases. All originals. There were about 20 racks in a row, with big isles in between. There were about 7 rows of these rows. All filled with this artists work. Then beyond that - the other half of the building was where they stored even more artwork all in huge two story steel shelves. We're talking hundreds and hundreds of original pieces of work.

All these acres of art work was just discovered in Italy – long covered up and forgotten until now. As I started walking row after row, slowly stopping to stare in awe, literally – I caught my mouth hanging open. Even in the dim shadows with an occasional shaft of light from a sky light overhead - I was overwhelmed. There are absolutely no words to describe the beauty of what I saw. I had never seen anything its equal from Paris to London or New York.

The artist’s use of color and patterns and movement was beyond brilliant. I could tell He liked to use the rich earth tones, of brown and red, gold, silver, creams and blacks, but occasionally he would use brilliant blue and translucent green and pink. Those pieces were really expensive.

OK so maybe it wasn’t a true are gallery. Because the name of this place was Arizona Tile and Granite. And the featured artist was God.

Upon reflection, wondering how unfair it was and why every single piece shouldn't be hung, lit up on display against black velvet over plush carpet, for all the world to witness the work of the Master, I realized that these AWESOME works were not his prized and favorite pieces. In the same way the Grand Canyon is not his favorite. The Pacific Ocean, or snow capped mountains.

As I stood there in reflection, I realized His favorite work was the man driving the fork lift.
And the man talking on the walkie talkie, and the one shuffling papers, leading us around, quite possibly oblivious to what they are truly selling. And it was me standing there in awe of the sheer mass amounts of His creativity and originality. And it’s you – sitting here reading this blog.

I don’t understand why, we’re his favorite when I look at His creation - besides the fact, that maybe out of all he has made, you and I have the potential to look the most like Him.

When you know the Living Artist, you can’t walk away from the Grand Canyon, or the Swiss alps, or the Pacific Ocean, or even a granite warehouse and not feel very small…… and yet cherished and special, and significant and important and original and one of a kind… all at the same time.

You are very loved my friends!

Still needs a little work....

Coleman - who previously wasn't much interested in knowing the time, found a digital superman wrist watch yesterday at the store. A superman watch that has a superman shaped lid on the face - like a pocket watch. He decided that he just needed it so he could tell the time. And since his purchase, he checks it about every 10 to 20 min. He knows the basics in how to read a face watch (thank the Lord) from school. However.... I think it's time to brush up on digital. He came in to the kitchen, opened up his super cool watch and proudly announced to my mother and I that it was 70 after 15.

After I stopped choking on my fried rice, and finished wiping the tears away, we took another look.......... it was 12:07.

Sweet!

February Update

Long overdue for an update! Besides regular life, Caleb turned 8!!! Dan turned 42!! And I started my new business. Here are some visuals.



In keeping with the spirit of the Farrier tradition, we have passed on the "Farrier Flip". All three of Dan's brothers sported the fashionable coif. We got out some pictures of Dan and compared. Scary! As you can see - Caleb is not enjoying it one bit.


Not to be out done, Coleman lost his first tooth! No sign of big daddy yet.


For his birthday, Caleb got to make his own cake. He decided it needed to be a bunt cake with colorful sprinkles. It was choc/van swirl, "so everyone will like it." Here is the master at work.


Here is the finished product. Quite festive, don't you think?



The creator and his masterpiece!



The other birthday boy. His favorite cake is homemade German Chocholate Cake. We had just restocked on propane, so we didn't feel it necessary to heat the house with candles. We just decieded to arrainge the cake with a 4 and 2 candle formation.


What's a birthday with out a love squeeze!


Or a double love squeeze sandwich from your biggest fans!



These are my CAbi friends and co-consultants! Here we are on our way to Nashville for the very large CAbi conference. Look...... No children anywhere to be found!! The gal with the Blond hair is my sweet upline - Jamie. Lots of fun was had by all.



This was at the CAbi Corral. After a hard day of sitting and stuffing our brains full of fashion/clothing/business knowledge, we ended the evening with a little line dancing and chick chat.


Since I've been back from Nashville, I have gotten started and it's been a lot of fun. My first season is shaping up quite nicely. But I'm still finding my groove.

Once February is overwith I will have a lot less on my plate. Our church's women's retreat is coming up, and I am up to my gray roots in work for that. Not only am I on the worship team, but I am writing, directing, camera woman, editor, and actress for a (7 women) skit. I am enjoying it, but just wish that I did't have to do life at the same time, ya know. Having to multitask, just takes some of the fun right out of it. I really hope it's going to be funny.

Our retreat is called Breakaway, but in lite of the stress, I've renamed it Breakout. Someone has stollen my chin and given me a teenagers instead. Where is my clearasil?!

Well to all 3 of my friends and family that read this.... you are temporarily updated!

Problem Solved

Ok, the problem is solved. Not that I understand how what I tried fixed it, but I'm not one to needlessly tax the brain. And no, I don't know why the replaced pictures suddenly are GARGANTUAN!

Tea any one?

Technical Difficulty

I am aware of the fact that a large number of pictures have walked off of my blog page. I am currently trying to find them and persuade them to come back. If anyone is blog savvy, please enlighten me.

Happy New Year!

The new and improved...? 2007 model of Dan and Shannon Farrier!

For the past 5 or 6 years, we have traditionally celebrated the new year with our old, but dear neighbors from Walford Drive - Bev and Steve Swanson. Now we only live two street away from each other, but we only manage to see them one or two other times the rest of the year.

We ATE and played many a game. Caleb was the contributing photographer, and Sienna (our friend's daughter) was testing out our couch's sleepability. At midnight we broke out the bubbly, sparklers, confetti poppers, and watched the fire works around the neighborhood.

So on this, the last day of vacation for daddy, we will undecorate, (Sorry Cheryl, I never took any pictures) and hopefully do something fun. At the moment, I don't know what that would be.

At the moment I need to go direct ornament traffic! Happy New Year to all who read this!

Strike A Christmas Pose!

I couldn't resist this "swav-e" stance from Coleman as he models his new cowboy boots. Paris runways...... look out!

Christmas day was great. We were not disappointed in the excited reactions from the children early Christmas morning. After the "Santa" presents were found, grandma and grandpa stumbled over with their coffee pot in hand and we had a yummy traditional breakfast of home made Cinnabon cinnamon roles, in which we stuck a candle in to sing happy birthday to Jesus. With stuffed tummies and a sugar buzz, we all listened as Caleb read us the Christmas story out of his first reader bible. He did a most excellent job. Then..... it was time to let her rip! Literally!

I would love to post more Christmas morning pictures, but they are simply too unflattering. Sorry.

Christmas ended on a rather yucky note. After I had just laid my head down on my pillow after a full Christmas day, I was shortly awakened by a crying child around 1am. Long story short, Caleb and I took a trip to the ER. Test were run, blood was drawn, IV inserted. At 5am they admitted us to the hospital with either appendicitis, or a kidney stone. By Tuesday night, they had ruled out both of the above - and were now saying it was Mesenteric Lymphadenitis or something like that. Which means that a lymph-node in the appendix/kidney/bladder area was infected with a virus and was mimicking acute appendicitis. But just for good measure, to make sure we were good and tired, they kept us another night, since Caleb was not yet able to hold any food down, nor did he have the slightest desire to eat anything. By the next morning, he was able to eat some eggs. We were home by noon on Wednesday.

Then on Saturday, we received news that my 94 year old grandmother had passed away. (My dad's mom) So we bid my mom and dad a safe trip out to California to lay her to rest.

It has been one interesting holiday!

Christmas in the air!

Remember how I said that I was having a really hard time getting my mind around the notion that Christmas is upon us? Well I was still in that state of denial until last night at bed time. What made the change you ask? The faithful and diligent work of the fabulous men in my life. Oh yeah, and the weather.

When we woke up it was 70* + outside. Within the space of 1 hour it dropped to 36*!!! To a now 10yr Texan.... it was cold!!!!

Dan took the day off (yee haw!). One of his goals was to get down the Christmas tree. If it had been up to me like previous years, I would have put it off for another week or two. I guess you could say they made it easy for me to make the swing. Between Dan, Caleb, and Coleman, together they hunted down, dusted off, lugged down, unpacked, assembled, and decorated the entire Christmas tree!

They also brought down all the other boxes for decorating the banister, mantels, etc. I was amazed! In years past the children "helped" to decorate by putting the ornaments where I told them to; or by me "adjusting" a teensy bit, their placement of the ornaments so it was just right. This year I have had a revolution. First off, I didn't give one fuzzy fig where they put anything. So with complete creative freedom, they amazed me! The tree looked great! And I didn't have to do anything except cheer them on. What a concept!

my job was to decorate.......everything else, except the outside stuff. So my big item I checked off the list was the banister.

After Dan supervised the electrical segment of wrapping the lights on the tree, he then made my favorite kind of meal....... it's called "I didn't have to make it" ! :)

We had Christmas music playing all day, mostly instrumental; (all of my favs: December - George Winston, Winterfall - some Windham Hill or Narada artist?, Christmastime - MWS, Christmas - A Time for Peace - Dino, Home for Christmas - Amy Grant, Narada - The Christmas Collection Vol1 etc. ) After dinner, I just passingly made the comment that the perfect ending to the day would be cookies and milk by the fire, and if that happened, I think I could really and truly be in the Christmas mood.

And what do you suppose happened?...... but a plate of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies, still warm from the oven and a glass of raw goat's milk was set before me! So I settled my self in front of a cozy gas log fire, ate my cookies & milk...........ahhhh!............ Bring it on!

Aren't my men the best!

Happy decorating!

Thanksgiving Leisure

Another Thanksgiving has come and gone! For the most part we had a great one. There were a few odd bumps in the the day, but we got through them.

The boys watched the Thanksgiving Parade on TV at grandma's house, while she was in her house baking and cooking, and Dan was in our house baking and cooking. I was in charge of a clean house, a pretty table, 2 homemade pie crusts, and the stuffing. Ye-haw! In this respect, my husband and I compliment one another superbly. He LOVES to cook up traditions and nostalgia. I however enjoy the challange of a completely new undiscovered recipe when it comes to entertaining. So he takes joy in cooking the Thanksgiving feast to the very last dollop of squash, just the way mom used to make! Go Hon!

My uncle Chuck (my mom's brother) came down from Longview, TX and spent the weekend with my parents......which means he kind of stayed with us too-(since we live next to one another :)) Because of the special guest, my aunt Jill (my mom's sister) came over every day to hang out while Chuck was here. We had a great time eating, playing ENDLESS games of Rook, and of course catching up. The weather was perfect for playing cards on the porch, but not so perfect if you need a cozy harvest feast eaten by the fire. I'm not sure it got up to 80* or not. All I know is that I was in short sleeves....!

The next day, we went out to my cousin Karen's house and had fun riding her 4 wheeler and motorcycle. My wild side just came out from deep repression somewhere. I could feel my thumb twitching to push the accelerator more...more....more!

Ok, so I only drove the 4 wheeler, but I did sit on her motor cycle. I'm trying to deny that I don't have the fever..... The evening ended with conversation by the light of a bon fire.

Tomorrow, it's back to school, back to laundry, back to normal. Thank the Lord for Holidays!

Almost there!

I've made it over hump day! and I'm still in good spirits. Thanks to all my friends, who have acknowledged my existence while a am locked away in my high walled infirmary! (Cheryl and Kevin). The patient got on the school bus this morning, still coughing but no fever and almost his old appetite back. Thanks too to grandma and grandpa - Dad took the older boys to Mickey Ds last night. Mom has been graciously pushing play on the vcr anytime the patient comes over and wearily says ...."how-bout.....Cinderella?" I have actually gotten most of school done this week despite our special guest (baby brother). So now that Clay is back in school, and we are winding down and gearing up for the weekend.......it's time to go back to a routine.....for two days.

I just cannot believe that Christmas is only one month away! I AM NOT READY FOR IT AT ALL! I feel like I just got the last of my decorations put away from last year. Plus it just got cold yesterday. I have no motivation to decorate as of this minute.......but then we haven't gotten through Thanksgiving yet. I did get out some fall garland and flowers, but that didn't involve ladders and wire and outlets, and it was probably less than three decisions to make.

Someone needs to call the waaaaambulance!

I have new sunshine these days. It never used to be in my living room. The vacant lot behind and to the east of us has been cleared of all the (nice and tall) pine trees. It looks completely different. Before our house was set in front of a green walled back drop. Now, from a few angles, it looks as though the backdrop was changed to a Kansas prairie. Ok that may be an exaggeration, but it feels bare naked! Consequently, with the angle of the sun being lower in the sky now, I have new bright blasts of sunshine streaming into my living room that was hidden by those tees before. So I guess it's not all bad. But only because I don't have to be using my A/C right now. I am always shocked by my strong feelings of anger, and at how badly I want to call the people up and say ..."WHAT ARE YOU THINKING??? THAT IS MY VIEW, MY SHADE YOU ARE HACKING DOWN! AT LEAST YOU COULD HAVE LEFT THE BOARDER TREES FOR CRYIN OUT LOUD!!!" But i have to calm myself with the fact that we did the same thing to our neighbors when we built our house, (although we did leave MANY boarder trees) and it is not my property, and I knew it was going to happen sooner or later. I don't want to be a "SAVE THE TREES" kind of girl, but it's very strong in me and I don't know where it comes from.

I believe that is enough whining for one day.

Please feel free to comment...........anyone...........anyone........Buehler...... (that happens to be my sister's real last name, ha, ha ....)

Thank you to those who already have. For those of you new to blogs, its very easy. Just click on the place at the bottom of the entry where it says "0 comments" and type in the big blank box where it says "Leave Your Comment", then click the "other" button and just put your name in the box (or if you want to be mean and nasty, I suppose you could click on anonymous), then type in what you see in "word verification", then click publish. I get your comment e-mailed to me right away!!!! Yeah! I would love to know who is reading. You don't have to sign up or be a member or anything.

Well, time to start the day! Ba bye now!

Intro to music 101

I often listen to classical music on the radio. Today at lunch, Coleman was quietly sitting at the table eating his lunch. I had classical radio on. I was mid bite when he said, "This is Blue Danube". I suspected that he was right, but wasn't sure my self. Quite surprised, I swallowed my bite. "Really? How do you know?" I asked. He calmly, matter-of-factly replied, "Because Elmer Fudd said it was."

What ever it takes! :)

Tis the season to get sick!

So far Dan and I are the only ones who have not gotten "knocked out" sick. We have gone all spring and summer with out dealing with a bug. But allergies have tried their best. This weekend was Clay's turn to get sick. Today he is home from school - currently sleeping in my bed. Thankfully his fever broke late morning. I don't really think it's the "Flu" bug, but then again the flu can take many forms. Still, we won't be getting shots.

I found a recipe for an electrolyte drink that I can make at home. It's safe for Clay because he can't have Dextrose, which is found in Pedialyte and Gatoraide. 1qt boiled water, 2 T honey, 1/4 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp baking soda. That's it. Lasts about 1 week in the fridge. It tastes good enough so that all my children will drink it if needed. And now I don't have to keep a stock in my pantry!

Dan is off to San Francisco for a couple of days. Then he flies from there to Washington D.C. to appear before an FTC board. All because of some buy out deal that a competing gas co is making in California. I won't see him until Friday or Saturday. November has been a rough month for him (= rough month for all of us).

We had to put a second transmission (in 4 years) in Dan's Explorer. We know we will have on going repairs with that car, but we did NOT!, I repeat, did NOT expect to have to replace another transmission so soon! Have I mentioned lately that I hate cars. ( I like the movie though! :))

Grandma and Grandpa bought the movie last week. Dan and the kids and I watched it last night for our popcorn/movie night. Dan hadn't seen it yet. The boys and I saw it in the theater. It's such a great movie!

Well, it's time for school!

A Day In the Life

This morning Clay was in a good mood as we navigated our way through the morning ritual of breakfast and dressing and waiting for the school bus. So I thought we would celebrate and capture the moment



This was his first "Cheese".













This was his second......















This was his "nice" smile.













And the grand finale smile.....

A little chess before bedtime anyone?

Behold..... I bring you ..... Pillow Monster!

He very much enjoyed playing pillow monster and had his big brother on the floor holding his sides from belly laughter. I'm not sure who came up with the idea. I'm thinking it was the one laughing.

Other happenings: Coleman came down with Croup last night. Very odd for a 6 year old, but he seems to be doing OK this morning.

I am very sore from my first night of WholyFit class. It's a Christian alternative to Yoga. I have never done Yoga before, so I don't know how it compares. I enjoyed it very much and felt the "warm fuzzies" afterwards. I didn't realize how "sloppy" I have become, muscle/balance wise. I am definitely hearing my muscles calling this morning. Am looking forward to improving in that area.

Well off to the laundry room!

Hello, my invisible friends and fam!

Well, we are not exactly "on the air" but pretty darn close. I am still figuring out what I want my/our family "space" to look like. Learning as I go. The first step is the biggest. Hopefully this will be an easy way to keep Grandma and friends "in the know" about the daily scoop.

And speaking of scooping......

Another October has come and gone. My sewing machine got it's annual work out. Sir Triestobegood, Sir Yellsalot, and Sir Harryfellow are posing for the camera at the Texas Ren Festival. The "chain mail" proved not to be too waterproof, as it was raining the ENTIRE DAY! But take heart! They are noble and brave knights......what's a little rain? Sir Triestobegood (left a.k.a. Coby Kidd) The fair maidens however, endured the soiling of slippers and hems, and the frizzing of tresses. Yet nothing a nice $3 cone of fresh baked chocolate chip cookies couldn't cure!

Well I bid you adieu for now.