Go Tigers!!

Matt and his team worked hard and won the game 18-16 last night. I took 198 photos of the game... LOL... I just set the camera on sports mode and then let it click away during all the action shots. I haven't cropped any of these pictures because I am short on time right now, but I wanted to get this all posted. (Dear Santa... I really reallll realllllly want a very nice strong Canon lens so I can zoom in nice and close on the action!)

I caught this one of Matt after the game. He is looking so grown up suddenly! Killing me here!


Matt completed two tackles during the game. I caught this shot of him as he and the first boy he tackled were landing. It was a proud night! We are heading out to the pep rally here in a little bit to watch him and his team be inroduced to the school.


Jessica wanted to curl her hair today for school, and she looked so pretty I had o grab a couple of shots. If any of my digi friends out there want to play with these shots with some conversions, I would love to see what you do with them!




Remember me telling you we needed to find a turtle for the "bring your own turtle" race? We were driving back from dropping the kids off at school when this little guy came strolling out in the street. We stopped, Chet hopped out and grabbed him, and we came home and built a little turtle sanctuary with one of the crates we had from our move. The kids have named him Max, and are thrilled he is here. Somehow, I don't think it is a mutual feeling for Max.



Beth wanted her picture taken today too... funny little ham!



We are off to get Faith to her first dance class tonight, and then heading back to the school for the rally. More pics later!

I have been a bad blogger lately...

It has just been a really busy couple of weeks. Sadly, I don't even have many photos to show for it, but here are some of them.

There is a ton of work to do on the property to get it where we want it to be. One of the first projects we needed to do was clear a burn pit. Most people just clear an area of land, but Jack wanted to make sure ours was really safe. This picture was taken as they broke ground on the pit, and we had to laugh as the neighbors would drive by and stare at the big circle we were digging in the ground. Jack and the kids have all worked hard to get it done, so I will get out there and take an "after" shot in the next day or two.


Mowing the yard has taken on a whole new meaning for us. The kids really enjoy the riding lawnmower, and Jess and Matt take turns making sure it all gets mowed. Kyle is also really good at it as long as one of us is with him. In these photos, Jessica was mowing the back of the property, and Matt was working in what I call the orchard. He had to pick up all the apples that were falling off the trees there before he could mow, and the next morning there was a new blanket of fruit on the ground. I am going to make a homemade pie this weekend, and the kids have loved just running outside to grab an apple off the tree if they want a snack. They are organic and free... what could be better... :0)



Bugs... uugh. There are so many bugs here. They give me heebie jeebies, but the boys think they are so cool. Actually, the girls like the no-so-ugly ones too... but even they steer clear of the ugly garden spiders. Todd started a worm farm, and when I went to run errands, he and Jack asked me to pick up some worms for him. Never in my life have I been sent to buy worms.

Grasshopper hunts have been pretty popular here too. The boys like to fill up boxes and boxes of the little creepers, and then they want to keep them in their bedrooms. Not. We are going to the fair next week, so the boys are keeping an eye out for a box turtle so they can be a part of the turtle race. (The flier says it is a BYOT event... their words not mine, so we have to find a turtle.)


In other news, Kyle cut his arm a couple of weeks ago and needed four stitches. He had the stitches taken out, and he is now quite proud of his scar. Apparently we are done getting to know the police, and now we are moving on to getting acquainted with the local medical personel.


The main time consumer the last couple of weeks has been work. I took Jessica to Tulsa with me, and we had a great time. She made her first scrapbook pages, worked as one of my teacher assistants in some of my classes, had a wonderful time swimming, and loved being able to eat at restaraunts she had never eaten at before. She even sold a Pages By Design system in the booth after she had helped out in my classes. We had a great time spending the weekend together, and I always love hanging out with Kara. We stopped at a craft fair and carnival on the way home where we saw windchimes made out of beer bottles and cans... it was one of the funniest things I have ever seen! Kara and Grace came up before the show, and Faith loved getting to know Grace. I have a cute picture of them on the other camera that I need to get added here.







Another great thing about the Tulsa show was that I got to meet a lot of ladies from this general area. I am looking forward to getting to know more people in this area!


Last week was the Bay Area show, and this show provided one of the most stressful moments in my career. When we set up on Wednesday, we didn't have any boxes, which also meant I didn't have any classkits. It was stressful enough to know I was teaching the class for the first time ever, but the thought of showing up to that first day of classes without any classkits had me a bit worried. As we were heading out on Thursday morning, I saw this HUGE UPS truck pull into the hotel parking lot, and a smaller truck behind him. I literally did a little happy dance in the parking lot, and then ran up beside the truck as he was parking and asked him (before he even got out of the truck) if he happened to have 125 boxes for Jennifer Wellborn. Woohooo... he did! Classes went really well considering the rough start we had!

Don't you just love men who wear parcel brown??


A great moment of the show was when I heard my name, and turned around to find Kathy. And our loopy friend Liz was with her all the way from Massachusetts... what a wonderful surprise!! I loved getting a chance to sit down for lunch with them and just chat and visit. I have known these ladies for over ten years, along with the rest of our loopy group, and it is always a good time when I get to see any of them.


I had to share this photo of the trip too... don't you just love the sexy pirate look Annie was sporting??? Aaargh, matey!


I have been swamped since I got home. School started (pictures to come soon), the truck had to spend a day at the shop, and there is still a ton for me to get done in the house. I have a City Planner project to work on, and some other small projects to get done this week as well. My hope is to get everything caught up by Saturday so I can take a day or two to just relax. I came home from the Bay Area feeling a bit sick, and I spent the first couple of days home just trying to get rid of it. Nothing serious... just enough to make me feel cruddy.

Tomorrow is Matt's first big football game (he had a scrimmage game last week, but this one is against anohther school for the first time), and Jessica is working on the school paper so she will be there taking photos and notes. My camera will be busy all the way around! I am going to go put away my last load of laundry (I found the bottom of the pile, can you believe it??) and get to bed. Good night!

Heading out tomorrow

Just a quick update before we head out tomorrow!

Court was very quick and decisive... Jack has full custody and Jessica is home for good. :0)

Football practice is going really well for Matt. They are supposed to play their first game in a week or so, and we are all looking forward to that. His team has already given him a nickname. They all call him "Vegas"... that should make some fun pages.

Kara and Grace arrived safely last night, and Kara and I spent a good portion of today scrapping. Faith and Grace are having a great time playing together. Jack and the kids got the trampoline put together today, so everybody spent a good amount of time jumping.

Here are some pages I finished today. The one of the girls is using the sketch that Katherine posted on the Deluxe Designs blog. The one of Matt is using Tracey's sketch at Scrap Village. The one of Kyle is one I didn't use a sketch with. After re-sorting all of my scrap stuff, I am more determined than ever to get my stash used up, thus the heavy use of alphabet stickers. I know I saw an idea for using a random alphabet border somewhere recently (probably a mag), but I couldn't begin to tell you where. I used the Plain Jane chipboards on all of them... love those! The brackets and rectangle on Matt's page are covered in paper and then magic mesh for a fun texture.

If you are coming to the show this weekend come by and say hi!

Almost there!

We got a lot of work done today. All of the kids' rooms are sorted out and nearly done being decorated. (I can't wait to show you those pics!) All the rest of the rooms are put together, and my scrapping section is organized and ready to use. I have about half the art and photos hung, and I have my sewing machine set up to finish making the rest of the drapes. In so many ways this house must have been meant to be ours. Things are fitting perfectly into spaces, and it is a really good feeling to know we are nearly done!

We had a big thunderstorm in the middle of the day. Lightning was crashing over our house, which always sets me on edge a bit, but the rest of the family thinks it is so cool. We got several inches of rain, and then it all suddenly stopped again. The weather has been one of the biggest changes for me here. There is so much rain! I love it, but I really could do without all the lightning that accompanies it!

Kara is coming up on Tuesday, and we are going to ride to the Tulsa show together. That promises to be a really fun roadtrip!

Jack and Jessica are on their way to court right now. They should be home tomorrow with finalized court papers stamped with a big "case closed" seal of approval... woohoo!

And I have a funny tale to share tonight. I was taking the kids out to dinner the other night and we were all debating on where to go from our list of not-too-many choices... McDonalds, KFC, or Subway. There was a general consensus that they all wanted McD's (yuck), and then Todd piped up in the backseat with, "I want Subway Eat Fresh!" We were all giggling... watch much TV Todd???

so much to do....

It has been a very busy week. I got home on Sunday, and it feels like I haven't stopped yet. I got most of the house painted (it was all white, and I need colored walls in my life) and we are almost done with the unpacking. We just need to get the rest of Jack's tools and my holiday stuff from Johanna's barn and sort through it and find homes for it.

Philadelphia was a really good show to work, despite the power outages we were dealing with. I loved the ladies in my classes, and had a great time. I loved this show last year too.... very friendly! I made it to Ikea while we were there, but had very little time to really shop for some of the things I want for the house. I did get the little boys a really cool swing for their room that I will share with you when we have it installed.

Matt started football practice this week. He is loving it. So far he is a linebacker, and I can't wait for his first real game! He wants me to come get some pictures of him practicing, which I hadn't done because I didn't want to embarrass him. Heck, though... if he wants me to who am I to say no!

I got the kids all registered for school this week, and all of us are eagerly looking forward to the first day of school. Jack and Jessica go back down for court on Monday, and everything should be officially court ordered as far as custody goes.

I have actually taken very few pictures this week, but here are a couple of the better ones to share. I took all of these in our backyard.


This shows about half of the acreage. You can see the pond from here. (I must admit that it has been fun to walk the property and say "that is my apple tree, that is our pond full of our own fish, that is our barn, etc)

Matt built this tire swing to practice tossing the football through. I glanced over and saw Kyle standing there with the tire framing the shot... love it! I can 't wait to drag the kids all over the property for more shots like this!

The animals are having a blast too. The cats have become mighty spider and dragonfly hunters, and I love watching them chase the butterflies. Barkley and Red just run and run and run. Barkley also likes to go through the fencelines and go say hello to the neighboring farm's cows.

Just another one I caught of the boys riding their bikes.

I need some serious sleep. We just got our internet set up, so give me a couple of days to get caught up and I will get all the emails answered! Have a great weekend everyone!