Christmas in July

There is a certain show on TV that my son watches on occasion. I strongly dislike it. To refrain from naming names, I'll just tell you that it involves a certain construction worker and his crew of talking machines & equipment. Oh yes, and a lady helper that we're sure has the hots for him. (right Tif?) Let's just say that the show is way too cheerful for my liking.

Anyway, Jamin has a few DVD's of this show, and today I got to listen to a Christmas episode. It's July. I already dislike the show, strongly, and watching a Christmas kids show in July is not my idea of a good time. That's why I only listened to it. I couldn't help it.

Just thought you'd like to know.

The Ocean?

Happy Birthday Hes!

Yesterday was my sister-in-law Heather's birthday. Not only is Heather family, but she has become such a great friend to me. I have been blessed to become part of a really great family. Happy Birthday Hes. Someday when we're rich, we'll spend these birthday's in Vegas! lol.

Friends

This picture wasn't taken recently but I love it. It's because it's taken with one of my closest and best friends. A friend I've had since I was a baby. Tiffany presented us with a challenge to post pictures of us when we were younger. I do not have a scanner so it makes it difficult to do this. But I remembered this one and thought I should share it. A lot of you know that Tiffany is expecting baby #3! I can't wait to meet her new little one. Only 43 days to go! Unless of course, the baby is born August 9th.

I'll see if I can come up with some more pictures of years past.

I think this is the first picture I've had of myself on my blog.

A year, summed up

This past year has been pretty busy for us. Just over a year ago my son Aaron was born.



Two weeks after he made his entrance into this world, we decided that sharing a bedroom with our newborn was not something we wanted to do for very long. And since the bedroom that was Jamin's was really small, it didn't seem like a good idea for the two of them to share a room. Thus started our search for a newer, bigger house.

We had looked at a few houses and then I found the house I loved. But before we could do anything about it, someone else bought it. Aside from that, we had to get our house ready to sell. There were some projects that needed to be done before we could put it on the market. So, we spent our summer painting almost every room in the house, fixing up the porch and re-siding the house.



Fall came, and we kept looking for a house. But we just couldn't find the right one. We finally decided to put our house on the market and hope we would find a new one. We looked at a house one evening and we both agreed that it wasn't for us. However, two weeks after looking at this house, we had an offer on our house. So we decided to look at the house again and see what we could do with it to fix it up. We bought it.



I call it my ugly house. But it won't be forever. We have plans.

We spent January living with my parents. Since they live half an hour away from us, Jeff stayed with his parents during the week so it wouldn't be so far to travel to work. We had to move twice. Not fun when it's -30 plus a windchill outside.



Once we got possesion of our house, we started renovating. Again, not fun. Especially when you have two children to watch. Although I must say we had a lot of help with the boys from my mom and Jeff's Aunt Joyce and my mother-in-law. Thank you so much.

I'll show you some before and after pictures so you know what we've been doing.





Living Room (The door still needs to be painted)



Jamin helping his Grandpa's in the kitchen!



Aaron enjoying the new cabinets!





Kitchen

I won't bore you with pictures of every room. The bathroom still looks the same as the picture in a previous blog. No wait, I shouldn't say that. It's getting uglier. Piece by piece our vanity is falling apart. The bathroom is our next big project.

We had a lot of help from family this past year, and like Jeff said, without their help we would still be putting the siding on the old house. So I would just like to say thank you to everyone that helped us out, with the kids, the house(s), moving, with food. Absolutely everyone. Thank you so much. We owe you.

Bathtime

Here's a little story that started a while ago. Most of the time I bath my boys together. It saves time, and it's just way more efficient this way. During a typical bath, I get Aaron all washed first, then Jamin. I then take Aaron out of the tub to get him dried off and in is jammies. I usually let Jamin play in the tub for a little while after, so he can have the tub toys all to himself. He quite enjoys this.

So one day, after Aaron was already in his jammies, I turned my back for just a few seconds, to put the dirty clothes in the laundry hamper. This is what happened next.



It happened again tonight. And I was right there, drying Jamin off. He's fast! No picture this time. Mommy didn't find it quite so cute the second time.

We're buying a truck!

We've been thinking a lot lately of buying a truck. For the last few years, Jeff has been driving the very first car I ever bought. And let's just say it's not in the best shape ever. I mean, it gets him to where he needs to go, but we're not sure for how much longer. So this past weekend, he's been talking to a guy down in Florida about buying this particular truck. And so, I believe as of today, it's ours. At the end of the month we are going to be flying down to Florida to pick it up. And I'm excited about it except I think on the way back we may be driving through Kansas. Anybody seen the Wizard of Oz? Tornados? Refer to the previous post if you are unsure of what I'm talking about.

Tornado's

Every now and then I have dreams involving tornado's. I don't have them very often, but last night I had one again. And I woke up from it with my heart pounding. I've always been the kind of person who loves storms. I still do, except now I keep looking out the window to see if there are funnel clouds. I even used to say that I would like to see a tornado(in the distance). I've now changed my mind about that. I think before I didn't worry too much about them because it was just me. But now that I have kids, I can't help but think how I would get everyone to safety if one came along. I know I shouldn't worry about it, and I don't(most of the time). But when the storm clouds come along, it's on my mind.

Maybe someday I'll write about my going blind dreams.

Camping

This past weekend Jamin went camping with his Grandma Vust and cousins Keegan and Shelby. He loves the pool!


And this year he actually jumps in, with someone there to catch him.

I went to see him twice while he was camping. One night we had "girls night". He loves "girls night".

Here he is with his Auntie Heather. Or should I say "favorite auntie", as that is what Heather refers to herself as. I'm sure there are some other aunties who might like to argue that. I'll leave it up to them to fight it out.

Happy Birthday Dad!

Yesterday we celebrated my dad's birthday! Every year he gets to celebrate his birthday with fireworks!
Dad, I hope you had a great birthday. You mean the world to us and we love and appreciate you very much. Happy Birthday!