Halloween 2012

We are the "last minute costume" family each Halloween.

You've all seen THIS costume before!  We've gotten a lot of mileage out of this crocodile costume we bought for Matt's first grade musical!

Cutest Little Croc ever!

Who is this Tough Guy?

Noah's haircut

Noah-- Before: look at that handsome hair... check out the curls in the back :)-- might be the longest ever?

 

 

 

 

Noah--- After:  still such a handsome boy!  Now with a new friend!

 





Matt--- cross country racing

Matt has been doing very well in cross country this year!
The team runs a 5k each morning before school.  Recently he's come in first in those morning runs... running it in~ 21 min.

These are some pics from a race that we all attended and Jeff was the photographer.  It was a 2 mile run.

Loft Beds

Jeff and Tay build Tay's loft bed in about a day or so...

We are joined by a couple of cousins...

And another one....

And a final one :)

Landscaping... Path to Pool

We had a pool party for our Community Group in which  6 -8 other families had RSVP'd, including about 15-20 children.  Matt and Tay would be the oldest kids there.

So, I made a list (shocker) and Jeff and I used that list as we prepared the house, inside and out, to host 30-40 people.

One of our projects was something Jeff took on himself, instead of hiring a landscaping company.  He build a path of steps---level steps--- to the pool!

The old path was one of my LEAST favorite things about our yard.  The previous owners of our home had thrown down cement blocks to create an un-even and dangerous path to the pool.

The project took quite a bit of time, but Jeff had it completed enough that our guests were able to travel safely and comfortably down to the pool.  See below the progress....

Getting them level was the hardest part of the process!

Look how nice that looks!

Almost finished!  All that is left is the brick siding!

Fence--- my favorite thing!

This year we invested in building something that is my favorite thing... a HIDEY-HOLE!

Ok, it's actually a fence and it hides all our JUNK!  YAY!  We have our trailer, the sail-boat, our tomato cages, our rock piles, our lawnmower-covered by a lean-to,... and a plethora of other things, hidden back behind that fence! 

Kevin built it with help from Jeff... they put in quite a few hours on it and it turned out great!

And here is the finished fence!

Fun with Area Rugs!

Although the boys didn't really "get it" when it came to why we needed to buy more rugs when we just got rid of our carpet, thankfully, Jeff "got it" and gave me a generous budget for our large 8x10 rug in living room.

I searched all over NWA and couldn't find one I liked and all the ones that large were $600-$700 dollars.  A friend pointed me to Overstock.com and I found the most PERFECT rug for us!

All my favorite colors!!!

My budget might have been so generous because of the HUGE deal I scored on some awesome hemp rugs from an IOMETRO Whse close-out sale!  (Thanks Windy Hall!!)

Each of these hemp rugs were $399 at retail and I got them for $75 a piece!  LOVE getting a deal!  They are now in our bedroom, my office and the "Art room".

Family pic

Andi needed a family pic for a frame she has up in the Maine house, so she asked (threatened) me to take one TODAY.  So, here we go... 2 new family pics :)  (Thanks Andi :)

New Wood Floors!!!

It took years to finally carve out the money and make the decision to rip out all the carpet and put in wood floors.

The boys favorite thing to do is this...

Brotherly Love

While our house was torn apart for the wood floors, the boys took advantage of the chaos and slept on matresses on the floor!  This is what I came downstairs to find one morning.  AWWWWWW!

Wood Floors-- In Process

For many days, we lived with everything from the living and bedrooms/office shoved into every other room in the house.  It was a mess!

Below are a few "in-process" pics...  after they had pulled up the carpet, down to the raw plywood floors... NICE....

This is where I camped out...

Taylors 5th grade graduation

Taylor finished off his elementary career very well! 
He got Honor Roll (All A's), Math Award, English Award, Reading award, President's Award and had some very nice notes from his teacher, Mrs. Fowler.

Taylor receiving his diploma!

2012 Baseball-Tay2

More video footage of the Taymyster

Baseball 2012-Noah

Noah was the Pitcher of the Thunder.

Baseball 2012- Tay

Tay's base hit

Spring Flowers

Love Spring flowers!

End of April Pool Opening!

A balmy 69 degrees and Jeff opened the pool.  The boys turned blue and purple, but stayed in the water anyway!

Easter Eve

We had our neighbor, Gavin, spend the night and go to church with us for Easter.  We learned Gavin had never colored Easter eggs before, so we saved that activity until he came over so he could participate.

Spring Break 2012-- Steamboat CO

This year we went to Steamboat CO for Spring Break... well, 4 of us went... Matt went on a Mission trip to Camp Livingstones in TN.

We stayed in a condo owned by a friend of Rebecca... just me, Jeff, Bec, Tay and Noah. It was a gorgeous place and we were close to the mountain.

Tay took 1 day of ski school, then skiid with Rebecca and Jeff the next day. Noah went to two days of ski school, then skiid with Jeff and Tay on the 3rd day.

These 2 were pics from my snow-shoeing day, which I LOVED!!

The Crew!