New Orleans!

I recently took a little trip to New Orleans to see our friends, Jen and Mark, meet their new baby, Jane, and have my very first Mardi Gras experience.  Our friends, Lauren and Andrew, were also there visiting, so it was a great time to go down and see everyone!  Poor Brad couldn't get away from work, so I had to have enough fun for the two of us...

When I first got there Saturday afternoon, we had crawfish...my first experience with those guys!  They were good, but a lot of work!

On Sunday, we spent the entire day watching parades.  I was amazed at all of the parades and all of the people.  The parades we have around here are so dinky, and I have never had any interest in going to them.  These parades, of course, put any parade I have ever seen before to shame.  

Someone explained Mardi Gras as being like a tailgate with beads and floats and marching bands, and that is really a good way to describe how our Sunday was.  Oh yeah, and wigs!  We just didn't have any football...

Monday Jen and Mark both had to work, so Lauren, Andrew, and I went out to breakfast and then spent a little time going in some of the shops on Magazine Street.  Jen came home early from work (it was her first day back from maternity leave!), and we lazed around that afternoon.  That night we celebrated Mark's birthday with dinner and king cake at the house.

I came home on Mardi Gras day, but we did spend a little bit of time walking down along the parade route before I left.  Everyone was in costume or decked out in their Mardi Gras colors.  People were so creative and funny with their costumes.  It was people watching at its finest -- and I thought Disney World was good.

I loved getting to meet sweet Baby Jane.  She is a precious little thing, and it was fun to get a baby fix for a couple of days.  She was a real trooper through all of the Mardi Gras madness, too!

I love going to visit Jen and Mark in New Orleans.  They are the best hosts, and they really know how to show their company a good time.  I can't wait to go back sometime with Brad so that he can see the city -- we will just have to plan around farming!

(All pics stolen from Jen's Facebook page...)

Nine Years Old, Where Has the Time Gone?

This adorable little face is Tyler back when she was around four-and-a-half.  Yesterday she turned nine.  NINE.

I am not quite sure how that happened.

It was just yesterday that I was pitching a temper tantrum because the hospital was calling to put me off one more day because they were too full for me to come in for an induction (I was four days past my due date, and I was. not. happy).  And it was just yesterday that this sweet little face made me a mommy for the first time, but somehow she is nine-years-old, and everyone is talking to me about how, next year, she will be double digits.

I have to cry a little just thinking about that.

But, here is some info about Tyler at nine:

-- She weighs about 50 pounds, as do her brother and sister.
-- I am not sure how tall she is -- need to check on that!
-- Her favorite foods are fried shrimp, tacos, hamburgers, spaghetti, and pizza.
-- She hates any foods that are green -- broccoli, green beans, peas, etc.
-- She loves to read (finally, FINALLY!!!), and can go through a Babysitters Club book in a day.
-- Ty loves clothes and jewelry and accessories, and she has decided that she wants to be a fashion designer when she grows up.  If that doesn't pan out, then she wants to be a makeup artist.
-- She likes to make up dances to her favorite songs, and she and Sanders have recently started making up puppet shows.
-- I get really surprised if she brings home a grade below a 95.   In the first grade, I thought that good grades would be something that wouldn't come easily for this kid -- she had trouble focusing in school, and she just generally had a hard time adjusting to the whole school work/homework thing.  Now she rocks it.
-- Ty is caring and loving, and she thinks she can take care of anyone younger than she is.
-- She has to make her first trip to the orthodontist later this month.
-- Tyler thinks she is 25.

There is so much more I could say about this first baby of mine, but I won't go on and on.  She is a blessing to our family, and Brad and I are lucky to have her.

Happy Birthday, Tyler!!

So

So, blogging hasn't been my greatest accomplishment lately, has it?

I am not exactly sure where all of my blogging time has gone, but it sure hasn't been spent sitting around being lazy.

Here are a few things I have been up to...

:: We have recently started a couples' Bible study and rotate hosting duty, and Brad and I hosted last week.  In addition to hosting, we have been trying to keep up with our homework.  We are using the book 1 Timothy & Titus: Fighting the Good Fight by John Stott.  Everyone in the group seems to like it even though the questions are not the easiest.

:: Our farm is switching over all of our computer software, so we had several days' worth of meetings with an IT guy from our new sales company.  We are also looking into new software for our piecework part of our payroll, so we have had several conference calls with a guy in California who is trying to sell us his product.  

:: Not only did Brad and I just move, but our farm also just bought a new office building that is adjacent to our packing house, so I am moving offices as well as houses.  We have been having lots of meetings with electricians, family members, carpenters, etc. to get the new office ready to move in.

:: Sanders has strep for the second time since New Years.

:: I dropped my iPhone on the carport, and the back of it shattered, so I had to get a replacement phone. It was all well and good until I got the replacement phone and the darn thing didn't activate correctly.  I got to the airport last Saturday (more on that later) and tried to call Brad, and the phone didn't even have a phone number in it!  Later it told me that it was activated, but I couldn't get internet or connect to the "cellular data network" until yesterday when my sister spent 45 minutes on the phone with Verizon.

Have you spent any time without a smartphone lately?  It feels like being in the dark ages, and I thought certain people were ignoring me...

:: Speaking of the airport, I went on a fun little trip that I want to give its own little post, but here is a hint about it...

Any guesses?!?!?

Yum. Just Yum.

I went to Costco last week and found the best breakfast spread ever:

It is by Belle Chevre, and it isn't sold everywhere -- definitely not in our grocery stores in the boonies -- but if you see it, get it.  I got both the fig and the honey flavors, and they are so good.  I have been eating it on bagel thins, and I could probably just eat it out of the container by the spoonful.  This stuff is delicious!

images

*I will get back to regular posting at some point in this lifetime...

Rejoining the 21st Century

Hello again! My last week has been filled with moving and trying to fit in work as usual and feeling a little like we are caught in this:



A big black hole...

We have had no tv, internet, phone, or cell service.  We live in the middle of the woods, and it has been very quiet around this new house.  It has been sort of nice because it has given me the opportunity to crank up my music and get a lot of unpacking done with no other distractions.  However, any time I get anywhere with a bit of cell service, I get a lot of messages and texts that say something like Where are you?  Why can't I get in touch with you?  This is ridiculous!!  Stop ignoring me!  It seems I've fallen off the face of the Earth -- unless I go in Tyler or Gibson's room and stand by one of their windows, stand on one foot, contort my body in some weird way, hold my mouth just so, and sometimes I can get a text through...sometimes.

Now we have our tv and internet back up, and hopefully my cell phone booster will help with my cell service.  We saw the phone guys sitting in their truck outside of the phone box out by our road yesterday, and I don't know if they thought they were going to hook up the phone telepathically, but they certainly didn't seem to actually be hooking anything up -- I just love dealing with service people. 

The house is coming along, though, and I feel like we are really making progress.  That is, I feel like we are making progress until we go back to the old house and see all that is still over there, and then I get really depressed at the mess that still needs to be sorted.  And we have a ton of boxes that we never opened when we moved from our old town, so they have been boxed up for a year and a half.  I have found some great things that I had forgotten we had, like the sweetest little pottery handprint ornaments from when Ty was 4, Sanders was 2, and Gibson was 3 months.  We have found some nasty things, like an old coffee maker that had a moldy, nasty coffee filter in it!!!  Yuck! 

Oh, moving is fun....

Final Sneak Peeks!

Here are some final pictures before the house is all finished and we are all moved in...

Living room:

Kitchen:

Butler's Pantry:

 Laundry room:

Powder room:

(vanity before it went in the powder):

Moving starts tomorrow!