Update...

Well, there wasn't really a whole lot going on here last week. The kids begged to make "shape cookies" (aka sugar cookies) so we did. Bless their hearts - they are their mothers children. For those of you who may not know to make shape cookies you roll out the dough, cut into shapes with cookie cutters, then take the remaining dough and smoosh it all back together and start over until the dough is gone. After the second round of making shapes they started asking if we were done and could they just eat the rest of the dough :-) That's my kids. I made them continue on, but in the end I did save them a pretty good size chunck of dough to eat (and of course some for myself too!).



CJ and Brian have been hard at work on the house all week (and weekend). The house may not look much different to you but they got the beams up for the box ceilings in the living room and master bedroom, and all the ceiling joist are up in the whole house. They also got the walls up on the garage. Tonight CJ and Brian will be working on getting the ceiling joist up on the garage and the beams that connect the garage to the house. That area between the house and garage will be filled in with dirt and that will be a covered patio area back there. The breezeway going across will be 20 feet wide and the two buildings are 10 feet apart. I'm so excited - it's going to be an awesome area! CJ is hiring a crew to come and put the rafters up. It's just too much for him to do. They should be here Wednesday or Thursday. Yippee! So next weeks pics should show the framing for the entire roof and you'll really be able to see the monster we are building. hehe. We also laid out the cabinets - woo hoo. I found 7 custom cabinet makers in Granbury and we are going to call 3 or 4 of them to come out and give us estimates hopefully this week.





Well, that's about all for now. Have a GREAT week!

Peach Pleasures

Brad Holt - The Community News
Grace Thompson enjoys one of the rides at thie Parker County Peach Festival, held Saturday, July 14 in Weatherford. A record crowd of about 45,000 people attended the event.


COOL HUH? Thanks Beth for forwarding this to me! Beth, Lily, the kids and I attended the Peach Festival in Weatherford last weekend and a guy from the paper took Grace's picture while she was on one of the rides. Afterwards he asked me her name and permission to print it but who knew he would?! COOL!

Hallelujah!

Praise the Lord! Thank you Mother Nature! Have I forgotten anyone? We have progress...




They poured the slab on last Monday. CJ has been out there every night this week working with the help of Brian. Our friend Carl also came over yesterday to help and they have all the walls up on the house. As you can see from the pictures there was threatening weather in the area. They worked through a rain shower or two but it never got really nasty. CJ will be working on putting the ceiling joist up and the walls for the garage this week. Hopefully the roof will be on next week. YIPPPEEEE!

Ode to Scrapbooking Supplies

How do I love thee, let me count the ways....
I just used my sanding block and a brad to finish a Bridal shower cake. hahaha.
I was happy with it, now I'm a mess. Is it smooth enough? Is it fancy enough? Is it what she wants? Is it the right colors? And to think that I was contemplating pursuing this more. I don't know if I can. To make a cake for me is fine, but to make one for someone else makes me a nervous wreck.
I need honest feedback. I don't want to think I'm good enough to go into business if I'm really not. "I would wait until you've had a little more practice" is preferred over "you suck." Thanks.

It is what it is.

It's been over a year and 100 posts since I started this crazy blog. Originally, I started it to be a way to keep long-distance family involved in our lives - only to find out that none of the family ever checked it. I think that has changed some now. Yeah!
Sometimes it's a place for me to express myself.
Sometimes it's a billboard for my girlfriends.
Whatever it may be, I'll continue to blog as long as you continue to read.

A Crazy Kind of Wonderful.

The second half of the week was spent at the Thompson's. A little busier, a little crazier, and a little louder but just as wonderful. Actually I think we set a record for calmness this trip - at least comparatively speaking. It only becomes this way because everyone is always there, and we LOVE it that way. It's wonderful that their family all lives close and loves to get together.
We got there tuesday evening in time for a great fireworks display. Morgan slept through the whole thing including the loud booming fireworks that about shook me out of my chair. I was surprised. Grace just kept saying "ooohhh, that one is beautiful" and Tanner's repeated comment was, "that one's the most humungous!"

The next day we had loads of fun the pool. Tanner took right to it. I thought he would because he did really well last summer but you never know. I was unsure about Grace because last summer she was still very clingy to me even with a lifejacket on. Not now. "I can do it myself!" It terrified Papa Dave to let go of her even with the life jacket on but she was insistent. By the end of the weekend she was toodling around everywhere and Papa Dave was breathing again too.

Lots of visiting with friends, grandparents, great-grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, neighbors, you name it. All wonderful! We were so happy to see everyone and there were lots of people that were missed! Hugs to you!

Tanner learned to ride his bike without training wheels. CJ had taken them off and set down the wrench and before he could turn around Tanner was already half way down the driveway yelling "look dad, I can do it!" Go Tanner!

We caught lightening bugs, frogs, crawdads, and even a couple of fish. The kids were in heaven. If you know my kids you know they love bugs and small animals.

Did I mention how much fun we had this trip? We miss you all very much!

Down on the farm.

Every kid should have a set of Grandparents that live on a farm. We started the week at my mom and dad's farm. We relaxed, watched movies, played cards. My dad built a "train" - which consisted of 55 gallon drums tipped on their side with a hole cut in the top, a seat put in and a pretend steering wheel - to pull the kids behind the tractor. They went on a ride at least once every day. Dad took them around the pasture and down the gravel road they live on to the neighbors and back. It made me smile and brought back fond memories of me getting to spend time with my Grampy when I was a kid.
CJ built mom a landing and stairs out the back door to her clothes lines. Yes, mom still likes to hang the clothes out to dry. I never have because they were always "crunchy", but mom gave me the secret - don't tell - liquid fabric softener in your wash and a good breeze = no crunchy clothes. Amazing! It made me want to hang my clothes out but somehow I'm guessing our HOA would have some kind of rules against having your unmentionables out for everyone to see. *wink*
While there are no traditional farm animals we did get to enjoy some great wildlife. Every evening at dusk the deer and foxes would come out to play. Right there in the back pasture. We only saw two deer, dad says there are usually more. But we enjoyed 2-4 foxes each night. Running and playing. Chasing each other around hay bales and trotting across the field. I tried to take pictures, but must have had my camera on the wrong setting because they didn't turn out. I'm really sad.
We also did the normal stuff - went to the park, played in the pool, ran around outside, etc. By the way, the pic of us on the teeter totter, I thought it was going to break the whole time. It was REALLY old and there was a big crack right in the middle of it. I was just waiting to land square on my butt at any given minute. It lasted the duration of our ride though. Whew!
Life at Duck-N-Shrub Farm (a play on our last name, Quackenbush, by my dad) is a simple one and we couldn't love it more!

Shall we start with the bumpy beginning?

We left Texas a little later than what we wanted - no big deal. We had to stop and feed Morgan about every 4 hours (Tanner and Grace both just slept the whole trip when they were his age)- no big deal. We were getting close and somehow made a wrong turn. Do you know how many times we've made this trip? NEVER made a wrong turn. It was about 6:30 in the morning and we had just stopped to feed Morgan and have breakfast. We were just on the east side of St.Louis. We get back on the road, CJ calls his mom and I'm just relaxing because I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Shortly after he gets off the phone he says, "that exit doesn't look familiar." Granted everything looks the same. Exits look the same, cornfields look the same, even drove over a little lake that CJ loves and it looked kinda the same. That was what set it off though. It just didn't look right. We stopped at the next rest area and asked a tour bus driver where we were. Springfield, IL. WHAT?!?!?! Yeah, we had just driven an hour NORTH instead of east. Somehow we had taken the 55 North split instead of the 70 East split. Can I tell you that I was on the verge of tears. We were so close to the end of our trip only to find out that now we had 3 hours left instead of 1 hour. We added about 90 miles to our trip and another stop to feed Morgan. CJ just laughed and I almost died. We made it though. 18 hours.
The day was pretty good. Tired from driving through the night but the kids were good except.....
Morgan wouldn't sleep. No joking. He was so tired he would fall asleep nursing, but as soon as his head hit the bed he would wake up screaming. We tried everything. We had him in the pack and play first, then we switched and put my nephew in the pack and play and gave Morgan the crib, we let him cry, we rocked, everything. Nothing. The other two never had issues so I never dreamed Morgan would. But, the different smells, sounds, creaking floors and doors (my parents live in an old farm house which I LOVE), another baby crying intermittently was more than he could handle I guess. He was at least fairly happy when he was up but he was having nothing to do with that bed. At bed time I had to let him cry for over an hour. It was torture. I went out on the porch swing to get away from it and cried. CJ came out and I threatened to put everyone back in the truck and head back to Texas. Nothing was worth this. Morgan finally went to sleep and he slept all night. Thank you God. I was on the verge of an emotional melt down from the stress and lack of sleep. All's well with a good nights sleep. The fun stuff starts tomorrow! Stay tuned......

A bumpy beginning and a bumpy ending

but a wonderful visit in between and we're all back in Texas safely. I have so much to share I'll have to do it one day at a time. I'm working on getting pictures uploaded and taking care of household things but keep watching there will be lots coming. This was probably our best visit to Indy EVER! Lots of love to those back home! xoxoxo