CustomizedGirl at Melinda Joy

So, I have a bit of an obsession with blog giveaways lately (I've already won a necklace, a pair of earrings, a shirt and two dresses) and today I found probably one of the coolest ones yet. It's a giveaway for a $25 Gift Certificate to CustomizedGirl and the giveaway is on the Melinda Joy Blog. Brian and I are celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary in June and it would be so cool to have a cute shirt in celebration of it. In fact, I designed mine on the site already and I wrote "Love of a Lifetime" on it because that was our wedding song and I truly have found the love of a lifetime. Here's where you can see the shirt I designed, and I would highly recommend checking out both CustomizedGirl and Melinda Joy!

AllPopArt Contest

I just entered this AllPopArt contest at Confessions of a Housewife and I hope I win! This would be so awesome. I would get the scrapbook style vintage one to hang up in our hallway of our whole family. Here's hopin', right?!

There's a pug in my yard!

So, when I was leaving to take the boys to school this morning, we see this cute little pug on our street, sitting by our neighbor's car. When I come home, it's still there, so I decide to see what's up. Asher and I walked over (don't worry, I kept Asher at a distance since we don't know the dog) and I was talking to it and stuff, but it wouldn't move. Finally it got itself up and walked away from me a few steps. I went and got a piece of bologna and tore it up for it, but is didn't seem all that interested. The lady who is taking care of my neighbor came out and said that the dog had been sitting there by the car, ever since she came in for her shift (so almost 2 hours). She asked if I had an extra collar and leash and that maybe I would be able to get it to come with me if I had one. I went and got one and was eventually able to get the collar on and it was letting me pet it and jumped right up and came with me. I realized that it's a girl at that point (oh yeah, she had no collar or tags or anything, so I have absolutely no way of knowing where she belongs). She happily followed me into our backyard and got acquainted with our dog, Sasha. I posted that I found her on Craigslist and then Asher and I set off on a walk around the neighborhood with her to see if we could find her owner. We had no luck and every person we talked to said they had never seen her before. We came back home and she took residence on my lounge chair. The poor little thing wants to come in the house so bad, but I don't know if she will poop or pee in here and I'm not even about to be cleaning that up. Not to mention, I think she sheds and I'm not cool with that either. She is a noisy, snorty little thing too and I can actually hear her right now, even though she's outside and the windows are all shut. So, here I am with a pug in my backyard and I'm wondering what exactly I should do with her. I hate to take her to the humane society and I'm obviously not going to just let her loose back onto the street again. However, I've got my 3 year old niece coming today for the weekend and my 14 year old cousin coming over today as well. This should be interesting, to say the least.

UPDATE: I just found her owner about 10 minutes ago. I have had her since 8:00 this morning and just now found her owner at a little after 5:00. I decided to walk down the street with her again now that I know people are home from work and finally two cars came driving up to me and all the people were so excited! They just stopped their cars in the middle of the road and jumped out and were hugging me and everything. It was hilarious. This little dog is obviously loved. It was funny because I had just told Brian that I kept wanting to call her Maggie for some reason and then as I was walking away from the owners, I turned back and asked them what her name was and it was Maddie! Seriously? How the heck did I get so close? Anyway though, it's good to have her back where she belongs. My cousin, Bryan, is here and now we're just waiting for Payton to arrive. Things will be much less chaotic this weekend, now that there isn't another dog in the mix...I think.

What a beautiful day!

Today was my last day of Women's Bible Study until school starts up again in the Fall. We had a really great morning with lots of yummy food (the fresh guacomole was definitely my favorite) and just lots of talking and laughing. I am going to miss my Tuesday mornings with all those great ladies and learning about the Lord together, but at the same time, it will be nice to have a break from having to get Asher and myself out the door every morning when he is often not in the mood to go. After that, we came home and I spent some time just hanging out with Asher before reading him a book and putting him down for a nap. While he was sleeping, I did a few things around the house and putzed around on the computer for a bit and then I woke him up and went and got the other boys from school. We had tacos for dinner and then headed out for my cousin, Rachel's, softball game. It was nice to sit and chat with my Aunt Nette and Uncle Randy while watching the game and the kids enjoyed running around (when they weren't driving us crazy asking for something to drink). The weather was so nice and it was just a really nice day all around. Tomorrow I am opening up every window in the house in the morning and getting to some serious cleaning. My house has been terribly neglected lately and it is a shameful mess. Gotta get that taken care of before we have my niece for the weekend and then my sister and brother-in-law for a night as well. I guess I should probably get my butt to bed so I actually have the energy to clean tomorrow. Praise God for such a beautiful day and such a wonderful and blessed life!

In a bubble

That's what I feel like anyway. A few weeks ago I had a horrible cold where my ears were popped for days and it drove me totally nuts. It's been gone for a while now though, so it was all good. Then, Friday night on my way back from my sister's house, my ears just suddenly popped again. Out of nowhere with no reason I could figure out. It was about 1:30 in the morning and when I woke up at about 8:30, they were still like that. Then, by about 1:00 in the afternoon on Saturday, they were back to normal. Weird, but I was glad to actually be able to hear right again. Then, this morning I wake up to them being popped again and they still are. It's driving me totally nuts. I feel like I'm in a bubble. I can't hear right, I can't tell how loud I'm talking and if there is more than one noise going on at a time, I feel like my head could explode. That should be lovely when I'm in a gym full of teenagers tonight at church. I really wish I could just stay home and veg tonight. I'm tired and with the way my ears are, I feel all out of whack. I don't want to miss working with the kids tonight though and since we aren't meeting next week, due to the holiday, I really don't want to miss tonight. Tomorrow is an early morning too, with our last day of Women's Bible Study until school starts up again in the Fall and Asher has Storytales at church. Oh well, I'll get some rest sometime...maybe.

Ok, this is downright ridiculous!

It has now been over 4 months since I last blogged. That should give you an indication of how insanely busy and just plain crazy my life has been. We had a very tragic thing happen in our family at the end of January that rocked our world, but God has seen us through and we're taking it day by day. I pray that my sweet cousin is resting in the Lord's arms now. We had Asher evaluated for his stuttering and they have suggested that we put him in young 4s in the Fall so that they can keep an eye on it and get him any necessary speech therapy he may need. The great thing we learned through the process is that at 3 1/2 years old, he is doing most things at a 5 year old level, so he is very smart and the stuttering is really his only issue. Gavin finished another basketball league and it's still his absolute favorite thing. He also had the opportunity to take guitar lessons and did really well with those and will take the intermediate lessons in the Fall. Riley just had his class play and that was something he was really excited about. He was Papa Bear and he looked so dang cute. Things are winding down for me as far as some of the things I've been involved in at church, since school is almost out. My youngest sister, Delyn, is getting married at the end of June and we're excited for that. Life is really good and God is great as always! I'm gonna be keeping this blogging up again and look forward to getting back into the swing of it!

It's Been A While

It's been really busy around here, but now things are starting to wind down...sort of. I can't believe how quickly Christmas and New Year's went by. I guess it seems that way every year though. We had a really great holiday and shared some really good times with friends and family. Now, we're heading into new things, like Gavin starting up Salvation Army basketball. He's excited and so are we. That's the only new thing on our weekly schedule and I think that's good because our family doesn't seem to do real well if there is a ton going on. I think we like more down time than we like to be running off to several things, so this suits us just fine. Life is really good and God has blessed us so much. We have seen some major things happen in our life lately that just confirms our faith and is making it grow more and more each day. 2009 looks like it's going to be a great year!

Here are some pictures from Christmas ;-)


Asher wishing you a Very Veggie Christmas


Gavin, Riley, Asher and Payton on Christmas Eve with their new blankets from Grandma.


Asher with George, that he got from Grandma (he hardly ever puts him down)


Riley with his new Ben 10 Alien Force guy from Aunt Delyn


Gavin with some of his new Legos