Forever and a day

I cannot believe how long it has been since I have logged into this blog, much less written anything. So much has happened since this summer. Work has gotten (finally) back to some type of normalcy. The Executive Director was fired 10/08 but in Nov. 2009 she and her husband (who had also been working with us) were indicted for embezzlement and conspiracy to commit a felony. Anna pleaded guilty pretty fast. She didn't make bail and was in county for awhile. We are still waiting for Gene to plead or go to trial. It has been a LONG couple of years.

What else? The boys started second and third grade this past fall. They are both doing well in both grades. They both like their teachers. They are playing basketball right now and enjoying it.

Jenn and I are still on the PTA board and she is finishing up her Associates degree this semester and will transfer on and is thinking about getting her BA in Secondary Education/History. I did a semester at OU but it was just too much with working full time and having young kids and a family. Maybe when Jenn finishes and goes back to work, then I can do school.

We got a new puppy around Thanksgiving. She is adorable. Her name is Mollie and she is (another) Old English Sheepdog. Our friend Monty took Chloe for us. She was just not liking the boys anymore and biting and nipping at them. She is very happy to be in a kid-free environment.

Mollie is great. We adore her. She is full of energy and very much like having a 3 year old. But she is a sweetheart. She fits right into our family.

Tuesdays

It's just me an E this afternoon. Jenn has class until 9:30 tonight. I don't know what we will do, but something fun! I don't have anything to work on tonight, except his Star Wars quilt. I am looking forward to just hanging out and spending time with him!

40th Anniversary

We went down to Chickasha today to take mom and dad out to dinner. It is their 40th anniversary. WOW! FOURTY YEARS! It amazes me! Dad suprised mom with some beautiful diamond earrings, but the best suprise (to me) is the trip they are taking in March to Tuscany. I am so jealous! They will have such fun taking in the sights, the art and the food! MMMMmmm!

Weekend! Woot!

I have never been so happy for it to be the weekend! OMG! What a long, long, LONG week. I worked early and/or late all week and I am exhauseted. On top of that, Jenn and Eli have both been sick and missed school this week some. It's just been crazy.

Work is really stressful and because we have had people leave, I have been on major overload, trying to keep up with an extra job and parts of other jobs. Everyone has. It has been just nuts.

I am looking forward to going out to eat tonight and to bed early. Tomorrow I have to show my face at a golf tournament, and that hopefully won't last long because a HUGE suprise for the boys is coming!!!

Shhh... don't tell!! It looks like this but also has monkey bars.

Packing it all up

OMG! We have spent the day packing up stuff upon stuff upon stuff. Thank goodness my mom came over for a few hours and organized us! Who else would have thought about making a master list inventory of all our wedding stuff.

My car is completely full of boxes of candlesticks, vases and candy for the candy bar, mason jars and silk flowers, and more and more... we had to pack our suitcases and put them in my parents car, along with Jenn's dress. There was no room left!

I cannot belive we leave tomorrow for Eureka Springs and that we are getting married in 3 days! I cannot wait to see Robyn & Traci, too! They are driving all the way from Minnesota! It should be a fun, but stressful and crazy weekened!

Oklahoma Science Museum

It used to be called the Omniplex. I worked there for a couple of years, like 2000-2001. I always loved that place and they are really doing some great stuff with it. We have been members ever since I left my position there and I try to take the kids out there frequently, but it had been several months and wow! I was suprised. They had all kinds of new things going on. I was really impressed. The boys had a blast and so did I. We didn't even have time to go upstairs to the space exhibit thing, because we were building stuff with cups and blocks and things. Very cool!

Incredible Pizza

We have been going to Incredible Pizza a lot this summer. It has been crazy and noisy but fun. The very end of the school year I had bought these coupons for $30 for Incredible Pizza. I got like 6 buy one get one buffets, a whole bunch of buy one get one bumper cars, racing and mini golfs and then a whole bunch where you buy a $10 game card and get a $10 game card free. It was great. We hardly spent anything there and went about 7 times this summer. The boys had a good time and Jenn always loves playing the Deal or No Deal game (ok, and I do, too!).

Family Reunion

We had our family reunion today. I was really dreading it because I didn't think most of my cousins were coming, but it turned out that they did and it actually turned out to be fun. My sister even came from Dallas with my bil and nephew and that was cool! The boys played frisbee and we had lunch and went swimming and then my cousin took E over to play basketball and he thought that was AWESOME! It was a fun day.

Weekend

We had a nice weekend. We all went to Toby Keith's I love this bar and grill for lunch and then walked down the river walk to the movie theater. Jenn and I went to see Mama Mia! and the boys went to the play center and when our movie was over, we suprised them and took them to see Space Chimps (which was HORRIBLE - and I love animated stuff). They liked it though, so I guess that is what counts.

After the movies, we went to the T-Mobile store to see if it was time for me to get the phone credit and it was! Jenn decided on a new phone (finally) and picked a Blackberry Curve. We used her phone credit to get her mom a new phone about 6 months ago and since I bought my Blackberry Pearl via eBay about 6 months ago, I didn't need (or want) a new phone yet. They didn't have any of the gold one's left, so we had to come back on Sunday.

We ran over to the candy store to look for different kinds of candy that we want to use for the candy bar at the wedding. We found some great things.... jelly bellies and m&m's and all kinds of things!

We ended up going to dinner at Red Lobster (it was so good) and then heading home. We were out most of the day and had a good time.

Sunday, we got up and did somethings around the house. Jenn's mom asked us to come over for dinner and to go swimming, so we said we would be there around 5pm. We went back to T-Mobile and they were totally out of the gold bb curve. They called a store in Norman, and they held one for us (since we were headed that way to Jenn's mom's place). We stopped in JC Penny and found TONS of boys clothes on sale and ended up buying the boys some back to school clothes and clothes for the wedding! I was so happy. I wanted to find them some dark brown dress shorts and we found some. We got them a very cute button-down shirt to go with it.

After we left JC Penny, we headed to Norman and the T-Mobile store there. We picked up the phone, stopped at the market for some things for dinner and then over to Debi's house. The boys were STARVING so we cooked hot dogs and baked beans and Jenn had picked up potato and macarroni salads. It was really good and totally hit the spot. Then we got our suits on and went to swimming.

The boys brought their new water guns that we bought for them on Saturday when we were at Bass Pro Shop. They were super soakers and they were crazy! We played really hard and swam a lot and everyone was exhausted when we headed home around 9PM. Both the boys fell asleep in the car before we even left Norman!

It was a good weekend, although I didn't get much of the cleaning out of the garage and my room done as I had wanted to. Seems like that is always the case! LOL

Memorial Day

Jenn took the boys to White Water this morning and I got to spend a lazy day in bed, playing Guitar Hero and having a quite house to myself. It was HEAVEN! They came home around 2 PM and we all took a nap. It was pretty uneventful (for me) but really it was exactly what I needed.

My Love

I cannot believe that it is only 5 months until Jenn and I get married! Boy, the time sure does fly by fast. Sometimes it seems like we just met and are just starting our romance and then it seems like I have known her forever. It is coming up on three years - wow!

We actually met online and as cheesy as people think online dating places like eHarmony and other are, they really worked for us and we know of several other couples that met in the same way.

I really liked the fact that I knew we were compatible in our views on certain topics like religion and politics and I knew that she loved kids and maybe even wanted more, like me. You don't get that when you met someone out at a bar or club. It is almost entirely superficial and based on chemistry when you meet someone face to face like that. Not that it isn't superficial online, too. I will say that I was definitely interested in Jenn by they way she looked in her picture and she has said the same about mine.

Who would have thought that three years later, we would be getting married and talking about expanding our family?! It is so exciting! I am so very happy in my life and have a wonderful partner and love.

Already a LONG week

We had a break in at the office this past weekend. They ransacked our offices. So far we haven't found anything that was stolen, which is good, but it has been a chore trying to sort through all the paperwork that was dumped.

On top of trying to put the office back together, Jenn has had mid-terms and her Biology class is just getting really hard. She is getting really stressed out. I ended up taking us all to Golden Corral for dinner last night, because I didn't think she would be up for making dinner after her crazy day. She had a test in Religions of Mankind and then her Biology lab quiz was very hard.

I am glad that my nephew's birthday party is this weekend, because a little trip down to Dallas may help us all.

The boys are excited to go and also to stay in a hotel with an indoor pool, so they can swim. LOL We will probably take them to Dave & Busters, too. I want to take the boys to The Purple Cow for a burger at some point and Jenn wants to go to Pappasitos. It is her favorite place.

It should be a fun weekend. My parents will be down, too and so we are hoping the whole family can hang out together a little bit.

My nephew...

is just a cutie-patootie! He will be 2 in March! I cannot believe how fast he is growing up. My sister and nephew came up from Dallas to my parents house and spent several days, while my BIL was out hunting.

My cousin, her husband and 4 children also came, so it was crazy-wild with kids! But it was so much fun. My grandfather seemed to really love having all the little kids running around the house, playing and being wild! All the boys sat down with me and watched Star Wars VI: Return of the Jedi. Even T, the little 3 year old. He was all about E and followed him around all day long. It was so cute!

E decided he wanted to stay with Nonnie and Pop for a couple of nights, so I ran to the store to get a few things and while I was there, picked up a TON of clearance items for all the kids. E had taken his iDog and J was fascinated by it and I found him one, too. He was so excited when he got it! I was glad.

Getting Cold

Well, we have had the most beautiful weather the last few weeks. It is cold at night and in the early mornings, but it slowly gets up to around 70 F by afternoon and is just lovely. I have been taking the boys to the park a lot. They have played outside in the back almost every evening after I get home from work. They swing and slide and dig in the sandbox and they have a lot of bubble stuff that they have been blowing bubbles with. And don't forget sidewalk chalk!

Today, it is cold. (For Oklahoma, it is cold.) It was 40 F this morning and it still is around 50 F now, at noon. *sad* I am not ready to give up this wonderful weather we have been having. The meteorologist is saying we are in a freeze alert for tonight. It is supposed to be 30 F overnight. Wow.

I guess it is finally starting to be winter weather. It was so nice to actually have an Autumn. It has been years since we really have. It usually goes straight from summer to winter, with maybe 5 days of autumn-like weather. I am going to miss it.

Halloween

The boys had a blast on Halloween. They were Jedi Knights (from Star Wars) and looked pretty good. For some reason, their light sabres were not lighting up properly, but really, it was good not to have them flinging swords around!

The Friday before, we went to a Halloween Carnival at the Oklahoma State University - OKC Horticulture Building. It was really awesome. They had tons of games for the kids to play, like pin the tail on the cat, a cookie walk, bean bag toss, et cetera. They also had a little haunted house that the kids liked. The Bourland's and their 7 little ones came with us and all the kids had a great time!

Halloween night, the Hazlett's were in town (from St. Paul, MN) and we were SOOO glad to get to spend time with them and go Trick or Treating with them. It was a lot of fun. We headed over to the Gatewood Neighborhood (which was crazy packed with people) and trapsed up and down a few blocks. Jenn and I googled at all the homes we liked and wished that sometime we could live in the neighborhood.

It was a very fun Halloween!

Homecoming!

Well, we all got better and went to OSU Homecoming. It was such a blast. We got up there on Friday night and went to the "walk around", looking at all the fraternity and sorority house decorations and then headed over to Gallager Iba for the pep rally. The boys got footballs and they thought that was awesome.

The next morning we got up early and went downtown for the parade. The collected a TON of candy (you'd have thought it was Halloween) and had a lot of fun. The football game wasn't until 6 pm, so we went over to the alumni center and they had little activities and temporary tattoos for the kids. Their was lunch stuff as well, so we stayed around and ate. They also brought Bullet (the horse) out on the lawn and the kids got to see him.

They game was really good. We had excellent seats, right on the aisle, so the boys could get up and stretch their legs and hang out on the bar that seperated the sections. We were on the 10 yard line, about 40 rows up. We could really see everything.

It was a very long weekend and a lot of fun, but I think we decided that we won't go for the whole weekend again until the boys are a little bit older. But it was really cool to be back on the campus and show it to the kids and have them be like I was at their age - excited and wishing for the day when I could go there too.

We had SUN this weekend!!!

It's true. It was sunny all weekend and DIDN'T rain! Can you believe it? We watched some movies Friday night. It was so nice Saturday, we took the boys to the pool and ended up staying most of the day. They had a blast. So did I. It was so great to see how well they are swimming and E just kept going down the slides over and over and over again. He was so proud of himself and so was I.

We were beat after all that. We had some dinner and the boys watched THE LAST MIMZY and fell asleep. Jenn fell asleep on the sofa around 6pm and we were just all around tired from the sun and swimming and playing.

We spent a lazy day on Sunday catching up on our DVR'd stuff and we let the boys play on the XBox most of the afternoon. Their computer is dead, so I have felt bad that they haven't had that to play on all week.

Our hot water heater is working great. Yay! Jenn still has some more on her English paper to do. It is due tomorrow. Ugh. I am so sorry that she did summer school now. It has not been a good experience for her at all.

What's new...

Well, on Friday, I got home and the SUN WAS ACTUALLY OUT! Wooohooo! It has rained for months here. I ran in and changed and then I mowed the lawn and did a little bit of weed eating. I still need to trim the hedges, because the lawn people are so behind, I don't know if and when they will ever show up!

We hung out with the boys, watched some cartoons and I fell asleep pretty early. I was so tired. Jenn finshed her English paper and went to submit it online and the site was down. She emailed it to her prof and I hope that is cool. I don't think she has heard anything back.

Saturday, I took Sophie to the groomers. We had a tball game at 10 and it was 95 and very hot. E refused to play and sat in the field and threw a temper tantrum, so I sent him to the bench. K played great! We were several people short. We only had 6 players. The parents of 2 said they weren't going to stay for the noon game, which left us with 3 players (since E wouldn't play). We decided to forfeit and this crazy mom went all off on Jenn for forfeiting. We told her that if her son wanted to play, they said he could play with another team, but she just went all off like she was on some kind of reality show. It was crazy. No. We haven't been playing much because it has rained for a month. All the fields are marsh land and they have cancelled games and practices over it. Not our fault.

We went home and Jenn fell asleep on the sofa, so E begged me to watch Star Wars III with him. I haven't let him watch it yet, because I heard it was somewhat violent. I told him if we started it and I thought it was too bad, we were turning it off. Jenn woke up and took K to her moms for awhile, while we watched the movie. I fast forwarded it a little bit, but it wasn't too bad. E was very glad to finally see it.

Jenn's mom came over for dinner Sat. night and then I put the boys to bed about 9:30 and she stayed so she could watch Sopranos (On Demand). Since she was going to be there, Jenn and I went out to see EVENING. It was really good. Then we had a beer and played some darts. It was fun. I hadn't really wanted to go out at all, but I am glad we did.

Sunday was sort of slow. I had wanted to sleep in, but the boys woke me up around 8am. I got up to make them some breakfast when my mom called to let me know that my grandma had passed away. I hemmed and hawwed about whether or not to drive to Chickasha, but decided not to. We went to Jimmy's Egg for some breakfast, then went to the flea market and then home for a nap. I was exhausted. I slept for about 30 mintues and then couldn't get back to sleep. The boys were being terrors and refused to calm down so I put them in different rooms and made them pick their room up. When I went to check on them an hour later, they both had picked up their room and were asleep! Yay!

I sat down in the sun room and watched some Harry Potter. About 6pm we decided to go to the pool for an hour or so and then go get some dinner. We got to the pool and sat there for about an hour. They had everyone out because the clorine system was messed up. We didn't get to swim, so we left. I was really bummed. It was hot.

We got some Chinese food and went home. The boys got ready for bed and watched a movie, while Jenn and I caught up on Big Brother. She is trying to get me hooked. It is like her favorite show. So far, I am not too impressed, really.

4th of July Celebration!

We had such a good 4th! We slept in and had a lazy morning. The boys and I watched BACK TO THE FUTURE, when all the sudden a little bird comes walking through the kitchen and into the dining room! We got it cornered, shut all the doors we could, opened the front door and we finally got it outside! Whew!

Then we went downtown to the Marriott Residence Inn and had a nap, went for a swim, walked over to the Harkins' Theatre and saw RATATOUIE and got out of the moive a few minutes before the fireworks started. We walked back to the hotel and sat on our 5th floor balcony and watched them. They were great.

Then we went to IHOP for some late dinner and to bed. I am EXHAUSTED today!

Great weekend!

We had a great weekend, despite all the rain. I took the family out for burgers at Red Robin and then to see EVAN ALMIGHTY friday night. It was GREAT! And everyone loved it, which was even better!

Saturday, the boys and I got up early, let Jenn sleep and went to McDonald's for breakfast. Then we drove to Seminole and went the to the Children's Museum. They had a blast. It was a lot of fun for us too. We went back to OKC and did a little shopping (the boys are outgrowing all their clothes) and back home. We had some dinner and the boys got in bed and watched a movie while we watched BREACH (which was really good).

Sunday was sort of a lazy day. Jenn did some laundry and cleaned the kitchen. She made a fabulous steak dinner. It was a great weekend.