Thank You

To all the men and women who have sacrificed for everything that we have, Thank You!

A Big, 4-year-old Sized Thank you!

Brenden says, "Thank you! MUAH"

So much blue! So much fun!

Thank you so much to everyone that was able to make it to Brenden's birthday party on Sunday. We are so blessed to have such amazing family and friends. I wish I had a chance to talk to everyone for longer than 3 seconds, but that's the problem with knowing so many great people. :)

Thank you to Tim who was up so late on Saturday but who got up early with me, cleaned, cooked, and everything else that we needed to do. We love you!

An extra big thank you to Mike and Connie for bringing food, helping set up and being all around awesome.

And a HUGE thank you to my mom. This party would not have happened without her. She watched the kids, cooked, cleaned, and kept me sane. Love you, mom!

All I Can Say is WOW!

Two days ago, I posted this on my Facebook wall:

I was being silly, of course. Then, I got a message from our friend, Ryan, who was in the Army with Tim while we were stationed in Colorado Springs. He mentioned that his dad painted and that I should friend him on Facebook and that he would paint it for me. To say I was ecstatic would be an understatement! Then, today, David tells me he is done. And I...I am blown away.

Original (taken with my phone):

David's painting:

Original (one of my favorites):

David's Painting:

Absolutely amazing! I may have shed a few tears, or a thousand, because I am so grateful and love them so much. Two wonderful guys, David and Ryan!

Why yes, he DOES have a website! http://www.davidpoyantpaintings.com/

Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU David!!!!

THANK YOU!

A huge, gigantic, humongous THANK YOU to everyone that was able to make it to my birthday party! I had a great time visiting with everyone, was totally spoiled, and had the funniest cake ever! (I wanted a Cake Wrecks cake. Tim and Bre came up with it, and Bre made it. She did great! Even if she did blush.)

It's a rocket!

Our personal cake artist, Bre. :)

Cake is always nice, presents are great, but the real treasures in life are my family and friends. I am so blessed!

Before and After (Karen and Rick's hard work!)

When I said our yard was awful, I wasn't kidding. Karen and Rick spent an entire day out there working on the yard and getting our sprinklers working. Again, a HUGE THANK YOU!!!! :)

BEFORE

It looked abandoned. Not good for showing the house to prospective buyers.

Weeds that could eat you!

FYI - That's a 6 ft fence. TALL weeds.

To top it all off a windstorm blew down 2 sections of our fence.

AFTER

Amazing, right? We owe them so much more than thank yous and a trip out to Colorado but I'm not sure what would really show them how much we appreciate everything they have done, and are still doing. Love you guys!

Oh yeah...this blog thingy.

Hi there! Yep, I've been gone for awhile. I actually haven't been on the computer (I don't count my Blackberry as one, even though it does almost everything our desktop does) in almost a week and a half. Oops! I realized that it had been too long when I received an email from someone asking if our blog was having problems. (Hi, Elaine! Thanks for checking on us!)

Even if I had been online I'm not sure I would have blogged. Who really wants to hear me complain about our cruddy renters and awful property manager again? (STILL haven't heard from either of them. And for some reason the PM needs until July 10th to finish repairs. URGH!) Or another family member in the hospital? (my grandma Halter...something is up with her blood) Or how our car has broken down for the 3rd time? (something "in the back" is what the tow guy said. AGAIN?!?) Or Brenden's molars that are giving all of us a headache? (seriously, 2 months of them is enough) So yeah, not much happy to blog about.

There were a few high lights that I haven't put on here. It's not all gloom and doom, although most days it feels like it. On the 27th I attended my 10 year class reunion. EEK! I learned a lot from Tim when he was planning his and his budget definitely came in handy. My friend, Cassie, handled most of the work and I was more of a sounding board. It would not have happened without her!

Dewey High School - Class of 1999

That morning we had a picnic at Sooner Park in Bartlesville. It was super hot but it turned out that the shade and the breeze made it pretty nice! We all ate hot dogs and hamburgers (Thanks, Shaunda!) and hung out just catching up. We even ended up having a bouncy toy for the kids to play in thanks to the Class of 1984 that was having a very small gathering at the tables near us. That night we had a small but fun gathering at the Canteen. We were entertained with some class member related bingo, 1999 trivia and a seriously funny game that included plungers and rolls of toilet paper. (Thanks, Jeannie! We will not forget that!) It was awesome to see everyone and I think everyone had a good time. I'm excited for the next one...especially since Cassie and I don't plan on planning it! :)

The next day Tim, Sean and I redid the floor in my mom's bathroom. It wasn't exactly the most exciting day for us but my mom was thrilled, so that made it worth it. Brenden was so eager to help. He's already a great helper, loves cleaning and throwing things away. He's pretty good at not throwing random things in there! The only thing I found in the trash that shouldn't have been in there was a sippy cup, and it was empty so I guess he thought that's where it went.

Helping dad cut measure the final tile.

I'll try to keep up with our blog a little better from now on, but I'm not going to make too many promises. Hopefully we'll have some good news, either on the house, the car, or the molars. Somethings got to give, right?

P.S. A HUGE Thank You to Karen and Rick!!! They spent an entire day fighting the humongous weeds (we're talking over 3 feet high) and fixing the fence on our house in Colorado. I'm looking for flights to come out there and fix you that meatloaf, guys! :)