On vacation....

We are leaving in the morning to head to the beach for 4 days! Doesn't that sound like fun? We are all excited!!! I am sure I will have lots to post when I get back!

Have a great week!!!

Exciting Update about the bag below...

I was cruising Hobby Lobby this evening and I saw the bag I've been wanting. I was just getting ready to order it this evening online, but decided to wait b/c HL usually has a 40% off coupon So I can get it for a little cheaper!

Aren't you excited for me?

hehe

Scrapbooking

Before I went back to work I tried to get some scrapbooking done. This website that I go to, www.lifetimemoments.com sponsors a Scrapfest in the Summer (& winter too). You pay to play and then they post challenges to get you scrapping. I usually only participate in the Summer b/c it's when I have the most free time. Below are some of my LO's I've gotten done. I like them for the most part:)


¡Hasta luego!

Wrapped!!!!

A few weeks ago some of Heather's friends from dance wrapped her house. This brought back memories from when I was a kid. Good times.

hehe

I had this picture when it happened but I was having trouble getting it on my computer.

Purse Fetish...

is this not the cutest summery bag? I am on a mission to find one.

Summer school started this morning and it really wasn't bad. I've set out on a mission to try to learn Spanish~hehe So if you have any suggestions let me know.

It is so flippin' hot in these parts these days that all we want to do is lay around in the a/c. haha

Summer~this week~

This week the kids were signed up for Showstoppers Camp. They learned the songs from HS Musical and went every morning for a few hours and learned some dances to go with them. Today they had their final performance and they did a good job. I think they had a lot of fun.

We went to the library yesterday and paid our $22 in fines. I let the kids check out 2 books each. We went back today for one of their summer programs. They had this magician there

www.trixiebond.com


and she was really good. If you have the chance to see her perform, take your kids. Her whole performance was based around different books.

I was asked to teach summer school this summer. I told them I would b/c the money is too good & it should be ok. The hours aren't too bad and there's lots of stuff I want to do around the house but can't afford~now I can.

YAY!!!

Next week the kids will be going to ECO camp through our Chamber of Commerce. My friend Rachella told me about it & she is going to help me with the kids next week.
Thanks girl

Isn't this cute?

Aren't these the cutest?

http://4ringcircus.typepad.com/its_a_4_ring_circus/2007/06/cotw.html#comment-71855668

Thanks for sharing Jessica

I can't get the link to work so you'll have to cut & paste. Sorry!

~Catch 22~

Ok so I want to take the kids to the library to get some books but alas I can't b/c we owe library fines! $22 worth of Library fines. It was my fault, so I can take the blame. So on Thursday (payday) we'll be going to the library to pay our library fines & getting some new books.

So see it really is a Catch 22~I either pay the fines or no books? hum

~99 Days of Great Summer Games~

This was posted on a website I visit regularly Maybe you can find some fun things for your kids to do this summer.

http://familyfun.go.com/games/indoor-outdoor-games/specialfeature/summer-games-june/index.html?CMP=NL_Wkdr
Also, I added a new link to my sidebar for ~SandyPea~, she's a Pea friend from www.twopeasinabucket.com. I was checking out her blog and she had a very cute & creative idea on there. Check out this
http://alwayswaitingforsomething.blogspot.com/2007/05/its-hilarious.html

Isn't that window just the cutest?

Oh, Summer is officially here now~I'm all finished with meetings for the school year. YAY for summer. Now if the rain will just go away!!! HAHA

End of the Year Teacher Gifts

My friend, Jennifer Bell, made these cute name frames for a lot of people at Christmas. I decided that they would be super cute for end of the year teacher gifts and they turned out pretty cute if I must say so myself. I know Caroline's teacher liked hers and Heather's teacher send a Thank you know but I don't know about Jed's teachers.

~Memorial Day~

Well, we are headed out to a cookout with some church friends in a little while. I was trying to make some homemade strawberry ice cream but I bought one of those packs at walmart and it only makes 2 quarts instead of 4 so I don't know if that will work. I'm also going to try to make Brownie Pudding.

here's the recipe in case you want to try it. The reviews are great. We'll see.

Brownie Pudding

1 cup all-purpose flour
2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa, divided
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into cubes
1/2 cup chopped semisweet chocolate
2 eggs
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup brown sugar
11/3 cups boiling water

Preheat the oven to 350 F.
Sift together the flour, 1/3 cup of the cocoa powder, baking powder and salt in a bowl.
Melt together butter and chocolate in a small heavy pot over low heat. Remove from heat and cool slightly.
Whisk together eggs, sugar, milk and vanilla until well combined. Add chocolate mixture and flour mixture and stir until batter is just combined.
Spread the batter evenly in an ungreased 8-inch-square baking pan.
Whisk together remaining 1/3 cup cocoa powder, brown sugar and water. Pour the mixture over the batter.

Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean. Do not overbake, or cake will be slightly dry. Serve the cake hot with ice cream.

I'm thinking it can't be too bad b/c it's chocolatey~right?

I have tons of pics but i have to get them resized.

Have a great day.

Here's the other one

We are FAMILY....

I think we've officially lost it. Here are our 2 new family members.

Here Comes Summer...

YAY!!!! We are counting down the days left until summer. Just 4 more times we have to wake up for school (well the kids at least) I have 7 more times. YUCK!!!!

The kids are going to be busy the first few weeks of summer. They are going to go to Showshopper camp which is like show choir from what I understand. Then they are going to go to ECO camp & I have no clue what that is all about. Then we are going to go to the beach at the end of June. We are so excited. Somewhere in there I am going to try to get them into swim lessons. So we are already booked.

We will probably make a trip up to OK sometime probably not until July. We'll have to see.

A friend of mine taught me how to make strawberry jam last night. It was so easy and we had a good time.

I'll post pictures in a little while.

~The Reason I Relay~

My grandma passed away in December after suffering from cancer for years. I decided a month or so before she passed away that I wanted to participate in Relay for Life. I really didn't know anything about it. I had a friend that participated in it, but other than that~I had no clue. I asked around school if anyone did a team & of course you know how this story ends up~they told me I could get one together. So I did~

We had our kids at school bring "Coins for Cancer" and we raised about $1200 for our teams~We thought that was AWESOME!!!

Our theme was S.W.A.T. out Cancer! So we were the Trout SWAT team. HAHA Here's what our tent looked like



Heather stayed with me last night & we ended up staying until 1am. Heather walked several laps & she had a lot of fun going to the different tents.

We bought luminaria for my grandma, but on the way home I remembered 2 other people in my live suffered from cancer. I could have probably spent $50 in luminarias. ACS & Relay for Life are a great cause & I encourage you to get involved in your community.

Happy Cinco de Mayo!!!

In honor of Cinco de Mayo, I'm posting this video of Jed & his friend from school & their Mexican hat dance. Jed was so excited about this dance for weeks. He's trying teaching his sisters how to do it too. I was very proud of him.



sorry for the crappy quality of the video.

Here's another video of a song they sang in Spanish~you can't really see the kids but you can hear them pretty good.



Happy Cinco de Mayo!!!

Moved In...

Well, we are finally moved in our new house & we are almost finished unpacking~it's hard to believe it's been a month since we closed. It seems like there is always something going on so we haven't gotten much accomplished. My mom & step-dad came down for a few days this weekend so hopefully we can get the big projects finished up.

Caroline turned 4 on Thursday & she will let you know that she is 4 now! We are going to have her birthday party in a few weeks, so I've got to start getting that together. It's hard to believe she'll be starting real school in August. She has had an awesome teacher this year & she can write her name all by herself.

Jed recently graduated to an orange belt in tae kwan do. he really enjoys it. He'll be in 1st grade next year~his class is having a Cinco De Mayo celebration on May 4 & he has been showing us his dance. I think he's excited. :)

Heather has been busy with dance & getting ready for recitial. She passed her TAKS reading test & we are waiting on the Math results. We are hoping for a 70 since Math isn't her strong suit. And thank goodness they don't test for Spelling~ACK!!!

It snowed here at Easter~crazy. Here's a picture. I can't quite figure out how to get the pictures to post where i want them. UGH!!!

I'll take some picture of the house this weekend.

I think that's all for now.

Have a great week!

HOMEOWNERS...

well, we closed on our house this morning. what a day! The guys from church are coming tomorrow afternoon to help move the big stuff. I HATE moving & packing. Where does all this crap (yes, there's no other word for it) come from? Sadly the only way to get rid of it or to realize it's taking over is to move.

Here's a few pics to tide everyone over until you come to visit haha of course this is their decorations so mine will look nothing like this haha

Spring Break~YAY!!!

Spring Break has arrived!(thank goodness)

Jed's skating party was a great success. Several friends from his class at school were able to come and we had a great time. I could post pictures but my digital camera was lost.

I mentioned to Tyson that my digital camera was lost and I had no clue where I had it last. I just cut my loss and hoped it would turn up while we were moving. As I started packing the other night, Tyson said he thought it might be in his hunting stuff & of course there it was. So the camera wasn't really lost, it was just hiding. hahaha

We started packing really good last night. We took Caroline's bed down and started on her room, so we could put the boxes we had packed in there. We used up all the boxes we had & I have to go tomorrow to get more.

I talked to our realtor & mortgage broker today & they are working to get our closing day moved up to next monday (March 19). The sellers realtor was supposed to be checking with them to see if it would be ok to git r done! haha

I'll try to get some pictures for the next post.

Whew! What a MONTH!!!!

I don't know where to begin. It's been a crazy life the last few weeks and just 3 1/2 more days and we can breathe a little.

In February, our family made it to the temple to be sealed together for eternity. It was a great day with all of our special family & friends with us.

We also began to house hunt~what a HEADACHE!!!! Finally, I made Tyson cancel his camping plans, got a babysitter & we sat out on a Saturday to find a house. We found something AFTER looking at about 10 houses. The house we liked we looked at towards the beginning of the day but I made Tyson & Brother Hardy (our realtor) look at all the others "just in case" haha. Everything seems to be going smoothly paperwork wise and we are scheduled to close March 29. We are excited & have already started packing!

Heather participated in something called Destination Imagination this last weekend. Her team had some trouble getting started, but they placed 7th out of 12 teams and we were very pleased with their performance. We had a great time at the competition and I think she plans to do it next year.

She is also performing in her school's musical "The Jungle Book." She will perform 5 times this week. She has been working on this since the beginning of school.

Jed turned 6 last week & the poor boy was slighted on his birthday b/c of so much other stuff going on. He wants to have a skating party, so I need to get busy planning that.

Caroline is her usual busy self. She is learning how to write her name and she loves school. She is getting so big and I just wonder where the time is going.

We are staying home this Spring Break b/c we are buying a house. The kids are kind of bummed but I think they'll get over it. haha

Hope everything is going good for everyone!

Autumn