It is amazing how fast life really does pass you by! Brian and I have been married 11 years today and I can still remember how I felt the day he proposed and the day we were married. We started our life a little backwards, but managed to get right on track once we did get started; 3 kids, a mortgage, some car payments, braces, carpooling, PTA, and now the first one of to college. I don't know where I thought we would be looking ahead 11 years, but I do know that I love Brian more today than I did 11 years ago. He is a wonderful husband, so supportive and kind that I sometimes wonder if I even deserve him (I always decide that I do, he's the lucky one, right :); he is an amazing dad to my (our) children and I love that he teaches them about love and respect between parents; I love that our daughter has learned how men should treat her and I love that our boys have learned how to treat their wife or girlfriend when the time comes from their dad. I know that even when it gets hard (and it does) that he will be there to help pick up the pieces; I know that marriage is hard work and that it takes two people everyday to keep it going, even though one person may carry the other from time to time; I know that I want to grow old with him and even dream of renting beach cottages so that our grown children and our grandchildren (not any time soon) will be able to come visit us.

I am blessed to have married this man 11 years ago and look forward to many more.

Happy Anniversary Honey, I love you!

Disney Autograph Books

Last month my sister and her family went on a Disney Cruise, which included the cruise and 4 days at Disney World. I remembered that when we had taken our kids on Disney Vacations, one of their favorite things were to get autographs from all of the characters. I wanted to make an autograph book for each of my nieces and my nephew for their trip, which I hope to do for all of my nieces and nephews when they go on their own Disney Vacations someday.

I spent a lot of time of these and I was really happy to be done, because I think, no I KNOW that I was a little more optimistic than I should have been. It was a lot more work that I thought it would be, but in the end, I thought they were great. I got on-line and looked up all of the characters that would be on their specific cruise and I did the same with the 2 parks they were going to visit and got the list of characters that would be at the parks those days, so I knew just what to put in their books; 22 character pages total, one side had the name and a place for their photo and the other side for the autograph.

When I took them to the kids, they were kinda like "... thanks TT" but they didn't really understand what they were for. However, when they got back, they were so excited to show me their books. They saw all but 2 of the characters I put in their books. My sister said that people were coming up and asking them where they could get the books and the characters were showing them off to each other, which made me feel proud that they had them for their trip.

So here are the books, with a few pages out of it. This is what it looks like without the pics or autographs, hopefully I will update after my sister gets the pictures in there.

Our Daughter's New Home

I know I have been bad about blogging this summer but it's just been crazy.

The end of August we made the 6-hour drive to Hays, Kansas to leave our 1st born child. It was a great day and I was incredibly proud of her and yes, I cried. I did good though and didn't cry until we actually drove away.

We drove up the night before so we could be at her new "home" early in the morning for the big move in. The school, which I have been so impressed with thus far, was incredibly organized as usual. We had a sorority actually offer to help us carry her stuff in and we had our car unloaded in a matter of minutes and her room almost fully done in about an hour.

Unfortunately, we didn't get a chance to meet her roommate Valerie because she was in orientation all day, so hopefully we will do that on our next visit.

She is doing great, we have been Skyping with her weekly, I think she misses her dog the most, but Tater doesn't like Skyping with her; she won't look at the screen, which is hilarious. We are so proud of her, she seems to have grown up overnight. She takes care of things all on her own (I know, she is supposed to but we weren't really sure it would really happen to be honest). She is getting pretty good grades, but hasn't had any luck getting a job yet. She and her roommate get along great and I don't think there have been any drunken episodes... yet. However, the ever popular "middle of the night - fire alarm" has been very popular in her dorm and she is very much over that!

Brady and Dad

Any man can be a Father, but it takes someone special to be a Dad!

Brady and Brian fishing on Father's Day!

While we were out...

We have been a busy family!

Here is the run down:

*We painted our house

Before

After

*Rachel Graduated High School

Celebrated her Graduation with Family and Friends

WOW!

Our daughter just left for her last day of High School! Wow!

When life hands you lemons...

You just paint another room!

Well as I eluded to last week, we were supposed to paint the outside of our house; something we have wanted to do for awhile but really got the urge to get ready for Rachel's graduation party, thus giving us some serious motivation to get it done. However, the house is still white and not the beautiful boston fern that I have chosen. We were not blessed by the weather last weekend and not to jinx us, but things aren't looking too good for this weekend either (boo).

I must admit, I was very disappointed. We had spent most of the week power washing the house, moving everything away from the house, and even trimming all of the bushes and such so we would have a nice clean house to paint. Got up bright and early on Saturday to get ready to tape the windows and we were not cleared for take off by our Painting Crew Supervisor (aka my mom's bf who was a painter in his former life). So back to bed we went and ended up having a great day running errands and spending time together.

However, Sunday morning I woke up and decided that I really wanted to paint the living room. We got new furniture several months ago and the new couch blended in with the old wall color a little too much for my taste. So I conned Brian into taking me to Home Depot after grocery shopping and picked out a new color... mulled spice (sounds spicy, doesn't it?). He was a trooper and after we put the groceries away, we got to work on the living room. I must admit I love color and I am not afraid to use it in my house; however this was a little brave for me, it is a bit orange and scared me a bit putting it up on pretty neutral walls.

So here is a before and after shot, I am very pleased with my new choice of color and think that is feels much warmer in our living room and a bit Tuscany...

Before

After