The Best Vacation Ever

Costa Rica cannot be beat.

We dare not try.

UNAVAILABLE

We regret to inform all family & friends that we will be completely unavailable for the next 9 days.

NO work, NO errands, NO cleaning, NO kids!

If you're curious as to where we are going,

click on the link below.

http://www.sandylaneestate.com/

Yes, we are really going there!

And YES, I'm going to miss Samantha :(

even though she peed on me...yesterday AND today! Geez!

Shake Your Sillies Out

This is why we LOVE library storytime!

Afterwards, we wander through the books

and play with the toys.

Mom, I'm ready for my closeup!

Hurricane IKE

We have survived Ike. We were prepared for the worst and luckily the Katy area did not get hit too hard. Ike came through in the middle of the night. The winds and rain were loud, but if it had been during the day, it would have been a bit scarier to see. My family all came over to stay the night, so we were up late eating and watching movies and the 24 hour news. There are parts of town that look worse than others, but we can't complain. The power was out from about 3am-12noon on Saturday. Sammie got to sleep with us.

We have a lot of friends and coworkers that are still without power and water, so we feel really fortunate. My Dad and Michelle work downtown, which has been closed to the public...so they were off work from Thursday afternoon and were back to work Wednesday. Blake had to go back on Tuesday. Schools are closed all week.

Here is the 'damage' to our house.

Just a few shingles missing...at least it wasn't the roof itself!

The gate blew in the wrong direction and knocked the handles off.
And my flowers got overblown.

My parents live about 20 minutes away, directly west of downtown. Their neighborhood got hit pretty hard. This is a picture of their backyard. The tree branches were resting on the windows and luckily did not break through and damage inside.

JUMP!

Up until yesterday, there was only ONE thing Samantha would watch on TV... I'll give you one guess. Yeah, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, duh! Samantha is a big country music fan, so I Tivo'd the CMA Music Festival and her favorite group, Sugarland, performed. We listen to Sugarland in the car ALL the time ... so to see them LIVE!

She was so excited, she jumped!

Baby or Toddler?

Craft Day

In addition to 4 HUGE loads of laundry, today was craft day. I have been working on this bulletin board for-e-ver! Amy and I went to buy the fabric and stuff weeks ago...but before we knew it, I went out of town and she had a baby! Crap, I'm on my own!

Nevermind! I'd like to introduce you to my new craft buddy! Surprise! It's Sam!

I think the bulletin board turned out really cute! It's hard to see, but the dots on the ribbons are cute little pink letters.

Now that we take a closer look...you can see my gigantic mistake... The problem? The frame I bought (a week ago) is 24" x 36" - and the actual bulletin board is 23" x 35"...how annoying and frustrating! Did I mention I had been to Hobby Lobby 3 different times to get the 24" x 36" cork board. I called ahead this last time and the gal assured me that "there are tons!" When I got there (an hour later) there were none. ARGGH! Instead, there were a bunch of 23" x 35" ones (and a damaged one for only $7.79)...I figured with the batting and fabric, I would be fine...nope! Perfectionists should NEVER do crafts! People like me (and Blake) just like to pay for things and whine about about crappy they are.