Thanks OTC!

The kids absolutely love my work. They love every last cheap, silly toy that I've ever brought home. Parker just asked me yesterday if we could go to there.

This is one of the last items I brought home for them. Punch balloons are always a hit! Note Parker's choice of footwear. It's a hundred degrees here and for three days in a row, he insisted on wearing his SNOW BOOTS! I finally hid them away in his closet so he wouldn't want to put them on.

My fine friends at OTC gave me an awesome going away/birthday gift including a bunch of UNO Hockey stuff. They all autographed a mini souveneir hockey stick and guess who loves it? Here is his playing "gowie" (as he says it).

HOME!

We are far from finished but here are some pictures of our new home.

This is our crazy front door. It was a very expensive, custom design that we aren't crazy about but we just can't bring ourselves to rip it out just yet. Our realtor told the former owners (who are the sweetest elderly couple you've ever met) that we LOVE it and they were so happy.

This is our amazing backyard. You can see that Ray got the trampoline put together. We also got a mosquito misting system installed so that we can actually be outside and enjoy it. The yard goes on forever but there's a lot of landscaping in the way. We have a pond just off the patio and a spiral staricase to a deck above our patio. We hear it's a great spot to enjoy fireworks on the 4th!

The patio. Covered with kids toys. I need to come up with a storage option!

The living room. Kids are watching "your backyard friends the Backyardigans".

Front entryway. You can see Parks sitting illegally on the couch!

Catching Up Part II

I think I mentioned that I had a flat tire in the middle of Kansas during our caravan (which consisted of my car with the frogs, cat and plants), Ray's car (with the dogs, kids and pulling a U-Haul) to Dallas.

It was 90+, 50 mph winds and a divided 2-lane highway literally 50 miles from any sort of town. It was a nightmare but my hero husband finally got the donut on so we could hobble into Salina, where I've never been so happy to see a Walmart EVER.

We got two new (cheap) tires so that we could exceed 50 mph for the last 60 or so miles of our first leg into Wichita.

See that jug of water? Parker thought it would be fun to dump it out on the road, despite the fact that we were all melting in the heat.

Catching Up Part I

Chloe graduated from Goddard's Pre-K program in May. It was so sweet, I barely made it through without sobbing. Grandma didn't fare as well when Chloe's friend Abby's mom was talking to her about the girls saying goodbye to each other :(.