The Flowery Branch Car Show & Chili Cook-Off

We took the guys, the kids, and my parents to The Flowery Branch Car Show & Chili Cook-Off. It was much bigger then I thought it would be and was a lot of fun.  The guys really enjoyed looking at the classic cars and all the restored VW's.  I know my dad really enjoyed it as well! Kale is posing with his favorite "Grandpa car."

 We even met Chipper the Gwinette Braves mascot at the show.  We topped off the day for the little guys at the bounce house and with some cotton candy!  :)

Grandma & Grandpa are here!

Visit with Grandma & Grandpa!

My parents had a screen printing show in Atlanta, so they came in for a few days! The kids loved to see them.  The first morning after they arrived Kale woke up at 5:30am so he could "wake them up" and play with them.  Needless to say, he had to patiently wait until at least 7:30am since he didn't go back to sleep.  This also made him extremely tired and cranky on friday.. but here are some fun pictures.

                                                     

We got Grandma all the way through the tunnel!

                                             and then the kids followed....

Pinata Fun

Today I started to do what I thought would be a fun and easy project with Kale, make a pinata.  His birthday is coming up in October and he wants to do a Buzz & Woody Party.  Toy Story!  So I decided instead of buying a pinata we would just make a Mr. Potato head one.  Thanks to Pintrest.

Easy - yes it was easy.  Basically tear paper and dip in in a bowl with flour and water. 

Fun - Yes it was very fun, it was easy enough Kale could do it, and I'm pretty excited to  see how it turns out after I paint it.

What I didn't factor in was the MESS!  

Kale throughly enjoyed dipping paper in flour paste and swinging it around in the process.  Even slapping it and forming it on the balloon was a highlight for him.  But when we were done he looked like he had been rolled in bread dough, the floor/table/everything was a mess and the paste did NOT come off easily.  So I sat on the floor with the back of a spoon for a good hour and scraped the dried flour past from the floor and chairs. 

Note to self: do outside next time, or cover Everything in trash bags!

Below are some pictures of our fun, I will post a photo later of the finished product.

School Started!

The Eagle Ranch School

 Grades 6-9

(All others attend Flowery Branch Elementary or High School)

We are officially on the school schedule! 

What's that mean?

6:45am - wake up, and get ready for school

7:15am - breakfast is over, kitchen clean-up and morning chores

8:00am - head to school (just down the hill - at the E.Ranch entrance)

3:30pm - return from school, do homework/study hall, free time (or chores)

6:00pm dinner, then bedtime and the alarm is set at 9:00pm!

I hear the school schedule is awesome and so much easier since the guys are not in the house all day, so we will see.  I didn't think the summer was that bad at all! 

Friday was their first day of school, and you can tell they were excited because when we went to wake them up at 6:45am they were already up and dressed, bags packed, and waiting to be let out of their rooms! (the rooms are alarmed) It was so funny... they were fidgety and couldn't wait! Luckily everyone came home after having a good day, and no one had any infractions! They came running in the house saying "Hi Daddy, I'm home" acting as if they were little kids coming back from their first day of school. haha  Kale missed them when they were gone, and kept asking if he could go to school also and see his friends.  His time is coming though, he starts preschool after Labor Day! 

Tomorrow we are off to church and then it's our "date night" (day off). So we are headed to my sister-in-laws house to celebrate little Caris turning one!  It's so great to be close to them, and see Kale grow up with his cousins. We are looking forward to a fun birthday party!

Another Urgent Care visit

I thought we met our Urgent Care and ER quota for the month by now, but evidently not.  I just got out of the hospital yesterday from getting a biopsy of a tumor that was found in my hip from an emergency appendectomy surgery 2 weeks ago - then this morning Kale ran into a frisbee golf disc that Preston threw... it caught him just below his eye, but turned out needed two stitches.  What a hard thing to watch as a momma and have to help with (hold him down) and not be able to do anything! Kale screamed in the process of getting stitches but he was a tough kid! 

Ayla did go to Urgent Care last weekend as she was diagnosed with impetigo (which we all got except Preston) but the rash is getting all better and is nearly all gone. Being we spent $100.00 on medicine for the impetigo it better be almost gone!

And to make a lot of medical visits even more exciting, I thought I should mention that on our way to the hospital at 5am yesterday we got a flat tire... basically it got too hot and melted. So in the process of changing the tire, we couldn't get the spare out from under the car... so I stood on the side of I-85 waving my arms (like someone would really stop!!??) just hoping someone would stop that may have a tool we could use.  45 minutes later a police office finally stopped and was just as clueless as could be as far as helping us out.  So now that we are an hour late and 7:00 traffic is starting to set in, we are able to get the tire loose and changed quickly to get me to the hospital in just enough time to get checked in. 

Now if we could just stay away from the doctors and hospitals for a little while..... 

Quick Trips

We are back in Flowery Branch! We just had a great week off and got to spend a little time in Charlotte catching up with friends and family, and also some time at the cabin in Jasper.

That was our last "week off" over the summer since school starts here next week! The kids do go home this weekend to get ready for school so we get to spend some time here to get ready as well.  (But we really don't have to do anything) haha.

Kale got a phone call the other day that he got into preschool (yay!) since he has been on two waiting lists.  So we are very excited he will get the opportunity to go to Celebration Academy.  I know he is excited because he has been asking about going to school.   I just put up a funny picture of Ayla for you to enjoy.  Ayla's latest thing is to put her sand bucket on her head and walk around until she walks into something and falls over, at which point she busts out in laughter.... it is the cutest and funniest thing to watch! She certainly cracks herself up these days!

FINISHED Construction

Yay, we have moved in and the boys rooms are ready for their arrival in - We moved in and got everything ready with 45 minutes to spare.  I did feel like I was on an episode of extreme makeover or restaurant impossible!

(This is the back of the house)

 Kitchen

One of the 3 boys rooms. (This one will have 3 boys, the other will each have 2 guys)

Living Room

Home from the Hospital

Well a hospital visit wasn't what we expected for this week, but we are home and doing well. After having a little stomach ache on Saturday and a big one all day on Sunday I decided to go to Urgent Care.  The UCare lab was closed so they really couldn't do anything.  So they refunded me my money and told me go to the ER if I wanted to know anything.  I almost didn't go because I didn't want to spend $100 for them to tell me it was just a stomach ache but luckily I did because at midnight I was in surgery for my appendix. Preston came and joined me at the operating room just before I went into surgery.  The ranch was so great to take care of everything back at home and Big Daddy came up to the house to grab the kids the next morning.  I was released from the hospital late Tuesday, and now we are awaiting Emory to call us to schedule another surgery for a tumor they found on the CT & MRI scans under a hip muscle.  I think of it as a God thing because if it wasn't for the appendectomy we would have never know about the tumor. We're also grateful this happened this week and not while we were out of the country because we were suppose to be leaving for Belize early Saturday morning to lead the church mission trip. (Sad we don't get to go) But we know that God has bigger plans for all of us.

Construction Photos

The Construction...

After we unloaded the POD this is where everything went... on and under the kitchen table.  Can you spot the table anywhere?

This is the living room furniture and the furniture from the boys rooms piled up

The Kitchen - Our stuff

Messy Construction.... We lived like this the whole month of June. Not to mention living in my parents spare room out of suitcases for the Month of May. Your looking at the living room into the Dinning Room

The laundry room - I promise its not that messy

This is where we "lived" - this is the basement. The door at the back of the picture is our spare room and we all slept in there.

The bookcase we stocked with food so it became our little pantry. And below you will see our improv kitchen.

The bikes outside ready to be ridden.

Master bedroom 

Master Bath & Below Master Bedroom

Thats the door to the bathroom and the "her" closet, then a built in desk.

one of the guys rooms just after new paint

This will be Kale & Ayla's room

The kitchen cabinets were dark oak with a white laminate counter top. Doesn't this look great? White and Granite!!! 

Fun NY Photos

Just a Fun Picture for you from the wedding.... 

The "Baird" Family

Our ladies man... wanted to be with the "Princesses" all night

NYC Vacation & Wedding

July 1-7th (Vacation!!)
The week of the July 4th holiday was a Blast. It was vacation time, and wedding time for my sweet cousin and her finance.
We went up to Connecticut and into New York on July 3rd, and the kids did great. We left at 5am and only stopped TWICE for the 16 hour car ride; once at 9:30am for breakfast, and once for lunch at 2:30pm, then we were at my Aunt's house for dinner. It was amazing how well they traveled.... coming home was not so wonderful since we left at 11:00am from New York to come home, and finally got in at 1:00am to Charlotte, only to have to continue the next day down to Georgia.  (When we found out my car wouldn't start and it needed a new battery!)

The one day we went into the city we saw a ton of stuff (July 3) - we went up in the Empire State building, saw an amazing Toys-R-Us, visited FAO Schwartz, played in Central Park, saw Rockefeller center, went to the 9/11 memorials, took a ride on the Staten Island ferry and saw the Statue of liberty, went by wall street, and the steps where George Washington took office, also went saw the Pub he liked to drink at, got to walk around Grand Central Station and take the train back to connecticut. Thanks to my amazing Cousin Stacey and her husband Paul for being our tour guides, we never would have made it around the city so fast!

                                       9/11 memorials were beautiful

 Katelyn was a great help on vacation as a extra set of hands, and was a great babysitter at the wedding so we could continue enjoying the festivities late into the night.

We had fun playing in the pool at Uncle Richards house.  Kale tried to learn to surf on the kick board with Tim, and had a blast.

 Ayla got her nails done at the nail saloon for the wedding.  I had gone with my cousins to get a mani/pedicure and Ayla came too.  She sat so still as they painted her little toes.  She also liked to stick her feet in the water when I got mine done. She would wiggle her toes in the water and watch it change colors and just giggle.

July 6th my cousin Megan got married at the Thayer Hotel in West Point New York.  Ayla was a precious little flower girl, and Kale was the ring barer. The two of them had a great time, and both did very well in the wedding.  Kale walked down the isle, and little miss walked half way down the isle then stopped and started to spin around in her dress as if she was saying "look at me!!" It was absolutely adorable. Here are some fun pictures for you to enjoy from the wedding and from the vacation!