Sleepover fun

Last weekend, Joel went to a great Reptile party (see previous post), had his first sleepover in CA, and Cori babysat for a friend.

On Saturday, Joel went to a birthday party at a reptile zoo. He then had a friend come over from school. Conner (his friend) was the best house guest I have had in a long time. He maybe said 10 words to us the entire night. Joel and Conner went straight in to Joel's room, played the Wii and watched movies. They only came out for more food and for pigs in a blanket for dinner. They were up early with cereal for breakfast and then we walked him home around 10am. Both Conner and Joel had a blast and asked to do it again sometime.

Nate and I have been spending our Saturday's watching college football. We have also set up characters on WOW that we only play together. Me on the laptop and Nate on his desktop, playing a video game together. We are both having fun spending the time together.

Cori was asked to babysit her friend on Saturday. Taylor is Cori's 8 yr old friend, who lived next door. Taylor's dad asked Cori to babysit for the day while he was at work. Cori had fun playing with her friend and being able to make some money too. I can see her starting to babysit more and more in the next year or so.

We had a fun filled weekend and look forward to another one this weekend too!

Did I mention Alabama is 4-0 and my Dallas Cowboys are 2-1!

Joel's Reptile Party

Joel was invited to a reptile birthday party on Saturday. This is the room that has all the different cages with lots of different reptiles. I quickly dropped Joel off and was coming back in 2 hours to pick him up. When I went to pick up Joel, one of the employees told me I could just go on back thru all the reptile cages to get him. Why couldn't they just page him or something....Did I mention I hate reptiles and bugs and all guy kind of "pets"

So I quickly walk past the Giant White snake named Twinkie..... (she was in her cage when I saw her).


I found Joel and we started to leave, and he wanted to show me one special animal....I walked around a corner to see the 2ft tail of some kind of lizard/reptile. As soon as I saw the tail, I made a bee line for the exit. Joel was yelling for me and I left him behind. As I was running/walking to the car with Joel 6 ft behind and Nate even further behind laughing.

I think this was the animal I was running from.

Joel had a great time at the party. He was able to hold a scorpion, tarantula, and a big snake. He was so super excited to be able to have a very "guy" kind of party.

Pictures are pulled from the Reptile Zoo website. Check them out here.

1st Niece Alice!

My sister Dawn had her first child on September 4th. Alice Everett was 3lbs 14oz and 6 weeks early.

Dawn was having some complications with her health during the pregnancy and so she was in the hospital for 3 days getting meds and being monitored before they induced her labor. After Alice was born, Dawn was in the hospital for another week getting more meds and her blood pressure under control. I am so grateful that everyone is now okay and that Alice was able to come home with Dawn and David yesterday!

Alice is doing well and is just a bundle of pink.

Getting a bottle 

getting to wear clothes

Water Leak Saga

On Labor Day weekend, Nate and I found out that we had water leaking into the dryer line under our condo. We called the property manager to have it drained. The guy came on  Thursday to pump out all the water. The reasoning we thought the water was getting into the dryer line was the irrigation water seeping into the line.


I washed/dried all my clothes but when I went to do laundry again on Sunday, the dryer was not working Again! I called again and the plumber came out again to drain the line. Since the dryer line filled back up so fast, that means we have a slab leak. 


On Tuesday, the plumber was Suppose to come by and check out the leak....that didn't happen so on Wednesday he Did find the time to fit me into the schedule. 


All day Wednesday, the plumber worked on the leak. Apparently it was a bad hot water leak under my bath tub. The chlorine in the water is eating away at the copper pipes and thus creating leaks. I was the 6th house in orange county this week. We had no water in the house all day so the kids had to go to the pool house to use the bathroom. I had to go get more water for the dogs at my neighbors house, because they had to stay on the porch all day long. 


The plumber cut out holes in the drywall to re-run the water lines up the wall and over the ceiling, then down the wall in my closet. I had to empty the entire contents of my closet onto my bed in 5 mins. 


Now that the water leak is fixed, I have to wait for the drywall guy to come back in to fix the walls and ceilings. The temperature in my house has gone down 10 degrees since he fixed the leak. I also have less hot spots on my floors. 


Here are some pictures I snuck in while the guy was working in other areas of the house. 

First hole behind the dryer

Hole in my closet

My empty closet

Closet

Ceiling holes

The rest of the wall in my dryer

Ceiling hole in my laundry room 

All of my closet on my bed! 

First Day of School ~ Success!

The first day of school was a big success for both of my kids!

Cori was off to school early. She has advisement (homeroom) with her best friend, Chloe. Cori also has a class with her boyfriend, and some other friends in each class. Cori was selected to participate in Honor's English and Pre-Algebra. She has an elective that is Woodworking, (1st semester), Art (2nd semester) and Drama (3rd semester). She loves all of her teachers so far and is still super excited for school.

Joel has two hot chicks for teachers this year. They are both really young and nice. (Joel's words). Cori responded to say she has all really old teachers like 70. Joel had a great 1st day and stayed on task and did not get in trouble. He was able to make a few friends and was really excited to go back to school today.

I know that we will have our share of drama, laughter, tears, homework...etc this year but I am glad to know that the 1st day was a success!

1st Day of School ~ 2011

The day I look forward to all year long  is finally here! The 1st day of school!

I worked last night so Nate got to be the one to help the kids get everything ready for school. This morning I have gotten up early and started getting both kids off to school.  Cori is off to 7th grade, and did NOT want to be walked to the bus stop or school. Joel is off to 5th grade and I'm walking him to school but he does not want me to stay till school starts and walk him into class. I am so proud of my kids.

On a funnier note, here are some of the conversations I had with the kids this morning.

Cori wakes up to say that she did not get any sleep because she was SO excited.....then Cori starts to dance around the kitchen because she is no longer a 6th grader!

Joel rolls out of bed complaining about being woken up early by Bella...I sent him to take a shower to wake up.He gets dressed and then comes in to complain about NONE of his pants fit.....Really, I bought you 10 new pairs of jeans that ALL fit yesterday. So we went to his room and pulled out a pair (which fit once he put them on).

Next, Joel complained that his new shoes were to big....Seriously Joel! So I sat down and talked with Joel so that he could calm down and relax before starting his day at school. We said a prayer and then the morning seemed to go better.

1st Day of 7th Grade!

New Zebra print backpack sent from Alabama (bc we could not find one anywhere around here)

Close up w/ new earrings!

1st Day of 5th grade! (last year in Elementary School)

With Backpack!

Both of my kids are Representing Alabama with their 1st day of school clothes!

1st Football Saturday 2010 ~ RTR!

Today starts the first football Saturday of the 2010 season. Being on the west coast means football starts at 9am. We get up early and get the TV and surround-sound going. Everyone goes and puts on the gameday shirts....it warms my heart as Nate and Joel come out in their Alabama shirts...Cori (in her Auburn...not so much).

I always spend the first couple of games of the season explaining and answering football questions from Joel. He wants to love the game and learns more each week but still goes and plays outside just after half-time. Today we have moved into the 3rd quarter of the game and I have the living room to myself....Nate had to go to work for a few hours, Cori is watching tv in my room and Joel is outside somewhere.

Roll Tide ! Let's have a great year!

Robot Making Fun!

On Thursday night, the kids and I went with some friends to Glendale, CA to build robots. There is a store at the Americana in Glendale that has workshops to teach kids how to build robots. My friend Melissa's son Gabriele turns 8 today so we all went to the Robot store for his birthday party. It was SO much fun. We drove together out to the Americana and ate dinner on the grassy area around a beautiful fountain. The Fountain and ambiance is hard to capture in pictures but I tried to capture it anyway. The Robot store let us build robots and then battle a different set of robots. Here are some pictures of the fun we had last night. 

Beautiful Fountain

Dinner on the Grass

3 story Barnes and Noble

Fountain

Getting ready to build

Reading the instructions

Testing the battery's 

I'm helping

Cori's Brush Robot

Battling

Their robots

Tristian, Melissa, and Gabriele (Birthday Boy)

Joel (with a sore mouth), Val and Cori