My sadness...

I am incredibly tired and stressed so this will be brief.
I have officially made it to Maryland, the state that I will eventually call home.
I miss Texas: my beautiful house, my wonderful friends, and all the memories that were created there. The drive here was long and exhausting (I will go into details later) but today I just want to write about my incredible sadness.

Today I was told that my 9 yr old dog, Ogden was hit by a car and is dead. Gary sent him and
Mattie to stay with his parents on their farm in Ohio until we can get into our new home here. Ogden loves that farm! He loves to run and hunt for moles and tromp around the woods. Well, the 1st day he was there, he ran out in front of their car and was killed on impact. I have never been so sad over the loss of an animal in my life! but Ogden was different. He was the first dog I ever had. Gary and I got him a month after we got married. He has been everywhere and done everything with us. About 6 months ago, we adopted a puppy named Mattie. She looks EXACTLY like Ogden and I was happy that we got her b/c Ogden was getting old and I wanted him to train her and show her the ropes. I had no idea he would be taken from us this soon. It was a tragic accident and accidents happen. I am glad that Heavenly Father let us know that we needed to adopt Mattie when we did. She carries Ogden with her and she will help fill the void left by him. However, Ogden can never be replaced. He is the best dog I have ever had/seen and I love him dearly. He will be missed terribly.

Playing at the park w/ Grandma

We went to Lampassas park after Conference on Sunday for a picnic and some fun with Grandma since she had to leave the next day. It was sooo cold and the wind was crazy strong but we had a great time! The boys miss their Grandma. I am so glad she was able and willing to come keep the boys while Gary and I went to MD and then stay with us for a while afterwards. We love you Grandma!

Kite flying fun!

The wind has been crazy strong lately and while we wanted to fly kites, we have held off until the wind was a little less strong. You can see from the video that the wind is still horrible.
Oh well, here we are in all our kite flying glory!

Zech's reading graduation at Chuck-E-Cheese

On Friday, we finally finished Zechariah's reading lessons from the book "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy lessons". Once finished, the book claimed the child would be on a solid 2nd grade reading level. I am happy to say, they're right! Zech can read pretty much any book he pulls off his shelf. How liberating! I was so proud of him. I am also extremely happy to have it done before we venture on this move. So, we had a celebration at Chuck-E-Cheese for the completion of his reading. I googled a coupon for 100 tokens for $10. With it came another coupon for 40 tokens, a large pizza, and 4 drinks for $18.99. What a savings! Fun was had by all!


Dance Dance Revolution was a fav! Me and Mom "Battling" I kicked her butt!


Yes, I am 8 months pregnant. People seemed to think this was not something I should have been doing. (I had a lot of people watching me). All I can say is "WHATEVER, it's fun!!!"

House hunting in VA

Most of you know that Gary is being PCS'd to Ft Myer, VA. This happens to be right outside of Washington D.C. We decided since the housing market is in such a crunch right now, it would be a wonderful time for us to purchase something up there that we would have never been able to afford a few years ago. So, I booked us some plane tickets, flew my mom in from GA to stay with the kids and Gary and I ventured off on a trip all by ourselves! Yes, I cried when I said goodbye to the boys, and in the airport waiting for the plane and on the plane to Houston. OK, I cried on the plane to Houston b/c I seriously-without-a-doubt didn't know if we would make it to Houston. I have flown quite a bit in my life and have NEVER been on a plane ride so bad in my entire life!!! Gary even thought the little twin engine was going to drop out of the sky at any moment. We were both terrified and nauseous when we finally did touch ground. On that plane ride I wondered if my boys would remember me, had I been a good mom? Had I left them written notes, pics, scrapbooks to read and view so they could know my love for them. Did I know where Gary's will was? OK, some horrible thoughts but they made me think and I am determined to spend more time on journaling, taking and scrap booking pictures, and keeping my affairs in order-just in case.

Anyways, househunting:
Tuesday: We arrived to MD in the afternoon in time to eat dinner with Will and Sarah, Aunt Nancy and my nieces and nephew. We then followed Aunt Nancy down to her house in La Plata where we would be staying for a few days.
Wed: we met with our realtor and looked at houses in Springfield, VA and then down in Woodbridge. Needless to say, we were very disappointed and frustrated by what we found and felt in our hearts. That night we went to dinner with Uncle Gary, Joyce, and Aunt Nancy at some really nice expensive restaurant where Uncle Gary was on a first name basis. (Interesting...)
Thursday: Aunt Nancy REALLY wanted us to look at some houses in MD and so we decided to please here and let her show us some and meet with our realtor in VA around lunch. The 1st house we went to-I immediately fell in love with but didn't want to say too much b/c of the drive for Gary, and the fact that we had not looked all over the DC areas yet. Then, our realtor in VA cancelled on us. I was PISSED!!! but maybe it was a blessing? I was like, "I spent 1000 bucks on plane tickets to get out here, you said you'd clear your schedule and now you cancel???" Gary and I decided to go to ALexandria anyways with Uncle Gary who had been hunting and scouring the countryside for the perfect house for us and check out the area. Once again, I had that pit in my stomach like the 1st day of looking. I mean, we were looking at houses that costs 350,000+ and they were tiny shacks with ripped up floors, no A/C and in really gross neighborhoods. I couldn't believe it! Well, that night we went to Fudruckers for dinner and I got to see my lil bro and his adorable wife, Kimmy. Along for the festivities was Gary's cousin Amy too. It was loads of fun. But, I was discouraged by the VA events and still thinking about the wonderful feeling I had at this particular house in MD.

Let me tell you about this house experience:
We walk up to the porch and see a Texas A&M rock in their garden. Hummmmm......ok. Interesting. The owner is there so I ask her if she's from TX. Yep, Corpus Christi actually. (bonus point #1) The house was adorable and set up much like mine is now. (bonus #2) She had 2 boys (bonus #3) She had a Wonderwoman purse hanging over one of her dinning room chairs (bonus #4) I walked outside into the backyard (which was completely fenced in plu room for kids to play), looked at Gary, and tears came to my eyes. I felt at peace, I felt love, I felt like I was home. (BONUS #5-10!!!!)

Ok, so back to Thursday night:
Gary and I got back to Aunt Nancy's and talked a lot about that house. I asked him how he felt when he was there. He had the same feeling of home as I did. We then prayed about it separately and together. We felt very good about buying it. 1st Gary wanted to make the drive from MD to his work.
Friday: We made the drive in 45mins (much less than expected), met all the people in Gary's new office, talked to them all for a long time and got some great info and advice on anything and everything. We then headed back to MD where we met with the realtor to look at the house once more (and a few others jus for kicks) and put a contract down.
Friday night we met Will and Sarah and went to Baltimore's inner harbor Little Italy for dinner, had some great Italian dessert, went back to their place to sleep.
Saturday: We caught a very early plane home to TX. Had another horrible flight from Houston to Killeen. Got home exhausted. Held and kissed our boys a ton and went to bed VERY early!!!

Needless to say, we are now extremely busy with preparations for our move out to Maryland. We have sold our house here in TX (well we close soon anyways) and all is well. God has blessed us more than we had even hoped or dreamed. We knew it would take a lot of faith and work to make miracles happen and so we prayed and prepared for weeks before the trip and sure enough Heavenly Father blessed us more than we could have imagined. The timing has been perfect, the house is perfect, the love we feel from Him and for each other is perfect.

Prayer works, Faith works and brings about mighty miracles. We have been so blessed and I am so grateful.

Here's our new home in MD!

30, flirty, and fancy free!

Today is my birthday.
Yep, I'm 30 and proud of it!
No, I am not sad-I earned this honor!
Age is beauty.
I feel smarter, happier, and lovelier at 30 than ever before in my life.
I will post more later cause I am getting ready to have a Wonderwoman/ farewell party tonight.

YAY 30!!!

Favorite pasttime

Here are some videos of the boys partaking in their favorite pasttime:

Wrestle mania w/ Daddy!

These were took on Monday night (does this count as FHE?) The video is horrible quality but I couldn't not post them. (FYI: My camera stinks!!!) You'll see the boys pinching Gary's nose, that is his on/off switch. It did not take Ammon long to catch on to this fact and he had loads of fun turning his Daddy on and off. Just thought I'd share. Man, these boys are getting sooo big sooo fast. It gives me great pleasure to watch them interact like this. It makes my heart swell. I just love my boys and I love my husband and I LOVE MY LIFE!!!!