While Dylan's away Riley will play

Yes, Dylan made it to South Padre safely.

Thank God they were allowed to have their cell phones the whole bus ride. I talked to him a couple of times and he was soooo excited. I think he was too excited to sleep. He said he was awake a majority of the time. They had to surrender all of their electronics to our youth pastor once they got there though. So....I don't know if he crashed last night or was still wired. No news is good news - I'm sure.

Anyway...Ron had the day off and I worked so much earlier in the week I barely had to work at all today. Ron, Riley and I went to Gameworks at Grapevine Mills Mall. We had lunch and played video games for hours. Riley Heaven! He has great hand/eye coordination (oops...allowed to play too many video games maybe???) and won several "jackpots" including a 1000 ticket one - resulting in 3 stuffed animal prizes. Wow!

Here's a few snapshots from the day taken with my phone...sorry not the best quality.

Riley was also able to have one of his best buddies spend the night the first night Dylan was gone. Another one of his pals will be here the last night Dylan is gone. We have swimming on the agenda for tomorrow and the library lined up for Sunday as well as PaPa and GiGi Sporman coming over. Can you say...trying not to have too much time available to miss his brother? :)

Off to camp

Dylan just left for church camp. Oh my goodness!

Now he's been to camp/away from home before BUT never 12 hours away from home - WITHOUT US...yikes! (they are headed to South Padre Island)

Pray...just pray...

He's looking forward to it being on the beach and being with friends and focusing on the Lord. Mom is worried about the trip there (overnight) and the trip back (long day) and being so far away if something goes awry(wrong). I trust our staff and the leaders and my kiddo but - he's gonna be so far away!

Pray...just pray...

THANKS!!!


Dylan and Riley - brotherly love..

The boys...
Dylan, Adam and Andrew - friends from school

The Moms...
Shelley (Andrew's mom), Kristi (Adam's mom) and Me.

Roomies and their fearless leader...
John, Dylan, Andrew, Peter and Adam.

Dylan and our Middle School Youth Pastor - Matt.

My boss and friend, Sheila...her boy is going too!

Fun Stuff!

Last week we went to Medieval Times in Dallas. Fun! Such a release to be able to yell at someone for just the sheer craziness of it.

If you don't know...you sit in a colored section and cheer for the Knight that is wearing the colors of the section you sit in. Of course we got to sit in RED - my favorite color...BIG, BOLD, out of control RED!!! And our knight was AWESOME!!! (okay - yes - I realize this is all scripted and acted out...still...)

And then you get to eat...not using utensils...silly...totally confused the kids...drink soup? pick off and pick at a huge chunk of chicken?...half a potato...without butter or cheese?...that you just pick up and take a bite out of?...WEIRD!!!

But, like I said...what a release...for no good silly reason. I loved it!

Enjoy the pictures...

48 years and counting...

My Mom and Dad. Married 48 years. Wow!

Thanks for helping me to be the woman, daughter, sister, wife, mother and friend that I am.

You guys are AMAZING! I love you!

Pups & the pool

When it's near 100 degrees even the puppies like to cool off with us!

Doogie and Katie trying to catch the water squirting from the water balloons.

Katie trying to catch and bite the balloons. Doogie didn't get there fast enough that time.

Katie going for a ride and Doogie waiting his turn.

Yes...they like swimming too. But, being long haired dogs we try not to let them do that too much. It would wreak havoc on our pool filter.

This ones gotta go...

Wind. Rain. Snap. Crackle. Pop. There goes the huge bradford pear tree in the back corner of our yard. I'm gonna miss the privacy it's big 'ole branches afforded us from the neighbors behind us when we were out in our pool. I'm gonna miss the shade when we needed a cool place to sit...we were working on an area under the tree with a bench, pavers and old windows we bought at Canton. Oh well...We may put a palm tree or some crepe myrtle tress - or maybe both - back in the corner and still try to make a little sitting area. Anyway...this one's gotta go...soon...it split in half and it looks like it had been hit before (before we moved in 2 1/2 years ago)...it just doesn't look good - or safe. Bye - we'll miss you!

Yuck!

I am NOT a fan of garage sales! I don't usually go to them and do not enjoy having them. But, here we are sitting outside in the HEAT that is called June and having one.

We have been able to donate alot of furniture before this and now are getting rid of alot of "stuff". CCA or salvation army will get the remainder.

Ron is RECLAIMING the garage!

We've been in this house 3 years since downsizing and it's finally going to be "the garage" not the place where everything goes that we don't want in the house.

YES!

(but - man...i am not a fan of garage sales...oh yeah...said that already... :)

A week in...

So...we are a week into our summer.

I LOVE Ron working from home! I think he's already use to it and loving it too. But...I miss being here during the day. He's an amazing dad - I know everything is taken care of but the mom in me misses doing all the little things for everyone. I'm trying very hard to handle as many little things as I can in the evening so they know they still need me... :) .

Riley has been in a basketball camp this week from 9 to noon. Dylan started private lessons for his trumpet. Actually he has been taking them the entire school year we just decided to have him keep doing them through the summer so he doesn't get rusty.

Dylan will be going to South Padre with our church youth group in a few weeks. YIKES. That's a long way away from the family. This isn't the first time he's been away but it definitely the farthest. Pray for us! Seriously. I'm gonna miss that boy.

As you can tell from the vacation countdown widget - we are less than 2 months from our Destin vacation. This is our 12th year to go and I still enjoy the scenery and relaxtion. I can and cannot wait. When we come back we will only have about a week of "summer" left before the boys head back to school so that is always the worst part of it (that I don't look forward to).

Right after we get back Ron and I will celebrate our 18th wedding anniversary. On the 18th of August. That is UNBELIEVEABLE! It seems like just yesterday...I am not kidding.

Well...I was just gonna sign off without any pictures but...I love looking at pics and love posting pics so I had an idea to post a few pics from last year's Destin vacation so I can day dream about being there...maybe you can too...Enjoy!

I hear these beach chairs callin' my name!

Mmmmm.beautiful sunsets...(and sunrises)

Warm clear water...

Our favorite restaurant

A beach view of our favorite restaurant. (It's right across from our condo...we can walk to it...yeah!)

Where we stayed last year and going to stay again this year.

SUMMER is here

Here's a couple of appliances that will get a ton of use at our house this summer.


Our ice tea maker and our new electric ice shaver. Kiddos and snow cones - SUMMER!

(love the Back to Basics brand electric ice shaver I got at Target - you can use regular ice cubes)

Everyone needs a friend.

I have to give a huge shout out to my friend, Sheila!

I love her!

We've been dieting for about 5 weeks now...everything is so much better with a friend. We've both lost more than 10 pounds each! Thank you Jesus for giving us the strength! It's tough at any age but I must admit it seems really tough the older I get. (and the higher the numbers on the scale got)

Besides being a huge encouragement she is a wonderful boss. I learn so much every single day about my job and being a christian woman. And...we've shared soooooo many laughs.

Just had to say, I love ya, girl!

It's June...we're still in school...UGH!

Today I went Riley's end of the year party for 3rd grade. Two days before school actually lets out...go figure...

Ummm....one of the teacher's notes said that all grades were counted through last Friday...soooooo.....they aren't doing much of anything this week. Apparently there's alot of cleaning out of lockers and desks. His teacher is retiring after 40 years and the room was pretty much cleaned out today...wow! freaky!...

Dylan is finishing up 6th grade and has some exams this week so I'm thinking there's a little more work going on over at his school. :)

Anyway...here's some pics of my "baby" at his party. Enjoy!

the yummy cookie cake

Riley eating some of the cookie

Riley doing the limbo - his way

Riley's name in Hawaiian

Mrs. Arts & Riley

Widgets...

Umm...through some blog stalking of my friends and friends of friends I found out some of the things on the sides of the blogs are called widgets.

Then I got silly and put some widgets on mine. Of course being in this silly weather concious family I was so proud of the WeatherBug widget I found and installed on my blog. (See right side about half way down)

Now you can see how crazy hot it is here in the Lone Star State. Hee...Hee...
(by the way - it's "LIVE" data - how cool is that?)

Enjoy.