catching up

it's been a few weeks since i've last posted and i have good reason...  i didn't want to share my exciting news too soon for fear that i would jinx something, but we sold our house! 

we sold our home ourselves and it took less than two weeks to get a signed contract.  we were totally not expecting that.  we thought it would atleast take a couple of months.  i truly think the whole thing is part of God's plan for us. 

after the shock of getting a contract wore off, we were faced with reality of finding a place for our family to stay until our "new" house is finished.  with very few rental options available in our small town, our best option would be moving into my parents home for a few months.  i don't think anyone really ever wants to move back home with their parents, but this turns out to be such a blessing.  my sister (who you can read more about here) started her treatment at md anderson today and her kids also moved in to my parents house yesterday.  yes, it is packed and it is slightly crazy, but what a great distraction for her kids to get to live with their cousins for a summer!  i forsee lots of pool parties and bbq'ing this summer :)

the past week or so has been kind of slow as far as the house renovation goes.  they've taken off more siding and we are now level.

jeff and i both agree that the house looks different being level.  i guess we were just so use to it being wonky ;)

the day after we closed on our house, we re-packed some boxes (literally!  jeff used some plastic bags and i used a box!  our luggage is in storage!) and headed off to lake lbj with jeff's family.  it was a nice end to a crazy few weeks of packing. 



my little graduate!

ok this post is a little overdue, but my sweet girl graduated from pre-k at the end of may!  doesn't she look so grown up?!?

prior to the ceremony, i was clueless as to what to expect.  i definitely had no idea how the ceremony would affect me.  when they started playing pomp & circumstance, my eyes welled up with tears.  my little baby was graduating!

after the ceremony they had a reception for them.  they did such a great job decorating!

  

each child had a memory book made for them that was filled with pictures throughout the year.  it started with a picture of kelby's first day of school and included all the holidays and field trips that they went on.  such a cute idea!

and this is miss brittany.  she works at kelby's preschool.  not only was she one of kelby's favorites, but she is also a very talented photographer.  i stole all the above pictures from her ;)  you can visit her website here.

relay for life 2012

this year the entire family joined the church relay for life team.  we actually registered before my sister's re-diagnosis, but after we found out the cancer had returned it made our involvement even more special.  my sister had signed up to be on the planning committee.  this years theme for the relay was "seasons."  our church decided on a christmas theme and holly suggested doing a tree much like the one we did for a family christmas this past year.  congregation members who made a donation to the team received a hand print with their name on it placed on the tree.  shortly after holly proposed her idea she received her diagnosis.  the committee continued with her idea and named the tree "holly's tree" in honor of her. 

some of the luminaries placed in holly's honor.

you can read more about my sister here.

house renovation week 3

here are a few pictures of the third week of the house renovation.  i'm getting excited because most of the demo is done and we are about to start the "fixing" stage.  i'm thinking next will come the leveling crew.  they will have their work cut out for them.  this house is very unlevel and after our engineer (aka brother matt) crawled under the house, we discovered some of the supports were old tree stumps!  kinda cool - kinda scary.  i'm not sure if those will be staying.  

like our kitchen ???  ;)

this will be the girls bathroom and since it will be tiled they figured it would be a good spot to cut an access hole.  scary stuff underneath there...

here are the old tree stumps i was talking about...

can any family members tell me why the walls are black in the bathroom?  fire?  i took this picture in the bathroom looking out into the hall where the buffet was.

another access hole.  mom says this is the old fireplace.