Our Week In Black and White.

This past week was supah-crazy. And not always in a good way, (I had some not-so-great mental breakdowns, and some not-so-great wife moments, thank you very much fixer-upper house), but it was mostly amazing.

For one, my parents were here.

And that's just always good.


For another, sweet Parker man had a lot of big boy-moments this week, some that I've already blogged about, and some that I still need to write posts for. Most of them having to do with pre-school and his big boy bed.

Parker (striped teal shirt) in chapel. Thank you, Morgan, for the picture! Sorry, teacher I don't know for the awkward photo.

We had a horrendous scare his second night in the bed when P rolled off it. Yes. Waking up to shrieks of "MOMMY!" is absolutely terrifying. Thankfully he was more scared than hurt and dozed off soon after I climbed in bed with him.


He also skipped nap the first afternoon in his big-boy bed, declaring that he was a "bid kid now" when I asked him for his reasoning behind it. Thankfully we have been semi-successful with naps since then….I'm still crossing my fingers though. The child is so excited to sleep in his room, it's a bit ridiculous. We also started using minty-toothpaste this week, which has made teeth-brushing about a million times better since Parker has an obsession with all things mint-flavored. I don't understand this. His father, however, has a tendency to hoard peppermints from restaurants so I guess I should have seen it coming. Apple and tree, I tell you! They are twins.

What did we do last week?

I believe there was a lot of eating. My pantry and fridge are currently showcasing the aftermath of that. We also got a lot of playtime outside as the weather has been wonderful at night! Lubbock has the best evenings of anywhere I have ever lived since it's not humid and not too cold. We can hang out well into October, sometimes even November. We were also blessed with two glorious days of overcast skies and rain!

What else…Parker was hilarious this week. I can't even tell you what all he did, but I do know for sure that he is turning into quite the little rascally man. Bryan and I keep asking ourselves what happened to our quiet, shy, well-behaved baby…but honestly, this has been my favorite phase so far!

My dad hauled our two nightstands that I scored on Craigslist as well a a BEAUTIFUL painting that my own dear, sweet sister did for our mantel all the way from Denver. She is truly talented and I love that we have one-of-a-kind art in our home!

 (Excuse crappy iPhone picture… doesn't do this masterpiece justice!)

We did lots of furniture painting, fireplace painting, and door painting in the living room….probably too much of it (insert mental breakdown, a la Katy), and I managed to make six new throw pillows for our couches. Y'all, I have conquered my fear of invisible zippers! This was truly a dream of mine (in the sewing department). Unfortunately, I am still not done.

Parker continues his obsession with Pops, and made it frequently known that there was no one else he would rather follow around. He can also point to every letter in the alphabet, count to 10, AND has finally decided that it's okay to wear hats. Just in time for Halloween!

My parents left yesterday….Parker was in tears, I was in tears…we were a mess. I didn't even change out of my pajama pants! It was a true crisis. Thankfully we have recovered a bit, I have cleaned the house a bit, and now P is in bed, I'm exhausted, and the last piece of chocolate cake is calling my name! So I should go.

Also, we have a fall candle warming on the stovetop. Why? Well, because I have terrible luck with  wicks burning too low to keep lit. It is a little annoying, but I am loving having a bit of fall in the house! There are few things better. Except for maybe chocolate cake.

Nursery work has commenced, everyone! Board and batten. BOARD AND BATTEN. Finally! I hope to update with house pictures soon!

Sorry for the random post!

Parker Loves Snowcones

By some miracle, I have just completed the enormous/tedious/BORING task of organizing every single photo and video on my computer. My brain it total mush. BUT I know where every single photo is so this lady is happy. 

Parker man hasn't gotten a whole lot of pictures taken with him on my fancy camera lately, so I made an attempt yesterday at the park. Thankfully, his love of snow cones trumps his need to move at ALL times, so we actually got some stress-free photos of him sitting somewhat still.

He was momentarily distracted from his snow-cone binge when the school kids from across the street came over for recess. (This is a public park by the way, we did not just happen to be at an elementary school playground, although I could definitely see something like that accidentally happening to me.)

He has a fascination with "bid kids". He walked around with a little smile on his face for the entirety of  their recess just soaking it all in.

And then we were back to snow-coning it like a champ. P ate that whole thing. 

I'm always having a blogging identity crisis. I think that's one reason that I never post anything on here (the other reason being a total lack of time).  Do you know that I also have a "family blog"? Yes, I do. That one that is supposed to be filled with photos like this, documenting our actual lives instead of staged home pictures and craft projects (and believe me, they are STAGED…you would not recognize my house in real life). But I never post on that one either, so don't get your feelings hurt. ;) 

My little OCD brain cannot handle everything being in two places, so I'm thinking of just mushing everything together on here. I don't know. We will see what happens.

I have to go now, my son just laid down on the floor and told me that he wants his diaper changed. (Who are you and what have you done with my child?)

I will leave you with a few photos from last night.

These freaking airplanes. He's broken the wooden one 1500 times so we bought him the little Dusty airplane a week ago and he NEVER lets go of it. 

Flashing the neighbors.

And the perfect (to us) little boy. 

Adios!

Louisiana.

Hi everyone!

We are out and about visiting our family in Louisiana. I am love being able to spend time with our family again--this is a treat since we live so far away!

We've done a whole lot of nothing today, and it has been perfect! Here are a few pictures of our trip thus far:

Hensley getting a bath....

Hensley getting dressed....

Abby and her new cat, Sammie.

Hensley falling asleep (under her aunt's watchful eye)...

Bryan meeting his niece for the first time!

Big yawn!

Love those blue eyes! And she's wearing one of my bows :)

Fun in the pool:

As you can see, our niece kind of steals the show, but I think we're all okay with that :). I'll be here until Sunday, but I'll be back with more pictures AND some of our new master bathroom next week!

Lately

Well, I'm definitely playing catch up with all of the craziness that has been going on this past week! Here is just a little peek at some of it:

Last Thursday, we had a fundraising dinner in Amarillo for a new science building at LCU. Everything went great--the food was perfect, the decor was pretty, and everyone had a good time!

We worked with a really great florist in Amarillo who was able to come up with some pretty things for our small budget.

The next day, we packed up and headed to Dallas for an alumni event at a Rangers Game. I was able to stay with my friend Whitney's parents and we had such a great time!

The event was a little chaotic, but all 200 alumni really enjoyed free lunch and tickets to the game.

Um, I'm obsessed with Lemon Chills....but it doesn't look like Whit likes them much in this picture!

Whitney and I!

We actually left the game right after this picture was taken to go to Six Flags. It was amazing. We didn't really consider the fact that is was Saturday night and the park would be packed which always equals really long lines, but we were able to ride all of the big roller coasters so we were pretty happy! I'd like to think it was because we were strategic in our ride-planning, but there may have been some "sprinting to each ride like we're 6 years old" involved so that might have helped too :).

After all of the craziness (and fun) on Saturday, we packed up and headed home on Sunday and went back to work on Monday....and I'm still recovering. Coordinating 2 big events in 3 days is exhausting and I have just now managed to get my office cleaned (like 30 minutes ago--yes I'm blogging at work, I know, I'm breaking the rules).

On top of all of that, Bryan over-seeded our yard this weekend! So, we've been watering the yard 4 times a day and trying to keep Louie from getting too dirty. Oh, and speaking of Louie, it seems that he has figured out how to jump up on furniture. Dang-it. A bottle of Resolve has found a new home next to the couch because of this.

Happy Wednesday!

Weekend Wowza

Like my title? No? Well, I was trying to be creative.

Alright my friends, this past weekend was an insane one. But fun. Which are sometimes the best kind in my opinion....

It all started on Friday night when my friend Jessica and I headed to a much anticipated Miranda Lambert concert. It was amazing. For those of you who don't know, Miranda and I are friends. We met at a gas station 3 Christmas's ago while driving through Texas and have been besties ever since. Well....I am joking about the bestie part but I really did get to meet her and get her autograph when our families randomly stopped at the same gas station my sophomore year of college. It was a huge deal since she's my absolute favorite country singer. And still is. So, naturally the concert was a huge deal too, and she didn't disappoint!

Don't you love those concert moments when the whole audience is singing along? Me too.

At the end of the video Miranda held her microphone up for the audience to sing....but I had to cut that part out, because you can hear me singing, and we are NOT going there.

Me and Jess enjoying the concert ambiance (iPhone pic):

A group of us from LCU headed to Houston bright and early on Saturday morning to host an alumni event at the Houston Astros game. The day was absolutely crazy and I learned a nice little tidbit that I will remember for the rest of my life: No matter how much you plan or how many things you think you have in place, they can all go wrong at a moments notice. There were several things (most of which were out of my control) that just didn't go as intended during the set-up of the event, but thankfully, once guests started arriving everything smoothed itself out and everyone had a great time.

We had about 200 alums attend as well as several future Chaps. Free dinner, free tickets, and a win for the Astros made for a good night!

More importantly, I was able to stay with my Aunt Kathy and Uncle Neil during the weekend! It was amazing getting to spend some quality time with them. Kathy stayed with our LCU group the whole time, so she was there for the entire set-up and tear-down of the event and was definitely one of the hardest workers around. I love her SO much and feel really blessed that I got such a great aunt. We had a lot of fun! Sadly, I didn't get a picture with her (of course I realized that when I got home), but she was definitely one of my favorite parts of the entire trip!

I did however, get a few pictures with my precious niece Hensley when I met her on Sunday!

Sweetest, most well behaved baby on the planet. No joke. And she is so pretty. And she isn't a chunk like a thought she was, the pictures were just deceiving :).

She slept about 99% of the time that we were there, and I thought it was so adorable that she would sleep with her eyes almost all the way closed. She tried to fight sleep but just couldn't win the battle!

I think this picture is sweet, Alisha may kill me for it, but here is what I mean by almost closed:

Here are a few iPhone pictures...excuse the poor quality, but enjoy the cuteness!

I freaking love that baby!

After they pried Hensley from my hands (kidding, kinda), we headed to the airport....and 5 hours later I arrived in Lubbock. Did I mention that the flight is only supposed to be an hour and a half? Oh yeah, you better believe we were delayed an hour AND had to turn around in the middle of the flight due to computer problems....yes, fun night. But all is well now!

Told you it was a busy weekend! Happy Monday...