Getting Ready....

Well it has been awhile since my last post. Things have been crazy busy around here. I noticed I didn't even blog about our Christmas morning! Well it's been a month, and I will just say, we had a great Christmas. Santa was very good to everyone!
We have been very busy this last couple weeks. We have been getting ready for our vacation and then of course everything seems to go wrong or something happens right before we go or do anything. This time it was Mike's car. The transmission decided to go out. We needed to get a new one...so after a week of being in the shop and $1700.00 later, the car is back on the road. Last week, I had to get the kids up at 5:45 am and pack them up and take Mike to work. We had to do this for 3 days. The kids did great, did not complain one bit. It was very cold and made for a very long day! I think going on vacation really kept me from being put in a mental hospital. It was a very stressful week!
So here we are a few days before our trip, I have already started packing. I thought it would be easy, but with the kids, it's a little harder, especially with Madison. Diapers and wipes and all the "baby stuff". Ryan was easy to pack, he actually helped me and had so much fun! I had fun watching him! We were right on track and everything was going according to schedule! Then I get a call that someone wants to come through the house. Which in this terrible market, is great. But we have not had ANYONE through in about 6 months, so why now...I really didn't want to have to reorganize all the toys this week, but it looks like I have to. The frustrating thing is nothing is probably going to come out of this, but it might, and that small possibility keeps me trying to think positive! Oh well, DISNEY WORLD IN 3 DAYS!! That is keeping me sane!!

Christmas 2008 with our Families

I am finally trying to get back to our regular schedule. Mike has been off work since December 19, so it's been really great having him home. We had a great Christmas! We started out by having Christmas with Mike's family on Saturday the 20th of December. We use to do Christmas Day with Mike's family, but last year we decided it was time to start our own traditions with "our" family and stay home on Christmas do, so the kids can actually enjoy their presents. It was always open presents and leave, and then the kids couldn't even play with anything until the next day. It was fair to them, and it wasn't fair to us. I love watching them play with their new toys. Such great joy on their face. So with little complaining this plan works out great! The kids had a great Christmas in Kalamazoo. I forgot my camera, so I don't have any pictures. We all got great presents and the kids had a blast.

Christmas Eve is when we Celebrate Christmas with my family. We didn't think we were going to make it to Ludington because of the weather. It was terrible. We had made back up plans just in case. We made it, just took us longer to get there. My only fear was not being able to get back home. We made it back, but it was a long trip home. We followed my brothers, just in case any of us went off the road.

The kids had a great time at Grammie and Papa's house. Great Grandma B. and Great Grandpa B. came down to see the kids. Took Ryan a little bit to warm up to Grandma B. but all it took was Grandma B. reading him a book to get him comfortable. We got some great gifts and had great food. My mom always puts on a great spread! The cheesey potatoes were my favorite this year, and I got to take lots home! YUMMY!!




Madison took right to Grandpa B. She wanted to sit with him! She probably would have sat with him all day if we would have let her! Madison got her Bitty Baby, and was in love. I don't think it was because she was a Bitty Baby, but because she was a baby. She loves babies!! Ryan his fire station he wanted and was so happy! We thought we were going to need a U-Haul to get home. Soo much stuff!!


Mike and I were happy to get gift cards to the mall so we could get clothes and stuff we need for Florida. I love getting gift cards, makes it so easy to getting what you want and need.

We thank both our families for giving us a great Christmas. I know the kids are very spoiled and never "want" for anything. We are all very fortunate!

Ryan's School Christmas Party

Ryan had his first Christmas Party at school last Thursday (12-18)! He was so excited to go to school for his party! We made cookies the night before and he couldn't wait to share them with his friends. Mike ended up working a half day and was able to make it to the party too. Ryan was so excited..he had his Daddy and His Grammie at his party. He was ready to perform. His class sang wonderful songs and were so cute! They did a really great job. The cookies all the parents made were great and we enjoyed them, Madison especially! That girl loves her cookies!!

We are so lucky to have such a great teacher for Ryan. Mrs. Simon and Miss Bell are wonderful! Once again, they did an excellent job with the party and the kids. I tried to explain to Ryan that he is on a short vacation from school. He didn't get it, but I am sure he will enjoy the break, but be ready to be back soon.

Ryan's Gingerbread house

Here it is! These things are so difficult to do. Especially with a 3 year old. Getting the walls up and the roof on is the hard part. Oh and telling a 3 year he has to wait and not touch anything until it's ready. Thank goodness for the Wii, because that kept him busy while we waited.

Once the walls were up and roof on, it was time to decorate. I tried to be very "controlling" and explain how it was suppose to be, but Ryan told me I was wrong. So I just let him do it all by himself. I put the frosting on and let him go! He had the best time! I am glad I let him do his thing, because he was very proud of it when he was done. I think it turned out great!!! Well, until I see Jennie's or Kristin's pictures! Then mine will probably look like homeless shelter! (Maybe they will not have time to do theirs!! Ha ha)

After Ryan was done with the Gingerbread House, Mike asked a good question...."Now What?" HMMMM....It still looks cute!!!

What a Weekend!!

Usually I am ready for the weekend. Cannot wait for it to get here! Well, this weekend was a little different! Friday, I was taking a shower when Ryan came into the bathroom and had to go potty. After he was done, the toilet starting bubbling. It has happen before so I knew what was wrong. Damn Sewer or as Eddie would say in Christmas Vacation "Shitter was full". So I told Ryan to just step back and not flush the toilet. What does he do, yup he flushes the toilet. The toilet starts to over flow. I jump out of the shower and turn the water off at the toilet. No prblem. I figured we would wait for Mike to get home, tell him what happened and have him call Roto Rooter!!

Mike gets home and calls Roto Rooter. They say they will be here in about an hour. I thought, wow that's great on a Friday night. So around 4:30 he shows up...brings in his big machine and begins doing his thing. The kids didn't like the machine and it was loud, so we hung out in my bedroom. At one point, Madison wanted out and to see what was going on. I open the door and I look at Mike and he gestures for me to be quiet. All I could hear was hissing. Then I hear the Roto Rooter guy say something about hissing outside and inside and he smells gas. Then he says he is feeling light headed. (He was talking to his office on the phone, and it was a 2 way radio.) The next thing I hear was the lady on the other end say, if you smell gas and hear hissing, you need to get out asap because that place could blow. She said to call 911 and get out. I went into freak mode!! I grabbed the kids and ran to the neighbors. Mike followed. Explained to our neighbor what was going on and asked if me and the kids could stay for bit. In the meantime, the fire department was arriving And then Mich Con. As I watched from the neighbors window, all I could think about was our house exploding. Mike came over to check on us and I told him to grab the computer with all my pictures on it, just in case! I know, crazy, but they were letting him back in the house because they didn't smell any gas in there and they said it was safe to go in. So Mike grabbed our little hard drive just in case.

Well, to make a long story short, the gas line went through the sewer line and when Roto Rooter was cleaning out the sewer line he hit the gas line. They finally found the leak after digging up the side of our yard. They had to bring in a back hoe to dig up the yard. So finally at 9:30 everyone was gone. My mom had happened to call and see how things were going in the midst of all this and Mike filled her in. She was on her way home from work and turned around to come get the kids. Thank goodness! So there we are at 9:30 with a house with dirt tracks all through it, no water, of course no sewer. We got the all clear to stay in the house, but we chose not to because of not having water or a toilet to pee in.

The next day we called Roto Rooter to have them come back out to fix everything and put it all back together. We were finally up and running around 2 pm but broke. We had to shell out 700 bucks for this whole mishap. However, it was all Mich Con fault for running the gas line in the sewer line in the first place, so we will be calling them in the morning for total reinbursment. I will let you know how that goes after the call! Let's just say we are ready to put up a HUGE FIGHT!

Here is one picture of Mich Con out in front of our house. I didn't get any pictures of the fire department because I didn't have my camera. I wanted a picture of all the lights and all the excitement. This will have to do!!