A Day at the Cattle Auction

I had soooo much fun this Saturday. Tony and I loaded up the cattle trailer and headed off to buy some calves for his mom's farm. Who knew it would be so difficult and involve so much adrenaline?? First off all we were about 40 years younger than the average person there, and it was apparent the moment that we walked in that we didn't know how it worked at all. Question: Who in the world can understand those auction guys??? Why do they have to make all those random sounds the whole time they are calling the bids? Is it just to confuse you, to prevent ackward silences, to make the crowd laugh?? It took us about an hour to figure out how it worked and then Tony started bidding. He was slow at first. He maybe raised his card for every 10th cow, but then he really got into it. I'm suprised we didn't come home with twice as many cows as we needed. It's really tricky because you bid on a per pound price and you don't know the weight until after you buy the cow. Also, they auction them in about 20 seconds so you have to make your decisions really quickly. It was so much fun! We laughed and laughed as we tried to figure it out. Here's an actual snip-it of a conversation we had while there: Tony: That's a brahma. Leslie: Yea, all brahma's are bulls so you should bid on that one. Tony: Really? Leslie: Yea, my cousins had one. Tony: Really? Because they would be extinct if they were all bulls.... Leslie: oh, right.... ha, ha, ha. That is how the conversatin went all day as we were making up things just to feel like we knew what we were talking about. We ended up buying 6 really fine looking calves (one being a brahma), and were just under our spending limit. It was so much fun!! I can't wait to go back.

God Is Good, part deux

If you haven't heard..... drum roll..... we're pregnant!!! Our new bundle of joy is due in April. We should know the sex by Christmas so I'll keep you posted.

While You Were Out

Okay, you know the basic concept of the show... you lure someone out of town and then madly work to make-over a room in their house. Janelle, my sister-in-law, and I decided to take on this challenge when our mother-in-law Vickie went for a quick trip to Santa Fe. We did some of the shopping the day before she left and then hit the ground running when she pulled out of the driveway at 11:30 on Thursday. Oh, let me add another twist to our challenge: we had two children with us the entire time. Let me give you an outline of what we did and then I'll try to describe the room beyond the picture.

Thursday:
11:30- begin to unload the room (wow, there was a LOT of stuff in this room)
12:30- attempt to remove wallpaper, had to resort to using a steamer. At one point myself, Janelle, Garren, and Jake were all peeling wallpaper
1:30- tear down cracked tape and bed from corner and begin to patch
2:00- paint, 3 walls mocha, 1 wall chocolate brown
6:00- drive to Combine to get Tony's tools
8:00- begin sewing drapes (doesn't get far b/c we don't have thread, pin and iron only)
8:45- Tony and Brandon start making headboard
9:30- go home and show Tony pregnancy test.... that's right if you haven't heard the news we're expecting

Friday:
8-10:00- shopping, Garden Ridge and Wal-mart
10:00- last minute paint and more patch in cracked corner
11:00- drive to Rockwall (home depot, tj maxx, kirklands, wal-mart) Again remember that we had 2 small children with us.)
3:00- attach foam to headboard, start to put room back together and organize clothes, shoes, memorobilia
5:00- Tony built cornice board, we upholstered headboard, Tony attached
8:00- Tony puts shelves up in 2 closets
11:30- finally go to sleep at Vickie's instead of our house b/c we have so much to clean in the morning before they get home

Saturday:
8:00- all up and cleaning house
10:00- finally able to sit down and rest
11:45- Tony and Jake leave for Rockwall
12:30- Vickie and Lila get home, mill around, and then finally she goes to her room and proceeds to scream with shock/delight. Tears abound and we have so much fun telling her about everything we did. She loves it!!

God Is Good

Remember the post about Job?? Well, I have to let you know how good God has been to us. We received a random check in the mail from our insurance company, Tony's work sent out an early gainsharing check, we only had to pay 1/2 our deductible to get our car fixed, and because of the sale of Tony's company we should be getting a large check in the mail by the end of the month. All of those extra expenses will be taken care of and we might even have some money left over. I knew at the time that all of those things were happening that God would provide and he did. God is good!

I Can Fly!!!!

I don't want to make anyone feel bad, but we really do have the best kid in the world! We had to fly down to Houston for a wedding a few weeks back and we were not really sure how Jake was going to do on the plane. Well, we shouldn't have been suprised when he was an absolute angel. The flight crew and even the other passengers on the plane loved him. Here is a picture of his flying adventure. Word to fellow parents: Do not board plane at last possible second with baby!!! People can give the meanest looks when that happens. I thought one man was actually going to throw something at us.

Sewing Part Deux

For those of you that know me well you will not be suprised that I did not let sewing "beat me." Although the class was overwhelming I decided to give it a try. I bought a simple pattern and some cute fabric, circa Lucille Ball, from Walmart and decided to make an apron. Being the prudent person I am I also decided I was in need of adult supervision for this first project so I loaded everything up and went to Granny's house. She helped me lay out the pattern, put the pieces together and make some key decisions. I did all the sewing and really got comfortable with my machine. It was so much fun and only cost about $20 to make. Here is a picture of the finished product.

Pretty cute, I know. Please try to limit your orders to 5 per day.

Fast forward 2 weeks and I'm getting pretty gutsy. I decided to turn my big, ugly pine coffee table into an ottoman. This project had 2 objectives. Objective 1 was to disguise the big, ugly table. Objective 2 was to hide all of Jake's living room toys underneath the table. I must say mission accomplished! Pricing the foam for the top of the table was scary, but luckily JoAnne's was having their Christmas in July sale so I got everything 1/2 off. Here is a picture of our new ottoman/coffee table. Please feel free to come by and see it in person too!

Have You Ever Felt Like Job???

I really hadn't until recently and maybe it's because we're studying this book in our Sunday School class. So, here's a run down of our summer:

1. leak in roof creates hole in ceiling, luckily this happened over the patio (roof repaired ceiling not)
2. outside a/c unit goes out (inside went out last spring)
3. have to have wisdom toothe removed... yuck!!
4. Jake running high fever rush to ER, en route have blow out causing damage to vehicle, Jake had 2 ear infections but is now back to 100%
5. have to have cavaties filled
6. now have serious case of poison ivy covering much of body and almost all of face, hence no picture for this posting
7. obviously no vacation as financial crisis in area of house and vehicle

I know that these really don't compare to the trials that Job faced as he proved his devotion to God, but like I said I really did see some correlation. As we have joined a new Sunday School class and have been meeting with this great group of people for bible study on Wednesday nights we truly have grown closer to God. I know that he will not put anything in our path that we can not face, and I have to add that both mine and Tony's jobs are great right now, Jake is a joy and blessing, and we have a beautful home, and two working vehicles.

I know I don't normally include "deep thoughts" on the blog and if this scares any one of my six devoted readers away please let me know and I'll try to curb my free flowing thought postings.