Just Stay Calm

OK, so Tad tells me tonight that a couple accepted our counter offer and we have to be out of our house in 15 days (pending inspection). Yep, 15 days. No biggie. It's just Thansgiving this week (in Augusta where we will be most of the week) and the GA/GA Tech game on Saturday and after all that's over we'll have...10 days. Yep, 10 days to pack our entire house in boxes, wait...I don't have boxes. Things could be worse.

Our New Addition

This is my life right now:

• Rick moved in with us. He's a director now at a local hospital. He is hysterical, and him and Tad together is just plain scary. Rick, Tad & Josh together is indescribable. Watching our family get adjusted to eachother has been quite amusing. I think when Kelly moves down Tad might send me to live with her and keep Rick.
• When we first told Sarah-Grace we were getting a new house, she constantly cried that Rick wouldn't know how to get there and she wanted him to live with us. We assured her that we would Rick give directions to our new house and he could live with us there too.
• Tonight Tad & Rick spent 30 minutes trying to find an X-Box game that they could both play. After 30 minutes they load the game and realize that Tad's character is "in jail" and Rick's character has to save him. SO far Rick's died five times trying to save Tad and Tad's guy is "locked" to standing and kneeling in his cell. Tad's now sitting with the control in his lap and watching Rick play - wouldn't this have been easier to do 30 minutes ago with a game only one of them could play?
• Last week Josh, Tad and Rick spent over 7 days plotting a camping trip for PS3 - Josh was captain since he was the veteran!! The plan was Josh & Tad would camp out, get their name on a "list" and Rick would meet up with them after he got off work. Josh & Tad got up at 4am on Thursday and spent the rest of the day driving to every location that had PS3's from here to Covington to Athens to Winder and back to Lawrenceville. It was really sad watching their dream die.
• This weekend Rick had what he now classifying as a mysterious "24 hour tooth ache". He asked me to research this on the internet.
• Rick has gotten lost everytime he's tried to drive home to Hickory or to David & Jeannie's house since he's been living with us(apparently Lawrenceville-Suwanee is a confusing road). The first time he was driving back to Hickory he got so frustrated he stopped at Best Buy in Athens and bought a GPS system to find his way home - then returned it when he got home. The scary part is Tad did this same thing a month ago when he was driving to Tennessee - they even bought the exact same model. This past weekend after an hour & a half of driving and ending up in Dacula he just called Kelly and told her he was staying here. We are beginning to see why Sarah-Grace was so upset that Rick wouldn't be able to live with us because he wouldn't be able to find our new house (at least the new one's in Dacula).
• Rick and I pretty much argue about food all the time - we both consider ourselves experts. Last night he informed me he was making Rhubarb pie to bring to Thanksgiving because that's what people in California do. When I told him Rhubarb wasn't in season and that the traditional pie for Thanksgiving was PUMPKIN no matter what state you lived in he said, "Oh". The day before that he was saying he wanted mincemeat pie.
• Rick grew up in California. His father was a fire chief. Any restaurant or entertainment place that ever existed started first in California, and Rick and his dad not only went to these original places, but they went on opening day to all of them.
• So far Rick's died so many times trying to save Tad's character I've lost count - it's been over 15 times, at least. It's now been 30 minutes to find this game and 50 minutes of Rick trying to save Tad out of "jail" so he can play too.
• We informed Sarah-Grace she will begin calling any cousins that are our age (or close to it) "aunt" and "uncle" because it's what we did when we were little and it's respectful. When we informed her of this last week she became hysterical and started saying how much she loved her cousins and why wasn't Rick going to be in our family anymore. We calmed her down and explained what we meant and that Rick was still in our family. She's compromised by calling him Uncle Cousin Rick.
• Charlotte was shopping with Jeannie & I last week for a shirt for Julie. The one we picked was a long sleeve button up shirt. Charlotte looked at it and said "that's cute, daddy's shirt". Jeannie said no, not daddy's and she replied, "Rick's?". We thought that was so funny.
• We love having Rick around and hope someday soon Kelly will join us too!!

Update to God is Good Post

Hey, I added some more pictures to "God is Good" post for my family, specifically Tori. Thanks!

Grace-erosity

I just wanted to write a post of Sarah-Grace's sweet, generous spirit. Last week her teacher's must have been talking to the children and "teasing" them about all their candy from Halloween because on Wednesday she came home saying that neither of her teacher's had candy since grown ups can't trick or treat. She really empathized with them and was concerned about this. So Thursday morning after her breakfast as I was getting ready I noticed she was busy running around the kitchen. I asked her what she was doing and she explained she was making goody bags for her teachers. I didn't say anything I just watched her. She carefully chose all the best chocolate candy bars from her bucket and then found 2 matching spider rings (one from her bucket and one from Charlotte's) and placed them in 2 baggies. She asked if it was OK that she gave Charlotte's ring away since Charlotte probably wouldn't wear it and I said that was fine. I just thought this was so sweet and generous of her. It was completley unprompted by anyone but herself.

Then today we were at the mall in the play area (which was INSANE by the way since there was no school). Sarah-Grace gasped when she saw that every single book in the book area had been thrown on the floor. She played for a few minutes then ran over and started recruiting other children to help put the books back on the shelf. They got about half way done before they lost interest (including Sarah-Grace) and then they all ran off playing another game. About 10 minutes later the cleaning lady from the mall came in and began picking up the books. Sarah-Grace noticed this woman and quietly came up behind her and began picking up books and putting them on the shelf behind the woman. My heart just swelled. There is no other charater trait that I would rather my children exhibit or possess than generosity. Not only did she notice this woman and begin helping her - she didn't do it to get attention (which if you have a four year old that's also an older sibling this is QUITE common). I love Sarah-Grace's nuturing spirit and her compassion and I love the way she empathizes with everyone around her. Her teachers noticed this was she was one and it still never ceases to amaze me. I just wanted to write these little random acts of kindness to remember them.

God is Good

FINALLY!! After years of searching we have found a house!! The past few years have been, well, let's just say challenging. We have wanted to move for a long time now, but apparently God had some lessons to teach us. Lessons we've hopefully learned from through 1 lawsuit, 2 different jobs, and a ton of unexpected hospital bills. We (OK mostly me...but Courtney(our realtor) agrees Tad is picky too!) went from a long list of "must haves" in a new house, to pairing this list back, to abandoning this list all together and just desperately trying to find something we could afford that would fit us and most of our stuff in it. God really brought us to a new place of learning to be appreciative of everything we have and thankful for whatever we could find (and afford). And once we reached that point - God brought to a house with everything Tad and I ever said we wanted (and things that we didn't even ever say out loud that we would like to have). Just more proof (like we even need it) that God truely does dream bigger that we ever could.
The house is 10 years old, and needs a little work. But, we feel its well worth it. Even if every square inch is faux painted (I'm not kidding, even the ceilings are painted, no joke). We aren't scheduled to close until January, which will give us some time to sell our house and time for me to research how to deal with plastered AND glazed walls. If you have any suggestions I would love to hear them. Here are some pictures below for you to see. Oh, and I would like to give a shout out to Josh Brown's prayers, there's no telling what will happen when he gets his prayer on.

OK, I can't stop laughing that I just wrote "get your prayer on", that has to be in some video with rapping and dancing christians. Josh, I'll give you $10 if you can find it.

The Front of the House

The "Foyer"

The Den (and what's currently the office, but soon to be a playroom off of the den)

The Kitchen, yes the heavens opened up and sang to me when I walked in...

even though it has peach plastered walls!!

The Keeping Room, YEAH!!!

(This only matters to you if you've known me since 1997 (which Courtney has) when I first discovered keeping rooms and lusted (I'm not kidding) for one ever since).

The Master Bedroom

Basement (1 of the 2 rooms)

Halloween 2006

Hey everyone! Here are some pictures from Halloween. Aren't my Cinderella's cute? We went to Julie & Elliott's neighborhood to trick or treat. Sarah-Grace was very excited to be trick or treating with new friends she met for the first time. At one point when I was waiting halfway down the driveway for her at a house she yelled "Mom, I'm FINE! I'm with the group. Go wait with the other parents on the street!" Yeah, that's my FOUR year old talking. We can't wait until she's a teenager.
Charlotte fell and hit her face on the trailer hitch on Monday and by yesterday she had a black eye - if you look real close you can see it. Of course it had to happen this week!! She loved her dress. I wish we had a picture of how she would hold it up to walk. It was SO cute. She would stand at each house and wait until she got 2 pieces of candy before she would say thank you and walk away. All in all in was a great Halloween.