Christmas tree pictures as promised

Our family home evening tonight was on cooperation. I thought it tied in nicely with "cooperating" in decorating the tree. Of course, the kids just wanted to decorate the tree. We all enjoyed it and now our home is feeling much more festive.

Time for Christmas!

Well now that we are back, safe and sound, we are preparing to put up our Christmas decorations. We were able to fit all of them in our van to bring back with us. Fortunately, we don't have that many yet. As much as I loved our vacation, I am glad to be home and able to rest a bit and get back into the swing of things. I have an amazing amount of laundry to do today. Good thing I don't have anywhere else I need to go. I hope to have the tree set up today so we can decorate it for family home evening. The kids love to decorate the tree. I'm looking forward to putting up my decorations. I think it will help this place feel more like a home. We brought a couple of pictures back with us to hang on the walls too. I think I'm going to try to get a new family picture taken so we can hang that on the wall too. I figure that if we are going to live here for a while, we might as well make it more like a home. Home is where the heart is anyway, right? So happy Christmas decorating to the rest of you. I post a picture of our tree once it's finished.

It was so fun to see some of you this past weekend. I look forward to Christmas and being able to visit more, and for a longer period of time, with more of you.

I am here in West Virigina

I'm here in West Virgina Finely. I have lived here scenes Tuesday. Tomorrow is the first time going to church down here. On Monday i am going out looking for a job. I'm going crazy sitting here a lone at night when Les is working 10-12 hours a day to 6-7 days a week. Well I love you all. Jocelyn

This Weekend

I was able to spend a little bit of time with Hannah this weekend. She was kind enough to pick me up from the airport at midnight and then even kinder to let me sleep in her bed. I just want everyone to know that I met her roommates and they are great. We don't need to worry, they will keep our Hannah safe :) We didn't get to see each other to much :( But it was still so great to see her.

Love ya Hannah

Update

Well, unfortunately we received some not-so-great news yesterday. That house I just wrote about, that we were very interested in, has had an offer accepted on it before we could get ours in. I don't know if ours would have even been high enough to even be considered, but we are all pretty sad none the less. Our poor kids. They go to these houses with us to see them and get their hopes up so high that they really feel it when it doesn't turn out to be the one. They really want to be in our own home. I can't say that I blame them. I'm right there with them. And though I ususally know better than to get my hopes up for any house, I did with this one. I'm pretty discouraged about the whole house hunting affair now.

GREAT NEWS! (potentially)

I heard from Jocelyn today that there is a potential buyer for her house. It's the mother of the man who bought our house across the street. I don't have any more details at this time. I'm hoping to get some more tomorrow. Keep your fingers crossed and your prayers up that this goes through and that her house finally goes away!

News from the house front

We saw a pretty nice house Saturday morning. We really like it. The bad part is that it is listed at $159,900 right now. It was a foreclosure and the bank now owns it. The selling agent is the one who showed the house to us and she told us the bank is very motivated. She said we should just make an offer and see what happens. So all weekend we've been praying and thinking about this house. We feel like we will make an offer, although it's going to be tons lower than what it's listed at, and just see what happens. We know what we can afford and we won't go over that. With the market the was it is, being flooded with bank owned houses, we may just get this house for what we can afford. Keep your fingers crossed for us! Sorry I don't have any pictures of it, but if things go forward I'll definately post some pictures.

Just an idea

So I was thinking how wonderful it would be if we were to to get a nice, professional family photo taken while everyone was home for Christmas. I do realize that price could very well be an issue, but I really like the idea of having a nice family photo. So what do you all think?

My first parking ticket!

Well, I got my first EVER parking ticket on Tuesday. The city public library has metered parking. It only costs 25 cents for 2 hours of parking, but it might as well be $100 when you don't have any change on you. I went on Tuesday morning to take Chelsea and Jaxson to the storytime they have. When I got there I realized that I didn't have any quarters. Storytime was going to start in 10 minutes and I wouldn't have time to go home and get a quarter and come back. Because I'd already told the kids we were going, I couldn't just go home (That is one tip for all you new parents, don't ever tell your kids what you are going to do until you are practically doing it. That way if some act of nature happen, or you just change your mind, you don't have to listen to them whine and complain and cry about you not keeping your word). So I parked, hoping that no one would be by to check for the hour I'd be in the library. Of course, I wasn't so lucky. Although, I did deserve the ticket, I did break the law. Unfortunately, the ticket was $11. So my parking fee actually was $11 that day, not the typical 25 cents! Life sucks sometimes.

Wish me Luck!

Well, today I'm attempting to collect a refund of money from the selling agents of the house we tried to buy. They had me pay them so they could hire a plumber to go into the house and de-winterize the plumbing so we could have it inspected. The job was not finished completely, in fact, the plumber only hooked up the water meter. The meter he hooked up was an old version and it was illegal for him to re-hook it up. But that really doesn't matter to me, it's not any of my business. However, I did pay for the house to be de-winterized so it could be inspected, and that did not happen. Therefore, I am requesting the selling agent refund my money. I've left a message this morning for the woman we dealt with to call me back. I'm expecting that she will refuse and that things will get ugly. I really don't want to fight about this, but I think I'm entitled to have that money back and it's not like it's a small amount. I paid $175 for that plumber. I can't just forget about that amount of money. I'm prepared to go to the realtor's association, the Better Business Bureau and even small claims court if I need to. I just hope it doesn't have to go that far. I'm not very good with confrontation. My stomach is just churning right now. AHHHHH!

50's Day!!!!

Today is Bradyn's 5oth day of school. To celebrate they asked that the kids dress in 50's style clothes. How easy for boys since all we did was roll up the sleeves of his white t-shirt and slick his hair. I must admit, Bradyn is just too cute!!!

FHE

Last night for FHE we talked about being Thankful. It was pretty cute, hearing all the things that the boys are thankful for. After the lesson they helped Les make Choco chip cookies. They love helping Daddy.

Not much new to report here. We're back in the swing of things with the kids in school, Charlie teaching and me at home. We are already looking forward to the Thanksgiving break. I'm still pressing forward with Weight Watchers. I'm having a more difficult time right now with all the Halloween candy on sale. This and after Easter are the worst times for me indulging my candy cravings. I've found some sugar free fudgecicles that are 0 points and that has helped. My goal is to be 10 pounds lighter by Christmas. Then I would only have 20 more pounds to go to get to my goal weight. I'm losing about 1 to 1 1/2 pounds every week. If I keep that up I should reach my goal weight by March or April. That's pretty exciting to me.

Our house hunting is on hold right now. We've pretty much looked at all the houses in our price range that we'd even consider. We just feel like the right one hasn't come along yet. I'm leaving things up to the Lord and trying to have patience with His time table. It's not very easy for me, I've never really been a patient person, but I'm trying.

I'm interested to see how the fantasy basketball thing goes. I'm not planning on doing very well.

Oh, Charlie has finally received a calling. He's going to be the 1st councilor in the Elders Quorum presidency. We kind of had a feeling that he's be there because the new Elders Quorum president is one of the only friends we have in the ward yet (although he says he was inspired with Charlie's name :)). He'll be sustained this Sunday.

Anyway, sorry for babbling on so. I hope everyone else is doing well. Hope to hear from you soon.

New Home?

Dad, Kay, Bob and myself will be looking at homes in Cadillac tomorrow morning. We have asked Bob and Kay to come along because two more sets of eyes may see things that we don't. I am going to call Kay and see if she can bring her camera so you can see what we are looking at. There are over 300 homes in the area for sale so we should be able to find something that we both can agree on.

Family Fast

Mom has requested a family fast on Sunday. The people have backed out of renting the house in Flint tonight. We are fasting to find someone to BUY the house. Mom has also said you can invite anyone else to join the fast "(i.e. I will be asking Jen and Cody to participate in our family fast, they are practically family.) So if you have any questions you can call Mom on the home phone because Dad has the cell phone.