I LOVE CHRISTMAS, but NOT this WEATHER!!

Ok so I know I have not been on here in a while and I will not make any excuses, although I know I could come up with about a million. I do finally have something that I feel is worth commenting on and that unfortunately for you is the weather.

Seriously... sometimes I just wanted to look up to the sky and go "ok big guy what's the deal? Who did you turn the weather controls over to and could you please train them better?" Monday this week the high was about 40 degrees. We were walking around in sweaters and coats and all that fun winter garb. Then I wake up on Tuesday, check the weather and prep myself for 70 degree misty nastiness. How is anyone supposed to stay well in this nonsense. I really don't care which way it goes, but just go one way. It's kinda like driving behind kranky whilst he listens to the chipmunks singing christmas don't be late. (You'll have to ask him about that.)

We did get to see snow this year and that was kinda fun. Mattie wasn't quite sure what to do, but she sure did look cute in her coat.

My favorite part of Christmas is the lights and they were pretty fun out in the snow too.

So... it is now officially Christmas Eve and the forecast for today is 72 and sunny. I guess we won't be having a white Christmas this year. What else should we expect in Texas? Who knows, miracles happen...just ask Mary and Joseph.

The Weekendlong Project

So we decided that we had too many left over bricks from when our house was built and we were tired of them hanging out in our garage taking up much needed space. The solution to this problem turned out to be a patio. We just figured we would use the left overs to build an extention to our patio. We got an idea, drew up the plans and found out that we didn't have enough bricks. Solution to this problem came in the form of left over patio bricks at gran's house. It only took 2 trips to get more bricks than what we needed and now the space that we took our bricks out of is filled with the leftovers from gran's house. The best laid plans, right? Well after a full weekend of work with help from Mark, Sarah, Jordan, and a little from Chase, we finally completed our project and now have an extended patio. My favorite part of the whole project was going to the landscape supply place for the sand to put under the stones. It was too much fun sitting in Chase's truck watching a machine dump a truck load of sand into the bed...thanks for that experience Chase. Not only that, but Sean also got his favorite part, the............ .........................................................fire pit. :)

Now we're just waiting on the pool plan to go through. Any volunteers for that project. R-I-I-I-I-G-H-T. We'll keep dreaming.

The patio

Last day before school 2

Well lucky me I get to have two nights before the first day of school.
Kind of crazy cuz we went to school for 13 days then a hurricane named
Ike gave us 10 days off, so essentially it's like starting school all
over again. Thanks to Mark and the oil business we get to chill about
25 rows away from home plate at the Astros v. Reds game. Go Stros!
Here's some empathy for all of the teachers who are adding extra Ike
kids to their classrooms. Thanks for your help.

Ike 1, Jennifer 0

Ok so I am sure you have seen the reports about hurricane Ike or are currently feeling the effects of him yourself.  It has been 4 days since he came to town and we are still living and breathing.  Some of us not breathing in a pleasant smell, but sewage happens.  We are especially appreciative of the generator that Kranky has so graciously provided us...please God don't let the gas run out.  It has been rather surreal to watch people wait 2 hours in line to get gas and the mass hysteria that a new palette of ice can cause.  I have much respect and admiration for the police officers that are out taking care of looters and keeping the crowds in check.  We are still waiting on electricity, which can make some people a little cranky.  I got a little annoyed at a woman in the line to go into the grocery store yesterday who first of all was trying to manipulate things and second of all kept asking "when do you think we'll get electric?"  I'm not totally sure what she thought she was asking, but I kept envisioning all of us walking around zapping each other like electric eels or something... she would have been my first target.  Due to our generator and the powers that be, we finally got Internet service today.  Woohoo!!  Boy I missed my Internet.  

Definitely this hurricane was worse then the last one we went through (Rita).  As you can see Ike pushed a tree over onto my parents' house.  That big jerk.  I have to say I was pretty freaked out after that storm when we got to my parents' house and found that tree on top of it.  What was even scarier was the fact that it crushed the corner of the roof and started letting water leak in.  The paint started peeling and sliding off the wall, the corner of the room was soaked, there was a crack in the ceiling, and water was dripping into my mom and dad's room.  Fortunately for my parents it could have been much worse.  I am still amazed at all the trees down that fell over and pulled up the roots...what a wind.

Thank God we still have it pretty good.  Lets pray the nice weather keeps up.

Ike 1 Geraldo 0

There is nothing funnier than a repprter who gets a little ego check.
At least Ike is entertaining.

Check out this video on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J52xbx2__OY

Jennifer Fanning
Jrobis34@aol.com

Happy Birthday U.S.A.

Well another birthday has come and gone...this time for the grand ol' US of A. We had a good time besides the heat and the short lived THUNDERstorm. We followed our usual tradition and went to the parade in the morning. I have to admit that the parade was not very good this year. Puny floats, political campaigning, and huge gaps made it a little too difficult to sit all the way through. So we crossed the street and made ourselves feel a little better by stuffing our faces at the Fuddruckers. Our goal was to spend the rest of the day in the pool, but of course somebody had a different plan and the whistle blew to get out of the pool due to thunder and lightening. I did learn something through that experience. My father has a VERY healthy respect for thunder and lightening :) After a fabulous BBQ dinner at home we set out for mass chaos at the town center where we ran into the corn guy (our PE coach) and several other friends. We staked out the perfect spot to watch the fireworks. I LOVE FIREWORKS!!! What a great birthday party!

My my time files...umm flies

So it has been over a month since the last time I blogged. Crazy how that happens. I once thought, how is it that you lose track of time? They always said "it seems like just yesterday..." and I didn't really have a concept of that. Well I guess I do now. Since the last time I blogged we have celebrated Sean, Chase, and Emily's birthdays, graduation has come and gone, thank God the last day of school has arrived, etc., etc., etc. So I guess you just keep living without paying attention to all the blipps on the radar, until you look back and think where did all those hours go. So although a lot has happened, I guess I wouldn't really say you have missed much. I have spent numerous hours in professional development and Sean has kept on truckin' in his job. Life as we know it continues. Man... we gotta work on that. July should be more impactful (I don't think that is really a word...school is out, get up off my back about it). BEACH here we come (in 25 days).

P.S. HAPPY 2 YEAR ANNIVERSARY

BEEP AND AMANDA

&

EMILY AND CAMERON!!!!

school ain't so cool

So here is a shout out to all of my teacher friends who are dealing with end of the year assessments, TAKS testing, grades, and uncontrollable children. We still have a month left to go and I couldn't talk over them with a mega and a microphone. It's a circus everyday and I couldn't be more tired. It's not like I really want to be there that much either. Now slap some parental units on top of this end of the year sundae and you got a situation enough to make you sick. You know things aren't so swell when teachers crave jeans days. How pathetic is that? Jeans... who knew they could be so pleasurable?

So again to all my teacher friends... good luck and God speed on the next few weeks.

zoo pics

It's a ZOO out there

Sean took me to the zoo for my birthday on Monday, since I had the day off. I definitely felt like a kid again. It is amazing how there is a whole other world out there. I think one of my favorite parts was the orangutan that was sitting up against the window just looking at us looking at him. You could tell he was hot because you could see the sweat on his forehead. He kept putting his chin on his arm right up in the window. I felt sorry for the guy and wished I could take hime home with me.

Another cool thing that they had going on was an exihbit where they were going to put cheetah cubs with some Anatolian Shephard dogs. The dogs are supposed to become protectors of whatever species they are connected to. They were huge dogs. Unfortunately the cheetahs weren't there yet so maybe we'll have to go back to see them.

I don't have a picture of it, but one other of my favorite things was an otter. He just kept swimming laps in his "aquarium." When he would go under water you could see the water just streaming off of him because of the oil on him.

Sean's favorite part was the monkeys too. Although, I would have bet it all on the sea lions or some other swimming creature. So be a kid again and go visit a zoo; promise you won't be dissappointed.

First Blog

Ok so Sean and I decided that if everybody else is doing it, then we should be too. So here is an attempt at doing this blogging thing. Really I don't think we have anything interesting enough to really blog about so we may just make something up and see if you can tell what is real and what isn't. Tee hee hee. How crafty are we? I was once told by a wise person, don't let the facts ruin a good story so that is what we will do. Hope you can find something on here worth reading :)