Life before children.....

I know my postings get pretty wordy so I am going to try to imput photos, but none are recent as I still after 9 months can't find the camera cord. I have 800 pictures to get off my camera! So here are some very old photos.

Every year before we had kids, we had pumpkin carving contests. I was going to post all of them but Justin felt shamed out by some of them and said this one from 2004, I could show. I of course won EVERY year. Oh the hours of taunting eachother about who was going to win and trying to sneak peaks at what the other was doing. I smile and feel and am filled with warm fuzzies. Good times. As we gear up for our marriage course that begins this weekend, I am excited to just have a scheduled day everyweek to give my full attention to my spouse. It gets difficult to prioritize and keep eachother right at the top under God. Some times those two sweet boys try to trump dad, but I am on to their tricks.

Here is a photo of the front of our house, thank goodness you can't see the garage. It's a good house and you know what the $20 faucet from home dept that is in our sink actually functions. I thought you had to spend at least $550 to do that. Those of you that know about our idol, I mean home know exactly what I am talking about. Thankfully after our last home, I feel like we have learned a few things. Let me share some of the MANY lessons learned:

1) Wholeheartidly consult God first, he may say no and if he does, we advise you listen.

2) If you have a budget, buy everything as under the actual budgeted cost as you can. If your budget is $100 for doors, ask to see all the $60 doors first and NEVER, I repeat NEVER look at $110 doors.

I am using doors as an example but if could be anything on your budget.

3)Don't work full time jobs and have your first baby while trying to learn how to be a plumber. Scratch that, don't try to be every type of building expert needed to build a house (ie: electrician, carpenter, framer) if you are doing any of first things listed previously. Some times the education, ie school of hard knocks, is actually more expensive than having the real deal come and complete it the first time.

4) Cheap light fixtures, cheap faucets and cheap carpet actually do, do the job. Who knew?

Idol in the rough.....This is Oct 2004. This is before we melted all our gold down to make the calf. I am compelled to thank all of the WONDERFUL family and friends who came out and helped us and loved us during this time. And the Thanks be to our heavenly father for delivering us through it, you are to merciful. For some reason I have no photos of the completed calf from the outside. Here is one from the kitchen and it's 9 foot island...
This one is from the loft outside the master bedroom french doors. Can you see those sconces? I am shamelessly going to tell you this, they were $800, hand blown from Italy and shipped over on a blue whale! They hyped up how beatiful the accent lighting would be, in reality the plexiglass ones would have had the same effect, shipping back to italy on a blue whale was too expensive! Oh how sad and wasteful!



Here is Steven when he was 2 days old. AHHHH, his nick name until he was about 14 months was 'Mr skinny guy' and after that he is known around our house as Peeky, but he prefers Steven.

Andrew at 2 days old, Steven 11 months and now ....my shining moment. I had been eating lots of Chinese. LOL

I am procrastinating taking care of some things but the trip down memory lane(old photo files) has been fun!