Life - Taylor Style

Blake! & a little weekend fun

2011-09-26T12:33:00.005-05:00

Hopefully you are keeping up with Blake on the blogs that I posted last time...but here's a pic that took my breath away! This is him standing in the Jordan River. Incredible.

Sweet Cam almost got sick from the heat at baseball practice, AND...to finish up our weekend, a little trip to Urgent Care. Always a joy.

If you give an 8 year old a scooter, he'll try and do a wheelie. Then he'll fall, only to be caught by the handle bar in the face.

If you take that same boy to Urgent Care, the doctor will say, "oh, he's just too cute for glue. Let's numb him up and put stitches in that poor sweet face"

If you give that same kid numbing cream, he'll feel so good that he'll actually WATCH the doc put in his 3 stitches.

It's always an adventure around here. Love to you all!

slacker

2011-09-20T18:04:00.003-05:00

So it seems as though someone on here hasn't blogged a whole lot. Hmmm...wonder who that could be?

10 for Tuesday:

1. Please go check out my friend Vicki's blog (listed below right as Marquez Family). Blake is on a Israel trip with her husband. (Another blog is http://gtitours.org/tour/2011-09-17-israel-with-scott-heare/)

2. Again, Blake was blessed with a 14 day study trip to Israel with our pastor. What an incredible experience!

3. Yesterday was our 13th anniversary. Blake got to swim in the Dead Sea! I got to take boys to dentist.

4. I just heard Lucy fart. Seriously. Made the poot sound. Blake always said she did it every morning. I never believed him. Until now.

5. Camron is playing YMCA baseball this fall. For all of you who know us, we NEVER play a fall sport. We are crazy.

6. Brandon is still doing gymnastics and is loving it.

7. I am in my 5th week of boot camp. I don't know what I was thinking on that one. I am still waiting till that "loving it" stage will hit.

8. I am on week 2 of our boot camp's Paleo Challenge. Google paleo. It's hard to eat that way. AND there's also exercise every night to top it off!

9. I miss my friend Brooke and her family. I miss them dearly.

10. I ALSO miss my family, both sides. Boo.

what to do...what to do...

2011-03-05T11:35:00.002-06:00

What to do when your life sort of gets turned upside down? (I know...not really turned upside down in some people's priorities & life stories, but upside down in my life.) I decided to have a pitty party. If anyone wants to join me, it's been fun. Not the kind of party with cake and balloons, but more of a "it's my party and I can cry if I want to" kind of party.

Well...trying to again figure out what to do, I decided to check blogs. Not the best thing for me right now, but I did find this really funny post that cheered me up for just a bit. Seems like she could have been wearing a hat at my party the day she wrote this. Wish I had words like that sometimes! Wanted to share just in case anyone else needs it!

who are you?

2011-01-19T19:26:00.001-06:00

Or who am I?? WHAT? It's been a long, long time. I miss blogging. Especially now that I've given up facebook. Yes, gave up. Cold turkey. It's been a couple of weeks, and I have to say, I don't miss it. I miss out on a little, but it does give me more to talk to people about. I get to catch up with friends in person. It's nice.

I have so much to write, and sooo many pictures to post, but I was just FLOORED by Brooke's latest post. So, you can click on her blog for your viewing pleasure today. It wiped everything in my head right out.

I'll catch up soon!!

Back to School-2010 edition

2010-08-23T20:04:00.004-05:00

It's REALLY hard to believe that this is our 5th first day of school since kindergarten. Can't believe it!! The kids were very excited, up until we hit the parking lot.

We started with breakfast requests: Cam an omelet made by Dad & Bran some pancakes.

Then we moved to the hair spiking and the picture taking. I am a bit crazy with my camera on the first day of school, but that is another post between me & my psychologist. :)

Here they are! Handsome...I must say.

Again, they were co-operative until we hit the pavement. Then the "Mom, stop taking pictures you are embarrassing me" started.

And...the grand finale-the annual collage.

summer time, summer time

2010-08-23T19:41:00.003-05:00

Where did you go?? It all went by SOOOO fast! Here's a quick snippet of how it all ended up for the Taylor Family!

Trip to the Myers/Gilberts for an awesome 4th of July bash! Nothing like some fun with friends & a jam session! Thanks Lynn for including the boys!

serious faces...

sweet happy "I get to play my guitar" face

serious jam face

Fun times @ Trinity University Baseball camp with friends!

love this one!

Closing out the summer @ the lake house!!

Bran had some sweet hair after a quick nap

sweet feet

sun kissed cheek brothers

ahhhh...such a sweet view for the week!

lots and lots and lots of fishing!

then we got back & got to enjoy a FUN week @ VBS! Elli was my buddy!

then f...u...n at the river with the other Taylors!

THEEEENNNN...we had our church's annual Baptism & Back to School bash!

Here are Blake & the boys doing what they do best...parking!

Camron got rededicated!! Here's a sweet moment captured by Esther as we were praying before it all started.

YEAH MR MAN!!! Up & out of the water he came!

We got to end up our last week of summer with THIS guy!! I didn't get a picture while I got to babysit him, but had to steal this one from Brooke's blog! MAN, is he cute or what?!

Last but not least...we ended up our last night before school with trip to Chili's with the Blevins'. Not to mention...in matching outfits! Aren't we cute?

Some pictures from Blake's trip

2010-07-17T13:38:00.008-05:00

Hi friends!!! I have made a little slideshow movie of some of the pictures from Blake's trip. Some were taken by him, some by Amanda Eisermann (who is a wonderful photographer!!) and some from Ryan Jacobson. I am quite sure that there will be many more to come from different people, but enjoy these for now!!! Love, Jen

Blake made it home...safe and sound!

2010-07-12T20:22:00.002-05:00

(and stinky!!)

Boy oh boy!! The mission team arrived home after a 31 hour travel after leaving Entebbe. They ALL looked like they were in desperate need of a shower and their beds. But the best part, is that the look they all had was beautiful! Beautiful from the heart. All 12 of them had just poured their hearts into 140+ children for 2 whole weeks! I can never thank them all enough!

Thank you for the reading the couple of posts and keeping up with them on the blogs! It meant so much to all of them!

Waiting for the fireworks on the 4th of July!

2010-07-06T20:51:00.001-05:00

-Jen (sent from my blackberry)

Blake's email update yesterday

2010-06-30T13:37:00.001-05:00

Today was clinic...130+ files, pics, charts, eye exams, HIV test, polio, tetanus, and measles vaccines, vital signs, dental exams, and letters to sponsors. Praise God...ZERO HIV positive.

That's it for now. We're tired and going to bed. We'll get back to creativity tomorrow. J

Love to all!

Blake

-Again, don't forget to check the other blogs for more details!

Checking in

2010-06-29T14:36:00.002-05:00

Well, Blake is GREAT! They are having a wonderful experience there. All he mainly says is that it's hard to describe. Hopefully he will be able to once he gets home!! i did get to have a great conversation with him yesterday, and it REALLY put me at ease. I needed that!!

Don't forget to check the other blogs. They are all taking turns, and are doing so well at it! So fun to live it through each of their words. And-please comment on their blogs if you can! It's really the only form of communication they are getting from any of us!!

Last email from Blake:
Love you...just wanted to check in. We're going to be out all day at the boys house digging post holes for the fence and then VBS. I hope acacia was good. I miss you and love you very much. Please hug the boys and let say hi for me. Read the blogs to know what we're doing. My turn to blog hasn't come up yet. I'm not a blogger, so it won't be like the others, but whatever. I'm having to do a lot of what I normally wouldn't do anyway. Today is my devotional though. We're about to have breakfast so I'm gonna go. Write back and tell me what's up.

Love,
Blake

Updates...

2010-06-26T20:50:00.002-05:00

I've been able to talk to Blake twice now. He's doing great, and not eating nearly as bad as I thought they would! They had tilapia tonight for dinner! Who knew? They are all sleeping well and it seems as though everyone is getting a little used to Uganda living. They are doing a great job with keeping up with the other blogs, so don't forget to check them!

Here's an update via an email that he sent me. I had no idea he'd be able to access his Scooter Store exchange server from Uganda! Did you? HA!

From him: Hi Babe. Josh bought a sim card and I can access my exchange server

OMG, the arrival to the house was overwhelming.

Joy and sadness all at the same time and about 100 screaming kids, all wanting to touch you and hug you at the same time. I fought hard not to break down and cry. I got to meet and hug on Moses. No one calls him that here. They all know him as Okere. Just Okere. He is sweet. Didn't get to visit with him that long...Susan sent them all home (boys house) so that we could unpack and eat dinner.He says that he loves us and he prays for us everyday.

Don't know if I'll email everyday, but maybe. Tell the boys hello and that I love and miss them deeply. Same goes for you.Love you, -bt

From me: Love you! Thank you so much for the update! Its so wierd that you are across the dang world right now! & that I can talk to you via email. I hope you are able to get some good, good rest tonight. I love you so much & it was SO good to get the email from you!! I didn't think I'd miss you this much already. Don't forget to take care of yourself!! & stay away from the roadkill. Heard y'all bought some road side chicken on the way there via jack. Babe, like mexico dog tacos. Love you!!

From him: Chicken on a stick is better than dog tacos. We also had roasted banana. Josh and I liked it, the rest did not.Sleep was good. Ambien rocks! About to have breakfast, talk to you later.Love,-bt

Blake's in AFRICA!!

2010-06-25T13:36:00.007-05:00

My sweet husband is now officially in Iganga, Uganda, East Africa!

What, some of you might ask?? (Probably not, with only a couple of people that read my blog & you know the story, but oh well.)

Here's the short of it: We are privileged to be a part of our wonderful church, Riverside Community Church. There are 2 trips that are taken pretty regularly through the church in the past 4 years-one is a teaching trip to Israel and a the other is a mission trip to Africa. Blake was going to Israel, I was going to Africa (part of our 10 year plan of life). See, Blake is smart. He can beat anyone I know at Trivial Pursuit, well maybe not his dad, but anyone else. Blake loves to learn new things. He loves the bible and history, so it made sense that he wanted to go to Israel. Me, I love kids. I love to serve. I am not a trivial pursuit champion. I get excited if I get 1 question right in the whole game, and it's normally pop culture. I wanted to love on some kids, not hike through the desert & memorize scripture. I know, terrible, but everyone is here for a purpose.

So, about 9 months ago, they start planning the Africa trip. Again, I want to go. Not necessarily this time, I am thinking, but Africa is my trip. So Blake looks at me and says, "Babe, I think I am going to Africa." In my mind I think, heck no, that's my trip, but out of my mouth comes "OK!!!" What? Blake? Africa? No way. Now?? It's expensive! It's FAR! We have 2 young kids! How in the heck to we come up with the $? And for Blake to go?? But, even though those thoughts went quickly through my head, I was filled with a complete sense of peace & knowing that HE WAS GOING TO GO, and we would find the $ for him to do so.

Fast forward 9 months, after lots of planning, reading, praying, wonderful, WONDERFUL hearts (people) that gave towards his trip, our saving, and some tears, Blake has made it. I was very torn if I should even write about it. It's not my trip, it's his, but I have the blog, and this is my side of the story. So there.

Here are a couple of pictures from the airport on Wednesday when he left...

Now, that's a LOT of luggage!! The team was able to take soooo much stuff for the orphanage in Iganga. Everything from medicine & medical supplies...more than you could ever imagine!, school supplies, clothes, a post hole digger, vbs supplies, and sooo much more!

The boys were so excited for Blake, can't you tell by the look on Bran's face?

The 12 person team that are going to do God's work in Africa over the next 15 days!! Please pray for them by name: Colton, Brian, Kayla, Josh, Blake, Ryan, Jaimie, Liz, Amanda, Sue, Nicole and Tamara.

And...with their families! (that's my hand & camera case at the very far left above the Little Mermaid pillowcase. Whew...I made the picture! and not sure what Blake was doing with his face on this one. Think it was something like "can we please stop taking pictures now" face)

Sue on the trip is going to try and update her blog at http://www.sue-henderson.blogspot.com/ and there should be someone updating the http://www.riversidearoundtheworld.blogspot.com/ one too. Just in case you wanna get it from their point of view too!!

New Post...what's that??

2010-06-15T21:20:00.005-05:00

Well...I have spent the better part of the afternoon updating my blog, thanks to my MIL. Thanks Chris for the gentle reminder!!

Well, I wanted to update, but then saw my friend Brooke's blog and decided that before I updated with a new post, I needed to make it pretty like hers!! Then I started looking at all the other blogs attached to mine, hers, friends of friends of hers...then it all goes down hill from there. So, I managed to update mine a bit and add a new post! Yeah me!!

So...for the post!! Here's a snippit of the boys' baseball season. It was super fun while it lasted, but we are glad to have the break! 2 kids on 2 teams makes for 2 tired parents...and about 2 whole home-cooked meals the whole season. (Click on the pic to see it bigger!)

Who is this girl???

2010-04-27T20:52:00.001-05:00

things around the Taylor house...

2010-04-23T17:01:00.006-05:00

Things have been busy!! Busy, but GREAT! Yeah, the little things like washing protective cups, untying knots in cleats...again, washing poop off chicken eggs, NEVER ever being anywhere close to being done with laundry, getting mad @ the bugs eating the new little leaves on my garden plants, holding sweet precious babies while watching those babies grow up & have their first Easters-all of it sometimes stinks, but sometimes makes me tear up because I am so happy to do it!! And I wouldn't trade it for the WORLD!

ohhhh...my teeny tiny cucumber plant coming out of the ground from seed!

the first mater!

boys on a roof...

look @ those yummies!

Easter kids! -growing up too fast!

Easter family

Eli's first cascarones!

Elli's first hunt...

Friends!

The closest thing I have to a bluebonnet picture this year. Kids wouldn't let me stop & take them!

Sweet Lela was born!

Another field trip with Madison!

Brandon has the best faces!

check out the intensity!

oh my goodness...for real. NO ONE can put their stuff away. Ever.

baseball hat anyone?? For real.

one picture...several thoughts

2010-04-15T15:47:00.002-05:00

So, as I sit on my computer...downloading pictures from my camera, for my not no nice friend Brooke, I go through my old pictures. (I know, you think Brooke is nice. But-look at this not so nice post of her slacker friend...me!!) So, here's me & Bran at the Taylor Family Christmas, and here are my 10 thoughts (as I am still waiting on pictures to send to Brooke):

1. Why are my arms so long?

2. How did my BABY boy get so big?

3. Why didn't Brooke bring her own camera to Easter? It's her kid's first Easter hunt for crying out loud.

4. Are my elbows big or it just the picture?

5. Can I hire a housekeeper to do laundry?

6. I buy gel, spike the kids' hair, and no proof of that.

7. I used to be blond...what happened?

8. It's night time in this picture...why do I still have sunglasses on my head?

9. How in the heck did I get all those eye wrinkles?? Seriously?? @ 33?

10. What did I ever do to be blessed beyond belief like I am...even with wrinkles!?!?!?

Good morning world & all the wind happens...

2010-03-28T13:17:00.004-05:00

Hello blog world, again. It's been way too long, and catching up would take way too long, and you would feel like you would need to take a nap, so I will try and spare you the boring details. :)

Here's a couple of most recent things... (in no particular order!!)

baseball season started! (2 teams again this year...double the practices & double the games-one reason I haven't blogged) my 3 favorite boys in the world!!

look at these handsome boys. love them.

This is Cam's first year at kid pitch. Let me just say that it hurts my stomach.

Brandon's on machine pitch this year!

We got to go to the Kingsville & the ranch to start off our spring break. 2 things we don't do nearly enough. Dang busy schedules!

RIVER!!! Love the river! It's so nice & full this year too!

Both in pink shirts...both dressed themselves. Again.

We make it a point to love on this boy as much as we can. Makes it real easy that he's stinkin cute & only lives 2 houses down!

Cowboy's doing so well that we had to shave him again. We went from having no hair to tooooo much hair again. It was a wonderful blessing, but a woman has to keep her house somewhat clean.

It's gardening time!!! This is our strawberry topsy turvey w/strawberries!! CAN'T WAIT!!

Cilantro in the pot so it doesn't burn in the 50+ days of 100 degree heat! SALSA!

Here's my mama BIN444 or something like that. Didn't have good luck with the garden last year, but hopefully with 16 tomato plants, we'll get some yummy yummy tomatoes! Ohhhhh...love gardening!

We finished up another season of Upward. Again...Brandon started figuring out the game @ the last game. Hope he remembers for next year!

Camron LOVED basketball this year!

My baby turned 7. Can't comment on that one yet. Makes me sad. (and can't get the picture to turn)

Well, hopefully I'll stay on my game & keep this up!! Only time will tell, huh??

blog world...where did you go?

2010-01-08T21:47:00.004-06:00

I don't know where I've been. I know that I have so much to blog about, but can't put it into words. I try. I sit down, try to blog, then stop. First thought...who is really out there reading my blog? Not many people. It gets discouraging. As I sit here now, with my hamster running around on the key board, well not my hamster, Camron's hamster but I like her, I think hmmm...will she soon pee & poop on the key board? Should I blog about it? It's kind of funny in my head. No pictures, just me & my hamster. But then I realize, not many people will read about me and my hamster, or anything else I choose to write about, right? Some will, but not a lot of comments. Sometimes makes us bloggers feel like we're writing to no one. But, I'm going to try. I will try to keep pictures of my beautiful boys, who are growing way too fast. I will write about silly things like my hamster who is now asleep in one hand, as I type with the other...very...slowly. (still no pee or poop, just in case you were wondering) Happy blogging!!

I gotta throw in a pic just cause she's cute. Isabella in her ball. :)

I got a new car!

2009-11-23T20:56:00.003-06:00

Well, a NEW TO ME car!! I was so excited, I couldn't even blog about it. But my friend Brooke did!

For the big news story...click here. Just couldn't reproduce her eloquent words.

OHHHH...and you also gotta read up on another Brandon moment...click here. Again, Brooke's words are too hard to beat. We've had to have this last conversation again since that post. The kid forgets everything.

33 and FEELING IT!

2009-11-13T21:00:00.000-06:00

Well, I had another birthday. There's a point in life where I think people are excited about birthdays, and then you get to a point where you kind of start dreading them. I was kind of in the middle of those 2 feelings this year, up until I found this.

A flippin hand freckle! FOR REAL??!! This might not be a big deal to most people, especially for my friends who are not freckle challenged, but for me it was huge. You see, my grandma has freckly hands. Now, my mom has freckly hands. Some might see them as cute, but I see old. No offense Mom & Gma, but it's my first one. The rest of them probably won't hurt as bad.

Besides that, I had a WONDERFUL DAY!!! I woke up in the morning to sweet cards from the hubby, kids & dogs. I also got a box of sham wow's! A whole box of them! (If anyone wants one, please let me know. I have 12) And inside the box was a check to go and get a new car!! YEAH!! My sweet husband rocks. So, now I am off to find the perfect car for our family!!

I was also blessed to have spent the day getting a pedicure with Brooke, got to have sushi with some of my great friends, and had dinner with my favorite boys!! What more could a girl with a hand freckle want??!!??!! (ok...maybe a maid. But we'll start with a car!)

Cam's turn

2009-11-09T17:44:00.000-06:00

Brandon writes me love notes, Camron cracks me up. This is on the hall walking through the halls of Arlon Seay (the place to BE!) A "Who am I " project.

40 for Brooke on Saturday

2009-11-07T13:22:00.004-06:00

My sweet & dear friend Brooke posted a comment about not making my 11 on Thursday post. So, this one is for her.

Frankly, I have had a REALLY hard time trying to come up with something to say about this sweet Brookie lately. She has really left me speechless for the last 6 weeks, so here is an attempt of her greatness.

1. You let me forget that I am 5 1/2 years older than you.

2. You are brilliant. And you don't let my non-brilliant self feel dumb. Well, sometimes you correct me, but that's ok, cause you could do it a lot more than you do.

3. You watch girly movies with me (and watch our husband squirm in the chairs next to us).

4. When I am making you NO sense, you understand me.

5. You can finish my sentences.

6. You are not a hugger, like me.

7. You made me somewhat of a runner. I still don't like it, by the way, but I NEVER would have done it with out you.

8. You call me to go for a walk/run.

9. You listen to me.

10. You help me with ANYTHING I ask you to do.

11. You help me when I don't even ask.

12. You watch my kids. A LOT.

13. You clean my kitchen all the time.

14. You never say I am a bad Mom, when you've seen me do lots of stupid things.

15. You love Jesus so much.

16. You taught me to love Jesus.

17. You are my #1 emergency contact on all the kids' forms. Have I even told you that one? Mental note, if you see that 980-8700 # come across...

18. You always have brilliant ideas when it comes to anything that needs to be done.

19. You are a very eloquent speaker.

20. You helped me get my baby weight off (even though it had been there for 5+ years)

21. You never, ever said that I had baby weight to loose until it was gone.

22. You calm my nerves when I am crazy.

23. Have I mentioned that you are brilliant?

24. You buy me gifts when you don't have to.

25. You call me all the time even though you don't like to talk on the phone.

26. You are one of the best mothers I have ever met.

27. You tried sushi cause I asked you to. (and loved it)

28. You threw me a suprise birthday party.

29. You are a wonderful cook.

30. You make desserts that make me want to put that #20 back on.

31. You lift me up when I am really down.

32. You keep me in check with myself.

33. You don't make fun of me.

34. We wear the same shoe size which is very convienent.

35. You will let me borrow anything, anytime.

36. You were the best pregnant person I've ever been around.

37. You recovered SO fast from the pregnancy!

38. You just turned in your 120+ page dissertation proposal!

39. You've been awarded 2 fellowships!

And last, for now, and the most important one...

40. You gave me the best gift in the WHOLE entire world by letting me be in when you had Eli. No words could ever express my gratitude!!!

11 on Thursday

2009-11-05T19:31:00.003-06:00

11 things today...

1. Camron learned 3 new cords this week in guitar lessons. He's up to 8 cords. Yeah!
2. He played "Happy Birthday" & SANG to Harrison @ his Bday party. He's getting a little less shy!
3. Brandon got 4th place in the hand stand contest @ tumbling class. Yeah!
4. He now has to start practicing hand stand push ups. Ouch.
5. He is also VERY into spelling everything. He walks around all day long spelling everything he wants to say instead of saying it. It's quite cute.
6. The 2 boys & I got flu shots today. Yuck.
7. Cowboy is COMPLETLY healed! Yeah!
8. Blake works late...every night. Yuck.
9. Camron and I are running (and walking) The Loft's Soul2Sole 5k this Saturday!
10. Blake is the MC guy.
11. The chickens are out of control. They are stinky. Mini, the one with the growth, runs really really funny.

Here's Brandon's note for today. Remember, he is still learning to spell.

Translation: Thank you for breaking the family. I climbed out the window. I moved to the Gilberts. Bye. Thank you for reading this note.

My sweet boy. He was mad @ Blake for making him go to his room when he couldn't calm down. What am I gonna do with this kid!?!?

Happy Last Day of October!

2009-11-01T18:40:00.001-06:00

Another year down!

I think next year, we're going to get more creative with the costumes. The whole "going to Target and spending 30 minutes in the Halloween isle finding the perfect costume" thing is getting old. We did creative last year, and I missed it this year. They were still cute though, and they thought their costumes were pretty cool!

Bradie, Logan, Cam & Bran @ Bulverde Baptist Fall Festival. The cool thing about this pic is that we only had to worry about Bradie smiling! The masked kids didn't count!

Jamie, Elli & Cam

My favorite almost-10month old out there!!! (Brother was the cowboy and sister was the indian!)

Bran & Charis

Look @ that sweet face!!!

And NOW ON TO MY FAVORITE 5 Week Old!!!! Man!!! He's a CUTIE!!

We matched in our orange & black outfits. I did not have on velour pants though. Couldn't find any in my size.

Another note from this picture-this is the 9th halloween that I've worn this shirt. Got it when Cam was 11 months old. (side note from the first side note, was reminded of how old this shirt was from Jenny & Jessica's sister's blog-she has a boo shirt that she wears once a year) This shirt too gets worn once a year. And, it too is getting shorter & shorter every year, hince the under shirt. Are shirts shrinking? Am I getting taller? Are pants getting lower? Or is it just not as cool when you are 30 something after having 2 kids to have your belly hang out? Or your butt, for that matter!?

3rd note, Hi Cowboy sticking your head out from behind me! He wanted in the pic too!

Pre-halloween festivities

2009-10-31T14:27:00.003-05:00

Well, it's that time of year again! The annual pumpkin carving...(this year Cam was really into his bald wig, and would not take it off)

Lights on

(Busted kid in background)

Lights off

Then it was time for the school version of dress up. They are to dress like a "book character" to keep it nice & clean.

Captain Underpants and Wolverine away!!

Always gotta put the Brandon/Madison pic in here!

Trip to Roundrock!

2009-10-20T14:35:00.001-05:00

The boys & I decided to make a trip to Roundrock to visit Charlotte, Corey & the kids while Blake spent some good time in worship @ The Men of Light Conference.

This trip was 4 fold.

1. To visit one of my dear friends that I hardly get to see.
2. To watch Lincoln play t-ball!
3. To watch Gwenyth play soccer!
4. To watch Maison play volleyball!

Did I mention that we went to go watch some sporting events?! They all did SOOOO well, and it was really fun to see the Kosse's. We miss having them so close!

Lincoln & I before the game

Tatum

Char & I

Me & my favorite boys!

Lincoln running home!

The proud mama!

Piggy tails & a soccer ball!

One beautiful 9 year old girl!

I still have my french braiding skills!

We had so much fun, and can't wait till the next time we get to see them all!

Why I do what I do...

2009-10-14T19:56:00.002-05:00

Brandon made me this at school. I love this kid! (And Cam too...but he's out of the "writing Mom special notes" stage already.)

you get chickens, you get chicken eggs!

2009-10-11T16:52:00.002-05:00

So I thought to myself one day, I wonder if I can let the chickens roam throughout the backyard? Really, it's OUR training, not the chickens I was worried about. Can we be SO careful not to let the 2 dogs out, so that we can keep getting eggs and not have chicken stew?

So, after a phone call to my friend Rob & Kim, my chicken goo-roos, I decided to let em out of their cage! And man...do they LOVE it! They chicken around all through the backyard & have a blast! (These pics really pick up all the beautiful hill country rock we have in the backyard. It's free, by the way. Just come load & take as much as you want!)

Then, they do this strange dirt bath thing where they waller around in the dirt. It's weird.

And now they're coming up real close to the house! They're getting braver & braver!

Right after we started letting them out, they started laying more! I was so excited one day when I got this!

Then, a couple days later, we were up to this!

Needless to say, we eat a lot of eggs. And egg sandwiches. And omlets. And egg soup. And boiled eggs. Eggs, eggs and more eggs. Blake checked today, and found 11 more! Seriously!

Fun in the Rain & Favorite Shirts

2009-10-09T07:44:00.005-05:00

This blog is about 2 things. Control and Fun.

1. I love control. One of my big control things is picking out my kids clothes. I pick them out. They don't have their own "style" they have "what Mom picks out style". I think this stems from all the pics of me as a child, not wearing the coolest clothes. I don't want that for my kids. So, I pick out their clothes.

2. Fun. I love for my kids to have fun. Especially if they can do it neatly and quietly.

This day was about NEITHER. There was NO control over what they wore, and it was very messy. But, they had a BLAST!!

There's nothing like playing in the rain, in what you picked out to wear. (At the time, it wasn't raining very hard, so we had to add the sprinkler for more fun.)

Camron has on a pink shirt. Go figure. The kid is starting to come out of his shell. He thinks pink on boys makes them real manly and cool.

Bran has picked out green shorts and an itsy-bitsy-teeny-tiny power ranger under-roos top. Classic Brandon.

I just love these kids!! They are SO fun!

Brandon's missing tooth

2009-08-31T21:05:00.001-05:00

Bran's second front tooth came out last night, so he's officially looking for his two-front-teeth! Camo already had his big tooth coming in when his came out, so we never had that tooth-less grin with him. So, I'm pretty excited about Brandon's! It's just so dang cute to see that little grin!! He was SO excited, he was shaking.

One other fun part, is Brandon's friend Madison is also missing her two front teeth. I just don't know if you could get any cuter that these two faces!!

And-we're 2nd week into school & the kids are doing GREAT!!! They are having a blast, and their teacher's are wonderful! Yeah school!

the chickens are a growing!

2009-08-26T16:57:00.005-05:00

The kids are growing...the chickens are growing. Everything's growing. Except for the garden. It's dead. Dead as a door nail. It's a sad corner of the yard now. Oh well. There's always next year.

We got our new little experiment, called a chicken coop, back @ the end of April. It's been fun, and WAY messy & stinky, but fun.

This was the first day @ home - at about 12 weeks old.

Now they should be about 28 weeks, I think.

Now, if it would just cool down and not be 400 degrees, maybe they'd start laying me some eggs!

First day of school 2009!!

2009-08-25T08:13:00.003-05:00

Well, exactly 1 year ago, this same post started the Taylor family into the the fun world of blogging. It's really hard to believe it's been a year!! Time flies!!

We started off our morning @ the ripe 'ol time of 6:22am. (I have this WIERD thing about time. Everything is always on wierd times. It's been following me for a long time. Sorry.) The kids woke up really excited and ready to go!!

So, our annual 7:10am picture taking in the front yard (prob more like 7:11 or 7:12)-

Then on to school! Cam had some butterflies in his stomach on the way there, but we decided to throw them out the window. Didn't need them @ school.

Brandon wasn't nervous at all.

Then it was off to the gym for both of them to wait for their teachers.

Gym means you're big now. No more library for Bran.

Quick recap of the last 5 first days of school. (I didn't take one for 2004. I was such a rookie back then.)

I just can't BELIEVE that we have been in the same house for 5 years now!!!! We have been able to have 6 first days of school here, and that just blows my mind away. I just LOVE that!

It's flippin hot

2009-08-14T15:30:00.004-05:00

...And my kids know it. They mainly know it from hearing me complain like crazy!! They're so used to hearing me complain that it's hot, that it's now becoming their language. I say, "Cam, go run this over to Gary's" (it's right across the street), he says "MOOOMMMM, it's too hot!" I say, "Go outside & play!!" They say, "MMMMOOOOOOOOMMMMMM, it's too hot! It's like 175 degrees!" I have NO idea where they get this stuff from. :)

So, it's hot. And people are running out of water. I did not comply to our non-water restrictions last week. It was too hot to jump on the trampoline, so we turned the sprinkler on. Who knew the kids would have so much fun!!

Baseball time!

2009-08-10T20:03:00.004-05:00

The boys did a couple games in Corpus, so we decided to finish up our week with a game in San Antonio with the Missions as Mary's last time hanging with the boys before she moves to Kingsville to start school up again & get her Pharmacy degree. Besides being VERY, VERY hot & us loosing the very LONG game, we had a blast.

Bran & Mary

Nothing better than being with your boys @ a baseball game!

6 days and 15 pictures

2009-08-04T21:11:00.004-05:00

My boys went to camp last week! Well, "Taylor style" camp. They went to Camp Grammy & Bubba's down in Rockport, and had a BLAST!! They went kayaking, went fishing on the boat, went to 2 Corpus Christi Hooks games, went to the museum, to Cole park, on the Lexington for 5 hours, and more that I am not remembering I am sure. All that,in 6 days. After all of that, we ended up with 15 pictures of their fun. 15 pictures. I take 15 pictures in 15 minutes. But, 15 pictures is what made it home. Sometimes I wish there was more to document their time, (cause this is not the first time pics haven't been taken), but this is their time together, not mine.
Here's a couple of pictures...

Bubba & Bran

Bubba & Cam

Bubba loves to fish!

The Lexington

Hope this is the ONLY time they are behind bars!!

arrrrggggg....

Well peeps, that's it. I say 15 pictures, but not necessarily 15 good pics. :)
Mom, THE BOYS HAD A BALL, and are still talking about it. Also, they are requesting all kinds of GOOD food. Thanks for that. :)

There's no way I can ever thank you enough for having fun with them Mom!!

Bran lost a tooth!

2009-07-22T21:57:00.002-05:00

Brandon finally yanked it out, and MAN was he excited!!! He even figured out that he can't say "tooth" very well any more. My baby's growing up!!! His new 1-tooth-less grin is pretty darn cute.

pool time!

2009-07-21T21:39:00.000-05:00

This was I think the first time we've been to the pool all summer & no one else was there!! The only thing I can think is that the Mom's are too tired from working @ Red Roof's wonderful VBS that's going on this week! Thanks to everyone who is serving! My kids are having a BLAST!! But, back to the pool, we got to share our time with the Kings. The kids had a ball. And thanks Jamie for pretty much letting me hold Elli the whole time. Gotta have my Elli time.

Camo

goggle pictures always crack me up

Sweet Elli enjoying the pool

Charis & Cam

Grady & Bran, who would not pose for a pic

Elli loved it!!

and here's Elli after a big 'ol bottle. Belly hanging out & all! (her, not me) hee!

15 years came and went

2009-07-20T20:52:00.004-05:00

There's times I feel old. There are times I feel young. This weekend was full of both.

For example, I feel young when I see the old women that always seem to be @ HEB in Spring Branch right around noon. Old ladies & other really weird looking people. If you don't believe me, go hang out in the pharmacy right around noon. Not nearly as fun in the summer as it is in the school year though. So wait till about September. It wouldn't be nearly as fun with your little kids hanging on you anyway. Wait till they're in school or MDO.

Before this weekend, thinking about my reunion, I felt old. Seriously? Has it really been 15 years since I graduated high school? It feels like I just graduated. Then I think...hmmm...married almost 11 years with 2 kids. I did not just graduate. It has felt like 15 years. 15 good years!

Then I changed my mindset about it. I was feeling pretty ok with it all heading down to Corpus. Had on a new dress courtesy of my friend Brookie, had a great dinner w/my wonderful husband, got to talk to some old people @ the restaurant (really old-the guy had on suspenders. a classic.), and then headed to a bar for the reunion. That's when the old feeling started. I am too old to hang out at a bar. Even if it's a planned thing with a bunch of people my age. The music didn't even start till 9pm. I am normally washing my face headed for bed @ 9pm. Then, the kicker. At the bar, saw a table behind me. Bunch of "kids". Two of the girls had braces. Seriously. And not like people my age trying to correct their teeth from when they never wore their retainer when they were in high school, the kind of people who are really young, who have their braces on for the first time. I am old. Am I? Is 30something old? Hope not.

The reunion turned out really fun. We didn't have that very big of a high school class, 170ish, but 12 people showed up. 12 fun people though. We talked, reminisced a bit and talked about our how our families are growing up. After a good night, the 20 year already started getting lined out. Fun times still to come!

Class of 1994, in 2009

Tracy & I lived right across the street from each other growing up.

Rhonda & I

Gotta love self portraits!

Brandon LOVES power rangers

2009-07-19T20:21:00.003-05:00

The 6 year old. I figured after like age 3 or 4, he'd grow out of that stage, but he still loves power rangers. Love-loves them. He got them ALL out the other day, lined them up by color, and surrounded himself in them. He counted 105 including the random yellow-power ranger head (with no body) that we found. Just silly.

forever and a post

2009-07-10T18:29:00.004-05:00

OK, I am WAY behind. For the 2 people that read this, I am sorry. So, I am playing catch-up. There are a couple posts below that I have been trying to catch up on. So, if you want, scroll down to the other posts.

For the boys' friends birthdays, we normally give a gift card & I have the boys do a card together. Well, Bran things he's big kid now, and had to make his own for Jake. I just loved his 6 year old spellings. Brandon's in green.

4th of July FUN! Thanks so much Raenette & Lance for inviting us to the Kendall County Firework show! It was super fun!!

Sitting on the side of HWY 46 waiting patiently for fireworks.

Zane...what a cutie!

Zane, Lance & Lawton. Rae, not sure where you were?

The Taylors
the boys

1 firework. Proof we were there. :)

Ok, so my garden stinks. Brooke's, rocks. Mine stinks. Tomatoes? Not so much. Brooke's, mucho. In my mind, not fair. In her's it's ok cause she feeds me her squash & tomatoes. Thanks friend, but still wish I had my own. Makes me feel less of a gardener. But, oh well. I's 4000 degrees outside, and the garden is going kapoot. But, we have peppers! That's about it.

The Taylors and Sushi Night

2009-07-10T18:13:00.002-05:00

Well, we did it. Our first family attempt at Sushi Zushi, the only sushi I eat. It's expensive, but yum!!!!!

Brandon wasn't so hip on the idea of sushi, so after one of his new car-colepsy attacks, we ran through McD's for him. (I had asked last time I was there with Brooke if that was ok for a kid for bring in his own food).

Brandon, chopsticks, and fries

Camron hearts the cajun roll (and tried the Tuna tower!)

Blake with food in his mouth and Brandon's burger. Funny.

Me & Camo

Cam and Bran played drums with the chopsticks the WHOLE time we were there. Not so fun.

What a great Father's Day!

2009-07-09T22:21:00.000-05:00

We started Father's Day with the boys sleeping in and Blake heading off to set up the parking lot @ church. such a good servant! The boys could hardly WAIT till he got home to open presents. Blake loves Astros. (New hat behind the glasses)

Right after gifts, we packed up the car, hooked up the pop up, and headed all the way to New Braunfels for our first camping trip. Didn't take too many pictures. Bad blogger. We did have a ball with our friends the Woodall's, the Harris' and the Wagers', all from Houston. Thanks guys!!!

The Taylor's set up @ Camp Huaco Springs.

Bike anyone?

Brandon & Wyatt

The Woodall's set up. Much nicer than the Taylor's pad.

Little relaxing by the river. HOT.

Dinner

The kiddos

random pics

2009-07-08T21:20:00.010-05:00

oh...when I grow up I want to be a good blogger. One day I will keep up with the family pics online. One day.

Until then, I will try my best. In keeping up with that, here are some random pics somewhere in the May-ish category.

Check out these cute red cheeks!

Baseball ready!

Brandon catcher

Camron and Gavyn

Cam, Gav, Brandon, and Payge

Backyard swing baseball, with buckets of course

Jessica-this is for you. I was trying for for the "artsy" look like you always get on Ryan. Yeah, safe to say it DID NOT work.

Even Cowboy (and Lucy, not pictured) got to ride along and play in Houston.

goofy Garrett

Little game action on Splash Day

Aaron, Cam and Logan

Brandon getting ready for the big slide

More of Brandon and Madison

Brandon on end-of-school party

Camron and Aaron

More Brandon and Madison

Camron and the best Second Grade Teacher Ever!! Love you Cindy!!

Brandon and the best Kinder Teacher Ever!! Love you Mary!!!

Last of the vacation pics

2009-06-30T19:58:00.002-05:00

Random pics to follow up our awesome Lake vacation!

Sweet Henry!! Can you believe that face??

Brandon in a bad mood...

Camron, his sombero, and some ladder golf

How funny is this?

Blake and his tube

Camo...

Henry taking a little nap

Fun in the tube!

Brandon the boat driver...

boys with tans.

Brandon being serious....

Little Slip in Slide action!!

The end!!!

Blake goes to work, comes home with 2 chickens

2009-06-19T18:30:00.006-05:00

I started this post for a couple days as an update, for 2 reasons. One, I was going to show the fruits of my labor. No, not my garden pics, like my friend Brooke and Steph have done, (my garden story is more like my friend Pam-Pam, I feel your pain sister!!!) but some egg pictures. fun, huh?

I FINALLY broke down and started eating the chicken eggs. I admit, I was a little intimidated at first. I mean come on, our chickens are named for goodness sakes. Do I really want to eat something that came out of our named pet's butt? Well, after 2 omelets and some boiled eggs later, YES. They are YUMMY! Very yummy. So thank you Abbey, for the yummy goodness.

Second thing I was gonna point out on the blog was my new gift from my Mother-in-Law. She saw this, thought of me, and hit the enter button on the computer to get it for me. Totally appropriate for the back door now. And funny.

So, then comes the 3rd part of the blog, the title of the post. I had a root canal this morning, fun and only half way done with that, and Blake emailed me and said don't worry about dinner-I'll take care of that. So, 5 hours later when he says he's picked up 2 chickens I think, cool-dinner. No, not the cooked-chicken-eat-for-dinner kind of chickens, the open the chicken coop honey, we have 2 more chicken kind. So, we started with 3, got 2 more, 1 died, and now have 2 more. We're busy chicken people.

Here are the new ones, Minni and Pearl.

Mean ol' Abbey who started pecking at them. She's mean, but she lays a yummy egg!

Here's our chicken family. Well, their butts.

last of the vacation pics to follow

2009-06-19T17:52:00.000-05:00

I have been a little blogging lazy. The rest of the vacation pictures will follow soon!

Day 4

2009-06-11T08:17:00.005-05:00

We are well on our way to really enjoying the lake life. And, there are quite some wality lake people around too! All more fun to enjoy. We had a slow, easy and realxing day today, and the hot tub is finally up to 100! That only took 3 full days to heat up. We had a day of board games, outside game of peg baseball, a nice dinner out @ Red's Oyster Bar, followed up with a night game-off with the kids on rock band. BTW-I am much more of a rocker than I thought. Proof below.

Several rounds of Disney Scene It

Then on to a long game of baseball. Flowers 1st base, glove 2nd base, baseball bag 3rd base & life jacket home.

Oh look, mom with no makeup got in one picture.

Ready for our dinner night out on the town.

The 4 boys

Waiting on dinner

WOAH! Mom got a 100 on vocals!!

boys rocking out.

Bran loves to sing, just like his mom.

The kids love them some Eye on the Tiger! Bran followed his mom with his 100 and Cam on guitar with a 97!

Day 3

2009-06-10T12:00:00.004-05:00

Day 3 came and went pretty fast. We rented a pontoon boat for 4 hours, which was the biggest part of the day. Having fun! And all 4 boys caught a fish @ night, thank goodness. So after super fun boat day, some homemade pizzas and several rounds of picture phone (it's funner than it sounds), we called it a day! (Super mega fun all day boat day will follow on Friday.)

Big shout out to our friends @ home who are helping us take care of the dogs, the chickens, and the garden. We love & miss you!!

Day 2

2009-06-09T09:53:00.007-05:00

We were up and at 'em early in the morning on Day 2 @ the lake. Which also means day 2 of trying to get the hot tub heated up too. It's been 2 days and has gone from 85 to 91 by the mid-day mark, then back down to 88 @ night. We obviously do not know how to work hot tubs. The kids have had some fun on tubes, slides, hanging out in the before mentioned luke warm hot tub, making up games, and overall being very good! Here's some pics!

Bran, Alex & Avery

Here's proof that Bran & Avery are getting along this year! They are sitting together and smiling!

Camron chilaxin (That's for you Raenette)

We got the setup!!

We made our own water trampoline.

Didn't do the beach, and we still found sand @ the lake!

Little ladder golf

The slide into the lake. Super fun.

More chilaxin.
Blake & Brandon doing some night fishing.

Camron & Alex

The Griswolds-Day 1

2009-06-08T07:32:00.009-05:00

The Griswolds, I'm sorry, the Taylors are on VACATION! We're pretty pumped, and Blake had to get us all packed up. Once we made the decision to take the trailer, it all went from there. We brought everything. The boys were SO exited, they "are we there yet"ed every 15 minutes. Well Brandon did. Camron always followed up with some sort of smart alec comment about telling time.

Here's some pics to start us off...

The very full trailer

back full too. Seriously, we need to learn how to pack.

The boys, ready to go, sporting their new do's

Quick visit with the Kosse's in Round Rock on our way out! Thanks Char!

The kids

The grown ups

The girls

Quick shout out to Brooke for her Birthday today! You're getting old! There's proof on HWY 35.

Gotta have the rock band action. Blake on vocals.

Camron on guitar

Brandon on drums. Rocking out.

This is the plan for day 2. After the girls go on the monster shopping trip!

Just picture me, in the recliner, spending way too long blogging.

meet our new Friend, Anna Faith!

2009-05-01T17:00:00.004-05:00

Wow! I love new baby posts! I haven't done one in a while, but the babies are here and are still coming! Last week we went to my friend Courtney's to see her new little bundle, Anna Faith. I was really hoping to get a sneak peak of my Matty Bug, but he was down for a nap, which is a precious commodity, so we didn't wake him up. So, Brooke, Raenette, Court & I all got to spend some girl time with each other & see the new sweet thing!! She is precious. So proud of you Court!

Brooke & Anna (she looks like a pro)

Look at this sweet face! And she already has a tan! Court has great skin too.

For some reason, I didn't get a pic with Raenette & Anna (so sorry Rae!!), but here's me! I love the babies!

Welcome to the world sweet Anna. You have an amazing Mom, Dad & Big Brother that are so excited that you are here!

meet our new chicks

2009-05-01T15:34:00.006-05:00

I don't even know how to start this one. The Taylors have chickens. Last week, we had a back yard, mostly full of rocks. It did have a very nice back porch that our friends help us build, and a growing garden that our friends helped us build, and a cool fort, that our friends helped us build. Wow. We have some really cool friends.

Then last Saturday, Blake helped our neighbor move his chicken coop from his yard, to our yard. I've been wanting chickens, and the dream was finally coming true. I am excited to get some eggs, and secretly want to be like my menagerie friends down the street. So Sunday, after Church, we went to Blanco to get some chickens. (Thanks to craiglist) So after a couple of hours, a trip to Tractor Supply and lots of hand washing (I'll maybe tell you the story of the chicken people a different time), we had 3 chickens. 1 full grown laying hen and 2-12 week old chicks. Then today, Blake came home with 2 more. Not too sure what they are. The 2 chicks we first got are females, which we want, and we'll just have to wait and see what these 2 others turn out to be. Hopefully they're females too! I don't want roosters. No way Jose.

So, meet the new additions--

The moving of the coop-Thanks Scott!

hmmmm...something we didn't quite think through. The bird dogs, LOVING the birds. Oops. They're doing much better now. (Look @ all the sweet rocks. Aren't they cute?)

My sweet, hard-working husband putting up the second perching limb cause I wasn't sure if they could jump all the way up.

Here's Abbey. (Camron named her) She'll lay blue eggs.

Was hoping for the golden egg, but blue will do.

Here's Diddy Kong & Dixie Kong. (Brandon named Diddy, and renamed Dixie chick to Dixie Kong. Come on Mom.)

Here's one of the nubie's - Jiggly Puff (she/he has a pom pom on the top of it's head)

and here's the other new one - that we're calling turkey. Mainly because we're not fo' sho that it's not a turkey. So, time will tell. But it got a name of turkey because of it.
Blake was taking Brandon out to help put in the two new chicks, and we found our first egg! Way to go Abbey!

See, regular store egg on bottom, Abbey blue(ish) egg on top.

Dixie & Diddy are pretty darn cute together. When they grow up, don't think they'll be as cute. Chickens are pretty ugly. But, they're cute now. They're always together.

Sea World with Mrs. Blevins' class

2009-04-26T16:33:00.001-05:00

There could be some alternate titles for this post: The Mother of all Field Trips; Mom vs. 20 kindergartners; Tomato Arms-Don't look now, but Mom sun screened the kids and forgot herself; and last but not least-Brandon and Madison are just too darn cute! You'll see the proof below.

Sea World with 3 classes of kindergartners=what I call the Mother of all Field Trips. Don't get me wrong, I would never trade my time in with my kids for the WORLD, but this Sea World trip is a LOT of kids. Our school was there, plus our neighboring school Bill Brown, and about 4 hundred others. I was only responsible for 2, thank goodness. I was given 2 children once they got off the bus at 9:45am and gave 2 back to the bus @ 1:30pm. My job was done. And, we had tons of FUN in those 3 hrs 45 minutes, which seemed like 8 hours and 45 minutes on kinder time. Here's a couple of highlight pictures from the trip.

First we all lined up, got maps, and the kids couldn't wait to find the first thing on the map-the fountain. That lasted about 22 seconds.

The two I was responsible for. One lives in my house. And is very cute.

Then they try and get ya! $4 for a tray of fish to feed these guys!

First time anyone in the Taylor family has ever been able to touch one! He was just hanging out letting all the kids pet him. (Notice my arm...praying that he didn't fall in!)

"Mom, what?"

So, what do you do when your mom says no way to paying the 4 bucks for fish? You let your sweet friend Madison give you all of hers cause fish are yucky.

Proof # 1. Too cute. Buddies. They were very upset that both of their parents were going and that they couldn't be in the same group. So, Madison's mom & I stuck together. She's tons of fun anyway. :)

The group

Proof #2

and finally, proof # 3. My favorite. Friends.

Gotta stick my head in, proof I was there. (Madison's twin brother, Brandon, is beside her. Don't even get me started on how we keep the Brandon's straight.)

Brandon # 1 and Brandon # 2.

2 of the teachers with Madison, Brandon & Brandon

Me & my baby!!

Proof # 4.

Proof # 5. With their (really cool) teacher on way back to bus.

BIG shout out to teachers, especially the ones @ Arlon Seay. You rock. I don't know how teachers have the energy, all the time for these energetic kids! It is a huge blessing to have you guys help us raise our children. You have no idea how much I am grateful to your time, heart & patience!!

Easter 2009

2009-04-23T09:24:00.000-05:00

baseball fun

2009-04-22T09:08:00.001-05:00

(Click to see larger)

10 on Monday

2009-04-20T21:49:00.002-05:00

OK, so I really don't know what that means, "10 on Monday" but I've seen other bloggers do it, so figured I'd do it too. But here's 10 random things for today.

1. I heart blogs. I love to every now and then go to a friend's blog, and click on one of their friends. Then click on a friend of theirs. And just keep clicking. You can find some pretty interesting stuff that way, let me tell you.

2. My sweet friend Brooke is 12 weeks pregnant already. It's already going so fast!

3. My dear friend Jamie just posted a muffin top picture of me on facebook. I politely sent her an email through facebook. I couldn't comment on something like that for the whole world to see. So, I'm blogging it instead. (If you don't know what a muffin top is, it's ok. I only found out about 2 months ago-from my Dad.) (And don't go check it out. It's embarrassing.) Not that anyone really reads my blog anyway. HA! Silly me. :)

4. Blake had my computer out yesterday and the dog stepped on the keyboard. The 4 key no-workie right. Then, as I figured out tonight, the 7 key no-workie right either. Or the 3 key. Damn dog. (I was not very nice to him about it either.)

5. In no sort of revenge, I accidentally washed Blake's blackberry. It's very clean and smells good, but the verdict on if it'll still work or not is still out. (He was, however, pretty darn nice to me about it! Sorry Blake!)

6. I have been blogging for about an hour and my phone had buzz...buzz'd about 25 times. Which means I have 25 new emails. Seriously? From 9-10pm? 25 emails?

7. My 4 key is sticking up and looking at me in this kind of "hi there, what ya doing?" kind of way right now.

8. Blake taught the boys to play 21 tonight. Monday nights is poker night with the boys. Which normally lasts for about 15 minutes with Brandon's attention span. I watered my dying plants while they were learning about gambling.

9. I love sitting down with my family at the table and eating dinner together.

10. Cowboy's had this sore spot on his foot ever since he came home from his surgery back in November. It sometimes acts like it's gonna get better, then he'll start licking it again. After a couple of trips to the vet including a shot this past Saturday, the vet suggested rubbing on Arrid Xtra Dry roll-on deodorant to get him to stop licking it. He hasn't licked it since! Who knew! It worked! Well, it has worked for 3 days. We'll see how long it lasts.

Off to bed for now! OH....here' a sweet picture of my boys! Aren't they handsome?!

The Secret Lives of Moms

2009-04-08T07:58:00.002-05:00

There's a new show that I am excited about...In the Motherhood. For those of us who are Mom's, it's no wonder that they finally made a show about how FUNNY being a mom is, and that everyone is in the same boat-even though nobody knows it. I never watch Oprah, but I did yesterday, and she had a panel of ladies on there which gave the idea for the new show. The Oprah show was hilarious and just reminded me that #1, Moms are FUNNY, and #2, we are not in this alone.

It did remind me of this video though. I got to see Anita Renfroe @ Women of Faith last year, and she did this piece. This is someone else doing it, but still great. I don't care how many times I've heard it, it's still funny.

Here's one of my favorite tid-bits from the show...

Dee-Dee is currently a stay-at-home mom, but she was a working mother once too. "The competition is there because we create it for ourselves," she says. "There's really no reason to compete, because [stay-at-home moms] are just as busy as the working mom. The working mom is just as busy as we are. We just tend to sometimes put the focus on the wrong things. We're all busy 24/7. I consider myself an at-home working mother." Amy says these wars arise out of our own uncertainties as mothers. "We're insecure about the choices we're making—that's why we're judging each other," she says. "We need to give ourselves a collective break." Try Amy and Trisha's judgment exercise. "Have compassion for each other," Trisha says. "Realize we all have issues, and we're all doing the best we can."

OH yeah, one lady on the show started a blog when she was pregnant with her first baby. She just was REAL about the pregnancy & about becoming a mom. Her husband has quit his job, and they both full time run this blog. Why you ask? Cause she gets $40k a MONTH in advertising $ for her blog. WHAT? Seriously. I think I am almost there. Anyone want some advertising on mine?

Brandon's class made the paper!

2009-04-06T20:38:00.005-05:00

From THE BULVERDE NEWSPAPER---

Teachers Wendy Clark, Rachel Kaspar and Mary Blevins, and their students are all smiles as the Comal Education Foundation awards a $4,206 grant: Outdoor Classroom: Green for the Greenhouse.

Way to go Teachers!! So proud, and you'll have SO MUCH fun building your greenhouse!

I showed this to Brandon, and he said, "Yeah Mom, I know. I told the kids 'Let ME in!' so I could get in the picture!" Front and center. Don't know where he gets that from...hmmmm...

Spring is here...and I LOVE IT!

2009-03-29T20:36:00.004-05:00

Spring...the time to get back outside! I LOVE the Spring. (Well, spring and fall. Not too cold, not too hot.) Here's some Taylor spring activities...

BASEBALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Here's Brandon

Camron

There WILL be plenty of baseball pics in the next couple of months. I had concession duty on the first game.

Smores @ the fire pit with the neighbors! (& Ben's Pop)

Ben's mom Terry & her friend

My sweet dear friend Brooke & Blake (Brooke waiting patiently for her 2nd smore)

Me & boys and Brandon's marshmallow

Spring Break @ the Kelly's lakehouse

Kids on the boat

THE GARDEN!!!

I love gardening. I am not really that good at it, but MAN...do I love it! Just planted last week and I can't wait till they start blooming.

My stab at the "insta garden", my huge Celebrity. (It has 3 blooms already! yeah!)

I sacrificed my strawberries this year to Blake's new pepper stash. He has 11 planted, if we can keep the bugs away! They've already had a snack of habeneros.

Just a big prayer for rain to keep the thing going!!

And then there's the BABIES! We have Court, Rachel, Cathi, Anne Lynette, Wendy, BROOKE and I am sure more that I've missed! They are a coming! Get your stock in some huggies.

Happy Spring!

kids answers about me

2009-03-22T15:39:00.000-05:00

I originally did this for facebook, but am now posting this here thanks to the idea from Jenny's sister Stacy, who just has the cutest family! So here it is...from Camron (8) & Brandon (6).

1. What is something mom always says to you?
C-I love you
B-I love you

2. What makes mom happy?
C-us being good
B-us being happy (now seperating boys so they don't say the same thing)

3. What makes mom sad?
C-us diobeying you
B-when I don't obey you

4. How does your mom make you laugh?
C-making funny faces & doing funny stuff
B-tickling you

5. What was your mom like as a child?
C-nice
B-didn't have a big nose, haven't lost any teeth, no earings, had a pony tail, and wasn't wearing that shirt, and skin was lighter

6. How old is your mom?
C-32
B-32

7. How tall is your mom?
C-5'8"
B-32 inches

8. What is her favorite thing to do?
C-watch us
B-kiss & hug me

9. What does your mom do when you're not around?
C-work and mom stuff
B-sleep

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
C-being the greatest mom in the world
B-clarinet player

11. What is your mom really good at?
C-doing laundry, cleaning dishes, cleaning, and work
B-working

12. What is your mom not very good at?
C-beating me in races
B-catching things that are too high

13. What does your mom do for a job?
C-work for our Church
B-make copies, run errands

14. What is your mom's favorite food?
C-oatmeal
B-cereal

15. What makes you proud of your mom?
C-all the stuff you do for me
B-that she's pretty

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
C-Sandy
B-Cinderella

17. What do you and your mom do together?
C-a whole bunch of stuff
B-eat ice cream

18. How are you and your mom the same?
C-from the same family
B-we're not the same! oh, that are skin is the same

19. How are you and your mom different?
C-you're a girl and I'm a boy
B-because you have blue eyes and I don't

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
C-you do a whole bunch of stuff for me
B-because you kiss me & hug me

21. What does your mom like most about your dad?
C-he loves you
B-he's handsome

22. Where is your mom's favorite place to go?
C-gringos
B-gringos

Upward Fun

2009-03-21T15:22:00.001-05:00

Here's a little video from the kids' Upward Award Ceremony, with a twist.

Field Trip

2009-03-20T12:13:00.002-05:00

I was lucky to have been picked to chaparone Cam's 2nd grade field trip to KSAT12 this week. It was really a cool field trip to go on, I just hope the kids ahd as much fun as the grown ups! We took a tour of the whole studio & set, saw how everything works, got to sit through the whole Noon Broadcast, and got to do a "Good Morning San Antonio" hello and wave that aired that next morning on the news! All 60+ kids sat VERY quietly through the hour long live broadcast, which blew my mind!

The kids on the set.

Here's the shot as if it were on TV.

The whole class. Such sweet & energetic kids!

The KSAT12 morning crew on the job

The 2nd grade teachers with the crew. Such HUGE hearts for kids these great women have!

Happy Birthday Wendy & Steve

2009-03-10T11:31:00.001-05:00

The Taylor travelers were out again and off to Kingsville. So after Cam's basketball game, we drove down to spend our quick 24 hours there. We went to celebrate Dad & Wendy's birthday. We haden't all hung out all together in a really long time. The pictures really didn't do any justice to the amount of FUN & the number of laughs we had that weekend. But, here's the whole family trying to pose for the camera on the coffee table with the timer. Always such good shots.

Happy birthday Wendy & Steve!!! So glad that we got to spend it with you!

life with Brandon

2009-02-25T12:02:00.000-06:00

Sweet Brandon is my specialist. You never know what you're gonna get. He's different every day. Sometimes he can wake up in the morning in just the worst mood. He won't talk to you, he won't get dressed, he won't eat, nothing. Then there's others, where he can tip toe quietly into our room in the morning, wake you with a kiss, and ask, "Mom, how was your sleep? Mine was great!" His eating habits also sometime boggle me. There's times where he won't eat at all. Then there was a week of this...

He would come in every morning asking for 2 full bowls of cereal, and would eat it all! Most of the time we would get refills! Guess he was growing that week, cause now we're back on to the no-eating stage. At least for meals. The kid can eat you out of house with his snacks. One day, I'll figure this out!

seriously, my blogging friends...

2009-02-22T16:30:00.004-06:00

Ok. So it seams that facebook has taken over the "I don't have anything to do right now, so I'll blog" time, or the "I have SO much to do right now, but I'm still going to blog" time. So, I am challenging each of you. Get off facebook for a couple of minutes and BLOG. That's right. Most of you were the people who convinced ME TO START blogging. There. Said my peace.

To start, you're being tagged. (For you facebookers, it's like being tagged in a note.)

Rules...
1) Link to the person who tagged you-
2) Post the Rules
3) Write 6 random things about myself
4) Tag 6-ish people
5) Let each person know they were tagged
6) Let the tagger know when you've posted

Randomness....

1.I love babies. I think all of my friends should keep, and start, having many of them. That way I can live thru you guys.

2. I never thought I could "mother" TWO BOYS, and now I wouldn't change those two for the WORLD!

3. I was the drum major in my High School Band.

4. I was quite the dork in high school . How you ask? See # 3.

5. A couple of days ago, Brandon lost his new mp3 player that he had just got for his birthday. After I so politely yelled at him for being irresponsible, I found it, right where I had put it about 2 hours earlier that day. I then had to apologize to my 6 year old. Then that night, he came into my room and said "Mom, I love you so much for getting me this ipod and letting me listen too it all the time. I promise I won't loose it again." I can be a bad mom.

6. I love season-all. Sprinkled on everything. LOVE IT!

Tagged--Jamie, Jenny, Brooke, Raenette and Courtney. Come on there friends!! (Brooke, you have been pretty good @ your blog, so not so much for you, but still fun!)

Brandon's Birthday 2 weeks

2009-02-14T20:04:00.002-06:00

My baby turned 6! I still can't believe it! We started off his birthday week with the flu...so he wasn't that happy for his "Birthday Breakfast".

Him thinking "Mom, I don't feel GOOD!" ( How cute is that face? )

Me, "Brandon please?" Brandon, "Fine, cheese."

Nothing would cheer him up. No whipped cream, no strawberries, no extra syrup. Nothing.

Then came Aunt Toni's Birthday card! That cheered him up REAL quick! Thanks Aunt Toni!

Since Bran was sick on his bday, we celebrated birthday @ school a day late.

Brandon with his WONDERFUL teacher! With his birthday cupcakes.

Birthday @ Mamaw & Papaw's. THANKS for the cake!
Brandon, giving himself bunny ears, excited about his new power rangers!

Then came the birthday party. We headed down to Beefy's, Brandon and his closest 21 friends!wow. I am still recovering. Brandon had a blast, and my mind only slipped once that week, when I scheduled Bran's party @ the same time as Camron's basketball game. I told Cam, and Brandon said, "Camron, it's ok. You can just be late to my party." Brothers.

Brandon, of course, wanted the SAME party as Camron. Would you expect anything different? Except we had Wario & Luigi instead of Mario & Luigi. Made it completely different.

Thank you to everyone who came, and especially to Mom, Dad, Wendy, Maddy, Thomas, Mary, Big Brandon who came to brave the wind and celebrate with their grandson/nephew/cousin. Toni...you were there in our hearts! We missed you!!

The return of the Mario cake. A little different, but a big hit!

"Happy Birthday to You!!"

Kids, kids & more kids.

Big Brandon, Aunt Mary & Bubba barely standing the amount of FUN!

Mom & Dad joining in on the fun. (I mean Luigi & Princess Peach)

The after party. A little wii...

And some trampoline! I think Bubba liked it.

SOOOOO glad that we have 9 more months till any more birthdays!!!

DATE NIGHT!!

2009-01-31T20:57:00.000-06:00

Blake and I got to go on a DATE!! I know. For real. A date. Just the two of us. No chillren. It had been a little over 4 months, but SO worth it!! AND-it was FREE! Even better. AND...Aunt Mary came over to play & hang with the kids so we could go! Thanks MAR!

Blake got ticket's to the "Huntsman's Ball", a charity dinner & auction benefiting the Comal chapter of the American Cancer Society. Black tie optional. Soooo...where do people from Spring Branch get clothes to attend a black-tie optional event?? From their sweet neighbors, of course. Thanks to Chris & Brooke for the sweet outfits, and to Jenny for my BLING!

The theme for the event for the night was "Venetian Masquerade". We had pre-dinner drinks, a great dinner, open bar, got to see a lot of people with LOTS of money get some really cool things @ the auction, watched & listened to Dysfunkshun Junkshun who were SO much fun, and had a GREAT time being with each other, and pretending to be high society.

We got free shirts, hats & wine too! Nice!

Love you honey, and thanks for the fun!

Blake with the fancy decor. We were impressed! You can't see the opera singers randomly walking around the ballroom singing. They didn't ask me to sing this time, maybe next.

"hmmm, excuse me, I don't know you, but can you please take our picture?"

"oh, I am sorry, one more with our masks on, please"

This one's my FAVORITE! Same self-portrait for the last 12 years!

Snow day

2009-01-30T21:13:00.000-06:00

The kids school held a snow day for the kids this week awarding them for hitting their reading goal. One of the only chances we'll get this kind of stuff in TEXAS! This was also the 100th day of school wrap up! One LONG day!

By the time Brandon's class got to go, the camera battery had died, I had roped up the inner tubes about 1000000 times and practically had a thrown out shoulder, and the "snow" was almost all melted. It warmed up REAL fast!

Camron going down...

Too cool for school.
(This was right before he binged me with a snowball in the back.)

The teachers had a little fun too!

Cam & Logan

100 days of school

2009-01-30T20:46:00.001-06:00

Most things in kindergarten are a big deal. This week was the 100th day of school! They had a HUGE day of celebrations. So fun building up to this day for these little 5/6 year olds. Their faces this morning we jsut priceless!!

Walking out to let go of 100 balloons!

Thank goodness they blew up extras. About 20 of the kids let go, Bran being one of them. Ooops.

After the let-go! I wish I would have got a picture of all 3 classes. ALL of them had this same look. SO cute!

They put notes with the School's address, to see where these balloons pop. The kids just know that they are going to get some letters from China.

"MOMMM...THE SUN'S IN MY EYES!!"

Just LOVE this kid! I do!

my baby lost his first tooth!!

2009-01-26T21:28:00.005-06:00

yes he did!

He was quite scared to pull that thing out, and it took several days, but he did it!

He walked out the next morning, with his note from the tooth fairy and his "dollars" and said "look mom...it worked! My tooth falling out worked!" as he shook his bill and note.

Big day!!

Brandon's New Year's Resolution

2009-01-24T12:30:00.002-06:00

Here's Brandon's New Year's resolution...(click on it to enlarge)

(Sometimes blogging is easy, other times it is NOT. I have been trying to post this for 2 days, and it just wouldn't work.)

Last for today, more on my specialist (aka Brandon). (If you need to know more on the "specialist story", you gotta ask.) They have each class' work posted in the hallway next to their class. I am always bad at checking that for both of my kids, but I did check this afternoon.

MAN...this kid CRACKS me UP!!! This was one of mine!

proud mama....

2009-01-23T19:18:00.015-06:00

OK...so I used to not like the Mom's who were"my kid is the smartest in the world" this, and "oh, my kid just got passed to the 8th grade from 2nd" that, but I am one of those proud mama's. My kids do things to amaze me daily, along with those astonishing "what in the world were you thinking" moments, which most of the times out number the amazing ones. But today, my kids did good.

Star awards were today. 1st 9-weeks star awards are down on this post.

Camron received 2 stars, along with the character award, AND the Principal's award. He was SO proud, and that's what just made me grin from ear to ear.
This kid pushes and pushes himself. Seems to be on his own...hopefully.

Brandon also received 2 stars, which is a BIG deal in kindergarten! And most important of the stars was his star for PREMIER behavior. Which if you know Brandon, him getting something GOOD on the behavior side, is HUGE! He stayed on green (which means no getting in trouble) everyday in his class for 9 weeks, and got a compliment from another teacher. Now we just need to keep that behavior staying the same @ home!

Way to go boys!!

We got to go see baby Elli!!

2009-01-13T19:33:00.001-06:00

And man...is she cute!!

Happy Birthday Baby Elli Graylyn

2009-01-09T21:12:00.000-06:00

The day finally arrived. I've mentioned my friend Jamie a couple of times...and she FINALLY had the BABY! After what seemed to be 16 months of bedrest, baby Elli made her appearance. She’s absolutely precious, Jamie did an AMAZING job, her husband, Don, is in baby mode, and Charis & Grady couldn’t have been more excited (or cute & sweet). Here she is about 1 hour old. She shares a birthday with Elvis (the King...get it, the king, Jamie King HA), not at all by chance. Don called her his "chunka chunka burnin' love. Welcome to the world sweet thing!

Happy New Year!

2009-01-03T20:44:00.003-06:00

Happy New Year!!!

We rang in this fun night @ the King's house again. Thank you so much to Jamie & the family for including us again. Nothing like a kids' sparkling cider toast, some queso flameado, and some bunco. I really do get my bunco on.

The kids @ midnight!! and...Grady made it this year! Go Grady!

Me & my ohhhhh-so pregnant friend Jamie. Elli-thanks for holding out on this day so that your mama could have fun!

The GIRLS!!

New Year's Resolution time...

1. I found a blog that really caught my eye. This girl made a resolution last year to cook something in a crockpot everyday for 365 days!!! She's pretty DARN funny too! Check her out if you get a few minutes. She has a lot of great recipes and she'll let you know if they were good or not! I, however, vow NOT to cook something in my crockpot everyday, but do promise to cook more for my family and plan my meals.

2. I found another blog that has a really neat schedule for Mom's. We'll see. I won't be that good, but hope to get a good start.

3. I promise to NOT watch the Bachelor, Mama's Boys, or True Beauty. They're so bad, I have to turn switch the channel when the commercials even come on. Seriously people. Did people really think they were going to be good? Sorry to anyone who likes them. I will however still watch Desperate Housewives, Grey's Anatomy and Brothers & Sisters. I like them, even though I don't know why.

4. I am not going to pile clothes on my tub. Promise. I am done. I have a hamper.

5. I will exercise again. I miss it. I miss it so much I don't even know it. That darn treadmill is calling my name.

6. I will try and blog better. Try.

7. I will find a cheap digital slr camera, I don't know how or where, but my kids do WAY too many things not to have good pictures of them. I will just pray for one.

8. I will be a better friend.

9. I will love my sweet, dear, and hard working husband more.

10. I will maintain my weight.

Ok...I am setting my goals pretty high this year, but can't wait!! 2008 was an amazing year, and can't wait to see what comes next!!!

Blessings to all!!

CHRISTMAS!!!!

2008-12-26T18:54:00.000-06:00

Ok...here's the quick and easy wrap up, in as few pictures as possible. We told the kids that they couldn't wake up till 6:30am. They started the morning @ 6:32am. Such GOOD boys they are!!!

wahoo!!!

One ( I repeat ONE) of their MANY favorites!!

Dad in another mask

The special "fancy" Christmas morning breakfast. This is the first year of the fancy wine glasses. The kids thought they were pretty darn cool. Brandon kept saying "mom, I like my wine." One mark on the bad mom page for the morning.

The lego aftermath...

We had a WONDERFUL day, week, and whole month!! It was wonderful & I can't wait to see what 2009 brings!

oh...the joys of December

2008-12-24T23:35:00.001-06:00

I love December. I love getting my Christmas decorations up, and EARLY. For a couple of reasons.

1. They are a PAIN, so might as well get to see them up for as long as possible.
2. The kids LOVE decorating. They remember EACH and EVERY thing we have stored up in the attic for 11 months, and love getting them out & putting them in the EXACT spot that they were in the year before.
3. I love my nativity that I got a couple of years ago. It's simple, even been broken a couple of times, but I love it.
4. Christmas lights are just beautiful!
5. It's a really cool tradition that our family has! And it's MY family!!
6. They are a pain, so might as well get to see them up for as long as possible. :)

This year it was BRANDON who was most excited about decorating!!

Camron was into his book, and not into the tree. For about 10 minutes.

Then it was the two of them...the whole time. Blake and I put on the lights, and that's about it!! (Yes, we still had to put lights on the tree. Old school. BUT, we did get a NEW tree on clearance that's pre-lit! Welcome to the 21st century Taylors.)

Boys...the whole time!

Where's Mom?? Cooking chicken fried backstrap in the kitchen (totally NOT healthy) making a HUGE mess. With sick-o Cowboy. Cowboy, GIT out of my kitchen!

Where are the boys? Under the tree of course!

We did find about 40% of the ornaments on the bottom branches. Think that was Brandon.

Then a couple days later, Cam got sick. When you don't have a bed tray, I improvise.

Hey...it worked! Ramen noodles, in bed. No mess.

Brandon was NOT happy about the situation. He wanted ramen in bed. With an ironing board. It just wasn't fair.

Then, it snowed. Not as much as our family in Houston, but it snowed.

The kids had their Christmas program. (Cam & his friend Logan. Who looks very tall in this picture)

Brandon and a bunch of kids I don't know. (He stood there with his arm like this the whole time. He didn't want his bell falling off.)

My boys.

Camron's Class Christmas Party (One of the perks of being one of the room mom's...you're @ every function!)

Then came CHRISTMAS EVE!! So fun, beautiful, and rewarding. We had our Church's Christmas Eve service @ Anhalt Hall again, our 4th year. We missed last year since we were in Colorado, which made this year that more special. I missed it!! Great job Brooke, on all your hard work putting it on...AGAIN!

Happy Family

The boys looked SO handsome, and had a great time. (Brandon's khaki pants didn't fit anymore, which we found out about 15 minutes before we left. The kid's growing like a weed!)

Then we get ready for Santa. We checked the Santa radar online, Camron designed the cookies, put them by the fireplace...

Went outside to throw the reindeer food so Santa could find our house...

Came back in, and LUCY, bad dog, had eaten Santa's cookies. We busted her. So, we put the non-designed ones out, and Camron decided to write a note.

Guess we'll go to sleep and see if he still comes. Even without his special cookies.

Still catching up...

2008-12-15T09:01:00.001-06:00

The end of November is such a blur in our house. Brandon's kindergarten class had a huge Thanksgiving feast! They had so much fun decorating, eating, doing crafts, playing, and the best was the class picture! 21 kids, all standing in a row. "She touched me", "he's looking at me", "she's in my spot", "Mrs. Blevins-the sun's in my eyes!" and on and on. All I can say is that Brandon's teacher is amazing to do this EVERY day. I love her.

Here's the whole class

Sweet Brandon, with the sun in his eyes

Here he is with his sweet friend Madison.

Now on for our Turkey day, we got to spend it with the oh so sweet Dean/King family. They were so sweet to include us!!

Thanks Josh for doing the dreaded task of the family picture taking extravaganza!

I didn't get many pictures of he fun filled day, but here I am with my sweet friend Joanie! (The only other picture I got was of sweet Jamie asleep on the couch, and she'd KILL me if I posted that one!

Our friends, the Kleins, went out of town for Turkey day, so we got to babysit their dog Sugar for several days. So fun!! (that's her on the right)

THEN...from that last picture you might think, wow Cowboy looks sad. We he wasn't sad, but REALLY sick. After a visit to the vet the next day, we discovered that he had an intestinal blockage and had to have surgery! Poor guy. He was a trooper, and after them tellling us that he had a VERY slim chance that he'd pull through, HE DID!! Yeah Cowboy!! As soon as he came out of anesthesia, they were putting his IV in, and he was already wagging his tail. He just likes to be pet!

Here he is the day he came home, two days after his surgery. Surgery or not, the boy has to have his tennis balls around.

Then, he had to get the lamp shade. Poor guy. He was embarrased.

He's doing great now, and we just have to keep a really good eye on him, not let him run around too much, and keep giving him wet food for about a month so his insides can heal.

Then Bubba and Uncle Craig came for a quick visit/needed a place to crash for the night on their way to Iowa to go hunting.

Here Bubba is sporting his new hunting hat, which just so happened to match his sweet hunting mustache.

Christmas posts will be on the way soon!!!

November catch up...part 2

2008-12-10T07:27:00.002-06:00

I am sorry, this entry should be named "Camron's birthday 2 weeks"

See, I was deprived of birthday parties when I was a kid. I had one. I think I was 12 or 13. I wasn't used to the whole "everyone look at me" thing, so my one birthday party was a bust. We had a water balloon fight, then I think I cried. Boo hoo. (Totally not to harass my parents. It wasn't their fault!) SO, to make up for that, I have made it a point thus far to always make a big deal out of birthdays for my kids. Well, Camron's birthday is and always will be either right before, on, or right after Thanksgiving. Which is hard to plan a birthday around. So, we used to have Birthday week, which has this year turned into birthday 2 weeks this year. Here's a few pictures of his big day (s).

First it was a celebration at Mamaw's and Papaw's in Houston the weekend before. She made a cake for both 8 year old Cam & my 11 year old nephew Colton.

Here's some of the grandkids! Missing 8!

Then came the traditional "Mom will make you anything you want for breakfast and Dad will decorate the pancake" tradition. And, you get to pick how you want your hair & pick out your own clothes. He, of course, decided on his pink shirt!

My boys!

Birthday lunch @ school. And, a good view of the favorite shirt. (This one's for you Mamaw!)

Then it's the birthday presents from the Aunts who are SO GOOD about being on TIME!! (Unlike me!!) Thank you Aunt Toni & Aunt Wendy!

Then...it's the you get to pick the restaurant for dinner. Chili's.

Then, I went a little crazy. Time for the birthday party. We started with finding the right cake. Found out, nobody makes Mario or Luigi cakes. Well, with out paying an arm & a leg. So, I found this picture on line, and in my crazy state, decided that I COULD DO THAT.

Here's their version.

One thing different with me, I have never made a cake, or I have never made anything but a 9x13 rectangle with icing and some figurines on it. So...lookie here! I did it!

Here's the Jen Taylor version!

Eyes on the mushrooms...

Close & personal with the goomba.

Again, being crazy, I decided to make all the kids Mario hats like my boys had for halloween, and some yummy popcorn!

Boys eating pizza!

Camron with his cake!

Crazy kids with the silly face picture

No party is complete without mustaches & sideburns on 8 year olds. We had a great time!

Happy Birthday my sweet Camron. I love you so much!!

Flashbacks...

2008-11-24T12:55:00.005-06:00

Sweet Matthew from 1 year ago!!!

Brandon LOVES his Matty bug!

Here he is now! So big!!

The November Catch up...(part 1)

2008-11-18T08:38:00.010-06:00

November starts craziness for the Taylor family. I am always dreading when I turn that calendar page. It seems as though as soon as November starts, we don't rest until June. But, it's all exciting & worth it!!!

We start with my birthday!! Happy Birthday to me! The big 32 hit, and I am feeling every year! Getting old is no fun. Blake and Mary were there too, but no pics.

Here's the boys & I at Gringos!
2 years ago...same place! (and SAME sweater!!!)
Then, we got to celebrate 5 birthdays in our acacia group! To do this easy, we all packed up and headed to La Hacienda for dinner. Our group doesn't get out much, but man...did we have fun!! We had Birthday Boys Lance, John, & Josh G (who didn't show), and Girls Kim & I.

We put the kids @ the end of the 24 person table because of the slightly crazy group of people that you can kind of see to the left.

So what do you do when there's a CRAZY group of older people next to you???

Chris Gilbert asks them to DANCE!!

Chris, you are a NUT. But, you can get your groove on!!

Here's a couple of pictures. I didn't get many...

Raenette, me, & Birthday Girl Kim

Meg & Brooke

Then...my niece Maddy turned 2!!! She was sooooo cute with all of her new toys, mainly her new baby dolls!!

My boys played a round of pin the tail on the donkey. I remarked with, "ohhh, why are you touching a donkey hiney??"

And, Camron learned how to blow a bubble!

The boys are both very much into drawing pictures, and making sure I keep EVERY one of them. Here's Bran's impression of "Dad hypnotized"

Not bad, huh?? Nice gotee! (By the way, urban dictionary defines as a gotee as "facial hair that is sexy")

Camron & Brandon both earned awards @ school. Go boys!! You make Mom & Dad so proud!

I'll have to post the rest of the month later! I have been working on this post for 2 days, and it's starting to fustrate me beyond belief!!

Halllooooowwweeeennn....

2008-11-03T07:46:00.007-06:00

It's that time of year again. When the leaves start falling, it's 32 degrees in the morning and 84 in the afternoon, and the kids start bombarding me with "Hey Mom, how many days till Halloween??

To prepare for the long awaited holiday, we carved some pumpkins. I have to say, as the years pass, our carving skills are getting better and better. I would like to go back to the jack-o-lantern face again. It's much easier that what we try to pull off!

Sonic & Mario with the flash on...

then at night. Not bad, huh?

Then comes the dress up time. After a lot of planning, and a lot of searching for size 10 boys overalls (who knew they made such a thing, and thanks DEB for finding them!!),

we end up with Mario & Luigi!!

We got to go to our church's Fall Festival again. So much fun!! The kids had a great time & loaded up on the candy!!

Here's some of my friends...50's, 60's, 70's & 80's!

Here's "Crazy Church Lady" & 80's chick

Crazy Church Lady again with 70's

After the fall festival, some of us joined back up to get ready for our trick-or-treating.

Here's a fine looking group of kids!

And here they are loaded up on the no-hay hay ride.

It was a loooonnnnggg hard day of Halloweening. They were getting pretty pooped & smeared up @ this point. We sure did get a bunch of candy though!! Let me know if you want some.

Things you should and shouldn't do...

2008-10-30T16:12:00.001-05:00

You should not let your kids play with their food.

You should pull over to take pictures of rainbows.

You should take pictures of your Mother falling asleep on the couch.

You should have an "ice cream bench"

You should take pictures of your kids crying to use as blackmail.

and then take the next picture where you force them to smile because of the above reason. Cheeeese.

You should watch your friends kids and dogs for them.

And have them crash out so that they are wide awake when Mommy & Daddy get back.

You should not let your dogs on your bed.

You should take silly self portraits with red mustaches with your kids.

You should let neighbors kids come play and let them do sometimes the most random-NOT HARMFUL-things (like hide under bathroom sink for 45 minutes)

Or in the dog kennel.

Let your kids & friends play in yard to find lizards, grass hoppers, ants, beetles, or in this case, tree frogs!

You should visit with long time friends that you don't get to see all the time.

You should take a picture of your son eating nachos with nacho cheese on his nose.

I don't think you're supposed to let your kids play on the ride on things @ Tractor Supply, but we do anyway

You should have a freaky skeleton that you take out every Halloween, name him Fred, and let the kids put tinker toys, swords, and power rangers in him. (It seems the neighborhood kids are doing a lot of random things in this blog!

You sould not allow your children to climb up and hang on the basketball goal. It gives them forehead road rash, some cuts (very small) in the head, and dents in Mom's car. Oooops.

Pumpkins and kids

2008-10-28T15:55:00.004-05:00

OK...so I am not the good mom with taking pictures in the pumpkin patch every year, but I wish I was. Here's our this year attempt.

2008

And here's 4 years ago!!
I told you I wasn't good. 2 in 4 years. Come on. But the ones I have sure are cute!!

A Tribute to my Friend Jamie

2008-10-26T22:07:00.003-05:00

I have been blessed with MANY friends here in Spring Branch. Luckily some are still here, while a few have moved away. Yuck. The one I am talking about today is my dear friend Jamie.

Jamie is an amazing person. She has several, SEVERAL talents. Some including being a wonderful mother to two BEAUTIFUL children who keep her very busy and an amazing wife to a great husband. She home schools those two children, and STILL manages to be one of our Children's Pastors @ our church. There are several posts on our VBS here that you can scroll down and see the proof that she's one busy person. She is also normally followed by her sweet and close family. She lives on the "compound" with her WHOLE family. (There's 6 houses besides her's!) She's one heck of a good person to know!!

Well, about 21 weeks or so ago, my sweet and crazy friend Jamie called me. After about 20 minutes of conversation, she said, "Hey Jen, there's something I need to tell you." I just kept talking throwing in "what? you're pregnant?" and continued on with my conversation, never skipping a beat. See, my friend Jamie and I, along with several of my friends (AT THE TIME), were in this secret "we're done having kids" club. The "you're pregnant." comment is just the normal thing you say when you say "Hey...guess what?" Welllll...Jamie didn't continue to the next conversation, she kept going with that one saying "Yes."

So, the last 21 weeks have been VERY eventful in Jamie's world, and I am lucky to have been a part of it. It started with me getting sonogram jelly on my neck (long story) and is continuing with many, many laughs and MANY prayers. My sweet and jolly friend has been put on bed rest and house arrest. It's kind of like putting a baby Jack Russell puppy into a kennel, for a month. And never letting it out. She's starting to bust at her seams, literally. This little sweet baby girl she's cooking inside of her little oven is coming, and a little too quickly. So, she sits at home. With her husband, her 2 children (that she is continuing to home school-on her bed!), and her 3 dogs. Oh-and she is still our children's pastor. Again, doing it all from her bed/couch!! She is quite the multi-tasker. She is LUCKY to have many family members around to help, and to sometimes make her laugh (which she's not supposed to do too much) AND drive her nuts. :) The husband and kids are doing REALLY well, considering the complete upside down-ness that has happened in their world, and we hope that she just gets to stay @ HOME to keep being with them. So, we as her friends try and help too, the best we know how.

Here's my latest attempt on keeping her feeling her plugged in.

Here you go friend...

the Deep Water Crew

2008-10-02T12:59:00.016-05:00

Ahhhh..."Doing Life Together". Another term for "let's get a group of people together in someone's house once a week, that don't know each other, and get them to do a boring study in hopes of bonding them together for life." Well, that first group came, some went, and some more came. Now it's this group of people who amaze me. I can't even describe the feeling. I was thinking about them all this morning, and here's an ode to the Deep Water Crew.

WHY I LOVE MY ACACIA GROUP

1. They are 29 of the coolest people I know (Picture missing the Riedels and the Josh's)

2. They pray, and pray hard!

3. Some of them can do the worm, and a couple of them can do it well.

4. We're 3 years strong!!!

5. We have LOTS of funny stories, and always repeat them to show our love for each other.

6. We are all REALLY good cooks!

7. We go through the good, bad, and sometimes the ugly. (Not really the ugly, but had to have it in there to make it look real)

8. We have a GREAT group of children that all really GET ALONG!

9. When one gets baptised, we ALL get baptised.

10. They can build or rebuild pretty much anything you can think of!

(including our pergola!! Thanks guys!)

11. The men are strong husbands and fathers and LOVE their wives. (Here's some of them, but not all)

13. We get to celebrate a LOT of birthdays!!! Come on, there's 29 of us!

Latest ones, Happy bday Kendall & Katilynd! (looking @ the pic, Kendall's not even in there! But it was the best picture I had of the day)

14. We miss each other when we're gone. (missing our friends on their trip to Israel & Turkey!)

15. You can call any one of them up when you need something/someone.

16. Between all of us, we have any power tool, lawn mower, game, camera, clothes, food, yard tool, computer skill, craft skill, question, answer, kid, idea, shoes, jewlery, movie, or anything else you can think of...that we could all borrow @ anytime.

17. They ALL LOVE JESUS, and make it a point to show the world his Love!

18. We can challenge another acacia group to a cabin make over challenge, and WIN.

(sorry other group. It was really fun!!!)

19. It's our FAMILY when we aren't around our own families.

20. We support each other the best way we know how.

Love you guys.

Just another day running errands

2008-09-26T22:15:00.004-05:00

You walk into Home Depot. What do the kids do? INSTANTLY start climbing ALL OVER EVERYTHING!!! Then in the middle of the 5th lecture of "Let me tell you again-the reasons you can't climb on the racks @ Home Depot", Brandon grabs himself (normal!), and says, "I've got to peeeeeeeeeeeee". They ALWAYS have to go to the bathroom @ Home Depot. I think it's just this malfunctioned inner brain thing that they are born with. It goes something like this-You walk into a store and your kid, anywhere from 2 1/2 years old to I think 15ish, and the kid has to either pee or poop. The store that the kid has chosen either does not have a customer bathroom available-and you have to walk, WITH the people that work there, through the super over crowded back room, to a place that only resembles a bathroom because there's a toilet, OR a store where the bathroom is just a few feet away from walking to CHINA. That's the story @ Home Depot. The only way that you could be anywhere close to the bathroom is if you were looking for concrete bags. Seriously. Otherwise, you have to walk 150,000 feet with a kid holding his privates ALL the way to the bathroom. The people who designed these places did not have children.

Anyway, so we make it to the bathroom. I don't know what y'all normally see when you walk into the bathroom @ Home Depot, but here's our experience.

4 Dogs in a cart. In the bathroom. At Home Depot. That's normal, huh??

The Day the Bomber left...

2008-09-26T17:44:00.006-05:00

It was a sad morning @ the Taylor house. Well, sort of.

Long story short, we bought an 1990 Oldsmobile Cutlas Cierra 2+ years ago from my Dad, which had been previously owned by my 19 year old sister, in the attempt to try and get us closer to where we wanted to be financially. So what do you get when you trade in a car payment? What ever you can afford,-this was it!! We named it "the bomber" and she was a beaut! Well, she died about a month ago, and is now on her way to being donated to Comal County's Habitat for Humanity. It's kind of sad. We'll miss seeing her in the driveway, rusting away. (Even though I am SURE that my NEIGHBORS will miss seeing her even more!)

Isn't she pretty??

The boys watching...

Going....

Going....

Gone.She did us well, and we can safely say that we got our $750 out of her.

10 years and a WEEKEND AWAY!

2008-09-21T17:00:00.005-05:00

We celebrated our 10 year anniversary this weekend and were blessed with some wonderful babysitters (THANKS MOM, TONI & MARY) and we able to get away for the weekend to Marble Falls!! The kids had tons of fun with Grammy & Aunts, and we were able to just be US!

Blake is always wonderful & gets me roses on our anniversary!

Here's an attempt @ a self-portrait @ sunset! (New diamond earings in my ears!!)

We went to a place called Badu House in Llano for dinner. So fun!

Can you believe this view? I just can't get used to it, and the fact that we live so close to this! We LOVE the hill country!!!!

I got all tatted up @ Market Days.

And put on my bikini in downtown Fredricksburg. I am just crazy, huh?

We got to do a lot of hanging out together, even went to a winery for a wine tasting. Very nice! (No pics of that.)

Here we are @ River City Grille in Marble Falls. Outside on the deck, waterfall in the back ground, band playing, no kids around, wonderful weather, just fun.

I LOVE YOU SEEP!!!!!!!! Can't wait to see what the next 10 brings.