14 Days and Counting

I (we) have 14 days left in our little one bedroom apartment! Oh.....my......goodness....I cannot wait. I have lived here for 2 and 1/2 years. I want to say I'm not complaining because I do believe living in such a tight space has brought Brady and I closer, but I'm also complaining. Sharing a parking lot with 50+ people, having to go up and down stairs everyday, taking the dogs out to a public yard, the noises, the smallness, the cigarette smell drifting up from the apartment below. Will I miss anything about our apartment....hell no! Did a lot take place in our apartment....oh yeah! We spent our first year as a married couple here, we found out we were pregnant here, we found out Brady got his job here, so...yeah, I'll have many memories. But.....now we get to move into a 3 bedroom/2 bath duplex. It has a garage, hall closets, storage in the basement, fireplace, and a fenced in backyard! We will bring Case home to this house, we will spend time here as a family, our dogs will run wild in the backyard (and not chase people!), we can have a dining room table, I can plant flowers and so much more.
Can you tell I'm excited?!? It's all coming together for us....

Perfect Couple

I LOVE being at home with my hubby. I HATE that we are both sick when we get to stay home together. Ugh! I started getting an itchy throat on Friday and I've been home ever since.This has been the worse head cold I have ever had....not exaggeration. I decided to give Brady my head cold on his birthday of all days. So after eating soup (thanks Wendy!), rubbing my nose raw with Kleenex, having my breath smell of cough drops, and even having that sick smell to me, Brady says this morning, "We make the perfect couple." Hopefully after this weekend we will both be well, but still consider ourselves a perfect couple.

Dashing Dachshund

This is Jack, the country dachshund that yearns to live in the big city. Just look how stylish he can be. This is actually thanks to my sister (it's her dog). She is always putting some sort of adorable sweater or vest on Jack. My poor dogs just run around naked all of the time. Brady would never let me dress them up when they were little. Now they are just dachshunds that like to flash everyone.

Baby Bump Alert

I've been hesitant of taking these kind of pictures because I really wasn't looking pregnant. It just looked like I had eaten 3 dozen donuts and 10 #1's from Sonic. But at last I feel like I can show off my tummy, even though it's not a tummy skin shot, it will do.
Goodness, Case is moving all the time. It's an amazing feeling. I swear today he was doing full somersaults. I love that little boy!

Burn Baby Burn

Curious Person: "Charly, what did you do on Christmas break in Wyandotte?"

Charly: "Well, I decided to become a pyromaniac."

Curious Person: "Oh....really??? Tell me about it."

Charly: "Ok!"

I was without a vehicle in Wyandotte because my mom and sis came to pick me up and drive me home (NE OK). They think because of my "condition" that I can't drive. Fine with me, I like being chauffeured across the state. Anyways, so on one day of being home I had some errands to run in Miami....bank, store, lunch with high school friend. I was on the go all day, stop and go. I finally picked up my niece and decided to take her with me to the bank because I felt like I needed company. We went to the bank. I stopped the truck. Then we noticed smoke coming from the right passenger side of my mom's truck! I told Sarah to get out and then she informed me that my mom's truck was on FIRE! Yes, on fire! The brakes had caught fire because they were too tight and I had caused so much friction by stopping and going all day that they thought they should catch fire. Insane! Insane! So imagine a pregnant woman and 13 year old running into the bank screaming that my mom's truck is on fire. They just stared at me. Finally a hero emerged and grabbed the fire extinguisher and put out the fire. It didn't really do much damage other then burning up the brakes. The guy who put them on replaced them, but still....the freakin' truck was on fire. I can only imagine if we would've been on a country road near a field of dry grass. No more truck for Momma Carol or field of dry grass for Farmer Joe.

That isn't the only fire during my break....two days later....we had my nephew burn trash at my parents house. Yes, in the country we burn our trash. It's just what we do. So, he put it in a big ol' barrel and away it went. We were in the house playing games when we heard a kaboom! It was a can that had blown up. We ignored it....30 minutes later my mom looks outside and the backyard is on fire. Guess what it melted? The freakin' water hose. Momma in her housecoat, sister running around frantic and prego here in socks trying to put out a fire. Dixie even got involved by running outside and jumping through the flames. She likes fire.

So there....my family has never had very good luck with fire. Our house burned back when I was in college and most of my aunts and uncles have been through a house or barn fire at sometime in my life. We just don't mix well with flames. I think next Christmas I will buy my parents a fire extinguisher.

Letting Go of Christmas

I seem to be hanging on to Christmas a little too long. I still have all my decorations up, maybe because I was gone the entire break (thank heavens for working for a university) and didn't get home until Sunday night. I've promised myself that it will all be gone by the weekend. I also haven't posted about our great Christmas. So here we go....We were able to see a lot of relatives in Blackwell and cuddle with the little ones. Then I headed to Wyandotte and spent the week of News Year at my parents. Brady headed down last weekend to NE Oklahoma and we then had our last Christmas TWO days after New Year's! It was nice to be with family so much, but it threw me off not having much time at "home". Here are some pictures from our holiday....

Aunt Charly is a wonderful aunt. She brings whip cream and sprinkles that are meant for hot chocolate, but end up in the little ones mouths. I like to pump them full of sugar and send them home with their mom.

The girls opening presents on Christmas morning. I loved seeing their expressions.
4C Ranch Christmas Tree
Hours of playing Kismet. I wasn't too good at it, but it was fun rolling the dice with all of the family. My Dad even got involved.
Our version of Christmas dinner (a few days late)....all you can eat crab legs. I think Brady would've eaten his weight in crab legs. It's too much work for me.
Mama Carol and Papa Charley: I think the world of these two people. They are the best.
The rest of the gang. Sarah and Guy are getting so big.
These are the silhouettes I made of the kids for Casey and Joey. I learned how to do it from Nie Nie's Blog (I love this blog). Casey loved them!
No this isn't a ninja, it's my Dad modeling his Under Armor gear. He swears by this clothing line to keep you warm (he works outside at night).