Ugly Face Contest

On Father's Day, my brother, Josh, took my camera and started an ugly face contest with me and Kylie. After going through my camera I found a couple of pictures that I decided needed to be put in the contest...Mary just made a face as Elsie was taking a picture and Devin was making a mean/pouty face and so I thought they deserved a spot in the contest! Josh's face is the winner in my book, it cracks me up every time I look at it! Honestly Devin's isn't bad at all...just thought it was funny. :)

Devin:

Darla:

Mary:

Josh:

Kylie:

Father's Day Weekend

I just uploaded some pictures from my camera and just wanted to blog about a couple of them...Most of the pictures are honestly of my niece, Elsie and nephew, Colton. We were over at my mom's house a couple weekends ago for my cousin's baby shower and then the next day for Father's Day. I could eat both of these little stinkers up, they are such a joy to be around and so cute! I know I could be biased just because they are the first niece and nephew in our family, but I think they are the funniest, cutest kids out there. Being around them makes me excited at the thought of Will and me having kids in the future. I want them to be just like Elsie and Colt, or at least have colorful personalities like they both have. I think Bryce and Mary (their parents) have done such an awesome job of raising them thus far and don't baby them too much. Elsie is like a small adult and really does understand the things you say and really listens to you. I love that I can actually talk to her and know that she will remember and she responds to questions and comments we say to her. I know that Colt will be like Elsie in that regard, but right now he is too busy being a boy and would rather be rough and tumble than sit and listen to you read a book or try to talk to him. He can really get me laughing though sometimes, he can be so easily amused and laughs his head off, which in turns makes everyone around him laugh too! I am so glad that I get to live so close to them and that I get to be around to watch them grow up and be a part of their lives the way that I am.

Elsie and Colt both love all dogs. My sister, Betsy, brings her dog, Kodiak to dinner most Sunday's and the kids just want to squeeze him and love on him, and he gets a little nervous around them.



Josh, my brother, also brings his dog, Cosmo (or Mo Mo, as Josh calls him) most of the time and he really does his best to try to stay away from Elsie and Colt trying to clobber him, or he tries to steal the food from their hands as often as possible. He's a pretty funny dog and loves Josh more than anything, so when I caught them sitting side by side on the couch together I had to get the shot!

New Fridge and Stove

Our stove in our house was pretty gross and old. When I bought the house with the girls 3 years ago that was one of the first items we said we were going to replace. Clearly that didn't happen...Will and I have been checking them out here and there and after shopping around a couple of weeks ago found that Home Depot had the best deal going on that week. We were just going to go for the cheapest stove, but after looking and talking we decided we wanted a nicer one that could stay nice for a few years and hope we won't have to update it when we sell the house in a few years. While we were shopping we found such a great deal on a stainless steel side by side fridge that matched our stove we were planning on getting, so we went for it and got both of them! It's so nice to not have a fridge that is leaking water constantly and a stove that doesn't stink up the house everytime you use it! And I've been doing some baking and cooking and they work so well, I haven't burned anything yet, which was virtually impossible with the old stove! And to top it off, the fridge and stove actually match now! We have plans to update the whole kitchen in the next year (at least that's the plan right now) and so it's nice to have our major appliances taken care of already. We don't have a dishwasher now, so that is next on our list of appliances to buy. Will and I came up with a plan of how we'd like to do the kitchen and I can't wait till it actually happens. As you can see from the pictures below, we have hardly any counter space right now and half of it's taken up by the dish rack. I get frustrated sometimes when I'm trying to cook and prepare a meal, when I have to clean up after each step to continue! So when we do get everything set up we'll more than double our counter space, so it will make the kitchen more workable.

Here's the before and after:





And my way of telling the stove and fridge that I love them:




After posting last time about working on painting the house, it's come to a stand still. First we just couldn't decide a color to use and then we decided to just go with White again, but then we've been busy and this rain has not been our friend either! But now that the weather looks like it's going to stay nice I think Will and I are going to finally finish our house painting project. I spent almost 8 hours last week staining our fence and painting the old playhouse in the corner of the yard, and now I just want the whole backyard to look complete and not have 4 different colors on the wall anymore. One day we'll continue on and repaint the whole house and put up shutters, but Will likes to go back and forth on what projects take top priority at the time, so we'll see when it all really gets done! :) Do the projects ever end? It does feel good knowing our money isn't being thrown away on crap now, though. We're putting every extra cent into making our house a better place to live and that makes me so happy. I watch a lot of HGTV and always have ideas in the back of my mind what we can do to make the house prettier...too bad Will doesn't see those ideas as brilliant as I do!