Blogging from Washington DC

I am at my National Sales meeting this week - and we are at the Gaylord National. It is a beautiful hotel. This is the view from my balcony down into the atrium - it is really pretty.
This is another shot from the balcony - over into the Potomac River - and into DC.

This is the same shot - only zoomed in and an attempt to draw an arrow to point to the Washington Monument. Right now I am headed down to go to dinner at the Smithsonian - Air & Space Museum and then on a bus tour of the monuments at night. My camera is dead - so all I have is my Iphone - so we will see how it does at night - but not holding out too much hope.

New Kittens!

So - I haven't posted about this yet - but Toby has a new home. Dogs NEED a lot of attention, and we didn't have the time to give him the life he deserved. I will post more about that later.

So we know now that we are cat only people. So - after Toby left - we got new kittens. They are 2 sisters - Lucy and Allie. Lucy is the calico - and Allie is black and white. They have doubled in size since we got them. They are arnery - but sweet!!

This picture is from Kiana's first sleepover!

Show us where you live Friday - Kitchen Edition

Kelly had the idea for this fun concept - and even though I am late getting mine posted, due to a busy weekend - here are the photos of my kitchen.
We bought our house almost 5 years ago. Everything in our house was plain - the walls were all white, the countertops laminate, and the fixutres all brass. So we immediately changed it all before we moved in! So now it may be getting a little dated again - but I still like it.

I am not a huge fan of oak - but as you can see the trim around all of our doors is also stained oak - so changing that would have been a huge undertaking.

Here is the view into the kitchen from the eat-in breakfast area. (sorry about the smudgy refrigerator). We also got new stainless appliances when we moved in. Our countertops our tiled - in reflection I wish I would have went ahead and got granite - but my husband used to do tile work - and it was more economical at the time.

This is a close up of the backsplash tile - even if we would have gotten granite - I still would have went with this tile. I love that it is not something I see everyday in other homes.

The cabinets here are our main food pantry - as you will see in the next pic. I have a lot of fruit decor in the kitchen. One reason I love to keep it this way - is that my mom was very instrumental in helping me decorate - and just knowing that makes me think of her everday when I am in here.

This is our pantry underneath our stairs. We bought some stainless steel racks to keep all of our extra bakeware/entertainment dishes etc.

Here is the eat-in area of the kitchen. This is where we eat together as a family when we aren't eating in the family room. The table expands out into a big square - so we have room for 8 in here for bigger gatherings.

This idea - of using ivy/grapes for a swag instead of a curtain was my mom's idea - and I have always loved it - this is the window above the sink looking out into the backyard.

Here are our everyday dishes. My mom and dad bought us these on our 5 year anniversary (this year will be our 13th).

These were a gift from our wedding. We rarely use this set - this group is on display in my china cabinet.

Here is a set that we bought - more of a plain pattern. We don't use this too often either.

We also have a beautiful set of Christmas dishes that were my moms. When she passed away my dad let me have them - as we do the holiday gatherings at our house now. Maybe when we get closer to Christmas Kelly will do a Christmas tour of homes - and I can post them then.

I hope you enjoyed the tour. I am going to try and get ahead for next week's post - Living Rooms!!

Kiana lost her 1st tooth!

Last night I was on Eric's computer after the kids were in bed - and Kiana came in saying her tooth hurt. Eric was already asleep too. I checked it - and it was super loose. I was like "hold on" - because I had to run down and get the camera to take pics before/while it was coming out. How exciting her 1st tooth - before she even goes to Kindergarten!
Here is daddy wiggling it. There was a lot of screaming not being depicted here. Not the same way as Cameron - as he would say "hold on, I have to tell you something first" but just screaming.

And then - tada - here she is missing her first tooth.

We left a note for the tooth fairy to please leave our tooth so we could shw it off - since it was the first one and all. I think what loosened it up was a really hard chocoloate Easter Bunny. I bet it won't be too long until the one next to it comes out. But she is not looking forward to that!!

My beautiful baby girl!

Last weekend we had Kiana's pictures taken again by Calotype Photography! They do such a good job.

I wanted this shot - of her full length. I think the look on her face it a bit mischievous!
This pic looks so much like every day happiness.

Soon my baby will be headed off to Kindergarten - time flies!!
We went and took some pictures after these at Bogle Park in Bentonville - but I have been busy and haven't even had a chance to look at them.

I am in Phoenix right now at the airport - can't wait to get home to my family tonight!!

Missing my mom on what would have been her 50th birthday!

Today would have been my mom's 50th birthday!! Unfortunately, that is not the case, since she passed away 2 1/2 years ago. I remember on my last major birthday (30) that she orchestrated a surprise party - and worked her rear off preparing a mexican fiesta for an army. She had a way of making everything BIG.



For a couple of years we had 4th of July parties at my mom and dad's house. My parents had a restaurant that had caught on fire 10 days after they opened, and we had brought the oven, mixer, hot and cold bars out to the shop. So, mom insisted on cooking all the food for this party. We had about 100 people one year, and we spent a lot of time cooking. We had fried fresh fish, brisket, homemade salads (potato etc) and homemade cookies (about 6 inches in diameter) among many other things. All of the work was exhausting, but there was NO talking her out of it. I just wanted to cater some food.



At night we had awesome fireworks - and if any of you had been there you know what I mean. My mom also liked to have a lot of fun. One year after this party, about 30 of us got in an above ground pool and were playing with a huge beach ball! There was also some drinking mixed in with this - some even had drinks in the pool. We had such a great time.



A couple of months before she died, we had a big birthday party for my husband. He had a lot of scotch and got sick (literally). We had a lot of people over - and we made jello shots. My mom and Eric's brother pretty much downed them all - and my mom ended up being sick when they got home! But she definately knew how to have fun!!



Last weekend at our friend's wedding reception, it reminded me of my wedding. My wedding was supposed to be at the Eureka Springs Botanical Garden - but it rained and we had to move it to the lovely sight of our reception, the Ramade Inn. Not what I had in mind or had planned for. My mom and I spent the day rearranging everything - so by the time the wedding was over we were thrilled. We had our dinner, reception - and then it was time for the dancing. Now, I was only 21, which means my mom was only 37 (only 3 years older than I am now!). On the dance floor - my mom and dad got down! - really. I swear my mom did a John Travolta slide on her knees move in her dress!! It was stress relief after our crazy day!!!



Like us, my parents didn't have many close friends. For me she truly was my best friend. We could talk about anything, tell each other our problems as well as good things. She would give me advice. We never got mad at each other. No matter how many good friends you have - there is truly no one like your mother. I hope as Kiana grows up we are able to have the same type of relationship. My mom was in the room when both of my kids were born - knowing she couldn't be there for another child is one reason I don't want to have any more kids.



Every day without my mom is a little less full. Still after all this time I sit typing this with tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat. To anyone reading this that still has your mom with them, tell her you love her and give her a big hug - because you never know when tomorrow may not come. The day my mom died I had talked to her 3 times. I had no idea what was about to happen. I am thankful for every day I had with my mom. Her guidance helped shape the person I have become today.

You can see the scrapblog I made at the very bottom of my page. I am going to have Cameron at the least guest blog this week and talk about his grandma - as well as try to find some pics and video that I don't already have on my sight!

Mom - I miss you so much!

Hannibal Lecter goes to the dentist!!

Monday Kiana had to go to the dentist for 2 fillings in her back top teeth. A few months ago we got the same thing done on the bottom, only that time she had 2 kinds of drugs, plus the nitrous and the novacaine.

We have known about the deterioration on these teeth for about 2 years, but they wanted to do the procedures in the hospital and put her under anesthesia. Since going under anesthesia has a very small risk of death - there was NO WAY I was letting her do that. So we waited until she was older. So, that first procedure went pretty smoothly. Daddy was in the room with her - and she only cried a little bit.

This time, I asked her if she wanted to get these teeth fixed, and she said yes. I told the dentist that we would do it without the extra drugs (and $350 worth of additional bills!!). I took her, and called daddy to come in case we needed him.

Here she is when they first hooked her up to the nitrous. She picked bubble gum as the scent in the "piggy nose". And she just settled in and watched Madagascar! Isn't she sweet (the headphones go along with the TV.)
Next, the Dr. came in and gave her a LOT of novacaine shots. Like I have said in previous posts, big brother would always freak at this point, asking "what is that?", "what are you going to do with that?", etc - anything to stall the progress of the appt.

Little sister is not like that. We had to sit there for a while waiting on the novacaine to take effect. There was a little boy in the next room screaming - but sweet little Kiana was oblivious!

When the hygenist had to put the raincoat (rubber thing that keeps the junk from going down your throat) in - I was worried. This is really the only thing that bothered her the first time. But this time Kiana didn't utter one complaint. It was amazing!!

The Dr. came in, drilled out her cavities (still not one word) filled them - and here is the light that hardens the materials! Not one complaint!! She was an ANGEL!!!!

Here is what I mean by Hannibal Lecter - here she looks like he did with his face mask on - LOL!!! The ONLY time she was fussy at all was when daddy came in the room - she was ready to get up. But she still needed to breath the oxygen, to get the nitrous out of her system. She didn't understand why she couldn't get up.

She got some heart stickers with her points that she had earned - and when we got to the car found out they were so old that they didn't have any sticky!! So I am still trying to find her some heart stickers to make up for those!!!

Moral of this blog entry - you NEVER know what to expect from a five year old!!