Random Stuff.....

Well, again, it's been too long since I blogged. Life is normal, busy. I really am in a blogger's slump but here are a few random things. I've been reading this book, The Help. Thanks to Katie, Ivy and Donna for recommending it. It's fabulous. Really, one of my all time favorites. Read it if you have time. As most of you know from facebook, we took family pictures while we were home for summer. I finally got them all printed and framed. Today my friends, Donna and Leanne came and helped me hang them. They look SO good and I'm so excited. They make my family room seem so cozy. No more bare white walls waiting for the pictures! I'll put up another pic soon of the huge family one I got done in color. I bought a sideboard table thing today to go under it in the living room. I'll get it hung tomorrow and post....maybe......

Just another view of our little family room....

I love this guy. He's been working so much overtime lately that we haven't been seeing much of him. But this week he's in training so he gets to leave the house later and come home earlier. Yay!

I snapped this today during Whitney's "naptime". She'll freak if she sees I posted this (actually, that I even took this. She's still right there in the same position as I blog) but she'll get over it.

A few Fridays ago (which is like our Sunday) all the guys had a meeting in the afternoon so Donna and Abigail came over and ate lunch with us. We watched 500 Days of Summer and played beauty shop. Whitney curled their hair and they both looked so cute. Fun to have a nice, fun girls day. Cupcakes and popcorn were also involved.

We can't seem to keep Chelsea off of the X-box lately! haha Found this on my memory card. I guess Evan got her all set up. Maybe taking some attention off of his own video game addiction! But anyway, cute picture. (ignore my fat-self in the background)

I still read all your blogs even though I'm a slacker on mine! On a happy note, Leanne is back in Saudi. We missed you!

The Reason.....

To Whom it May Concern:

Please excuse Gwen's absence from her blog, facebook and any other forms of communication. You see, her new Kindle arrived and she has been busy reading books, playing word games and other worthwhile activities.

Really, I LOVE my new Kindle! I ordered it and had it shipped to my friend Debbie's house in Utah. Her husband, Wade, brought it back to Saudi for me last week. (along with my blue case with light that works off the Kindle battery) I had debated for a long time about whether or not I wanted one because 1) I enjoy owning books 2) I like the way books look on the bookshelf and 3) I like the way books feel, the pages turning, the print, etc. But I finally ordered mine and I love it more than I ever thought I would! I've ordered a few books and am really enjoying reading. Starting with Catching Fire (second book in the Hunger Games series). Awesome. Next, Mockingjay (3rd in the series). Then, because Evan recommended it, The Book Thief. Also, all my scriptures, song book are on it and easily accessible. ***** (5 Stars from Gwen for her Kindle!!!) Any book suggestions??

Other cute pics from summer.....Ok, so they're all of Piper, so what?

Ms. Piper playing with her blocks and a BlueBell bucket Piper and all her cool, big girlfriends...overstimulated but they are thrilled
Piper and Aunt Whitney

Piper playing in the Louisiana rain

She didn't want her knees to touch the sidewalk or grass

I love this one and it's not of Piper....MawMaw and Whitney

Uncle Taylor and Piper wanting to reach that fried fish

Piper tasting her first snocone with help from Aunt Whit...I'd say she liked it

The cool friends again

Playing blocks with Great Grandma

If she could just get her hands on Dre she could pull his adorable curls

Piper and PaPa chilling in the beanbag

The Mosley's come to visit......

Donna and her kids Chad and Abigail came to visit for a couple of days and we had so much fun. Donna and Rusty are our friends from Austin that live in Saudi. It was so fun to have Donna here and introduce her to my friends and parents and show her around "my world". Since Evan was gone to Iowa that week, we thought it would bed fun to all crawl up in his bed and take pictures. Below is Abigail signing the signature wall in Evan's loft.

Chad and Taylor got to know each other and do a little fishing. They will both be at BYU-I this coming semester so they had alot to talk about. Plus both recently returned from their missions- Taylor to France, Chad to Peru....well, at least they could talk about the contrasts!

Of course, we stayed up talking late both nights! It was fun....

Other Summer Stuff......

A list:

• Evan flew from Saudi to Lake Charles with Christian Mason, a boy his age we know from Saudi....they did fine. Evan did get delayed for several hours in Dallas. Michael, our next door neighbor was on the same flight so they ate and visited. I was glad to get Evan home. I really missed him.


• The day after he flew in he started driver's ed at Parkview. It lasts Sat. and Sun afternoon for two straight weekends then three days of a few hours of driving. He is now the proud holder of a Louisiana Driver's Permit.


• Orange Texas Stake Youth Conference was held in our area this year. Glad the kids were there for it. It was great. I housed six teenage boys at the house and got them where they needed to go. So fun!


• I had PRK eye surgery, the older form of Lasik. I see super great close up now, like for reading but my far vision is still not as good as I'd like. I think over Christmas, I'm going back in for a tune-up. I will be regular Lasik this time which will be much easier. It's amazing though to be able to read and do my crosswords without glasses at all.


• Brad flew in August 1st which is his birthday and our anniversary. We were all so happy to see him. I was actually thinking we'd been married 24 years but he came home with some beautiful diamond earrings for our "25th" anniversary. What? 25 years? Could it be? Yes, Ivy informed me that she was almost 24 so it had to be 25. How did I lose a year? A real sign that I'm getting older. But I love my gift. They are beautiful. And luckily Brad had ordered himself a new trolling motor so I didn't feel guilty!


• Whitney was invited to go to Destin, Florida with the Guidrys. She was gone a week and had a great time. Lots of fun in the sun!
• Taylor flew in from Idaho the day I had eye surgery. It was so good to have him back. He fished almost every day and fried fish for like nine days straight for lunch.


• Evan was invited to go on vacation with the Zingers. He flew to Minneapolis where they picked him up and the drove to Des Moines. He had a great time. He turned 16 while he was there and they treated him like a king; amusement park, birthday dinner at Ruby Tuesdays and Kirstin even called to get the recipe for his favorite Butter Cake. He had a blast.


• Donna, Chad and Abigail came to spend a couple of days with us. Fun! (own post to come)


• Piper (along with her parents) came to Nana and Papa's house to visit. Papa (Brad) was so cute and went to Walmart to buy her some toys to play with. Of course Nanas and Papas must have toys! (own post to come)


• Brad's parents also came and we had a great time with everybody.


• The day before we flew out, we took family pictures with Lindsay Janies Photography. They were supposed to be outside but in true Louisiana fashion, it poured so we had to opt for inside. I think they'll be good anyway. Can't wait to see them.


• August 18th- Brad, me, Whitney, Evan, Ivy, Calder and Piper loaded up to head to the airport. Taylor had left on an earlier flight to Saudi. We met up with him in Bahrain. Perfect timing. Elaine Newton was also flying out of Lake Charles so we had fun with her in the airports. Had breakfast at Chili's in Dallas before we parted ways!

Crazy Summer but I'm gonna try to catch up....

This summer has been so, so, so packed with stuff that I've just not even known where to start. It's been busy and fun. I'm just going to start blogging stuff. You might enjoy some of it but mainly it's for us to remember all the details. Whitney and Evan both took trips with friends that they really enjoyed. I took some trips. We had lots of company which we loved. I'm just gonna start and add to it when I can. Here goes.....

Cupcakes and Stalkers.....

Well, ok. I really do enjoy reading blogs. I justify it by saying things like "I hardly ever watch tv" or "I'm really interested in reading about normal people and their lives"...I'd actually much rather read about someone like me than somebody famous. So most of you know that I read NieNie Dialoges which is the blog of an "inspiring beyond words" woman who survived a horrible plane crash. I've read it for years. Also, her sister has a blog called "C-Jane Enjoy It" of which I am also a faithful reader. Andrea reads them, too. Thousands of people do, just saying. When we knew we were coming to Provo we decided that we MUST find out where they live and drive by! Do you think this is creepy? To make matters worse, we decide to recruit sweet, innocent Rita as our driver and Lisa as one of our accomplices. Ivy acted like she thought it was dumb but she was all over the clues helping us find the Retro House. So in Blue's Clues fashion we wrote down everything we knew about where they lived and went on the hunt. We never found NieNie's house. (later that week she actually posted her street name....(It would have been fun to wave!) At one point Andrea said defensively, you don't understand, we feel like we know these people!" The key words being -feel like- because we don't ....actually....know them....but we do like them. We also found their parents home which is featured in their blogs alot. So that's that. We stalked....just a bit

They talk alot about a shop called Sweet Tooth Fairy that we found and it did not dissappoint. We all ate our share of wonderful cupcakes and cake bites. Heaven!

• In case you want to stalk Stephanie and Courtney on your own, I'm sure they wouldn't mind:
  http://nieniedialogues.blogspot.com/

http://blog.cjanerun.com/