This weeks update ...

Jade caught a cold this past week, actually since she started Kindergarten just about every week she comes home with some kind of sniffles, thank God she is such a healthy child and eats so well so everything she gets over fast and nothing hits her that hard but this past one ... well she is almost over but she is still coughing, poor thing. I guess the early cold mornings don't help either but on Friday morning when really I feel as a mom she should have stayed home although she thought she was ok, they had their mile run at school and Jade would rather have died than missed that, being Friday, I figured what the heck and sent her. It was freezing that morning so because I had to work later the morning and wasn't feeling too great myself after a bad night, I let Dave go stand in the cold to cheer her on :-) He said she did fine, I told her she could run on one condition that she didn't try to win, that she took it easy, you see there is another run at the end of the year where they are timed again so she thought she had to run her fastest ... I told her next time she can run as fast as she could but this time coz she was sick she needed to take it easy. Dave said she pretty much ran in the middle of the class so she still did well, as athletic as she is with her gymnastics, she really isn't a runner so I didn't expect her to win anyway :-) That being said, she tries so hard, I know she would have done a lot better had she felt more herself.

Anyway here is a picture of her class before the run, you can tell that most of them ran with jackets on it was so cold.



On Sunday we went out to the house to get an update, most of you probably are getting tired of these updates but we are trying to show our folks the stages of how a house gets built her so please just hang in there, it will eventually be built and you won't have to hear too much more about it :-)

Here you can see that they have started putting the siding on the front of the house but remember I mentioned before that the color you are seeing is not the color that you will see in the end, it still needs to be painted, that being said, I kinds like it this light but it's going darker ... they have also started putting the shutters on too, I think one more week and we will need a key to get in every week as the garage doors will be on which is our main entry right now into the house.



This is the back of the house, I am sure shortly they will start our deck, you can see that the one side of the house closest to the camera is all done being sided too but the other side hadn't been done yet.



These two are just of the inside, it's a lot cleaner looking than it was last week but here was so much dust going on because they were actually working on the house when we stopped by that I didn't even go in, Dave just took a quick pic or two. Yeah it was Sunday, can you tell they are eager to get it done. They say it will be done before Christmas but we have no intentions of starting to move in till mid January, so ... guys since we won't be making a trip out to SA anytime soon, we will have lots of space for you, so hint, hint, time for a trip across the ocean, come visit !!!





Last but not least, I want to tell you about a proud parent moment, on Sunday evening at church Jade was asked by the Monsignor to help take up a basket when they took up the offertory, you see during the mass she attends a kids class in one of the back classes and then when the Father is done with the Homily, they come in and those chosen walk down the center of the church with the rest of the group taking the offertory and rest of the goodies for communion, only Jade was right in the front and she did so well, she had to walk up on the 'stage' as she calls it, the alter to put the basket up there and then come down for a blessing. She was so cute and so proud, she ran back to us with a big smirk on her face and mom of course was almost in tears.

Oh oh ... I said last thing but I wanted to mention one more thing, today I took Jade to have her eyes tested, my gut feel was that there was nothing wrong with her, I mean she is my child that can find a needle in a haystack but her pediatrician suggested it so better safe than sorry. Well they did a bunch of tests before even seeing the doctor then they dilated her eyes for further testing, not ever having had that happen to me before, I had no idea what she was going to experience and from what I understand, it could be a totally scary experience and she was as usual such a trooper. She had to wait 30 mins before seeing the doctor, in that time her site got worse and worse and she kept on telling me how much less she could see, a scary experience for me actually but she was totally ok and handled everything so well. Bottom line is thank God all is well and she passed all the tests perfectly, hopefully she has my eyes and not her dads, the doctor says obviously it is no guarantee but it looks like she is going to be fine and won't have eye issues anytime in the near future ... Thank God !!!

Jade is such a brave child, as long as you tell her what she is going to go through, no matter how uncomfortable things are, she just deals with it, she is way braver than I am, that I know for sure, poor thing, I am so proud of her !!!

That's it for now, Halloween on Friday so I am sure there will be lots of pics then.

House Update

Well it's been a week or two since I updated last, since they were working inside there house doing all the electrical and water, you weren't seeing too much from the outside so I thought I would wait a bit for a bigger update !!!

Let me back track here a bit, two weekends ago Jade and I went to see Disney On Ice, every year I like to take her to some ice show but I was excited about this one since there were 4 stories, Cars, Lion Kind, Little Mermaid and TINKERBELL !!! Yeah not Peter Pan but Tinkerbell ... I had no idea what that story would be all about but I was exited for Jade since Tinkerbell has been the character for the past year or so :-)

The show was good, the Tinkerbell part was a little confusing but I think she got it, hopefully she got it. It was a great mom and daughter fun morning, of course dad has had his fill of ice skating over the years so didn't think twice about getting out of this one (hehehe) !!! I actually took lots of video if I get a chance I will load some.

After that Jades school had their Fall Festival which to me was a little disappointing but Jade had fun and that is all that matters right. Dave was out at the house laying surround sound cables etc. so he got out of that one too, lucky guy !!!

I am sure I have mentioned it before but Jade is really loving school, this weekend she said the best part of school is learning to write, I was sure it would be the playground, or gym class or the bus ride but was thrilled to hear just how excited she is about learning to write and well we all know she loves reading so that she is enjoying too :-) Now let's hope this excitement follows all the way up to graduation right.

Anyway, this past week was even more fun for her, they had a mock farm day where the kids had to either come to school dressed as a farm animal or a farmer, well mom being so uncreative dressed her like a farmer and she looked too cute, I totally didn't have time to take pictures at 6h30 in the morning so you will have to take my word on that one. She had dark green overalls on with a cute checked shirt under it, and pony tails, she loved it :-) Today they are going to a real farm, it will be the first field trip Jade has taken without me so I am a little nervous of that.

Actually that's not true, last week they took a short field trip to the fire station but that being just across the road that wasn't too big a deal for me not to attend, but this one is a good way away, they get on the bus at 8h30 this morning and wont be back till just before school comes out. She is so exited, hopefully I get lots of details as to how it went. It's cold today so hopefully she is warm enough, no rain hopefully but it's 2 degrees here this morning, later should be a lot warmer but Winter is on it's way that is for sure.

What also was fun for her this past week is the school had a Donuts for Dads morning, so instead of her catching the school bus, Dave took her to school and he and all the other dads had some coffee and donuts with their kids before school and going off to work, too cute.

Friday this week the kids are all doing a mile run at the school, I am going to pop down before going to work early Friday to support Jade, that's going to be a long run for the little Kindergartners, I am not even sure they have to run the entire distance but it is definitely advertised that way so we will see :-) hold thumbs, thank God she is very athletic so she should be ok.

Now onto the house, as you can see they have started with the brick work, I was a little disappointed how similar the bricks were to the house next door to use but I think the more I look at it, the more I can see the difference and once the siding is up and our colors are different, things will be better. We have two totally different shape houses so there is no chance they will look that similar.



This one is from the back, you can see they have started the siding, it's hardy plank so it gets painted the color we chose so what you see there is not the finished product.



Here you can see they have started the drywall inside, what a mess and oh how dusty but it's starting to take shape, it looks so very different with the drywall, amazing actually :-)





We actually got to meet our neighbors yesterday too, they moved into their house about two weeks ago, Jeff and Wendy, they have 3 kids, lets see if I can get this right, Hope is 8, Holly is 10 and David is 13. Jade got to play outside with them while the adults talked, they seemed nice so that's good to know :-)

So yeah, that's the update for this week, I am sure I will have more pictures next weekend. Have a good week.

Renaissance Festival 08

As usual this year we went to the Renaissance Festival ... oh gosh my moms going to hate me for all these pics again, she went with us years back and loved this festival !!!





We always make a day out of it and really enjoy it !!! The only thing we did differently this year is we didn't watch the jousting which we always do but we were busy enough that we didn't miss it ... also this year we passed on the traditional turkey leg and tried the bread bowls for lunch ... bad decision :-(

I somehow think this tree guy looked different last year, I need to go back and look. I tried to persuade Jade to go and stand between his legs like others were, for a photo but she didn't want to hear of it (hehehe).



Jade was mesmerised by all the wings, obviously with Renaissance being all about Fairies too, there are many fairies to see and lots of wings and outfits for sale.



Here is one of those fairies, she was beautiful, she played a flute and I too was mesmerised by her :-) She called the kids over and out of her pocket she would pull out a flattened clear marble but it was full of fairy dust so when she placed it in your hands you were covered in fairy dust, Jade loved this and went back twice for more :-)



Here are some knights, probably ones that partook in the jousting, I am not sure, I am always amazed at how many people dress the part for the festival, it's pretty neat actually, I could just sit and people watch all day, I love this festival :-)



I actually bought Jade a very regal dress for the festival but it was too long and it just would have gotten buggered up so I let her wear this one, the boots were not ideal but still she kinda looked the part and as she walked by, people working at the festival would refer to her as being a princess and she was just tickled pink by all that !!! Next year she can wear the other one !!!



Last year if you can remember Jade rode the elephant, well this year the elephant was on break when we went by him so she decided she would ride the camel instead this year :-)





This year since Jade was just a little bit older we decided to let her go on this trampoline thingi ... I knew with her gymnastics background she would be fine on it and since she is so close to doing a back handspring on her own, I knew she would enjoy this, see for yourself, do you think she did :-)

Here she filled a bottle with color sand ... we were all upset that before we even left the sand had gotten all messed up, we don't think it was compressed tight enough but oh well ... we live and learn right !!!



I don't think I have seen these mushrooms there before, very cute.



Here Jade is doing a small ride, thought it would make a funny picture since as you can see all the rides are manually driven by people ... obviously :-)



Last but not least here are two character pics ...





See you next year Renaissance Festival !!!

House Update

Well this week you won't see much of a difference from last weeks pics because this week they concentrated on the electrical inside, as far as we know that should all be done by the end of this week where we will go do an inspection pre drywall ... wow !!!

Since it was raining last week when we went out, I decided to go and take the pics from the back of the house so you could see that in progress too :-) As you can see all our windows and doors are in.



Most of you won't have seen this before, this is what the framework looks like inside as they are building.



This is a view looking up ...



This is the view from my kitchen / breakfast nook and too the left my lounge. The woods are pretty close to our house as we don't have a big back yard which Dave loves ... little yard work to do.



Anyway, I am not sure we will see anything different next week but we will wait and see, only time will tell.

House Update

We had quiet a busy weekend, Jade had a party on Saturday afternoon, it was her BFF Maggie from preschools birthday, so while she enjoyed her party which was a big girl Hannah Montana birthday party, Dave and I took advantage of the free time and went out for lunch, then went to pick up our new flat screen TV that Dave has bought for our bedroom in the new house ... now I just have to figure out where the hell to store that huge huge box in our little apartment :-(

After getting Jade we went through to the new house to see the progress and were shocked once again by the progress ... The roof was on and all the windows and outer doors were on, I cannot believe it !!! This is going so fast !!! They had also delivered the two baths for Jades bathroom and the spare bathroom and our bath for our master bathroom, wow !!!

Anyway it started to rain so I didn't manage to get any pictures but this one.



After that we went through to our old neighbors TD and Sylvia, Dave needed to fix something on his PC so we popped in there for a while. On leaving TD said he wanted me to take a picture of him for my blog ... I don't think he thought I really would put him on my blog but here you go TD ... now you too are famous amongst my blog followers :-)



Yesterday, Sunday we went through to the SA'n Festival which was being held about 30 minutes from our house. I thought it was going to be quiet a big event since it was running Friday, Saturday and Sunday this weekend but really it was almost a waste of a trip, I say almost because I got a yummy bag of koeksisters which made it a little more worth while. I think the organizers put a lot of work into getting it off the ground but in all honesty, it was really disappointing, and if it is going to be an annual event, I know we will pass on it and thinking many others will too, sad but true.

Then being out that way we went to Concord Mills for a bit, I love Concord Mills, anyone that knows me knows that !!! After that we went to check out a house being build in a neighborhood close to the Mills. It is the same model as ours we are building but we thought was ready for sale but it wasn't it probably is a week or two ahead in being built than our house so we didn't get to see too much there or get any ideas. At least it showed me how the house will look flipped, you see the model that we have been looking at it is built the opposite way to the way our one is being built, this all depends on where you house is situated in the road ... and me not being too visual knew it was going to be difficult for me to figure it all out. Our old house was the same so we are used to that but still, you know when you buy something on the idea that it will look almost exactly like the model and now it is flipped ... well that messes with my brain.

We got home in enough time thankfully for Jade to get her homework done, can you believe she gets homework every day and a project every weekend !!! And this is Kindergarten, gosh I have a lot too look forward to.

Anyway I need to get done and get out of here, I need to go get gas now that Charlotte has gas again, it's been crazy with almost all pumps being out of gas and people not being able to make it to work because they dont' have gas, not to mention the prices the gas stations are asking for gas because of the shortage, and those that have gas have 2 hour wait lines outside, madness ... but hopefully today it will be much better, hold thumbs.

Week 3

We popped by the house yesterday, Sunday ... this is week 3 and I house is completely framed. Here you can see the house from the front and from the side, remembering I can't really get far enough from the house at the back because of our small garden back there and all the wooded area to get a shot from the back but hopefully this helps :-)

Pre Halloween Costume Pics

Ok well this week my concentration was on finding some dress up stuff for Jade, you see the stores are now full of costumes and usually at this time of the year, I go around and find some good bargains and add it to her dress up closet.

This year she is going to be a glowing fairy but you will have to wait till Halloween to see those pics, I will keep you in suspenders till then (hehehe).

In the meantime I thought I would tease you a little with some of the costumes that I bought her to dress up in :-) but first I have to say ... there is nothing wrong with Jades right eye !!! I have no idea what was happening but only after the fact when I looked at the pics did I see that her right eye was closed or smaller than the other one all the time, she said it was the wind or it was too bring or something but it's really weird if you ask me ... kids you have to love then right ? I figured after the Flapper pics I took indoors that came out so badly that outside our apartment was best, this was just off our balcony :-)

Ok this first one is a Barbie Princess dress, actually it said wedding dress but I think it should be longer then but oh well, I love it all the same :-)





Then later you will see a regal dress fit for a queen, I bought it for her to wear to the Renaissance Festival that we go to every October, remember mom :-) sorry !!! Anyway last year she was upset seeing all these little kids with costumes on so I thought this year I will buy her something special but the queens dress is beautiful but too long to wear there, it would get so messed up so when I found this one I thought it would be perfect and we would buy her head gear there as they have tons ... but what do I put on her feet, I have no idea, she needs gold sandals or something, not sure, need to give it some more thought ... but I am excited that I have something for her to wear there.



She loves this one and said that if for some reason the glowing fairy didn't work out, then she wanted to wear this one, she loved the arms. It's actually a witch costume but it kinda looks like bat girl if you ask me :-) I love the purple colors on it, but we will see ...







Well this as you guessed is her Little Mermaid costume but I have to get her some red hair for sure ...





And last but not least as this one is my favorite, this is the queens dress, it would be perfect for the Renaissance Festival but maybe she can wear this one next year when she is a little older and a bit taller and the dress doesn't touch the ground, now there's an idea :-)









Well we are off to the house again sometime this weekend so keep a lookout for updated pics :-) Have a good weekend.

My Flapper Girl !!!

These pictures came out terribly in the light I had and I am so sad as I took a lot of cute ones but really even doctoring them some light wise, they just didn't come out well :-(

Anyway went to go look at Halloween costumes yesterday and in the process bought a few items for Jades dress up closet, this one was really cute though and as she did her little fashion show I had to shoot a picture or two ... I will send more later, I have to figure out the lighting in this apartment first.

Another Trip To Lawson - 13th September 2008

Yesterday we took another trip out to the Lawson house and couldn't believe how much framing they had already done, wow ... it's really exciting !!! This gave us a better idea of how little a back yard we really would have and how high in the air our deck out our back door would be. Dave seems to be happy with how little mowing he will have to do but we are both hoping that we have not made a mistake having such a small really useless back yard. For us I think it will be perfect because we never use our back yard, not ever, if anything we use the deck and that we will have, a nice big one so ... I hope the privacy is what sells the house when we want to resell one day ... golly I hope that is a VERY long time to go so really worrying about it now, is not worth it. I think we will love it. I know we will love it !!!

Jade has been with us out there on two occasions and has already met a few kids that live right there in the area, apparently there are many that are close in age to her so I feel confident we will be happy there. Also we heard that on Friday nights they have a very social outside life and we love that so we are now even more excited to move in, we were worried about not being in a cul de sac but now I think we will be just fine :-) here's hoping !!!

Here you can see the framing from the front ...





And here you can see the back of the house, you can tell where the back door will come out half way up the house ... that bottom area for those that don't know how houses work here, if you build on a slope and don't go for a basement plan, they build what they call a tall crawl, it's a huge, huge and I mean huge storage area under the house. Most people just keep their mowers etc. down there but we plan to use it like we would use attic storage, only we need to make sure that stuff doesn't get wet down there ... we need to research it all a bit more. But you can also see how small the back yard will be, once we move in, Dave will clean out the brush a bit to make it look nicer but really our grass won't run too far into the forest area, it's not a forest but you know what I mean, wooded area.



Both neighbors on either side are new, the rest of the houses around us have been there at least a year and one or two are into their second year. But both neighbors on either side of us will be really new, you can tell the one on the right as you face the house is a little more ahead of us in framing but the one on the right, a real Charleston looking house, closes this week so they will be moving in really soon. I didn't like the look of this one when I first saw it, maybe it was the color but I love the Charleston look with the balcony's :-) Dave loves more of a brick frontage which is what we have gone with so I don't think he likes this one much.



Anyway stay tuned, we will keep updating as the house progresses.

Daves Birthday - 6th September 2008

Well today is Dave's birthday, we had a lot planned for the day but because Dave came home with a bad cold on Thursday our plans were on hold, thankfully though he felt a lot better after spending most of Friday in bed and we were all able to have some fun with him today.

We got a slow start, Jade woke us up very early, she is getting into the school routine but weekends are hard when she automatically wakes up at 6am ... something I definitely need to do something about, anyway since today was a special day, she and I went and got his gift bags and woke him up with the Happy Birthday song ... neither of us are ever going to be the next American Idols so I felt sorry for him being woken up to that but hey ... what can I say !!!

I tried to buy Dave a bunch of little goodies to make him feel special since the trip away was really his birthday gift, I think he was happy, what with a trip he enjoyed, all the little goodies the morning of, his nice new watch from his folks and a Black and Decker tool from my folks, I think he felt spoilt :-) I hope so.

I then made us breakfast and got us all ready to go to the Cabarras County Fair for a fun day ... Thank you to everyone that emailed, sms'd, called and even sent cards to make his day special, you guys are great !!! I also bought him a small birthday cake, here you can see him and Jade about to blow out the candles.




Then off to the Fair we went, Dave and I used to really like this Fair but somehow this year, I think we had just grown out of it and were ready for a nicer and much bigger Fair. We decided that we would find out when the North Carolina State Fair was going to be on and then we were going to take a road trip and go and see that one, it would be a weekend away since I think the Fair is in Raleigh but I still need to investigate more. Jade of course loves any Fair so we always get our money's worth with her :-) We always buy her the 'all you can ride' ride ticket, and we were there for about 7 hours and she just didn't stop, thankfully this being the first weekend the Fair was on, we didn't have to stand in too many lines, obviously the later you stayed the more the place filled up but how can you go to the Fair and not stay to see all the lights :-) I think we counted that she did about 14 different rides but did each of them 5 or more times, so non stop ... did I say non stop !!!

We always start with the livestock exhibits etc. Jade loves all the animals and there were tons of baby everything there this year, horses, cows, donkeys, there was even a pig that gave birthday which unfortunately we missed but we did get to see something that even I have never seen in my life which I was thrilled to bits we got to see, we actually watched chickens hatch, it took what felt like forever but we watched a little baby chick break it's way out of it's shell and come out into this big bad world for the first time ... it was amazing, brought tears to my eyes for sure, what an experience, I am sorry we missed the pigs though although I think that might be a conversation I don't yet want to have with my 5 year old no matter how smart she is !!! I wish I had videoed that, I didn't think of it but anyway we were glad to see that.



There was this little area for the kids to play in, above you can see her doing the milk can toss which none of us were very good at, but she enjoyed playing in the corn and even the hay, we stayed in there a good hour I think.



What was funny though is she had an opportunity to milk a live cow and she wanted absolutely nothing to do with that, she even said she wasn't sure whether she wanted to ever drink milk again ... don't blame her on that one (hehehe), anyway in this little interactive play yard above you can see there was this mock cow milking station and she totally loved that ... I thought I might be able to talk her into actually doing the real thing after that, but no way ... she was not budging (hehehe).

Then it was first off to see the pigs racing which she got a good kick out of and then off to the circus which isn't a real circus but a family that does a whole bunch of different acts. They even included their 5 and 3 year old in their trampoline act and since Jade is now in a trampoline and tumbling class, she could really have done all those kids did so asked me ... Mommy do you think I can join the circus too, now what is a mom to say to that ?

After that there was this really hickville show going on, mainly aimed at the kids but here you can see her on stage with them, she and a group of kids played along on a soap board, it was pretty cute actually :-)

The next few are just some of her on some of the many rides she went on.





After all the coasters she went on in Disney, these little ones were no big deal for her :-)







Oupa you better get your boat ready coz she loved this ride, unfortunately this was one of the rides that just had a crazy long line so she only went on this one once.



This one is always a favorite of Jades :-)



Anyway we left just before 9pm but it was a good long ride home, she fell asleep on the way which is very unusual for her these days so I knew she was totally worn out !!!

Sunday afternoon we went to Tina's house and between she and I we organized a little party for Dave including a cute ice cream cake ... we are really spoilt to have such great friends, thank you Tina, we love you guys !!!

And that was the end of yet another birthday weekend, how is it he always seems to get a birthday weekend ... not fair right !!!