Miracles Do Happen!!!!

Okay, for those of you that don't know, Organization is not my strong point when it comes to things like my scrapbook stuff and my office/computer area becomes the catch all for my house. Don't get me wrong, I know where everything is, it just might take me a few minutes. I will find it however!!! Well, over the weekend, I took a trip to visit Greg in Northern California. (blog for that to follow later!!) While I was gone my sister Alycia and my OCD friend Tonia decided to get a head start on "organizing" my scrapbook/office/living room area. Don't think that this is an easy undertaking!! They did this with Alycia's 3 kids, Tonia's 2 kids, and yes my 5 kids!!! Yes that is right, you counted correctly!!! 10 Kids!!!

Well this is a photo of the process. It wasn't the beginning but it was in the process of the whole ordeal!!! (Day 2 by the way!!!) This is the living room. Everything from the office has been exported to this room.

This is the office/scrapbook room. In the process!!! Well folks!! No matter what anyone tells you, Miracles do happen. This is certainly nothing short of a miracle. If you are waiting for a miracle, keep the faith!! It does happen. The following photos are proof!!! Everything has it's place in whatever container holds it. And no worries if you don't know what that place is, each container is labeled!!!
These cubicles are a perfect match to the colorful walls in the room!!
Notice all the neatly labeled containers and organized shelves.
And no worries, Tim survived the remodel!! I did have to have a say in something!! Yes that is what I chose!! The Tim poster and if you noticed the little bag of Fritos in the photo of the desk on top by the books, yes those are Tim McGraw Fritos!!!!!
Well, I am looking forward to being able to sit down and actually use the wonderful scrapbook supplies that I have so wonderfully organized now. It is going to take some discipline to make sure it stays this way. I am sure I can do it. I am very proud of it now and want to show it off to everyone. I am going to be hosting our next Scrap 'n yap event. That will be fun. I am grateful to Tonia and Alycia for sticking with me and being diligent and patient. They did a great job even under the circumstances. I know I am not the easiest person to help and have a dificult time organizing all of the things that are going on in my house. Thanks.

Maddie is a Pop Addict!!

Okay for some reason Maddie has become quite the "pop" (or soda for those of you not from around here!!) addict. It does not matter what kind of pop it is or what kind of container you try to hide it from her in. She loves it and feels entitled to it. She will let you know of her deep desire for it through many different methods. Screaming is where she starts, it is quickly followed by kicking with the screaming. When her hands flailing is added in, that is when her face turns red. Eventually she will resort to holding her breath. When all that fails she will resort to the sneak attack which was used in the photo below. The photos in this post were taken at the new sprinkler park they have put in our city. It is a lot of fun and the kids really enjoy it. Maddie however does not like the water. I thought I would be optimistic and put a swim diaper and a swimsuit on her. She did not want to go in the water. She did however want to drink anything she could get her lips on . She climbed up on the table and drank all the leftover capri sun left over by the other children. When all that was gone she made the sneak attackn on Alycia's pop!!!

She just kept drinking that pop without even stopping to breathe through her mouth. When we were laughing and taking photos of it, she would only look at us out of the corner of her eye!!
Well, what was not figured in to the drinking equation was that she had a swim diaper on!!( For those of you that don't know, a swim diaper is made to hold in any accidents, not to absorb them!!) Well it was only a few moments when her little bladder and swim diaper could hold no more!! All of a sudden on top of the table, it started flowing out of her little diaper like a fountain!! She didn't seem to notice or care!! Alycia on the other hand decided that was too much and you can see she is taking off!!!
My first reaction of course is to take a photo!!!

Of Course Trish and I had to visit Tim!!

Well, it seems every summer that Trish and I are together, we have to make a visit to a Tim concert!! (Coincidence that there is always a concert when we are together?) There is a funny story that goes along with this one. No one got removed by security or arrested!! We decided to go at the last minute and Greg had to spend quite some time getting the tickets emailed to him. We left a little late and had to drive all the way up to Birmingham for the concert. We had been working on her house all day and were very tired. We finally got out the door after a whirlwind dinner and leaving Greg to babysit all 7 kids!! We were about an hour into our hour and 10 minute drive up there when Trish asked the question, "Did you get the tickets?" I of course gasped and said no!!!

We were panicked and frantic. We got on the phone with Greg who went right to the fridge and yes there the two tickets were on the front of the fridge. We were able to find a Holiday Inn right near the venue. I ran in and frantically explained my situation. The women at the desk were very sympathetic and quickly pointed me to a computer where Greg was able to walk me through to his email and reprint the tickets!! We can never just do something the conventional way. There always has to be a story.

Anyway, we had really great seats and it was a great concert!! Of course it was outside so we had to endure the heat until the sun went down and it got a little cooler!! It was well worth it though!!

Swimming in Alabama!!

We did a lot of swimming at Tricia's house. At first Maddie did not like it at all!! She managed to figure out how to climb out of her float. After a few days she decided this swimming wasn't so bad especially since it was 100 degrees with about 97% humidity!!
Christopher loved the pool and improved on his swimming skills a lot. He did a lot of swimming without any floats too!! He was very brave.
Zack impoved his going under the water. That was the one thing he needed work with at his swimming lessons this past fall. He did a really cool flip under the water. He was really proud of it.
Taylor and Savannah were in the pool everyday. Sometimes even by 7 in the morning. Now Taylor has some beautiful GREEN highlights in her hair. I tried to convince her that it was cool and people pay a lot of money for that. She wasn't buying it!!!
Now she is just bored with the whole thing!! (It was pretty close to bedtime too!!)

Our trip to Alabama!!

Well, while I am making the storm post, I guess I will add some recent events. We recently made a trip to my sister Tricia's in Alabama for 2 weeks. We were lucky enough to keep Greg for the whole trip. He took a bag packed for business waiting for the call that he had to go. We managed to avoid that until this Sunday. We arrived home about 9:30 Saturday night and we dropped him off at the airport Sunday at about Noon.

Well, here are some photos from our trip to Tricia's house. This first one is a great shot of Maddie's newest expression. She can sure do a mad face!! No one really likes getting this face from her.
The following photos are from a trip to the Wild Animal Safari in Pine Mountain, GA!! These animals were huge!! We rented a Zebra striped van (15 passenger) and loaded up the gang for a 2 hour drive through this animal filled preserve. They would stick their heads in the van to get these nasty looking pellets we were supposed to feed them. These animals were apparently very hungry!!
The giraffe sticking his head into Greg's window for a tasty pellet.
This water buffalo's face kind of reminded me of Maddie's "mad face"!! Look real close you will see it too!!

Hungry Zebras!!

Our Creepy Storm!!

Well, last night we had a really creepy storm. It was the first storm since our freak Tornado on Saturday night. I think that since the tornado, everyone is a little more on edge. Taylor was pacing the floor at Mom's house and finally talked her into bringing her back home. Apparently it was going to be better at our house. Actually, we didn't really get much more of the storm than some lightning and a rain shower that lasted about 2 minutes. The lucky folks to the immediate north of us got the brunt of it all!!
This is in front of the house to the north of us. The clouds just looked so creepy.
This is from the backyard. I think that since it was sunset, it made the colors look even cooler.