The way I see it.

The way I see it toddler cuddles are pretty sweet.  They don't happen often, so when they do I cherish them.

The way I see it, I would do ANYthing to make my boy feel better when he's sick.  But, by about the third day, it all just gets old.  Even the cuddles.

The way I see it, the snake by the front door actually helped me out a bit.  If the snake hadn't been there one day a long time ago, then I wouldn't neurotically check out the front window before opening the door.  If I wasn't constantly checking first, I wouldn't have seen the dead bird by the front door, would have opened it, Matthew would have walked out, and I am sure of it, he would touched/picked up the dead bird.  The snake saved me from that.

The way I see it, if it's so hot outside that my sunglasses instantly fog up when I walk outside, then there is no reason good enough for me to go outside.

The way I see it, nothing good can come of trying to go grocery shopping with a whiney toddler in tow.

The way I see it, there is an ear plug company out there making millions off of people like me.  My husband snores so loud it's the only way I can sleep. (ha. you thought I was going to say I wear earplugs to ignore the whining. I would never do that. :-))

The way I see it, if my toddler pukes in the neighborhood pool, thus shutting it down for the rest of the night, mommy deserves a glass of wine when she gets home (you know, especially if the kid is fine and all).

The way I see it, mommy always deserves a glass of wine at the end of the day. :-)

And finally....

some house pictures! I took some new pictures now that we've done a little painting and hung a few things on the walls. 

Front hall

Playroom

New curtains

Cute pictures I bought in Dallas.

Hallway into living room (kitchen off to the right)

Living room

Fireplace.

Living room

Eating nook.

Guest bathroom

Master Bedroom.  I love the new furniture. The walls still need to be painted (blue) and things hung on the walls.

I love these lamps!!

How I spent my birthday: painting the bathroom. I love how it turned out!

Matthew's little oasis in the backyard.

So that's almost everything on the first floor, except for the kitchen (haven't done a thing to) and the guestroom (still a mess).

We have a lot to do upstairs--Mike made the bonus room a man cave/theater.  I have plans to paint and decorate Matthew's room, but haven't yet.  There's also another guest room up there that could use some attention.

More pictures.

Matthew and I spent the long weekend in Dallas visiting our friend Susan.  I forgot to take pictures most of the time, but we had a fabulous time, shopped till we dropped (well, maybe Mommy was the only one who dropped), ate too much, and had a blast hanging out with Susan. 

One morning we visited a nearby splash park to visit with another friend. 

Matthew loved it.

Hi friend!

Safety first.

Matthew's new bike helmet.

Tyler invited us to bring a friend day at Soccer Tots.
Matthew didn't "get" soccer yet, but he had fun in the obstacle course.

I celebrated my (gasp!) 35th birthday last week.  I spent the day painting the Master bathroom and then we went out to dinner with some friends and family.

Here are my boys.

Chrissie, me and Matthew waiting for our table. A LONG wait. 

I had a great birthday!

Matthew loved the cake!

The Tuetkens.  I love that we are living near them again!

My cousins kids.  They were troopers. We waited a long time to be seated and they were so hungry and tired. 

HELLO?!?!?!

Well, when the third person told me I needed to blog, I realized this was serious.  I don't know what has happened, besides the fact that we are just loving life in Texas! Despite the humidity and heat (which is nothing to make light of---it's disgusting! Gross! I hate it!), we are settling in just fine.  Mike and I joke all the time about how we have likely done more exciting things in the short (almost) 2 months that we've been here then we ever did in Oregon.  Suddenly we have a social life. We have people inviting us to dinner at their house, and we had a backyard full of people for our first cookout.  I know each move is fairly short lived, so we are making the most of our time here while we can!

Matthew is doing just fine.  He spent a few weeks one right after another getting sick when we first got here, but he's been feeling great lately.  We have found a playgroup, although we've only been to a couple of get togethers.  Timing hasn't worked out yet, but we are signed up to go to 2 next week.  He continues to be a little fish and would live at the pool if I let him.  We have several pools in our neighborhood that we use, as well as the gorgeous pool at the gym (which is where we swam today).

I'm going to dump a bunch of pictures--so I'll probably take a few posts to do it.

We went out and bought this very cool sprinkler for Matthew to play with in the backyard.

You can see on his face what he thought about that.

Taking a break at the very cook picnic table my cousins family handed down to him.

Hi.  I'm just chilling here in my sylish outfit.

In all seriousness, our yard is fenced in so I didn't see the need for a bathing suit. His swim diaper works just fine for coverage.

He loves his swings!

THIS is how humid it is here.  I tried to take pictures at our cookout and the camera lense kept fogging.

Matthew's friends Tyler and Andrew lounge around in the pool.  Don't worry, that can is not open.  Tyler just kept  running to the cooler and bringing one into the pool with him.  I don't blame him- it was probably much cooler than the water.