He’s there

I am a very skeptical person. I don’t want to be glass half empty but I try to never count my chickens before they hatch. This has made me question God many times. We have dealt with a lot in the past 6 months (although it may seem nothing – I rather take when we have rather than losing a loved one) which made me question if he was even there. It doesn’t help that in college my major was Geography and I was fed a lot of atheist crap from my professors.

 

Anyways, we have had some issues….

 

Two days after I returned to work from maternity leave I was laid off. Matt’s grandmother died in March. Our water heater blew and flooded our first floor in May – while we were in Austin for the weekend. Our Claims adjuster was difficult to work with. Someone hit my car in the parking lot In June – making us take out yet another claim. It has been 8 weeks and our house is sitting empty with walls gone and concrete floors. Like I said I questioned his existence. Why did this keep happening?

 

Oh gosh, I don’t do well with problems. But then I sat and thought….

 

I was laid off – but I was also given 12 weeks severance and I also got my yearly bonus which makes it possible for us to afford this home mishap (upgrading our carpet)

 

I was hit in the parking lot – the lady that came out of the SUV begged me to not call the police because she was on probation (yikes). I didn’t and she complied with my insurance and I didn’t have to pay for our deductible.

 

God is not going to prevent stuff from happening to us. He is trying to show me that he is here and is laying opportunities in my lap.

 

There is this frame at my work (yes – I got a new job 3 weeks after I was laid off – so I received double income for 8 weeks – THANK you God!)

 

 

“At the heart of each crisis is a tremendous opportunity.”

 

To make a long story short we were going to have to pay about 6k out of pocket for the repairs (not including upgrades) We asked our contractor and our adjustor to help us. Our adjustor upped his estimate and our contractor lowered his and everyone is in agreement. We are going to start work on our house soon.

 

Thank you JESUS. I miss our house.

 

Can I keep this up?

I love to blog. I am not very good at it but I thoroughly enjoy it. I love to post about really good deals I get and just about my life albeit it is incredibly boring. I have always blogged off and on and have changed webpages multiple times. I have always quit my blogs but have just missed it so incredibly much. I don’t have a lot of time for it these days (you always have time, I just don’t manage it well) but need to because I really enjoy it! Plus, blogger friends are fantastic!

I am starting a change come July 1st. I have got to lose weight. Once I lose the weight I usually keep it off just fine. Incentives work well too!

I had a baby boy 11/24/15….I lost the baby weight pretty fast….but I still have baby weight from baby boy #1 03/14/13 …yeah… I need to lose about 6 lbs. The incentive if i lose the weight is that I am then allowed to go and buy shutterfly christmas cards! I love them but haven’t done them in a while because they are pricey!

Here is my baldy, Linc, at 7 months old

my 3 yr old, Maxim 😀

 

 

Standstill

I feel like we are in a massive traffic standstill. We have not moved at all with getting our house fixed. We had 3 contractors come out and 2 of them were very close with each other in regards to the price range. Unfortunately our insurance quoted us for 5-6k lower. So we are now fighting to get that extra money.

We shouldn’t have to pay extra to get our house fixed right? We understand paying out of pocket for upgrades but we shouldn’t to get our house back to what it was.

I just feel like our life is on hold. I don’t want to live in the apartment anymore. I want to be “home.”

Praying this week we get some answers. We need our house.

Max calls our house the sick house : )

Lincoln on the other hand… does not care 😉

Nice Blog Name

What a nice blog name…it has been hard to choose joy since May 1st – our water heater in our attic blew and just wrecked havoc on our house. My mom was watching our pugs, because we were in Austin. She came back to the house around 930am to water gushing out of garage. When she opened the door the water was up to the baseboards and gushing out the front door.

She called us and we had to leave immediately. Luckily we have a great family and great friends because Jesse and Jen came an helped along with our awesome neighbors, Keith and April. We also had Kevin and Preston helped towards the end.

 

 

We have been living with my famiy for the past two weeks. We are going to be moving into an apartment tomorrow! We used to live at this complex back in the day so we are familiar and that is nice.

 

Catching up, once again.

I haven’t done this in a while and I realize that I do have family that does not live near us who would love to see pictures of these precious babes.

 

Selfies add 10lbs to the camera. Linc looks like a completely different baby!

There’s my babe

Saturday Morning love

Selfies add 10lbs to the camera. Linc looks like a completely different baby!

Selfies add 10lbs to the camera. Linc looks like a completely different baby!

Selfies add 10lbs to the camera. Linc looks like a completely different baby!

Silly time 😀

 

 

Diaper Cost Spreadsheet

So we will have two kids under our roof in November. That means 2x the daycare. Daycare is super expensive so I am trying to start being cheap frugal and start eliminating unnecessary spending and to start saving up.

We are trying to get Max out of diapers. He fully understands the diaper situation and doesn’t care for the potty right now. We are still working on it, I even had a dream last night that he went potty…love those awesome dreams!

I decided to create a spreadsheet after I heard that someone actually loved Parent’s Choice diapers (Walmart). I am always skeptical of cheap diapers but my kiddo does not have sensitive skin and the only diapers I REFUSE to buy are Pampers (something about that mesh).

btw – this is for size 4

So I went and bought Diapers at Walmart! There’s a little money to save right there!

I am also going to start buying a pack of size 1/2 diapers to stock up for November!

There is a great deal going on at Target, if you buy 2 large packs of Up&Up diapers you get a $25 giftcard. Great deal and diapers end up costing around 13 cents (someone told me). I just can’t afford two $37.99 packs of diapers (192 count)

We have an $80 kiddo budget per month and Max needs some wipes and some new shirts so this one will have to be passed on right now. Like I need a giftcard to Target…. you don’t go there and not buy more than $100 worth of goodies….

Now some pictures of Max this week…

Long time no see

It has been forever. So Sorry! When I found out I was pregnant the world basically changed! I was super sick at the start. Nausea without vomiting is no joke. I had no energy and couldn’t eat. I finally got Diclegis – which is FDA approved for Pregnant people – it is basically Unisom and B6. That made a worlds of difference but didn’t change the fact that my energy level was at 0%.

I am now 14 weeks along and am starting to feel better energy wise. I still take Diclegis – only because I am scared not to. I still get sick to my stomach at night so I know it is not over.

You may not want to come to our house anytime soon. It is a zoo.

These past 3 months in a nut shell…

– Went to a wedding, found out i was pregnant the next day!

– Came home from wedding to find out Presley was sick, took him to emergency vet in Boerne and found out Presley had a UTI and has crystals – diet change for the rest of his life $280 later

– Found out baby is due 11/17!

–  Had to go back to the vet because somehow Fleas got in our house and caused Presley to lick everything… another $280 spent

– Max running around like a mad man most of the time and getting bumps and bruises all over the place

Our Annoucement!

Max has become obsessed with Curious George – he will try to take him everywhere

Max was sick the other day. I saw on camera that he was getting some love. Our teachers are great. She had him go get his blankey and then put it over him and rocked him. We left work early to go grab him and he stayed home the next day with a low grade fever.

He is brand new today!

Pinterest

I have always been a huge fan of pinterest. It took me a while to come aboard but I haven’t looked back since!

I have 2,108 pins and 36 boards. I pin stuff just to be able to look back on it. I don’t have a baby girl but I sure as heck have the cutest baby girl rooms if that ever happens (I am pretty sure Matt and I will have a boy filled family, lol)

I have made a pact to myself to complete a few projects by October. I always want to make the cutest holiday crafts and fill silly for doing it in July but then the fall comes and busy happens.

Here are my pinterest projects!

A “Seasons” Wall. I have not actually seen this but we do have a wall in the kitchen (where there is a dry erase calendar that still says “December” on it….that my dad antagonizes me every time he sees it. I am  going to take this down and make a picture collage of pictures about each season!

Here are some Spring pictures that I will put up

http://www.ellaclaireinspired.com/spring-flower-wreath-free-printable/

A “Hero” wall – About 2 years ago (I know, I am BAD!) I asked if I could get pictures from both of our families of everyone who was in the military. I wanted to make a wall that Max could look at and be proud of. Yeah, I have the pictures and in frames but nothing is up. I came across this pin the other day and hope to find a good picture to be in the center of all the pictures J

Halloween Countdown, Thanksgiving Countdown, Christmas Advent – I am going to continue with what We did for Thanksgiving – Maxim loved the thankful tree. I will also keep the Spider Halloween countdown as he got a kick out of that. I just need to get them set up and ready.

A Secret Christmas Present. I have to make 4 of these.

Believe

Happy Birthday Jesus Box (another Christmas Advent)

 

Elf on the shelf ready and prepared for all his activities (My mom got him one last year and we just had him hang out on the fireplace and he pointed to him a lot. I have a feeling he will be ready this year)

 

Completely finish my GOD quiet book – yeah, I almost finished this last year and did nothing with It, time to finish!!

 

Paint the guest bathroom!! I have a wonderful vision in my head but I believe I will have to buy my fake pink peonies first before I go looking for a paint color. I am thinking a green but I am unsure right now.

Our first project should be the bathroom but I am going to be working hard on the Hero wall and Seasons wall!

Now for some Max pics!

That is Max above…with his feet on the table, lol

Maxim is two!

Our love bug turned two on March 14th!!

Look at this booger!!

Now two!!!

We got him some balloons! He freaked!

We “mistakenly” got Max this chalk paint…our whole patio is covered as wells as his body! It wipes off so easily though!

He got some chalk from his Auntie C!!

I did not want to have a party, After his big 1st bday shindig I just wanted close family and friends and am waiting until he wants to have a party.

We went classy and popped on over to Chuck E. Cheese.

The toddler zone was crappy but we did what we could!!

He wanted to play Skee Ball so badly so we let him and had to yell “FOUR” a lot!!

He loves Gigi’s Cupcakes!

We spent all Sunday outside painting and hanging out in the sandbox…

My mom got him a Wobble, it is massive and a lot of fun to play with!

My parents going to Maui!! I had the pleasure of dropping them off at the Airport on Sunday Morning! I love airports!! It was super busy at 7am!

Max’s Stats!

Max had his 2 year check up this past Friday!

The kid won’t eat, but he’ll drink the heck out of Milk, Water, and super watered down juice!!

Stats: 34 inches and 26 lbs

We have always known the he wouldn’t be a massive child. They say you should double their height when they are 2 and that is how tall he will be…5’8″ it is!

26lbs is in the 40th or so percentile. We were floored, lol! We thought he would be underweight!

His screaming issues at bedtime are normal (the past two nights he hasn’t screamed when I put him to bed)

His eating issues are normal for this age!

We get home, I make his lunch and I hear this business going on. All toys were saved. The TP sadly met the end of their life and Max promptly laid on the wet floor.

Awesome!