Glad you still check in, Reta.
You know what?  You're absolutely right about yourself!

Server page numbering issue bump.

I don't know that guy, but he is right you know.....

If your ever up in Connecticut, shoot me an IM, dinner is on me.

Thank you, PWA. I've never spent time in the northeast, save for the one time stopping through JFK as an idiot teenager on the way to Europe. I hear it's beautiful there, especially in the fall. You never know, we just might take you up on the offer sometime.

Reta, I'm still praying for and thinking about you and your family.  I hope you guys can enjoy some great memories as you work through the tough moments over the holidays.

Wes

Hey there. I'm sorry I've been so absent of late. Life is still chugging right along.

Alex, the oldest, is slowly getting into the groove and becoming an adult. Both the girls got their driving permits, though Kristen quickly got herself grounded, first for two weeks, then extended to two months, then tacked on another month. She'll complete her sentence next Friday and she's already making plans. Alex has been chauffeuring Kristen around during her sentence so I haven't had to  It gives Alex some extra driving practice too.

Travis is still blossoming. Usually you don't notice small changes in someone when you see them every day, but I swear I see changes in Travis. He looks taller. Older. More like Jeff, I think. I only have one picture of him in little league when he was 9. He's wearing a hat and squinting in the sun, so it's hard to really see him.

Thanksgiving was nice. We made homemade pizzas. We were without Kristen, but we still had a nice day.

The boyfriend and I are still together. I was talking to a friend the other day and she asked about my love life. When I told her the boyfriend and I had been dating a year now, she said "Okay, now you have to go to a wedding, a funeral, and take a trip together to see if you are compatible" or something like that. I just laughed. Rules for someone and for something, I'm not sure what.

Last year I was having lunch with a friend when she told me about a family with whom her kids were close. Long story short - The kids' dad died unexpectedly and the mother was absolutely devastated. They had nothing. I was able to pay forward some of our Arfcom gift to this family. Last week my friend called me and said that the mother had gotten a settlement and wanted to also pay it forward. She wanted to know if I wanted the money to give it where I chose or if she could choose someone to receive it. I told her by all means, she should choose a worthy recipient. I felt so good giving the money and I wanted her to feel the same joy in giving to someone else. The gift that keeps on giving... Arfcom

That's great to hear!  Thanks for the update!

 


Also, no need for going to a wedding, funeral, and trip.   Just do a half day canoe trip together.  It will teach you everything about communication, teamwork, and how you two overcome things if they don't go the right way, literally.

Thinking of you and your family today, Reta.  I'm missing Jeff with you.  

It means a lot to me that you still post here; I'm glad to see you going forward with your life with your head held high.  Living your life with strength, integrity, and caring.  

God Bless.

Great idea! Of course, BF says no effing way, but I bet I can use my womanly charms to convince him otherwise  What's the worst that could happen?

Thank you dear. Yesterday was an okay day. I took off work and was lazy for much of the day. I only cried a little in the shower. We got the Christmas lights put up outside. Travis says we are now ready for Christmas

Looking at the pics of your Montana trip and seeing the bears reminded me of a story that my grandmother told us. When my grandparents were newly married, they and another couple went tent camping in Yellowstone. The women heard noises outside of the tent and were getting scared and apparently very talkative. One of the men said "Will you two keep it down?". They responded with "WE HEAR BEARS, DON'T WE?".

Always made me laugh, and yes laughter is some pretty good medicine.

So you ever gonna tell us your boyfriends screenname?

Came by to check in. Glad to hear things are going well.

Same here. Sounds like you are 'living life'.

Some day...

For the past few years we’ve made sugar cookies at Christmastime. Well, I make the cookies then we all decorate them. Now, if you haven’t figured out by now, we are pretty non-traditional. This is evident in our cookie “art”. You can see some traditionally-decorated cookies, but you’ll also see an octopus, a ghost, a heart, a couple fish, a “dragon”, a hot-air balloon, a guitar, a crocodile head, two spiders, a cat, a squirrel, and two handguns. There is also my feeble attempt at an AR15 bolt face. It’s fun to be creative and laugh and point at our less-than-stellar results. They’re still yummy, though!



Merry Christmas y'all

Merry Christmas wishes to you and your family, Reta. I like the bolt face logo cookie. I tried to get my kids to do fangs dripping blood on a snowman cookie, but they went with a conventional look. "Dad, you're so weird" will sound a little different when they're teenagers, I expect. I'm cooking Christmas dinner tomorrow for the inlaws. I'm glad to hear you're doing well, and I wish you the best for the holidays this year.

Reta, Merry Christmas wishes to you and your family

those cookies look good

Hey folks!

I'm still here! All is well, looking better actually. The middle child is behaving (as far as I know) and survived her three-month grounding. I just have a feeling she's up to things I would rather she not do, but you gotta give them room sometime. She comes home when she's supposed to and does what she's told without much attitude. Fairly average teenager.

The oldest is going to the local county college and got a 4.0 GPA last semester with her three classes. She's taking another three classes this semester. Hard to believe she'll be 21 this year! And she hasn't the slightest interest in drinking anything alcoholic. (Yes, I'm sure she's my kid.)

Travis seems to be growing half an inch a month. He's about eye level to the boobs right now. He still struggles with reading comprehension, but is otherwise doing well in school. Those damn state tests are kicking his butt, but will not keep him down!

The girls and I get to go to Italy this summer with an educational tour. We got our passports about a month ago. It's costing a pretty penny, but I'm sure the memories will be worth it. I figure good or bad, we'll have something to talk about for years to come.

The boyfriend is still magnificent as ever. He's so wonderful with Travis and treats me very well. For never being married or having kids of his own, he's doing a fine job of filling some gigantic shoes. I think we're very lucky to have him. Maybe this summer we'll try canoeing or kayaking on the Trinity River...

Glad to know things are going well for you, thanks for the update!

Thanks for the update.  Glad all is going well.

Renewed my NRA membership and went for the Life option before prices go up. $25/month is not bad at all. You can even pay $25/quarter - only $100 a YEAR! The gun club requires NRA membership anyway, so I figured what the hell?

All my best to you fine folks here!

Best to you, Reta, thanks for the updates. Hope the kids are well. Spring is coming...

Heck, spring has already sprung in Texas this year. We barely had a winter at all!

I cleaned the outside of all the downstairs windows last weekend, so I'm getting a jump on spring cleaning. The storm that blew through Tuesday pushed down some fence panels that were hanging on by a thread. I guess they're technically my neighbors' fence panels (the crossbeams face their yards), but of course they fell into my yard. I'll prop 'em up until they maybe decide to fix them or at least approach me about going in half.

I'm thinking I'd like a bigger shed this year. I need to assess the garage and shed contents to see how I want to arrange things and see if a bigger shed is really necessary. Need to get the gutters cleaned and get some gutter guards. That's not too lofty a to-do list, right? And of course there's always a painting project here and there...

Some of you may or may not remember a little over a year ago, my wife and I lost our 1st son.

I am happy to report our second son was born Sunday and is doing well.
i hope everything is well is everyone else.

That's wonderful news, Josh! I came across your card and picture of precious Porter just the other day. While you reserve a spot in your heart for Porter, your heart grows and still allows you joy to share with your new little one. I'm very happy for you and your family. You deserve all the best!

All my love!

Congratulations! Glad to hear it.

The projects never end and things keep breaking!  The downstairs AC finally went kaput. My usual AC guy gave me options ranging from $4600 to $8200. I'll get another quote tomorrow from another company.

The side neighbor and I got our shared fence fixed, but the back fence neighbors are in no hurry. Regardless, I have the same guy who fixed the side neighbor's fence lined up to work on the back fence. I'll ask those neighbors if they'll reimburse me half. If not, fine. MY fence!

Need to get the roof looked at (again). The adjuster is coming out next week.

I accomplished some yard work recently - weeded the flower beds, put down weed barrier material, mulch and a few plantings. I'm quite proud of my work. I trimmed a bunch of branches from a bunch of trees. The boyfriend asked if I was building a defensive berm with all those branches. (See pics on the beautifuldayinparadise blog. I'm too lazy to link them here.)

All is well

Congrats!

BigDozer66

PM sent.

BigDozer66

Jeff's birthday was yesterday. He would have been 48. We had a strawberry cake with cream cheese frosting for him. Strawberry cake and spice cake were his favorites.

We've had lots of teen drama lately. My middle child will be the death of me...

Travis is struggling a bit in school. He does well in math, but language arts is his weakness. He's never passed the state test for reading (this is his third year to take it). He reads, but has trouble analyzing the material. We're doing what we can at home to bolster his reading skills, even having him take past years' state tests, but I think it may be time to hold him back. He's one of the younger ones in his class and he still has speech issues. Maybe a year will help him catch up.

Teenage drama is the worst. I have a 16yo stepson, with a girlfriend. It's constant, and never ending drama.  I'm hoping my 7yo is better in this regard (be like me, and be oblivious to girls' hints till after I graduated high school)

 

My middle daughter vexes me.  

 
Always has, likely always will.

Love her always, but want to strangle her on occasion.

I'm not even close to being an expert, or even knowing what I'm talking about.  But that's never stopped me before...  

I would suggest finding Travis something he wants to read.  When I was young, my mom was the (small town) librarian.  I spent many an after-school hour in that dingy old library, and I'm absolutely convinced I'm a better man for it today.  For me it was the "Tom Swift" series of books that got me started.  I read and read and read, then moved on to other things.  At one point I actually read an encyclopedia - all volumes, cover to cover.  To this day I can still spit out obscure info that nobody would be expected to know about... unless, of course, they'd one day read an encyclopedia...

But I digress.  If you find him something he can immerse himself in and he starts reading because he wants to instead of because he "should", it might just help clear the logjam.

I wholeheartedly agree Travis might read more if he found something he enjoys. He likes the Magic Tree House series and Harry Potter (partly because he's already seen the movies), though the Harry Potter books are a bit challenging for him with all the made-up words and the occasional English accent thrown in. He had to read a variety of genres for school and I hoped he might find something that flipped his switch, but he's just not excited to read. Kids nowadays have so many other flashy, animated, bubblegum-infused, noisy options. Reading just can't compete. The boyfriend came up with a "reading bank" so that he could log reading hours in exchange for movie/TV or game time. That certainly got him reading more, but I still don't know that he understands what he's reading. He can answer questions about the material as long as the answer is plainly-stated in the book. When asked his opinion about a character, or what he thinks might happen next, or why a character did something, or any question that requires him to make his own connections, he struggles.

In preparation to re-take the state reading test, we administered some previous tests that we downloaded from the TEA web site. (He did NOT like spending his Saturday taking a test!) Notably, when answering questions about a play he read, he got every question right. It seems that kind of layout is easier for him to understand.

We found out yesterday that Travis didn't pass on his second effort. While he is doing okay in his other subjects, actually doing really well in math, I think it's time to hold him back. The school administrators will likely argue that he should be promoted to 6th grade, but this question about retaining him has come up over and over. He's a young 5th grader, is smaller that the other kids, has mild cerebral palsy, and some attachment issues, in addition to not passing what the state has established as the criteria for being ready for the next grade. Failing the state test is pretty much my excuse to finally do what I felt we needed to do years ago. I've talked to him about it and, while he's not thrilled, he understands. We used a video-game analogy - if you don't collect all the coins or you don't complete the level in the allotted time, you have to try again. I told him that his dad and I considered holding him back a few times before, but his teachers could show us that he'd made improvement, that they'd implement special interventions, yada, yada... I'm sure they'll show us that he's still improving and throw a bunch of statistics as us. All things considered, I think holding him back and giving him another year to mature would help him more than passing him on to 6th grade.

I also worry about him being bullied. Kids can be so mean!

Meh - his dad was a fighter.  Travis will do fine.

We are holding our 5 year old back in Pre K this year for a lot of the same reasons you stated. Plus, he is at an age that it wont stick with him. Good luck and don't let the school bully you into a decision you do not want. A parent knows what is right for there child.

This is copied from my blog. I'm too lazy to link the pics here, so go to the blog if you want to see them.

BIG POST!! Nothing earth-shattering… just a LOT of content, since I haven’t updated in so long.

This must be the year the house goes to shit.

BOTH HVAC units have been completely replaced. Only the ductwork is unchanged. In that process, the city has to come out and inspect. Well, the overflow pans had backflow, so it didn’t pass inspection. The AC guys came back out, rerouted the overflow drains so they could be lower than the AC units. The city was to come back out to reinspect but the inspector said they were short-handed, that they are familiar with Reliant’s work and he was confident that he could just pass it without reinspecting. I made sure he knew it didn’t pass the first time and this was to be a reinspection. He was still okay with passing it sight unseen.

Next the roof shingles were replaced. The roofer had to access the attic because one of his guys broke a standpipe and once he pulled the attic ladder down, he smelled gas. Knowing that the AC was recently replaced, he suggested I call my AC guys. I called and they came out that evening. The house reeked of natural gas by that point. The AC guys were very apologetic and said that one of the gas lines was not as tight as it could have been and they tightened it down, checked for leaks and said everything was good.

That was on a Wednesday. By Saturday (Memorial Day weekend), the house still reeked of gas so I called Atmos, not sure if it just takes forever for that smell to dissipate or if we still had a leak somewhere. The Atmos guy came out and did a pressure test and said there is a leak but he couldn’t find it. So he shut off the gas. (Luckily I had already cooked dinner.) He said I needed to call my plumber to find the gas leak. On a Saturday. Memorial Day weekend.

Have you taken a cold shower? They SUCK!

I called my usual plumber and left a message. Then I looked for an emergency plumber. Though I could get a plumber out, he wouldn’t be able to do anything with it because he would need a permit from the city. Of course city offices were closed for the Memorial Day weekend so nothing could be done until Tuesday. (The worst part of a cold shower is cold water down your back!) Finally the plumber came out, found the leak (a roof nail punctured the gas flex line running along the underside of the roof), did the repairs, and $1100 later (thank you, boyfirend)… we still had no gas. (COLD SHOWERS SUCK!)

The inspector came out Wednesday and okayed the repair, with the caveat that we ground the main gas pipe. (This was a mercifully easy thing to do.) He was to let Atmos know electronically that it was okay to turn on the gas. I was told by the plumber that since this is an electronic process, Atmos should know within an hour or so. I fully expected Atmos to automagically show up and turn on the gas. Late Wednesday, no Atmos. No gas. No hot shower. I called first thing Thursday morning and was told that the homeowner is supposed to call Atmos to set up a time to turn on the gas. >:\       Though the Atmos lady I talked to said it would normally be the next day (Friday), she would override that and get someone out the same day. By early afternoon we were taking HOT showers again.

The back fence was replaced on Memorial Day. It is absolutely georgeous!! It’s nothing fancy. Just upright. All one color. And in one long, straight line.

The kids have wrapped up their 2015-2016 school year. Travis did not pass his second attempt at the STAAR Reading test. He understands what this means and is accepting. He really is a resilient kid. I am confident he will do fine, probably better, getting a chance to catch up. Kristen has been… Kristen. Let’s recap this school year:

•    October 2015, shortly after getting her license, goes to a friend’s birthday party but winds up at another kids house with boys and alcohol and no parents. After progressive revelations about this, lying, and sneaking out in the middle of the night with a friend WHILE GROUNDED, her final sentence: grounded for three months.


•    April 2016 – was past curfew getting home. When she finally answered my call, she was upset because she was stuck in traffic and low on gas. When I asked where she had encountered so much traffic, she said she had been at a party in a not-so-great part of town and was stuck in night-time road construction traffic. I talked her through getting to a gas station. When she got home her friends called her to see where she was. They were still at the party and stuck there because a friend lost her car keys. Her car was holding some of their work uniforms hostage. They were messed up. Some had been drinking and eating special brownies to excess. The boyfriend, Kristen and I drove to the party and brought home two of the kids to crash in the living room. Only one stop on the way home for one of the girls to puke. Kristen and her boyfriend had broken up fairly recently, so I took it easy on her; final sentence: grounded for one week.


•    Late April 2016 – was caught skipping class with three of her friends. They were in her car in the school parking lot, the idiots! I got a call from the assistant principal. I no longer felt sorry for her, so her final sentence was grounded for two weeks.

Even with all this, I still say Kristen’s a good kid. I know it could be worse!

I started a little project while the boyfriend was gone for three weeks. (See what happens when I get bored?) I have long hated the giant plant ledge in the living room. So, I seized the opportunity to hack away at it. I just hate the way the plant ledge butts into the fireplace wall. The idea is to get rid of the plant ledge abutting the fireplace wall, put the stone on that I’ve had for over a year, and build a closet on top of the remaining archway which would be accessible from the landing.

I’m fortunate to have a wonderful guy helping me. (Or I’m helping him?) He’s one of Jeff’s buddies from the guard. He just shakes his head at me and my projects. He’s a sweet guy, but I know he’ll be glad when I’m gone on vacation!

Alex, Travis and I participated in an American Cancer Society Relay for Life event last month. I was on a team with some folks from work. We walked, and walked, and walked, and walked… I think I counted 25 laps around the track. It was an interesting experience. I didn’t even cry much. I’d like to do it each year, if possible.

My computer’s power supply got zapped in one of the storms we’ve had over the past couple of months. Being the wife of an IT guy, I was often exposed to computer guts all over the floor and paid attention to what was going on, so I was able to buy a power supply, install it and get my computer back up and running.

We celebrated Jeff’s 48th birthday this year with a strawberry cake. I did the writing with cookie icing – not meant for cakes. Just a few hours after taking this photo, the heart and flower became mere blobs and the writing started to blur together. Jeff would have loved it anyway! Maybe I need to learn to make more manly cakes?


This morning I went to open the microwave door and half the handle broke. I’m laughing on the inside.

ETA: I continue to be very thankful for the generosity of my ARFCOM family. Many of the recent repairs could not have been made without it.

How appropriate for ARFCOM - a microwave break.  It's California compliant.

Hope all is well ! ! !

Well hey! It's been too long, I know.

It's been a good summer. No kids were grounded! The middle child is strutting her stuff cuz she's a senior this year. Thankfully, the school sells a "senior package" which includes their parking pass, reserved parking spot, prom ticket, and yearbook. Maybe, just maybe, I won't be nickel-and-dimed all year. She has a schedule issue to fix, but she's all set. She now says she wants to be a veterinarian. I've asked her "Have you seen your grades?" She needs to step it up, big time.

The oldest is enrolled for the fall semester at the county college. She still doesn't know what she wants to do, so she's pursuing general studies. Neither of the girls have found work yet, though they're not trying too hard. The oldest does some commissioned digital art work so she has a little bit of pocket change, but she needs a real job.

Travis is his usual happy self. He got glasses on his birthday and I swear he looks more like Jeff. We just had his birthday party yesterday. Thirteen kids came, most of them girls!

Travis is registered for fifth grade again. That's been a really tough decision on my part. We had meet-the-teacher Friday night and I really like his teachers. Maybe fresh teachers, special education, and an extra year to grow, mature, and expand his vocabulary will get him on the right track.

We had a great vacation to Gulf Shores. The drive was not terrible and we stayed in a nice condo on the beach. Middle child started getting bored by about day 9, and I wasn't able to arrange a kayak trip before we left, but all-in-all we had a good time.

My house project is nearing completion. The plant ledge is gone, the closet is finished, things are painted; I just need to put the stone around the fireplace. I'll probably be painting this week while the boyfriend is gone. With Travis's party over, I can go back to making messes

Hey Reta.  
Just checking up on you and the kids.  Hope everyone is doing well.