Pictures and Listings

So today I have focused my efforts on our master bedroom and photos. I have been cleaning and organizing our bedroom. It is not in bad shape but it is the room that is often on my daily cleaning schedule and often turns into a dumping ground when we have company coming over. So I am almost done with the basic cleaning and then I will begin to pack up things such as books that we never look at and bag up items for a yard sale. I have read that it is best to clear out any unused items because it helps the room to look clean and spacious... that is my goal. My other job for the day has been taking pictures and adding our home to listings. I am taking pictures as I get a room prepared. So far I have pictures from outside, the kitchen, dining room, kids bath, attic entry, 1 view of the bonus room, the boys room and a photo of the trey ceiling in the master bedroom. I can't decide if I want to post pictures of Taryn's room before or after I paint it. Right now it is pepto- pink. I will be painting it a nice neutral brown/tan color... unless someone comes along in the meantime that likes the pink! Now I will take a break from my cleaning to go eat with Jake... among other things and then continue (maybe with Jake's help) with out closet this evening.
Here is the link of our pictures... so far... if you know of anyone who might be interested :) I plan to go back later and add room dimensions so people can try to visualize the space.
http://picasaweb.google.com/lisabdickey/House#

For Sale By Owner

This has been a great house and we have the best neighbors but we feel that we need to make this financial decision for the betterment of our family. We have been praying about this for months. So why now? We have gone back and forth about what is best for our family. We decided that having our finances in better shapes and not having to pinch pennies is better than living in a big house. Please keep us in your prayers and if you have any advice on For Sale By Owner we would love to hear it. Also if you know of anyone who is looking for a house in Dalton please send them our way!

I am going to try to blog throughout this whole process. For the last week I have been cleaning, clearing, sorting, etc. So far the laundry, kitchen and dining rooms are almost show ready. The kids rooms look good enough but I am trying not to displace to much of their stuff at one time. I worked on the bonus room yesterday. It was a MESS... but not any more. It still needs some work but for the first time in months I can see the floor! That was just part of the bonus room... hopefully tomorrow I can begin on bonus room part 2. It actually feels good to clean and clear out spaces. I am hoping to be done with all of this by next weekend so that I can begin to plan a yard sale... if I have enough stuff worth selling. If any of you are interested in joining me for a yard sale at my house let me know... we get good yard sale traffic.

St. Simons Part 2

So we took care of the whole RoofBag situation and took off down the road. The drive went pretty good and the dvd player was awesome! When the kids are watching a movie we have to listen to it because it is routed through the speakers but it was much nicer listening to it than 3 kids whining about the car ride :) It took us about 6 hours to get there. We arrived and quickly got into camp mode. We got all of our name tags, schedules, tshirts and stuff, unpacked, went for a walk and ate dinner. Then we dropped the kids off and went to our first chapel service. This years speaker was Brad Bird and he spoke on Romans 12; how we belong to God, we are part of God's body, and we are to love each other... of course it was a lot deeper than this but I am not going to type out all of my notes... haha. After chapel we got to break up into our small groups which is always a great way to get advice from other coaches (for Jake) and coaches wives (for me). There just happened to be a guy in Jake's group that had taught at Apalachee when Jake was there. After huddles we went to the adult fellowship, a time for the adults to eat snacks and socialize. We spent the first evening social talking with the guy Jake used to work with and his wife. They only live 30 from my parents house so I am hoping one of these days we can go down for a visit. The next mornig we were up at 6:30 and off to breakfast by 7am. From breakfast we took the kids to their groups and went to competition. Jake did a mixture of sports everyday from football, to kick ball, to softball, to his favorite volleyball. I also competed everyday with women coaches and coaches wives. I have to say that this year was much more competitive than last year. We played volleyball, wiffleball, kickball, and ultimate frisbee. After competitions we would go to a morning session. This years was called Balanced. It was about balancing finances. It was amazing! We only got to hear the first 3 lessons at camp and are doing the rest here at home (balancedonline.org you can watch the lessons and download the pdf's). After morning sessions was huddles, lunch then free time. Our first day of free time was spent napping. I had a headache and Jake was going to a class for FCA huddle leaders so the kids and I slept, it was the best 3 hour nap ever! The next day we went to the light house and the playground overlooking the ocean and then hit up Dairy Queen. Our last day of free time we went to the pool. After free time was supper, then break out sessions, chapel, adult fellowship and child pickup.

Oh and how can I forget Thursday night. Thursday night was date night. As we sat in the cafeteria waiting on the kids to finish eating a storm blew in. It poured and the wind blew and then it was over... so we thought! Jake and I dropped off the kids and headed out to eat. As we headed towards the bridge a HUGE storm appeared. It was raining in every direction, the wind was pulling the car up rom the road, it was hailing... it was scarey. We made it across the bridge. We were in a state of shock but we decided to go ahead and eat (at Five Guys and it was YUMMY!) then we walked around Target waiting on the storm to go away. When we felt it was safe to venture back out we went through the Chic-Fil-A drive through for a milk shake and then headed back to the camp. It was the night the kids were to perform and I was scared that the weather would cause us to miss out but we made it back in time... in time to find out the power was out in most of the buildings. We were asked to pick up Taryn and T and take them with us to watch the older kids sing. Instead of the kids singing infront of just parents in our evening chapel they were moved to the teen chapel because they had power. It was great! Hundreds of teenagers worshipping and then cheering for our kids on the stage. I believe some of the kids were a bit shocked. They were up on stage in front of hundreds of teens and perents and siblings but they did great.

It was a really fun week. It was exciting because this year we had 6 families from our area that were able to go! I know I had much more to say about camp but I will have to post more later as I think about it. There is just so much that happens during this time of relationship building, fellowship and worship.

St.Simons Part 1

June 29th was when our summer really kicked into gear. I drove for 6 hours! Yes, me... who usually falls asleep after 2 hours of driving managed to drive the full 6 hours to St.Simons. I really surprised myself. Now the drive home was a different story. Jake drove and I am pretty sure I fell asleep around the 2nd hour. We will talk about the drive home later. Back to the drive there. Our new car does not have as much room for luggage as our van did so I ordered a luggage bag to strap to the car. The night before we left I loaded the bag and carefully followed the directions to strap it on our car, with no luggage rack. It's ok, the directions explained how to do it. As we started down the interstate the straps started to vibrate. It's ok, the directions said this might happen. So we pulled over and I adjusted the straps and we proceeded down the road. The straps seemed better and we drove through Atlanta. An hour or so past Atlanta several cars drove by pointing at the bag on the car. Jake looks at our cars shadow and said that's how it has looked the whole time so I don't bother to pull over. But then I realize we are getting horrible gas mileage so I use the side mirror to point up so I can get the bag into view. The front of the bag had folded up causing an L shape. No wonder our gas mileage was so bad :( We found a rest area and I looked over the bag, looked in the car and said we are not going to waste any more time. Jake and I unstrapped the bag, shuffled the kids around, emptied the contents of the bag into the car, folded the roof bag and shoved it in the floor board. I am determined to use this bag on future trips, there are other ways to strap it (that in hindsight make more sense anyway). So maybe I will try it out this weekend when I take the kids and the dog to Cleveland. This is going to have to be it for the evening. I have so much more to post!

Ft. Mountain

My parents and my brother and his wife spent the night last night. This morning we went to Ft. Mountain. We hiked to the overlook, then stopped at the tower for a family photo, we then made our way to the rock formations and then through the woods to the parking lot. We enjoyed a PB&J picnic lunch with some Pringles, Oatmeal Cream Pies, and Star Crunch. The kids ran around for a while before we made our way to the lake where we walked the trail. The boys did great. They walked the entire time. Taryn on the other hand did not. Jake carried her most of the way to the overlook and then down to the parking lot. I carried her halfway around the lake. Jake was already feeling worn out from a non-stop week of volleyball camp so today put him over the edge. I told him to lay down when we got home and he's been asleep ever since! I hope it's just exhaustion and not some kind of sickness because we will hit the ground running on Monday for our trip to FCA camp at St.Simons!!

With that said there are things that must be done. Clothes to wash, fold and put away, bags that need packed, a really messy kitchen from company, a car to vaccum and wash (a habit I have before any trip), a bit of shopping for the trip, and kids to feed... Taryn is getting cranky. At least we are not leaving until Monday so I have some time to do all of this, if I can keep on task :) Now I am off to feed the kiddos.

Boredom

Are you prepared for the digital switch? I sure hope so because it has happened... and my abc is gone! I hope it shows back up when I rescan... how can I watch WipeOut if abc is gone!! And it's back but the CW disappeared and then was back and now it's gone again. What am I even doing up thinking about this right now I really need to shut my brain down and go to bed. I blame it on Jake who said he would go to bed at 1, at the latest... he is still playing his game so I have become a permanant fixture with the laptop on the sofa! Maybe I should just flop over and fall asleep. That would be a whole lot easier than going up the stairs to bed. Wow! Can you tell I have had a boring evening... we did have great steaks (thanks April) for dinner and a quick game of spades with Paul. Paul left to go home and get on his computer so he and Jake could look for keys of some type in their video game. Oh that sounds like fun? Anyway, I could have picked something productive to do with my time but I sit here watching everything from Samantha Who to 20/20 to news to late night. You know I have never watch the Last Call with Carson Daly but it's on right now. I am going to be SO tired tomorrow. Speaking of tomorrow... Jake is going to take the boys to the driving range and then a baseball field. Taryn and I will probably clean the house and then take a nap... yes a nap tomorrow... I mean today sounds great. I really must get off of here and go to bed. Have a great day!!

Our Van

On May 22nd, as I was taking Caleb to school, a car rolled past a stop sign into the side of our van. I will always remember the loud noise and the screeching tires and the look on the faces of the kids. Thankfully no one was injured but it sure was scary. The other driver was insured so I have spent the last few weeks working with them to get our accident resolved. After the insurance adjuster took her photos and measurements she left me wondering "repair" or "total loss". It is a total loss! I don't know how I am supposed to feel about this. We bought that van when Caleb was around a year old. It is the van that we used for many years as our only vehicle. All the trips taken, all the memories that centered around that van. Then there were the repairs. Last night I found the papers from where we had the lifters replaced, the 100,000 mile tune-up that resulted in buying a new engine. I had just replaced both headlight casings within the last year. The air filter that was almost impossible to replace... but between Jake's muscle and my skinny fingers we always changed. The stains I had just cleaned out of the carpet and seats. The cd player that was messing up. The rear windshield wiper that only worked for the first week but the car place would not repair because I bought it as-is. Both good and bad memories. But being faced with giving up something that we have had for so long it feels weird. Now we face the what-if's. What if the new car we have to buy, with the small amount our van was worth, turns out to need repairs in a few months? What if we are faced with replacing another engine or transmission or some other big part? Is it better to buy a cheap used vehicle that may break down in a few months or make a nice downpayment on a newer vehicle that we know will not need repairs for years? Ever since we bought our van I have not enjoyed car shopping. I feel like we were tricked into the van and so now I am scared of car lots. When Jake bought his used Honda I thought it was great because we did not pay much for it so we were not scared of future repairs. When Jake decided that he wanted a newer car I supported him but he understood our limit and found a new car we could afford, but he pretty much took care of this himself.

Now I am faced with making the decisions. I have to pick out the vehicle that I will use to drive my kids around. Do I get a smaller more fuel efficent vehicle, another van, or an SUV? I guess once we have the insurance check and we look at some vehicles my mind may feel better but right now I am confused. I guess we really have until the end of the summer to find something because we can share a car during the summer.

This morning the tow truck came to haul the van off to a dump somewhere. It makes me sad because it still ran. It's not like the engine was destroyed. Now it will sit in a dump somewhere collecting rust. I need to look at it like our van is an organ donor. It was not safe to drive so it had to be put to sleep. It's parts will be stripped and sold to people who will be able to fix their car for a cheaper price than buying new parts. It will help others. Silly I know but maybe this will help me feel better.