We started baseball practices in January and we are still going.....

Adam joined a new baseball team this year.  It was a little hard for him, playing with new kids, playing new positions and sitting out more but overall he had a good time.  His Mudcat season has ended.  Now he is filling in on the river league team for a hurt kid and playing with his friends for fun and he is really loving it.  I am glad he got the chance to do that!  I really wasn't ready for baseball to end anyway!

More fun stuff!

Erica turned 18 this year.  I am still finding it hard to believe that I am getting so old!  We had a party for her....cake and ice cream up in the shed.  After 18 years of planning themes and making cakes for her parties I was really searching for what to do this year.  I saw a segment on the Early Show about decorating cupcakes that inspired me.  They used tootsie rolls and icing and sprinkles to make broccoli and icing to make lo mein.  Since chinese is Erica's all time favorite I decided to go for it!  She loved the cake and it was easy and fun to make.  I got the chinese words off the internet and on the outside of the cake I put them all around....love, honor, faith, together, smart, funny, health, wealth...all the things I see or hope to see in Erica's future.

This has really been a tough year on Erica.....having to grow up and so many milestones that Grandpa missed.  He is working in Iraq right now so he wasn't here for her birthday.  He sent her this hat in the mail.  He said all the guys wear them over there!  She loved it!  He also found a way to call right when we were having the party so he could talk to her...and make her cry!!!

My favoite time of the year....

PROM!!!  Every mother's dream to see her only daughter all dressed in a beautiful gown, looking like a princess!  I love it!  Of course it had to rain that day though and ruin our plans of taking pictures at the river.  Erica's friends wanted to go to the Capital Plaza to take pictures.  It is a beautiful local hotel that is real ritzy and has a beautiful fountain.  Good idea, but no one knew they were having 3 conventions that weekend so the fountain was turned off and tables were everywhere!  Good thing we stopped at the Governor's garden in the rain to take some pictures or I wouldn't have gotten as many good ones!  The first two were at our house...our grass hadn't even turned green yet!UGH!  Erica went with her friend Michael.

Adam's first turkey!

Turkey season was hard on Adam this year.  With Mike's schedule, and working weekends he couldn't take him much.  He went with his uncles but didn't have any luck.  Well, I had taken off work for prom and planned to sleep late, Mike came home from work in the morning and decided to take Adam hunting in our back yard.  Well, he woke me up at 7 in the morning to come outside and see his turkey!  He was so excited to get his first turkey.  I was very excited for him, but still didn't want to get up that early!hee hee

Along with all the work on the shed.......

We had to dig up our whole back yard in order to get the electric and water to the shed and the sewer from the shed to the lagoon.  Talk about a mess!  I was beginning to think it would never get done at that point because it was so overwhelming.  You can't even imagine how many rocks we had to pick up.  It is a good thing I have lots of little helpers here!   I ended up having to redo all my beds around the house.  A friend hauled me the rock for this one.  He also gave me the boulder.  What a story too....after shoveling the rock for hours to get it all spread out in there, while my husband was riding on the lawn mower,  we headed over to get the boulder.  I wanted to keep this bed very simple because my other flower bed is huge and takes a lot of work.  Well the plan was to load it on the truck near the end then when we got home with it we could just roll it off.  Great plan but it didn't quite work that way!hee hee  We got home and backed up there and we couldn't budge the rock!  I didn't think we were going to get it off the truck.  We also had a load of mulch on there so it was kind of hard to get to it.  We finally got it rolled one time and it was on the tailgate, so were Mike and I........BAM the tailgate strap busted and threw us off and the rock too!  It landed right where it is!  I think it is a perfect spot!hee hee

Since this picture the grass has grown in really nice and the pompous grass turned green!  It will eventually hide the air conditioner.  I got the rhododendron shrub from a couple of the kids I watch for Easter....they are so sweet!

While the digger was here digging up everything I had him dig a hole for my pond!  I had this pond in the shed for several years and have been wanting it for a long time.  I dreamed up how it would look for years.  It finally got finished.  I absolutely love it.  It is right by the lower patio and when we sit out there in the evening it is so soothing and beautiful.  I am so happy I got it finished but it was a lot of work!  I drove around our gravel road and dug up all the rocks that are all around it.  All the hard work just makes you appreciate it even more!

I have some flower beds in the front that I worked on too but I didn't take pictures!  I can never get anything to grow up there.  I put some spirea bushes in there and they are still living!  I still want some more shrubs up there but I ran out of time before graduation so I will let that go until next spring and finish them up.  No one ever goes in our front yard anyway!  hee hee

Our shed

About 7 years ago or so we built a shed.  It was a nice shed but we basically built the shell to store our junk from the garage in so we could turn the garage and basement into a day care.  We never finished the inside like we wanted to do.  Well, after Christmas this year we decided that we were going to get it all finished before Erica graduated high school so we could have a big ole graduation party out there!  We really worked our butts off putting up insulation and walls and we made a bathroom and a tiny kitchen area.  We sorted and organized everything and now it all has a home.  We did all this working around piles and piles of stuff in the middle of the floor.  I didn't think we would ever get it all finished but we did it.  Just barely in time for graduation.  It is so awesome and we spend alot of time out there now playing ping pong, frying fish, we have air hockey and darts and we seem to just sit out there in amazement that it is all finished!

We still have a few things we want to do...gutters, ceiling fans and motion lights outside and we want to put tin on the ceiling or something.....that is a project for next year though!

We will start with the girls weekend.......flip flops, dresses, beads, junk and fun!

We started our weekend early on friday with a bead show in St. Louis.  This is our second year to go to this show and it is awesome!  It was me, Erica, and my two sisters.  We found lots of goodies!

On the way up there we also hit an antique shop....one of my favorites right off highway 70.  I found lots of goodies there.  We also stoped at one in St. Louis near the airport that is a really really junky place but we all came out with something!

I love my blingy rhinestone bracelet! You can't even imagine how much it sparkles and shines when I wear it....which is all the time now! I love to collect old brooches, I am making a frame lined in velvet to display them on.

We shopped most of the time for a prom dress for Erica.  You know it has to be something very special for the SENIOR prom!hee hee  Mostly I just got flip flops!  I love the yellow box flip flops, they are so comfortable and don't sink down in the heel like my nike ones. 

We did find a beautiful prom dress at a little shop called Special Occasions.  The owner of the place, Paulette, was a hoot and I never laughed so hard spending so much money in all my life.  The dress was just beautiful though and fit Erica perfectly.  Pictures of prom will be coming soon!

We stayed in Chesterfield at the Hilton Garden Inn.  It was really nice, although we didn't spend much time there.  We did get to hit the pool and hot tub one night.  The manager let us sneak in after hours to relax or shopper's feet.  That was so nice.  When we go on trips we always have a great time and laugh and cut up so much.  I can't even tell you all the stories that have developed out of this trip but it was a blast!  I am already looking forward to next year.  It wasn't totally a fun trip....we stayed till Monday and met with the people at the St. Louis College of Pharmacy where Erica will be attending in the fall and took a tour of the campus.  It is a great school and I think she will love it there!

I have had way too much on my plate!

Well, those of you that know me, know that I don't work too much from Christmas until usually March or so.....well, this year has just been crazy for me. I have had so many things going this year that I have not painted in a long long time!

I did paint up some things in April and did a display at the Eldon conservation fair. It was alot of fun and I sold some things. If you live in the area I suggest you check it out for next year. Lots of informative seminars and freebies and even dinner that was really awesome. And of course I went by myself (who knew?) so I didn't get a chance to even take any pictures. Next year!

Anyway, in the next few days I will be catching you up on all the happenings so far.....I have many things I want to share. Believe it or not I even have some things to put up for sale and some cool jewelry I have been making! There are just way too many things to put all in one post!

So, take care and stay tuned! Chris