Sunday, March 31, 2019

Our Destroyed House Part 1

Our refrigerator came with our house and we aren't sure how old it was.  The ice stopped dispensing and the water would't make loud noises.  We decided after 5 years it was time for a new one.  

We picked out a fun one and were super excited to get it installed!  Neil thought it would be a good idea to start this project of unloading the fridge around 9pm one evening.

He pulled the old fridge out and GUSH!  We heard a little bit of water.  Not thinking it was a big deal-I grabbed a couple towels and Neil went to the street to cut off the water.  

After about 30 seconds of a trickle-it started a Niagara Falls style gush for a solid 20 minutes.  Because of where our house is situated the water main was on a different street.  Neil ran over there with a key, but it didn't work!   He had to run back home for a wrench...he finally got it off.  We had no idea the damage we were about to endure.



I ended up using every single towel in the house to soak up water.  The water ended up going all the way to the hallway.  I started noticing the wood buckling in the living room, but I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me.  Nope.  Our floors were 99% wet and we never even saw water on top of the floor.  It all went under the dishwasher and to the rest of the house,



It went all the way out the garage and down the driveway

Kyle and Kenneth were so sweet to come over to help!

I contacted our sweet State Farm Agent, Robert Temple to see what we should do.  We just thought we'd have fans for a few days and call it good.



After 5-6 days of fans running on the floors-they were still soaking wet.  They had to take up the floors in order to dry them out.

This sent me into a tailspin


It took the team DAYS to get the floors up in 2 rooms.  This small jackhammer was no match for the glue on these floors!

Coming home each day to see this was baffling.

We ended up going with this lighter engineered hard wood,
 With all of the destruction-we were advised to get a hotel room for 2 weeks.  The only place that had availability for a family of 5 for 2 weeks was the Homewood Suites by the airport.  We had no idea this would become our HOME-tel for 49 nights!



Trying to create festive favors in this madness was just not that fun.

Our sweet friends brought us a gift basket of hotel essentials for our stay!

Not gonna lie-having breakfast each morning was a treat!

Hotel life

We even celebrated Sarah Kathryn's birthday in the hotel!  The staff brought her a little gift!!

Saturday, March 30, 2019

Pizza! Pizza!

Jill and I split and auction item of a Pizza Party for 50!  What a cool party!  We invited some friends over for a pizza party and more.  They brought in their big trailer and made tons of pizza!  We got to have any kids we wanted and even got to create a fun dessert pizza!


I made this ahead of time-fruit pizza!


The pizza cooker was so cool!




I had a cookie decorating station and they let me use the frosting and sprinkles to make my own!  It was amazing.

Yay for the Days!

The Barkers came too!  Henry and Hudson.  They call each other Huddie Bun and Henny Penny


Wednesday, March 27, 2019

Spring Break Fun

Since we weren't doing any traveling over Spring Break I decided that we would go to "Mexico."  We dressed the part, picked up a book about Mexico, ate at Superior, stuffed a pinata, got churros, and busted the pinata!  We had so much fun "exploring" Mexico!





Catherine and her boys didn't want to miss my lesson on Mexico so they joined us!


And pretty soon the McGuires and Williams joined us too!  I guess I was doing lots of good teaching on Mexico that they didn't want to miss

We stuffed the pinata FULL!

We picked up Churros from Taco Bueno and brought them and the pinata over to the McGuires.




 The next day we traveled to Carmel for a luncheon at the Vine Office.  This is the first event with my new job as the Vine Oil and Gas community relations prize patrol!  I basically get to give out someone else's money to worthy organizations!

We went to a movie.

 The kids went to Ruston and Neil and I went to Nacogdoches to celebrate Anna's birthday!  It was so much fun!  We went to dinner at the Fredonia and sat by their fun pool.  It was like stepping back in time!

Happy Birthday, Anna!

Saturday, March 23, 2019

St. Jude Miracles on the Red

Our St. Jude gala was a smashing success this year!  We decided on the ABCs of Cancer for our theme, we went with family style food service, and we put the auction inside the room.  Lots of planning and preparing went into this event and it showed!  We raised $360,000!



Decorations crew!
Our team!

Got my hair did for the event!  2 things I love: getting my hair done and a braid.

The company Neil works for sponsored a table.

Here we are in front of the ABC wall.  We made a replica of the one that is at the actual hospital.

I am so happy the McGuires were able to join us!

Good looking crew!

LAC and Bryce

LAC!  you never LAC fun with us!



The McGuires bought my Festive Favor auction item!  So sweet!