Thanksgiving Part 1

We are back from our whirlwind trip of Texas. On Monday morning we headed up to Tyler to visit my family. Christine and Kyle had driven from Virginia so we decided to head up there to visit them before we headed to Oakville for Thanksgiving. We all had a great time and it was really good to see the Hoovers. The boys loved playing with their cousins and getting spoiled by Gram and Papa. We played outside a lot, ate good food, played games, and topped it off with a trip to Chuck E. Cheeses for Reese's birthday!

Daddy and Cooper

Cooper is getting so big!

We threw all 5 boys in the bathtub together! It was total chaos!

Gram and Baby Luke

Luke playing in the leaves.

Trying to get a picture of all 5 boys in the leaves. Cooper was not happy about this!

Cooper riding the tricycle.

Sweet Cooper

Gram and Luke

Cooper riding the choo-choo train at Chuck E. Cheese

Gotta play this game when you go

Will in the Safari Jeep

Tyler riding the clock ride.

Racing the horse.

Papa and Cooper driving

Christine and me playing Dance Dance Revolution! We were HORRIBLE!!! Notice how we are stepping with the opposite leg. We were supposed to be in sync!

Totally out of breath at this point!

Cooper HATED this ride! Am I a bad mom for laughing and taking his picture instead of getting him down?

Tyler in the playground area

Reese loved playing air hockey!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! Tonight I got the boys dressed in their costumes and headed to the park with some friends for our neighborhoods "trick or trunk" party. They had about 15 trucks decorated in the parking lot and the kids would trick or treat out of the trucks. They had games and activities for the kiddos. The boys had a great time and especially enjoyed the "treats"! Here are some pictures from the night!

Flounder

Flounder and the Shark!

Getting ready to go to the park!

Our friend Minnie Mouse

All the kids ready to go!

Waiting to get some treats!

Hudson the monkey!

Back on the Market

Yes, you read the title right! Our house is back on the market. We got a call from our realtor today and he let us know that the people who had signed the contract to lease our house for 18 months have decided that aren't going to lease it after all. ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? The reason was that they wanted to put their 14 year old daughter in private school and just couldn't afford to do that and pay the rent on the house. I have so many words that I want to use to describe these people, but I think I will refrain because this is a family friendly blog. I just cannot believe that this is happening and that they are such idiots and didn't think about this before they signed a contract and put a security deposit down. The only consolation to us is that we get to keep their security deposit. Whatever, I would rather not have the money and have my house taken care of. I AM SO MAD!!! Travis and I are just so furious and so confused. I mean seriously, can anything go right with this whole move? I think most of all I am so mad that people are going to start calling again to see the house. I'm not going to lie, my housekeeping skills have gone down hill since we signed the contract and haven't had people coming to see the house! I'm off to go scrub toilets and mop floors. Yippee.

Snaggletooth

Cooper's teeth have not come through in the "normal" order and therefore he has a hilarious smile right now. I've been trying to get it on camera for awhile and this is the best I've gotten. Click on the picture to zoom in and you can get a great look at his smile!

Painting Pumpkins at the Park!

Last night a few of my friends all got together with our kiddos at the park to eat pizza and paint pumpkins while our husbands were at Bible Study. The kids had a great time and it was nice to get together with some of my favorite girls!

The kids getting ready to paint!

Look at that concentration!

Cooper getting some lovin' from Candice.

Whit concentrating on his pumpkin.

Oops!!!

All boy, all the time!

Precious Cargo

15 Months!

My baby is 15 months! I can hardly believe it and he is really more of a toddler now than a baby. I took him to the doctor today and he is doing great! He weighs 25 lb. 8 oz. (75%) and is a little over 32 inches (75%). He is almost exactly where Tyler was at this age. The biggest news this past week is that we took his pacifier away! If you have been around Cooper for even a small amount of time you know that he was completely addicted to his paci and had even named it already! Yikes!!! The first night we decided to take it away he was in his room looking under the bed for it and asking for it by name. He called it "nana". We just said all gone and he was not happy about it! But since that night he has done great without it. He talks a little bit more at nap time and bed time, but that is okay. He did manage to find some throughout the house and car and would surprise me by having one in his mouth when I would see him, but I think I have confiscated all of them by now.

Tyler and Cooper are really starting to play more and more with each other. Tyler always asks where Cooper is if he is not around and I think expects him to be by his side. Tyler can still be mean or too rough with him sometimes, but we are working on that. Cooper has also started to get an attitude when Tyler does something mean and usually grunts at him and swats his hand in the air like he is trying to hit him. It's pretty funny, but also something we are going to have to work on.

I'm so proud of Cooper and how far he has come. All of the nursery workers at church are telling me that he is doing great and that he seems much happier now that he can walk and keep up with the other kids. He is also turning into more of a Daddy's boy. He definitely still likes mom, but he LOVES when Daddy is around! We love you, Cooper!

Good News!

We got some good news this week! We have a contract on our house to lease it for 18 months! Travis and I are both really happy with everything, especially with selling our house looking more grim after all of this crazy financial mess of failing banks and crappy stock market! After the hurricane we had actually decided to postpone the move until the end of the year,
because Travis was able to get some extra jobs due to all of the damage to help pay the bills. Today was his last day to work for Zac, but we looked at all of the jobs he has contracted and it is more than enough to pay our bills through the end of the year. God has totally provided for us and His timing is perfect! The renters have a temporary lease that ends in January and therefore want to move January 15! Absolutely perfect timing!!! So, we will be moving the first week of January. The renters also expressed some interest in potentially buying the house after the lease ends. They were transferred here and I'm not sure if they know how long they will be living in the area. We are just going to trust God with whatever He wants to do. We are just so thankful for His provision and now we just have to trust Him with the future.

It's Time for VeggieTales!

Tyler loves VeggieTales right now and he has started singing along with the song in the beginning. Here is a clip of the big finale. I think he might have gotten his singing ability from his mother!

Look Who's Walking!

Cooper started walking! He really started getting good while we were in Tyler for our "hurrication". He is doing fabulous and is even standing up on his own. Walking has really helped in the whining too! He is much happier now that he can keep up with everyone. He is such a sweet boy and is doing terrific. The past two times I dropped him off in the nursery there was not one tear! He usually throws his big bottom lip out and has a good cry. They have said he has done great this past week in the nursery! Yippee!!! He is also really trying to talk. He can say (at least we can tell what he is saying) Mama, Daddy, Ball, Duck, Tyler, Elmo, Dog and a few others. He is growing so fast- almost 15 months old! I can't believe it. I'm falling more in love with him everyday! By the way, can you tell by his shirt that he is teething???

The Wrath of Ike!

I promise this will be my last post on Ike, but I wanted to post the pictures showing his fury. Our brush pile is one of the biggest I've seen in the neighborhood. We lost a lot of good trees, but we still have plenty of beautiful ones to look at.

These two trees were to the left of the garage and the boys swing hung between them. I guess we will have to find a new place for them to swing.

This is looking into the backyard from the back patio. The tree that I'm most upset about losing is the huge one laying over the sandbox. We had positioned the sandbox between two trees to give the boys a nice shady area to play in.

This picture was taken standing in our backyard facing to the right.

Our huge brush pile in front of the house. Driving down the street you can't really even see our house because it is so tall.

And more piles.

Oh Happy Day!!!

WE HAVE POWER!!! Day 14 was our lucky day. This morning I decided that I was going to come home today because the front of our neighborhood has had power for a couple of days. According to the Centerpoint workers in the area our power should have been on by early this morning. Well it wasn't, but we knew it would be soon. My friend Laura was in Little Rock during this whole fiasco and she had decided to leave this morning and was willing to come through Tyler on her way home and pick me up. So we decided to chance it and it paid off! On the way home Travis called and let us know that we all had power! You should have heard the excitement in the car. We were thrilled and could not wait to get home. Our house was a site for sore eyes. And yes it doesn't really look the same with some trees gone, but it is home. Our brush pile is HUGE and is much bigger than anyone else's that I have seen. I'll try and post some pictures tomorrow, but I'm off to sleep in my own bed!

STILL WAITING!

This is Day 10 without power and we are waiting as patiently as we can, but I'm SO READY to be home! I know crews are working day and night just to restore our power and for that I'm very thankful. Travis went home on Wednesday morning to start cleaning up our yard and return to work (as much as he could anyway). He has worked very hard cutting up trees and limbs that fell in the yard and getting everything cleaned up before we come home. He has been hanging out with our friend, Tim, who stayed the entire time during and after the Hurricane. He has a generator so I think Travis has been hanging out over there a lot. They went to the A&M/Miami game on Saturday to get away and have some guy time, but it was probably just as depressing as sitting in the dark with no electricity!

So I'm still in Tyler with the boys and they are having a good time, but I'm just ready to be home and back into our normal routine. We had just started up normal fall activities- mother's day out, bible studies, etc. when we were interrupted with IKE. Plus, I don't have my car since Travis left on Wednesday in it! Therefore I'm pretty limited in getting out of the house which means I'm going a LITTLE stir crazy! I did take my dad to work on Friday so I could borrow his car and take the boys somewhere fun and get out of the house for awhile. On Saturday we all went to the East Texas State Fair and let the kids ride some rides and see the fine people of East Texas! They had a really good time and we discovered Cooper LOVES the merry-go-round! He had a blast!

To be continued...

The wait is on...

for electricity that is! We are still in Tyler waiting for our electricity to be turned back on. According to our friends, we have no phones, electricity, or water and cell phone service is very sketchy. So we are staying put for now. Our house made it through the storm okay, but we have some major trees in our yard that were uprooted. I'm just thankful that none of them hit the house. According to our friends, our backyard is a really big mess. We are very anxious to return to our house to see the damage and begin the cleanup, but things at home are very crazy from what we hear. People can't get gas or groceries because there is no electricity. Some of our friends drove to Huntsville last night (45 minutes north) just to buy gas. Travis might head back sometime this week to try and get things cleaned up before power is restored and things at work get crazy. But the boys and I are staying put until power is restored. I have heard estimates of 2-3 weeks for some areas around The Woodlands because Entergy suffered "catastrophic failure"- whatever that means!

It is a pain to be away from home and not be able to go back, but we are so thankful that our family is together and safe and our home was protected. Any of those trees could have easily fallen on our house. We have heard from several friends that had trees on their house including my grandparents in Kilgore. Praise God nobody was injured.

By the way, my friend IKE ruined another girls weekend I had planned for the end of September. Our women's retreat for church was supposed to be at the Nassau Hilton down in Clear Lake the last weekend of September. That's not so much going to happen now. I'm sure they will just postpone it and possibly change locations, but come on, this girl needs some time away!

I'm sure I won't be blogging much until we get power back. Just wanted to let everyone know that we are okay and how our house weathered the storm.

We Bailed!

Okay, so we bailed at the last minute. Last night Travis and I decided that if the traffic wasn't bad that we would go ahead and come to my parents house in Tyler. The news was freaking me out and my dad kept calling and asking, "What are you guys doing?", "What is the news saying down there?" and I just started getting nervous. We had already decided that once the stormed passed we would probably be heading up here anyway because we will be without power for awhile. So we decided to just go ahead and come. I knew I wouldn't get much sleep because I would be worried about my boys. There are some very big trees near the boys rooms and that makes me nervous with the forecasts stating that the winds would be anywhere from 75-110 mph even where we live. The traffic wasn't bad at all and we made it here in record time. I feel good about being out of the storms direct path and hope we only feel minor effects from the wind at our house.

IKE...

is totally ruining my weekend! I have had a girls weekend planned with my college roommates for awhile now and IKE is totally ruining our plans. We were supposed to head to my friend Callie's house in Katy on Friday for a weekend full of fun sans kiddos! Obviously our plans had to be canceled because of IKE making that turn towards Houston. UGH! After a long week with Travis away in Ecuador I was really looking forward to some girl time- to enjoy a conversation without kids interrupting or wanting to be held, to get our nails done which is a special treat for me, and to go out to eat and not have to cut up someone's food! And I do have perspective- I know people are in danger and people's houses are in IKE's destructive path. I don't want anyone to experience danger or have their houses destroyed, but I'm still bummed I'm missing out on what would have been a great weekend!

I almost evacuated last night with the boys, but Travis wasn't going to be able to leave with us because of work. So I decided against it. We are definitely staying now because traffic is already getting really bad and I don't want to sit in traffic for 8-10 hours just to get to Tyler which is normally a 3 hour drive. Our friends have a generator so we are going to hang out with them when we lose electricity and have a little party. Tyler will probably think it is the greatest thing that ever happened. We are expecting lots of rain and high winds. The only thing that makes me a little nervous is the big trees we have in our yard and the potential for them to be uprooted. Say a prayer for us and even better, pray that IKE would head east of us so we will be on the clean side of the storm.

Livin in the lap of luxury!

This is the way to do a mission trip. Wake up at 10, cocktails at the pool, all you can eat buffets, and maybe do a little bit of work to justify calling it a mission trip.

Chillin by the pool

5 star dining

Just kidding! This was a resort we stopped and looked at a ways down the river called Casa Suiza which is a Swiss resort in the jungle. Our accomodations weren't quite as luxurious.

We got back from Ecuador yesterday on our weeklong mission trip with some guys from our weekly Bible study. We had talked about doing this for a long time and we decided it was time to bite the bullet and just do it. It was an incredible time and we had a lot of fun.

We landed in the capital city of Quito late Friday night and were met in the airport by Leithe Camden who is our church's missionary to Ecuador. He took us to the hotel and we didn't get to sleep until about 3:30. It was a welcome change to be up in the mountains with 50 degree weather especially coming from 90 degree Houston weather.

The next day we drove 5 hours down to the jungle town of Misahualli. The drive itself was quite an adventure. We weren't 3 minutes into the drive when I spotted a dude walking down the streets of Quito with a shirt on, but no pants. I couldn't see a speedo underneath and I didn't look too close to find out for sure. We had a good laugh about that. The drivers in Ecuador are CRAZY! Passing on blind turns is the norm. There are no guardrails on the turns and it is common to be driving on a road with a 1/4 mile dropoff on one side. It was a little scary. The roads go from gravel to concrete with no rhime or reason. It is definitely not a very organized country.

We got down to the jungle and started to do what we were there to do which was work on a lady named Corolla's house. She was bit by a snake when she was a kid and had to get her leg amputated. She was living in a shack made with bamboo and scrap wood with 7 kids and we were going to finish up the house so that she could have a little more room. We learned that only about 10 percent of the people in Ecuador get married and that most of the kids have little or no contact with their father. The women do most of the work and the guys just sit around and get drunk and have kids that they don't support. It is definitely a broken system.The kids living with Corolla were her nieces and nephews that her brothers left with her. 2 of the kids,Max and Junior 9 and 6 respectively, hung out with us the whole time we were working and loved being around some guys that just had fun with them and tickled them. They conned us out of a lot of Cokes and candy and had a great time in general.

We worked 4 days on the house to finish it up. It was tough work. Lots of hammering and cutting wood. They really need to learn about air compressors and nail guns down there. That's just my opinion. We did take off one day to go on a jungle river cruise. We stopped at an Indian jungle village and went to the school, went to a zoo and saw a bunch of animals that were being cared for, and stopped at another village where there were some ladies that showed us a traditional Quichuan Indian dance and had us dance with them. While we were getting down in the jungle a monkey decided to grab on to my leg and hold on for dear life. He did not want to let go. Someone finally pried him off, but he was not happy. What can I say? It's just my animal magnetism! I think someone has a picture of it and I'll post it when I get it.

The highlight of the trip was every night when we had a little church service in the hotel with the believers in the town. Their church's pastor had disappeared a while back and they were starving for some encouragement and spiritual food. We had some really rich times and I think we all got encouraged from our time together.

I was actually surprised by the amount of Spanish I know when I really have to use it. This trip didn't make me want to move to Ecuador, but it was a neat place to visit and we were all glad to have had the chance to go. Thank you Sarah for letting me go and thanks to the Flemings for helping out with the kids while I was gone. I couldn't have done it without you.

Ecuador!

This is where we stayed in Quito the first and last night.

Just another random sight we saw on the 5 hour drive down to the jungle. Ecuador is definitley 3rd world and we saw some crazy sights. One of these cows ran in to the back of an 18 wheeler about 5 seconds after the picture was taken. It wasn't seriously injured and we laughed about it for about 5 minutes.

It was a beautiful drive with lots of mountains, rivers and waterfalls. There are 3 waterfalls off in the distance in this picture.

This is the bridge that we drove over every day to get to the work site. It was a shady looking suspension bridge held together with rebar, some steel, and the guardrail was chicken wire. You could see the bridge go up and down as a car drove over it. We weren't disappointed when we said goodbye yo it. Lots of prayers were said crossing the bridge.

This was our sweet ride. An 11 passenger rental van that we nicknamed "The Shock" due to the fact that it had none. The building behind us was our hotel in Misahualli. It was $23 per person per night and it included 3 meals. The food was exceptional.

This was Corolla's house in the jungle before we started. Unfortunately, my camera pooped out on me and I didn't get any after pictures. I'll try to get one from the other guys and post it. Suffice it to say that it was quite the upgrade from where she was living and it was probably the nicest house that we saw in the area.

This was the crew just before we started on day 1. The shack behind them is where Corolla and about 7-8 kids lived before they moved in to the new casa.

Zac tiling the shower.

Corolla's old house

Another suspension bridge that we tried fishing under in Misahualli. It made the other one look like the Golden Gate Bridge.

Brian under a sweet pink mosquito net in our room in Misahualli. We were loaded up on mosquito spray all week to try to keep the malaria away. The mosquitos weren't that bad though.

The mean streets of Misahualli

A herd of monkeys crossing the streets in front of our hotel.

A little squirrel monkey hanging out.

We stopped at this school in an Quichuan indian village and talked to them and the teacher for a while. They sang us a song in their native Quichan language.

We stopped at a "zoo" in the jungle which was really a hospital for sick or injured animals. We had a guide take us around and show us all of the animals. This was a Trumpeter bird called Trumpy that followed us around on our tour. He was cool.

This was Tim, Zac, and I at the Swiss hotel on our jungle tour day.