retail therapy and guys night out.

friday, october 22, 2010.

today i shopped 'til i dropped hurt all over. i hit ulta, michael's, famous footware, last chance, stopped for lunch at pick up stix, spirit halloween store, marshall's, target, the dollar store, the 99 cent store, then back to the halloween store! phew. so glad the boys were with my parents...i was able to purchase everything we needed for our halloween costumes!!! i made a stop off at home to take joshua and t.j. to the light rail. they were meeting up with two of joshua other friends to head to a pre season suns game. chuckie and shannon couldn't go, so they gave their tickets to us. we couldn't find another couple that could get a sitter, so joshua got to have a guys night out and i got to do some more retail therapy. when i got home, joshua enlisted t.j's help to take his welded art projects over to john and michelle's. they were going to take some of his work along to a show they were in. not sure if it's the right market, but we are excited to see how it goes.

free range chickens.

wednesday, september 22, 2010.

 free range chickens. hahaha. i love that they just get to roam around our back yard. they seem so happy!

 levi finding nemo's egg

 junior's came about 2 hours later.

 junior's eggs are always darker and have lots of dark brown speckles.

 her's are shinier than nemo's too. i'm thinking it has to do with their age. i think junior is younger than nemo.

 the girls new favorite spot. digging around under the citrus trees.

 they probably feel safer under there. it's too hard for abraham to catch them because the grapefruit branches have nasty thorns. it doesn't stop him from trying though.

 while taking pics of the girls i notice joshua put all of the crosses under the citrus.

 i'm assuming to help them rust.  all the laundry water soaks this whole area.

the crazy shaped ones.

they sure are beautiful!

i was so tired during piano lessons that i just laid down on the floor in the boys room. not sure if it was being out in the heat or what. i grabbed the pig pillow off of levi's bed and curled up. levi layed down next to me without a fuss, but abraham kept climbing on me. i just kept my eyes closed and eventually he fell asleep too. thankful for a much needed nap. it's just so weird because neither boy naps any more. i had to snap a pic. 

creepy crawly, joshua's welding, and more yukon rides.

monday, august 2, 2010.

this big guys was creeping really slowly through the cabin. luckily joshua was there to capture him. he let him go outside though!!! hope he doesn't find his way back into the house. he looked prehistoric.

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joshua grinding down a weld. he's making a contraption that hooks onto the side of my pops trailer to display redwood he has for sale.

no flash. sparks flying.

the boys wearing ear protection so they can watch.

watching.

i love how ear protection pushes abraham's chubby check together!

yukon dashboard. star setting. this is the feature i wish i discovered when we were playing with sparklers in illinois. i wanted to try a "picasso's bull" type photo. or see if we could spell our names. oh well, now i know for next year!

yukon passengers.

yukon drivers. we saw deer grazing in a field, but it was too dark to get a picture:(

i killed a SCORPION!

tuesday, july 27, 2010. abraham didn't sleep so well last night or the night before, which means i didn't sleep so well either. ABRAHAM'S still FEVERISH, so he gets fidgety while sleeping, which wakes me up and i had to give him more meds in the wee hours of the morning. luckily he didn't puke at all yesterday. levi really wanted to go see g'ma battaglia, so since we all seemed ok after abraham's sunday sickly incident, maaa... said the boys could come over for a swim. i wanted to stay here and work on the blog, but i ended up sleeping for like 5 hours instead. dang! joshua said he and the boys had lots of fun at my parents. no pics though because i wasn' there. hahaha.

this is a SCORPION I KILLED yesterday!!! ewe. joshua had taken the boys on a little excursion, so i was home alone. i went upstairs to get our "months" worth of mail out of a bag we set up there and HE WAS UNDER IT. yikes! being here alone i had no choice, but to kill it myself. i've actually had to kill several over the years at my parents house in wickenburg so i wasn't too freaked. i just took off my tennis shoe and whacked him several times with the heel. now i'm SUPER PARINOID though and am constantly scanning every room i go into.

goodies from yesterday.

our last full day in illinois. part one: morning metal.

monday, july 23, 2010. joshua was gone all morning at the farm doing his "favorite thing", WELDING goodies for the fam.

WOW. we couldn't believe it. joshua made a BACKHOE out of random scraps of metal for uncle ralphf!

aunt mic and her new wall hanging. it's like the one joshua made for joey, but with a twist. pics below will show the difference.

uncle ralphy coming to see his gift. everyone was so impressed with joshua's newest creation!

levi checking it out. the seat moves from front to back too.

aunt mic's wall hanging looks awesome against the bricks.

here's the twist. this one is more three dimensional.

so when the porch light shines on it, it casts cool shadows.

this is the cross joshua made for aunt mic and uncle ralph when they came to visit us in arizona in march. it also looks fab on their yellowish brick.

taking it easy.

thursday, july 22, 2010. just a relaxing, lazy day.

the boys newest obsession...

running around at top speed around this ottoman. they cleared out everything else in the way. they loved crashing into each other. i didn't care for that part much:)

so fast. even without "tie shoes."

i love abe's face. levi getting ready to lap him.

our fish friends were back by the dock. from the way i described them, joey thought they were blue gill.

it was so loud when the fish would try and chomp on it!!!

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hard to see, but there are four fish trying to get this one.

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as we were watching the fish eat it started to get stormy and within 2 minutes, it was pouring! i LOVE all the rain.

it poured down hard. we watched and listened to the rain from the screened in porch. storms blow over so quickly around here.

the wind was whipping.

joshua made this for uncle rex this morning.

and he made this wall hanging for joey.