a life beyond running shoes.

our church community gave us a house warming party on sunday. this was great incentive to finish up all the major projects.... floors, walls, bedroom, ceiling, etc. my hubbie worked so hard.... what a trooper! we had 51 adults, 18 kids, and one neighbor..... what an outpouring of of support & love. here is one table of food: christian and mary made all the food - grilled flank steak, grilled figs with blue cheese and prosciutto, artichoke dip, homemade bread sticks, hummus, corn salsa, roasted peppers, tomatoes & goat cheese with olives, crab cakes, and that really is just the tip of the ice berg. it was amazing!!!! here are some pics of the house: we even painted the stairs from poop brown to black: we have an entry way: our kids area in the dining room: (ikea rocks!) our bedroom: showcasing our new bed (our first headboard in seven years of marriage. we can actually read in bed and not roll away from the wall). here are the floors & baseboards. what is just not communi...

over the last month, i started teaching again.... well, the semester started. this means, i get to ride the subway and read. i finished one book that i started this summer, another that i started over labor day, and two that are young adult. here is the recap: peeled by joan bauer (who goes to our church...how fun is that). a quick read on the subway, but i actually stayed up past my 10 o'clock bedtime to finish. i really enjoyed it. for young adult fiction, i was engaged..... even with the ghost story premise. hope was here by joan bauer (her newbery honor book). i too finished quickly but enjoyed. i was sad when my stop on the train came and it was time to walk with my nose out of the book. my life in france by julia child. so i love her. i can't cook french but i really enjoyed her story of falling in love with cooking...and not until she was past 30! she really is a fascinating lady. i even ordered her mastering the art of french cooking because i was just im...

my baby is getting big....not the baby in my tummy (that is a whole other post). little bit's personality & vocabulary are exploding. he is trying so hard to keep up with his big brother. he loves the guitar & singing..... and mary poppins ...well, the song parts. he is a pro at the scooter and adds new words to his lexicon every day.

i think it has officially been a month since i have posted. wow. times flies when you feel as if you are under water... but emerge i shall. last saturday was our inaugural trip to the ER. little bit feel down some friends stairs and busted his lip. it ended up not being as bad as we thought it might have been. they glued it up, gave us an antibiotic and sent us home....three hours later. here is the patient.... it was hard to capture the true essence of the incident. it looked worse on the inside of his mouth. he is fine now.... no worse for the wear.

as of monday, i am through my first trimester with sweet baby #3. the sweet children will out number the adults come the beginning of march. as john likes to comment about my day to day coping skills, "her body is betraying her" as i adjust to pregnancy and surviving with two small children. i still can't find our flash drive to upload pictures....i'll work on it. it requires clearing off the computer desk which exists in the middle of the living room due to the plaster/drywall work being done to patch up the hole from the toilet leak. supposedly the new hardwood floors are supposed to arrive this week.....which means we could potentially move out of the office and back into our bedroom in a couple of weeks!!! the small pleasures in life!

If you're the "average" person, you've only read SIX, according to the National Endowment for the Arts. my friend, scribbling suit , has read 43. now that is impressive..those crazy english teacher types! So, here's what you do: Copy onto your blog. Bold the books you have read. Italicize the books you intend to read. Underline or change the color of books you love. Then bug those people who have only read six of these. 1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen 2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien 3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte 4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling 5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee 6 The Bible 7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte 8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell (in two weeks i will have read for my book club) 9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman 10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens 11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott 12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy 13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller 14 Complete Works of Shakespeare (I'...

it is always more than we think it is going to be. here is the ceiling where the plumber fixed the leak.... we still have to fix the plaster. THEN there is our bedroom floor.... all those dark spots.... we think are cat urine... from the 20 that lived here before we did. heat and humidity don't work well with cat pee smell. we will be replacing it all including the sub floor. what fun, what fun.

cute kids. a special trip to the happiest place on earth... a place where baby brother did not come! sweet family olympics. g'parents & g'kids. (there are 8 g'kids)

so here are some fun facts from our vacation in florida..... we got home saturday. 19 days in florida. 14 days with daddy. 1 kitchen repainted (while the boys & i were gone). 1 living room painted. 6 days at the beach. 1 head gash. 2 busted lips (same child). 104.6 fever.... the high reached. 9 of 12 adults sick with cold (the other 3 got it later). 2 runs.... lame! 4 books read.... 3 by stephanie meyer. 2 hours of swim lessons spent entirely in tears. 7 cousins. 7 years of marriage - happy anniversary to us. 34 years of life - happy birthday to me. 1 game of tug 'o war. 1 egg in spoon race. 1 three-legged-race. 1 sandcastle building contest. 1 shotput. 1 game of holding your breath.... i was terrible. 1 water relay with inner tubes and all. 1 sweet family olympics. 1 hole in the ceiling from leaking plumbing.... welcome home! pictures to come!

friday night was our latest book club. while i thought it was going to be a bust discussion-wise, i knew we would all find the read delightful. i would not constitute our discussion as riveting but more discovery. we all learned little things about this clever and witty book from each other. such as character names: braxton hicks victor analogy liz bennett jack schitt bowden cable (reference to a bike cable) mycroft (sherlock holmes' brother) and much more......there were laugh-out-loud moments. we all loved our heroine (thursday next). it really is a book that compiles all genres.... and wittingly. i highly recommend for a fun, quick read. and who doesn't love the idea of actually meeting mr. rochester from jane eyre ?!

i can't believe that the boys are getting this big.... this is our street.... that is a pedal-less bike, yes, the little one is riding a scooter.

here are some of the cute pics that we got from our visit with cousins.

with the departure of mom & dennis.... the arrival of four cousins.... we had a full couple of days. day 1: south street seaport times square, toys 'r us, museum of natural history. day 2: staten island ferry, battery park playground (they kept going and did top of the rock, american girl store, and rockeller plaza) day 3: new york historical society, central park (rocks, lakes, playgrounds, picnic), pizza and sparklers. day 4: everyone leaves and we build stairs.

...that ended with a date. we got to go out for our anniversary two weeks early taking full advantage of free babysitting. but more of from the homestead. windows... primed & painted. washed. living room windows washed with new screens.... a fabulous house warming gift from mr. denny. more light fixtures. a ceiling fan in the boys room. more paint. i love this color! they leave tomorrow but more visitors arrive tonight. we will have a FULL house tonight. in total: six kids and six adults.

here is dennis finishing the dining room ceiling and our new light fixture. mom got the kitchen ceiling painted.... walls are all prepped for some color! we had finished all the trim on wednesday during nap time. de nnis cleaned windows and scrapped the old paint off the trim.... that was a serious job... and he hates doing windows! and john got the kitchen painted. phew. we are not sure if we love the color.... i may need to call in some decorating help to figure it out. it blends with the cabinets..... we'll wait until we can get all the canisters organized and off the counters to decide.

mom and dennis are here in work mode. here is the recap from thursday and friday. we got the dining room wainscoting sanded & painted. hall & bathroom light fixtures changed out..... i should put a picture up of the old ones but i didnt' want to waste my time... they are gross. got the boys room painted. daddy did that. it is orange..... better pictures later. more work for saturday....more painting, more light fixtures, and some window cleaning.

here and there we keep getting things done. this past weekend g'pa & g'ma were back up.... he replaced the window in the bathroom. the night light with sensor now registers when it is day. john primed the kitchen with a little help from the three-year-old. and last night started painting the trim..... half of work crew #2 arrived sunday....my mom. she is prepped and ready to paint.... we'll try saturday. today she helped me unpack three more boxes, use animal urine enzyme cleaner (for the third time), and got me some running shoes. not bad for a days work. and we keep pressing on.

here is our very, verbal three-year old. and our less-than-verbal-but-still-communicative 18 month old in the background.

my husband is a busy little bee. he was out of town last week and before leaving got a few things done in the house. i tried posting last week but was having trouble. forgive the delay. the boys room..... wall finished. floor sanded & painted. carpet down. beds up. toys creeping out of boxes. air conditioner installed. inside front door painted. (we have two front doors) new bathroom door.... new as in found in the basement. painted, shaved, and installed. it used to be green....lovely. john's office... painted. carpeted with carpet tiles. books on shelves. desk up. (okay, so i was the busy bee and did all that while he was out of town two weeks ago with help from friends)