Santa Pancakes

Whenever we get a chance to relax and just hang around the house, I like to break out all the fixings for breakfast...pancakes, french toast, sausage, bacon, hash browns and anything else the kids or Chris can dream of to eat. This is usually a Sunday morning feast for us, but for Christmas Eve I am going to make this part of our tradition with Santa Pancakes. It is a really cute way to serve the pancakes and get the kids to eat their fruit too, even if right now the little ones don't eat the whip cream or the cherry nose. For me it is the fun of making the funny faces and getting to see my whole family around the table, this is the only time I don't get overwhelmed with the noise because everyone is chewing.

House Update

Chris has been hard at work getting the plumbing roughed in so I figured I would take this time to update everyone on the house progress. Please have patience with me it has been six months and I think the last time I posted a picture the house was still getting walls. Now I can tell you that all the walls are up and the interior walls are up too.

Chris is building the staircase to the basement with my brother Justin and so far they are still up and functional.

In the midst of all the construction, Chris decided to add a bit more cement to the drive way, which has been a blessing with all the snow we have been getting, but this didn't go without a hitch. The day the cement truck came out (the second one I believe) we had not one but two city inspectors come to the house; courtesy of our neighbor's phone call. One was to look at the cement going down for the driveway (our on going fight over the property line) and the second one was to look at the height of our house (I guess the neighbor thinks it is too high), but both left without a qualm and told us the project was looking good.

Here is a shot to the trusses going up with the help of Chris's former high school buddy he reconnected with on facebook (Yeah social networking). Mike M. came down with his father's lull and we were able to get them up easier than imagined.

Not only did the lull help with the trusses going up but with the transportation of the over hang, which looked like the wing to a small plane when Chris built them.

Here is a shot of Chris riding in the basket to get the final piece of the trusses in place, which finished off the look of Chris's vision to the house.

One of the last pictures are of the house getting the windows in place, which drastically reduced the wind coming into the living addition in the back. The front of the house is taking shape and now we are focusing on the interior and getting that going.

The last picture is where the house sits right now on December 24, 2010 @ 3:20 in the afternoon and instead of getting ready to go to my folks house to celebrate Christmas Eve I am updating the blog. I also hear we are in for another whopping snow storm in a week...bigger than the 17 inches we got before. OMG...where will we put that snow. That will be a very interesting post if and when the snow comes. To Be Continued....

We Are Back!!!!

I have internet officially back at home. This is the first post since that day so many months ago. It is hard to believe that it has been six months and so much has been done. I don't even know where to start. I guess with the current house situation would be the best...right now as I type Chris and Tim are wrestling with getting the wirzbo on in the front of the house. For the past few weeks we have had to let the water drip, but now with the temperatures really dropping Chris figured it was time to get the heat on.

The front of the house is entirely up and lovely with all the windows (not looking forward to actually cleaning them), but it is a fabulous site. Chris is working hard getting the plumbing ready and this project is steaming ahead. It is hard to believe that we have been in this addition for almost a year already.

A short recap of the last months goes kind of like this...

Disney World in August with the kids and my parents...a very long drive (5 days down, 4 days back) & very very very HOT, but the kids loved it.

September was the start of school for Jasmine (Middle School), Nick (1st grade), Jayna (preschool) and myself (grad. school) so that meant a lot of changes to the schedule for everyone. Most days are crazy but the schedule is good for everyone too. Jayna is excited that she gets to ride the school bus with Nick next year.

Side Note: somewhere in there Tough Tony broke his collar bone horsing around upstairs with his big sister Jayna.

Halloween was the typical chaos around here. Jasmine was a devil (along with her horse @ the Halloween fun show at Windy Ridge Ranch), Nick was a jail bird, Jayna was a lovely ladyBUG, and Tony was a puppy dog. This was the first year that Tony really got into the spirit of getting candy but his little legs got worn out really fast; good thing we had the wagon.

Now that the holidays are in full swing, it is hard to believe that 2010 is almost over and I got to blog only half of the year. Just also to let everyone know that the updated videos of the house project and other interesting videos can be found on our flip share site...

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