Minnesota, Here We Come

It's been 9 months since we left MN and now are making our first trip back.

Just wanted to look back and see what the kids looked like 9 months ago, comparing it with one of their recent shots together. Yeah... they look a little bit different. I'm laughing, though, because Naydine is still wearing those jammies and they are 18 month. She'll be 3 this August! haha... peanut!




I've also rented the Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM from Rentglass.com. I'm pretty excited about it!! IT'S FREAKING HUGE, by the way! Put that thing on my little Rebel and I do a nose dive! But so far, SO COOL. Great in low light. Love it..... Plus, I love that wide angle. I don't think I'm ready to purchase this lens yet, but, I did want to see what it was all about.

We fly out Monday morning, early, so we'll have a full day on Monday. My grandpa passed away last week, so I missed seeing him. One of the reasons we were coming back to MN. The timing stunk on that one:( Here is a shot from him at his 80th Birthday party last August. We are all so grateful that we had this party! He was such a wonderful man!! I have so many fond memories of my grandpa, teaching me to play crazy eights and smelling like Old Spice...... aaahh.... I love him!

Maybe I'll be seeing some of you bloggers in MN!!!

Another Nephew

Congratulations to Amy and Josh!! Landen James McDonald arrived today!! 8 lbs. 6 oz, 20" long.

I have to say that I only saw Amy's pregnancy through pictures and she basically still had a 6 pack at 40 weeks pregnant. We were betting that the baby was like 6 lbs. 3 oz. And she pushes out the whopper!! Holy cats, I AM SO SURPRISED!!! This is her first baby!

Way to go guys!! We'll see you in 4 days!

SOLD

Good bye, 8444 13th Ave. SE.

The Olympia house was our first house purchase together. It's kind of sad that she's not ours anymore. But, we are happy to be closed. Coast to coast is not an easy rental property.

We had somebody in the current townhouse yesterday. I think he was quite interested. And if he is, and wants to close by the end of July like he said, I think we'll be going apartment style. Or.... rental house, I guess. Yeah... I better start looking for some rental houses. Our new house hasn't even started yet!

Just Like Her Momma

Except she was talking on a phone that no longer works. Eli calls her Jaime Jr. Sometimes he slips and just calls her, Jaime.

Where are my manners? Happy Father's Day Eli!

And I found this one of Dane from a while back too....

Heat Wave

This is my first summer in North Carolina. And of course, we are having record temperatures. Nothing that this MN girl can't handle, though:) I do love the heat and the air conditioning, equally. We are talking temps of 103-107*. So, we joined the Elks Club. They have a pool right down the street from us, takes about 2 minutes to drive there. Also walking distance from our future property. Naydine was calling it the Alex Pool. I guess that's what my accent sounds like when I say Elks. Interesting....

Naydine is doing awesome at swimming. She loves to wear the goggles and go underwater for a long time. It's crazy!! We are going to have her do the swim lessons and I seriously think that she's going to be swimming by herself soon. She goes under water in the kiddie pool and swims around. However, I think she's kind of laying on the bottom and pushing herself around from the floor of the pool But, it looks like she's really swimming underwater! And she'll dive in and glide along the bottom too. Eli and I are just laughing the whole time!

Dane, he's not a big fan. I think tonight, finally, he got in by himself and grabbed a toy from the pool quick and got out. He tries to steal other kids snacks, talk to the teenage girls in bikinis, and crap his swim diaper. Oh, and Naydine has to poop every time we are there too. And why can't kids be discreet about this? She has to yell, "Mom, I have to poop!!", while grabbing her butt! LOL.... right when you think that maybe everybody didn't understand her 2 year-old-language, she has to confirm this statement by grabbing her butt.... aaahhhh....

One other crazy thing here is that our hose water never gets cold. Well, neither does our tap water. But, it's kind of cool that the house never gets ice cold because then I get to take all these fun pictures!

Dane is ticked at Naydine for taking the hose!! He's getting a temper on him! ha!

New Bedding, again

A while back, I couldn't stand my ghetto bedroom. Well, I still can't stand it. So.... I was browsing on PotteryBarn the other day and found the stuff that we both really liked a while back, WAS NOW ON CLEARANCE. Can I get an "Amen"? Geesh... fabulous! Well, some of the stuff wasn't available anymore. Like the solid green shams, gone. And the solid green quilt, gone. The decorative pillow, gone:( So, you ask, what WAS available? We got the duvet cover, the printed shams, and some other solid green sham (not shown). And some new nightstands. They are actually the first nightstands Eli and I have purchased together for our room. WE ARE RETARDED, I know.

Now we are thinking about this headboard. Seagrass... Anyway, we are gonna get there, piece by piece.

I hate Typepad

I'm going to admit that I used to be a little bit jealous of the Typepad users. Your pages are just more "clean" and your pictures posted nicer, etc. I kind of wanted to switch but, whatever, I never did. Now, I hate Typepad. What is with it?!?! 1/2 the time I want to comment on your Typepad blog, I get an error message..... If I can even get your page to load. I can't get your pages to load right now! I swear, I want the old Typepad back! haha.... Good luck guys! I feel for ya!

Verde

More than a year ago, the Cox's went to Mexico and Momma Jill brought back a little green dress for Naydine. She was just so tiny then, of course it didn't fit.

Naydine was rummaging around her dresser yesterday and asked if she could wear that little green dress. And the scrunchy. I loved the scrunchy. It brought back memories of back in the day..... Gotta love a scrunchy:)

These are for you, Momma Jill......

The rare few shots of the kids together.....

I think they are even holding hands??? haha.... They're good kids!

We Hate Insurance

Obviously, Homeowners Insurance isn't going to cover our TV. Which totally sucks because we have been paying for a rider that covers personal possession loss so that we don't eat the depreciation on the item.
The reason we are not covered is because somebody would have had to trespass into our house, we would file a police report, and then homeowners would cover under their peril of Malicious Mischief. According to me, Naydine did Malicious Mischief.
Now the TV is sitting in our garage. So I ask the agent a hypothetical question, "So let's just say the TV is now sitting in the garage and one of our ghetto thumping neighbors sees it in there and steals it out of the garage tonight. Would you cover it then?" And she says, "Yes, we'll consider that claim". But her voice was slightly hesitant. Hahaha... I was just wondering because they obviously have it on file now that our TV is broken. So I just figured they answer would be, it's an unusable item at this point and we will not cover anything where your TV is concerned.
Then I called a repair service and they laughed in my face. She tells me that it's most likely going to cost more to repair it than to buy a new TV. I don't see why it has to be that way. I should call Pioneer personally and really talk with these people. She says she's not certain and will call me back..... and the final the answer is: it would cost $2500 to buy the part we need and they no longer sell it. HA HAHAHAHA. Yeah, that TV is history. I just need to see if this servicing company would like to buy our TV for parts. It is useless to us.

So...... we also have a policy that covers jewelry, furs, stuff like that. However, there is no category for televisions. Trust me, I would have put it on the policy and claimed in 9 months when we move to the new house. The do have a column for guns and cameras. So, I did add those items to the policy along with my furs:) And this policy does cover for accidental (like, if your kids drop your camera, or if i do!) with no deductible.

I do love USAA so, I can't hate them, I just hate insurance. Even if I did sell insurance for several years.
Which reminds me I need to update some other insurances.

Everybody out there have their insurance up to date? With cameras on a policy as well??:)