We've Moved....

Our new blog is - www.teamhopper.com. Come check out our new blog! :)

New Blog

A new, updated, and facelifted blog will be coming soon. I'm sad that I've let this fall to the wayside. My life hasn't slowed down any since July, surprise, surprise! There will be a new domain name and all! :) Can't wait until it is ready for the reveal. LOL! I'll be paying for our own domain name, so that should keep me motivated to keep this blog updated!!!!

I suck.....

at trying to keep this thing updated. Our lives are every so busy and when I do finally sit down at the computer, the last thing I want to do is recount the insanity of our schedules. Although, our schedules are slowly starting to slow back down, now that Tristen's school sports are over for the year, thankfully. Although we love watching him participate and compete, the boys' schedules started conflicting.

Tristen wrapped up his school sports with Track. He competed in the 800m and the 1600m, coincidentally, what I ran in track. He did fairly well, considering that he really wasn't 'excited' to be in track. It was one of those things that he started, but didn't want to finish. We have a rule in our house that once you start something, you have to finish it. I think in the end, he is glad he stuck with track. The track meets are a lot more fun than practice, which I think he quickly learned.

Colby's baseball is now in full swing which keeps us busy usually 4-5 nights a week between practices, weekday games, and weekend tournaments. Colby continues to excel in baseball, even playing an age group up. He has consistently been lead off batter all season long. He still mainly plays 2nd base, but does play catcher on occasion. He is about to play 16 games in 10 days!!! How crazy and assinine is that?!?!? Several of them are makeup games from rainouts we've had, so I CANNOT wait for May to be over!!!

Baby Corben is still cooking away. Tomorrow, I will hit 29 weeks. He'll be here in 11 weeks! Hopefully, those weeks fly by. Jason primed the nursery and he has one wall painted. Originally, we were going to do one wall orange and then the other 3 walls a light brown, but have since changed our mind that the orange may be too much. One wall will be a darker brown and the other 3 will be a light brown. I'm ordering wall vinyl ciricles to put on the darker wall, along with his name in wall vinyl. I have 2 showers coming up and possibly a 3rd at work. It has been mentioned, but not sure if it will happen as I said it wasn't necessary - STUPID...I know. (I have a really hard time with people doing things for me....and I have no clue why!!!) Jason and I did finally register, so that has been marked off my to-do list. I did order Corben's baby book and I absolutely LOVE it. It is the same exact fabric that I picked out for his custom bedding. Speaking of the bedding, I did get in back from the seamstress and I love it! I can't wait to get the entire room put together! Our search for a childcare provider and a pediatrician have begun. I'm pretty sure I've already found the pediatrician, but the childcare provider is going to probably be a daunting task. I do have a couple of leads for in-home providers, which is what I want. Jason and I just need to find a time to go meet with each one of them individually. We've chosen our pediatrician and so things seem to be progressing right along. We are in the downhill stretch and the next 11 cannot fly by quick enough!!!

We recently had to replace our stove b/c one of the burners (which has been giving us problems since we moved in) finally became dangerous. We called our Home Warranty company and they sent a company out to look at it. Well, the Home Warranty company didn't want to pay for the repairs since it was the same cost as a new stove. So....we had the option to either get a comparable model with no charge or to use the amount of the comparable model and upgrade (pay the difference) and purchase what we wanted. We chose the upgrade option and were able to purchase the stove through our Home Warranty company at their cost, which saved us about $200 (+ no tax, delivery or installation charges). So...........we get the stove but then we still have our yucky, white, builder grade over-the-range microwave. I found exactly what we wanted at Best Buy, but it was on backorder. Long story short, I finally found a Best Buy in Frisco that had the microwave in stock. Jason installed it and it looks fabulous. Now our kitchen is complete with all stainless steel appliances and looks fabulous. I'm so thankful that we've continued to renew our Home Warranty each year. While some people don't reap the benefit of a Home Warranty, we sure have. It has been benefical and saved us so much money. Our Home Warranty has replaced our garage door springs, water heater and now stove. Next up on our home renovation list are counters, backsplash and cabinets. We've pretty much made up our mind that we will be moving in 5-6 years - once the boys have graduated from high school. We aren't sure where, but most likely somewhere that we have have some land. We are contemplating buying a piece of land in the next few years and then building on it once we are ready to move. Not sure that this will really happen, but those are our current thoughts.....which I'm sure will change b/w now and then.

Here's a pic of the new stove/microwave and backsplash Jason installed! Love it!

Bug Updates

The bug is still coming along. We are closer and closer to having it done.  Well, not we, but Jason is closer to having it done.  It is now running.

Here’s what it started out as….. – THE BUG.

 

Working on the new floors

The other side of the floor

Inside of the car with no floors

 

Inside of car with lots of rust and seats removed

 

Ummm….i’m not sure what this is. Maybe where the motor goes.

 

The fenders removed so the dents can be repaired.

Rebuilt motor, transmission or whatever makes the car GO.

Taking it for a test drive

Test drive with no windows and one seat barely bolted in.

 

 

Next up, he will be putting all new interior in, which he has, but just has be upholstered. The windows and windshields need to be put in,  bumpers put on, and something about lowering the back end more. Eventually, he will get it painted, but for now, I think he is going to roll with the original paint.

Spring Break - Camping

During the boys' Spring Break, we took them camping. We took them camping with 5 other sets of our friends. In total, I think there were 21 of us out there (including kids ranging in age from 2 1/2 - 13). Overall, the camping trip with this many people went MUCH better than I expected. Usually, we there are that many people together, something goes haywire and pisses someone else off or whatever. Fortunately, nothing like this happened and it was a fun trip.

We headed up north to Ray Roberts Lake - Johnson Branch Unit, which is only 45 minutes from our house. I like camping relatively close to home just b/c packing and unpacking is such a beating. I swear we were loaded down like we were moving out of our house. We had the Acadia packed to the rim and borrowed a friend's trailer which could not hold anything else. We packed so much stuff, I think it took us 2 days to get it unloaded.

I failed to really take any pictures but here are a few random pictures.

 

Tristen & Colby setting up their tent…..that only Tristen slept in. Colby decided he was going to sleep in ours.

 

Tristen & Chopper (Kate & Allen’s dog)

 

Hanging out on the playground

Good ‘ole tire swing….

Whooooppppppsssss!

Baby Updates

Well, since it has been over a month since I've updated this blog with anything, I'll start with some baby updates.

Baby Hopper has been determined to be a BOY! While we were not so secretly hoping for a girl, we've been blessed with another boy. My gut feeling was that it was a boy. I was born to be a BOYMOM. Baby Boy Hopper has been named. His name is Corben Keith Hopper. Corben has been Jason's boy name pick since I was about 8 weeks along. Originally, we were going to spell it with a "K", but Colby and Tristen's names. Keith is after Jason's dad. Both Tristen and Colby have part of Jason's name as their name, so it was only fitting that we carried on the tradition.

My pregnancy thus far has been so smooth. I really can't complain about it. The past 12 weeks have been blissful and I've felt great. More recently, I've had more aches and pains, but nothing to cry about or complain about. Today, I'm 23 weeks along and I can't believe a week from today I'll be 6 months pregnant. People at work are finally starting to feel comfortable asking me - when are you due? I don't see a lot of people at work and it isn't like I've made some big annoucement that I'm pregnant. The people I work directly with (which is only 4 executives) have known since I was 13 weeks. In the last 2 days thought, I've had 4 other people stop my and congratulate me. It is kind of funny to see their face when I tell them I'm almost 6 months pregnant. Here is a snapshot of how my bump has progressed:

 

We have started on the nursery. Well, I say started, we've purchased the furniture and it has been delievered, and I've ordered and shipped the fabric for our bedding to be custom made. I'm pretty sure I searched every baby bedding website out there and nothing really struck my fancy. I didn't want any characters or a specific theme. I'll post pictures of the bedding once we get it back from the lady who is custom making it. I can't wait to get it back so we can start painting the room and putting everything else together. I found the perfect lamp today, but didn't buy it just yet b/c I'm not sure what color we are painting the room. I may just go back and buy it anyways. Here is an idea board of what our plans are:

I guess I've now reached the nesting phase. Although, I don't know that I'd call it nesting b/c I'd still be doing it if I wasn't pregnant. I've cleaned out closets and organized crap that should've been organized a long time ago. I usually clean out the boys' closets every 3-4 months b/c they outgrow things so quickly. Yes, just like a baby, these boys are growing like weeds. Tristen has out grown 2 pairs of jeans since the end of January. What is that...a month and 1/2? Seriously? The kid won't quit growing. He's grown 3 inches since last year and I don't think he's stopped yet.

So, there you have it. A baby update. :)

Busy, Busy Weekend

We have a busy, busy weekend ahead of us. It is the start of the neverending Baseball Season. Colby's tournaments start this weekend. Tonight Colby has practice. I'm going to hang out with my baseball mom friends. Tomorrow Colby has a 9am game and I have a 10am dentist appt. We'll all head BACK to Grapevine for Colby's 1pm game. I just found out about a surprise b-day party tomorrow at 5:30. I'm not sure if we'll make that.

Then, tomorrow evening, my sister-in-law, Haylee and I are heading to Divine Cosign, which is a huge baby consignment sale. We actually get to go to the First Time Mom's pre-sale. I'm super excited. Although we don't know the gender yet, I can at least look for some things that are gender neutral. I'm not really looking for clothes. I'm more looking for the gizmos and gadets Baby Hopper will need. In other baby news, we had the name discussion again last night. Boy this is going to be hard. I thought we had made some progress the last time we talked names, but we are pretty much back at square one. I have a boy name that I like and he has a boy name that he likes. Neither one of us are crazy about the other's. Then there is a boy name that we both like, but isn't our #1 choice. Girl names.....is pretty much the same way. I'm 99% sure we already have the middle name for either one down.

Jason is making a lot of progress on his Beetle. My guess is it will be close to complete within the next month. I really hope I'm right. I'm ready for that thing to be FINISHED and I'm pretty sure Jason is ready for it to be done, too.

Other than baseball, babies, and the beetle, not much else is going on. We are planning a camping trip with several friends for the first weekend of spring break. Yes, I will be camping when I'm 5 months pregnant. LOL!