Christmas 2010

Presents, lights, food, giddy excitement, too little sleep... Aaaah, Christmas!

Madison's last Preschool Christmas Pageant

Canyon Creek Preschool does a really cute Christmas pageant with the kids each year. This will be Madison's last one since she starts kindergarten next year. She's in the back row, fifth from the right. She is good little singer and enjoyed all the hand movements along with the song. Such a sweet, fun age.

ICE, ICE, Baby

We booked a hotel in Grapevine, Texas, talked our friends the Andertons into coming with us and took off for our northern adventure. Between Fort Worth and Dallas is a little town called Grapevine. The town is very fond of Christmas and goes all out. It also happens to have a resort called the Gaylord Texan where Christmas is taken to new heights. We all went to see the ICE show there - a Charlie Brown Christmas this year. It was beautiful - and COLD!!!

Big Trouble with New House

The last day of our Thanksgiving/Birthday blowout we discovered a huge sewer backup that flooded the new house from both sides of the first floor. It. was. disgusting. It started a huge ordeal of emergency clean-up crews, mold-testing and Standard Pacific's head of warranty dept overseeing everthing. It was a big, messy deal. They had to rip out all the carpet, tile, and some of the wood, baseboards, doors, moldings. They cleaned and then tested the house 3 times before it got a green light from the mold guy for the rebuild. Fortunately for us, they let us re-do the master bath at the same time. It was the only ugly part of the house when we bought it. Apparently every dark cloud has a silver lining.

Double Big Birthdays and Thanksgiving

I realized that my Dad, Tim Jernigan, and brother, Wade were turning 70 and 40 on December 3rd and 5th of this year. So, I hatched a plan to get everyone out to Austin to celebrate Thanksgiving and the big birthdays. Luckily we closed on the new house on November 20th, just a few days before everyone arrived, so we had some extra rooms to share. Wade, Stacy, and the boys flew out, Mom and Steve drove down, Dad and Teddy flew out, and Wendy flew out with her boyfriend, Mike Ezelle who we were all going to meet for the first time. No pressure, Mike. We had a huge Thanksgiving meal, a kid's interpretational First Thanksgiving play, Black Friday shopping, a huge birthday party, a scavenger hunt, did the Austin Duck Tour, had a big-kids night out, played Bingo, and ate ourselves silly. It was my most favorite Thanksgiving ever. Scavenger hunting... Down the greenbelt... Cooking and eating... Duck touring... Proof we all actually were in one place at one time!

Halloween Fun

A week of Halloween parties: the special dance class dress-up day, Canyon Creek's Halloween parade and party, the church trunk-or-treat, and finally, the actual day and trick or treating with Meredith. Halloween is a big production around here!

New Job. New House?

On October 18, I started my new job as an intern at Rudd and Wisdom. I met Nadia Binkley and Ray finally and got a personal tour as Dani took me around the building. I was excited to meet everyone. I am processing pension benefits for our clients - it is very complicated and the rules are different for each client. Definitely not mindless! A week later we were driving through a nearby neighborhood looking at the new houses when Dave noticed one that had previously had a sold sign that now said 'available'. It had a gorgeous Rocky mountain-looking exterior and dark wood floors througout the downstairs. It has a private backyard backing up the a greenbelt, an outdoor kitchen, and 2 levels of decks in the backyard. Perfect yard for a pool! I fell in love with it almost instantly. Dave took a little longer. After looking at houses for 7 years, I felt it was the perfect one. I am ready for a new start and want to land where we are going to be. We put an offer on the house and are going to close in November! Super excited!!!