Progress

So the painters are halfway finished! Yay! It's going to look AMAZING! One more coat to go.

Big difference.

Hopefully tomorrow I can get pictures of the carpet, it could be hard to tell since they were similar in color. The new carpet is just a tad darker. We are in the process of moving everything back into the rooms. I'll be glad to be finished, we are running on fumes. I'll be glad to have an organized house without things strung everywhere. For example:

Dining Room/Storage Room

I can't stand it and it's only been a day.

Getting some rest and hopefully get things finished tomorrow.

Another week has begun.

It's going to be a looooong week. We're still exhausted from working so hard this weekend. Our house is upside down and I can't stand it. We've moved almost all the furniture downstairs to the dining room, the spare bathroom is packed floor to ceiling and ours is getting pretty close. I'm glad Wednesday is almost here so next week we can have our house back, after the joy of putting it all back together.  I'm sure we will love the new look, I can't wait. The most exciting part (hopefully) is that they will officially be painting the house tomorrow, weather permitting and all the siding is fixed. I can't wait to post some pics!

Children are a blessing!

In Neil Postman's book, The Disappearance of Childhood, he writes, "Our children are the living messages we send to a time we will not see."
Our church service today was about how children are a blessing and a reward. I totally agree. Colton is such a blessing to Rob and I. We couldn't imagine how our life would be without him. You never think you can love someone or something so much until you have children. And it's hard to believe that God loves us even more than that. That is so awesome!

This is part of an e-mail that was sent to me from TCC:

When you are tempted to doubt God's love, remember the cross of Jesus Christ. It was directly in response to man's moral and spiritual failure that God chose to demonstrate His greatest display of love... the Cross.

So, when your children fail, and they will, consider them a blessing, because your abiding love for them serves to remind you that God's love for you never falters, despite your failure.

In this study today we learned that you reap what you sow in childbearing. As a parent if you're not taking your responsibility seriously according to Proverbs 17:25 it can be more of a curse than a blessing not only to you but society as well. I pray everyday that Rob and I look to God's guidance in raising our son.

Yes.Finally, It is DONE!

Getting up bright and early this morning and waiting for it to turn 50 degrees outside, we started our outdoor project of the weekend, staining our fence. After two trips to Lowe's (at this rate we should move in), some sun burn, aching muscles, extreme exhaustion and 15 gallons of stain it is finished.

Before

1st coat

Finished.

I've talked a lot about the work that has needed to happen on our chimney so I thought I would show you what I was talking about.

This is after all the wood was removed and the frame was rebuilt. Now finally waiting for the house to be painted.

Randomness....

Colton loves animals. Whether real or stuffed toys, he can't get enough. It's too bad that our dog Rivers, aka butt head, is to aggressive to be around him. All Colton wants to do is give him a big hug. So the only time he's around pets is at Nana and Pops, Nanny and Granpa, or Aunt Kelly and Uncle Jake's house. Such a shame.

Showing Misty some love.

Poor dog.

Went to visit Jerry and Josh at the propane store.

Just a day in the neighborhood...

What a beautiful day it ending up being. We ended up just going to our neighborhood play area this morning when it was still a little cool. Colton is going to be an outdoor adventurer. He LOVES it! Every time we go in he cries and wants to stay out a little longer.

Climbing up the "big boy" slide.

Long way down.

That was fun!

So to the "cooking challenge", tonight we had breakfast for dinner. Rob actually made french toast and bacon. Colton is just like his mom and dad. We love breakfast anytime of the day. I think he had swell belly. Haha. Tomorrow I'm thinking pork loin...yummy!

Such an unproductive day!

So my goal was to get started packing and move as much things from upstairs as possible to get ready for the carpet. What I got done: all picture frames boxed, guitar and accessories packed, dvd's moved to another box that still didn't fit them all, and the same for my shoes, then moved Colton's things that I had boxed already to the hallway. That pretty much sums it up. Still feeling a little overwhelmed.


More drama with the house. I think by this point I'm ready to scream! The people that lived here before were supposed to replace some water damaged areas, and they did, or so we thought. They must had picked dill- weed off the street to fix it because it looked ridiculous and didn't solve the problem. If anything it is what caused the problem. So what do ya know.....more $$ to fix the ENTIRE chimney, frame and all! Bye Bye tax return plus savings....

Hope you all had a Happy Saint Patrick's Day! We saw green.....as it was leaving our pockets!

I'm going to be a cooking machine!

So it was freezing today! Where is the warm weather? I'm excited Saturday will officially be Spring, I'm ready to wear some bright colored clothing.

So as most of you know, I'm a frugal woman (the past year or so anyway) and I love my coupon binder. I've been a little slacker lately when it comes to cooking and we have been eating out a LOT! We've just been so busy running errands here and there and we are hardly ever home around dinner and sometimes lunch time as well. It's amazing how $30-$40 meals sometimes twice a day add up!  So we've set a goal of only eating out once a week and get back to my frugal ways when it comes to cooking. So if anyone has any good recipes send them my way, I always like to try something new. I've gotten a few new cookbooks lately and I'm ready to see how they do. I'm hoping this blog will keep us faithful :) No more Chili's, LongHorn, Cracker Barrel, Danny's BBQ etc. Oh how you will be missed.....

What a disaster of a day...

This has been a horrible day. Where do I start.....Colton gets up earlier than usual this morning, the painters get here and start pressure washing the house and the inside smells like a hospital (very strong bleach smell) almost like a rest home even with the windows open most of the day. Rob comes home and the guy tells him that there is some rotted wood on the entire chimney which means lots of $$$ to fix. So we decided to cook dinner, some chicken with random spices and olive oil (which was delicious), baked pineapple, which I didn't have enough cheddar cheese and had to use some mozzarella cheese (I wouldn't recommend but was edible) and broccoli.

A quick put together dinner...

Then we decided to open a glass a wine and what do you know....the wine opener broke! Ahh.... Then the cork breaks into numerous pieces, so we tried some tools and with a lot of work and sweat we finally got the wine open.

Once opened it was pretty good.

Rob decides to finish updating the drawers in the kitchen with new knobs and the screws are 1/2" to short. So now we need to make our 100th trip to Lowe's and buy longer screws. And the night was topped off with a broken wine glass.

This was my vent for the day, sorry to all those reading! The Mangum's are calling it a night!

Monkey Joe's Adventure...

So I have to tell you about this place called Monkey Joe's in Raleigh. If you're not familiar with Monkey Joe's it's a large indoor play area that kids can run, jump, slide and whatever they can imagine to do in these inflatable things! My first thought was, this is going to be a lot of fun for Colton, he's never seen anything like this. He's going to run around and jump and so on. Little did I know that Kelsey and I were going to get more of a workout then when could have ever imagined. We were climbing up walls stepping on these little inflatable blocks (if you want to call those steps) while carrying 25 lbs toddlers while wearing slippery socks! I was sweating! I'm sure all the other parents had a good laugh at us....but I must say Colton and Camden loved going down those big slides. I would love to go back but, Rob will be the one climbing those floats!

 These pictures are just from the toddler area!

Camden hanging out at the "pool"

Look at me Mom!

Taking a break...

Sundays

Oh how I love Sundays! Nothing like a lazy Sunday afternoon and a 2 hour nap. After church we decided to try the new Italian restaurant here in town and I must say I was pretty impressed. It was a great atmosphere! Rob was able to finish the painting that we had taped off yesterday, now just a little more caulking in the dining room and I think the inside will be FINISHED! (Except for the dreaded carpet coming in.) Talking about carpet, Lowe's called today and our carpet had to be ordered and won't be here until the end of the week, so we're looking at another week before it can be installed. Egh! Which I'm sure we'll need to get everything packed up. Still not sure where all this furniture is going to go....! If anyone wants to come and help, I can cook a mean lasagna....

Selling!

So we are in the process of selling our home. Who knew there could be so much work involved and how much stuff we have in this house! The fun part is about to arrive in a week, new carpet! To save a little money we have decided to move the furniture out ourselves. (What were we thinking?) So much work ahead of us and I'm stressing out. Rob is such the calm and laid back person and nothing bothers him...I think I make up for the both of us. The house is being painted starting Monday and I can't wait to see how it's going to look. I'm sure we'll love it! Why couldn't we do this 4 years ago so we could actually enjoy it how we wanted it to begin with?
After a busy day of cleaning windows, working on crown molding and other odds and ends things we are finally calling it a night! Happy Spring Forwarding!