Christmas Joy to the Max

We are having so much fun with little Maximus! He is two months old and brings a lot of joy into our lives.  He is a lot like a baby to our family. He is getting lots and LOTS and lots of attention. Do you remember my "Referee" post a few months back? Well, Blake and I are now playing referee over the puppy. Who held him last and who is next and for how long...etc, etc! He is a Dachshund/Poodle mix. He is the cutest and we especially love his random bouts of hair sticking up in random places on his little body! He is adorable!!!! When he plays fetch he pounces like a rabbit. Soooo cute! 

Downtown Aquarium Fun

On Friday we went with The Murdock Family (Blake's mom and dad, brother Ben and his family and his brother Scott and his family) to the Downtown Aquarium. We had sooo much fun together. I was impressed with the exhibits of the fish. We got to touch stingrays and see humongous fish and snakes (gross) and tarantula! We saw tigers and eel and sharks! We had fun riding the ferris wheel and the train! It was a great day! We went to eat afterward and  eventually that night we made it to see The Curious Life of Benjamin Button! ( I thought it was entertaining but did it really have a purpose???)  Our day at the Aquarium was a wonderful time and we were so happy to have been invited! 

Look how very sweet! Bella was making a wish while throwing a coin into the fountain. Blake's father, Lynn, is so wonderful with the girls as is Blake's mom.  We count their love in our many blessings. 

Look how HUGE this fish was! 

We got to see them switch out the tigers! After the switch they fed this girl! I was impressed with how close the Tiger came to the glass. The feeding was amazing. 

We all got to ride on the Giant Ferris Wheel! I am so afraid of heights but this is pretty fun. 

Blake, Ken, Cali and I rode in this gondola. Brae rode with Scott and Aly and Bella rode with The Murdocks!

My hair got so jacked up with the darn humidity that day!!! Uuggh, Houston! Anyway, Cali looked too cute to NOT put this picture up. 

This was the Shark Adventure Train Ride. We got to ride under the 'shark tunnel'. I won a bet while standing in line for this! Thanks for paying up Blake with a lovely shoulder massage! I bet that we would get on the next train! I barely won when we slid in with the rest of the family when the conductor tried to get Blake, Brae and I to wait. 

Kaleb (Blake's nephew) and the girls standing in line to ride the carousel

Dinner at Taco Bell after! We all had fun "relaxing" at this restaurant. :)

 Brae, Cali and Ken sat at their own table and behind them were Ben, Sara, Kaleb and Dylan. Bella sat at her own table for awhile then joined Ben and Sara's table for cinnamon twists.

Aleathea, Lynn, Aly, Scott, Manda and Blake.

Christmas Goodness

Our holiday season was jam-packed and the most stressful one to date! With running the business it added so much stress and chaos around our home! It lasted all the way up until Christmas Eve. I don't have pictures yet from Christmas Day but I want to share a few miracles that touched our hearts! We had someone do a drop at our door with a home-made gingerbread house. The inside was filled with candy too. The girls and I loved it! It was a beautiful treat! We also had a drop at our door with presents and plenty of goodness to go around! What was left was really too much and we were very humbled. Many tears were shed from the generosity of others! It was a true act of kindness! We also loved when our next door neighbors rang our doorbell on Christmas Eve and brought gifts for each of the girls specifically. It was so sweet! We are not sure if they even celebrate the holiday or not so it was very touching! We have had many blessings that surround us but these three were true acts of charity that I wanted to share! 

My Saving Grace

I am so glad the last week is over! I can't even begin to tell you how intense it was! I had my second open house for my business on December 5th and I received a lot of orders from it! I had 13 days to complete all the projects! If you add everyday life and the holidays (school programs, parties, shopping, Christmas cards, teacher gifts, etc...) to the nightmare of the orders you get ONE MELTDOWN. 

This season has been one of many lessons learned. I won't bore you with the knowledge gained for the business but I will share things I have learned in general. I learned that you can survive on very little sleep, four hours Sunday night, Monday night, Tuesday night and an 'All Nighter' on Wednesday night to have the orders done by Thursday. I learned that Late Night Talk 

Shows are a lot funnier on little sleep. haha I learned that vinyl is dangerous work. Do you know how many injuries we had this week alone! I learned that you can add getting a puppy to the mix of this past week and you can find joy amongst all the craziness and poo.

(Meet Maximus... one cute little puppy. He is a Dachshund/Poodle (Doodle according to the girls) mix. He is 2 months old and the girls gave it to Blake for Christmas! He is adorable.)

I learned that I can sleep sitting straight up at a dentist office and a Frappaccino can cure the tears during a meltdown Wednesday morning when it appeared there was NO WAY to get the orders done. Here are the most important things I have learned though... that family and friends are always there to help and that Heavenly Father provides a way to help us even when it appears there is no way. 

(This was one of my favorite signs I made this week for a woman. I think of The Jones' every time I see it :)

I blogged about how The Hairs helped us two Sundays ago and they also came back over the following Monday night for FHE to help with vinyl. Then, later that week Shannon and my friend, Lisa came over to help... ALL DAY, and ooh that was a harsh day! Then, this week, my friend Tiff took the girls for hours after school to help me while I worked. And can I just say how much I love Blake for what he's done to help! He has surprised himself by how good he is with peeling vinyl and recently applying it to ornaments (when we had 35 ornaments the night before the deadline!!!) He stayed up late with me during this past week working then on Wednesday he told me he was staying home from work to help me. If he hadn't done so there would have been NO WAY that I would have finished! We worked so hard! I can't describe how much it meant to me, in so many ways, that he would stay home to help me! Priorities are huge to one's heart. 

We completed all the orders and sleepily I went to drop them all off. I

crashed when it was all over and finally get to blog about it all! I am

trying to get caught up in life now after the craziest two months of my 

entire life!!! I am thankful for what I have learned professionally and

personally and I know that Blake and my friends are my 'Saving Grace'.

Holiday Party

Friday night was Blake's holiday party at Moody Garden's Hotel in Galveston. It was a beautiful event and the food was delicious!!! The hotel was gorgeous and was all decorated for Christmas. After the party we walked out to the "Festival of Lights" presentation. It was a really fun time! This is the only picture from the night. As a side note, the time away was MUCH needed. If I hadn't gone I think I was going to need to be admitted to the psych. ward! I feel much better now. 

Snow in Houston

It is darn cold today! We were sitting in line at school and it started to sleet. I was impressed with that for Houston. The next thing I knew it was snowing. It lasted for like twenty minutes or so. Pretty crazy!!!

Where Have All The Dresses Gone???

Well, I will re-phrase that question... Where have all the MODEST dresses gone? I went to the mall last night with Blake to look for a dress for his holiday party coming up. We looked in every major store in the mall and every other store that looked like it might sell a dress. There are NO modest dresses out there. Out of every store we went into I tried on 3. None of them were long enough! 

I loved this picture. We were in Dillards and this was my favorite dress of the night. Blake picked out this ROCKIN' sweater to go with it! What do you think? 

Intense

So, last Friday was my second open house for MandysWallCandy. It was a huge success. I had one women who needed her order by Monday. Since she lives an hour away I was trying to complete the order by Sunday at 5:30 so my friend from church could take it into work and save me a trip. :) I didn't get a chance to start the order until about 3pm on Sunday. There were 18 ornaments and one small tile. We were invited to the Hair's for lunch/dinner so I took the vinyl over there and we created a small sweat shop. Jared, Skyler, Kamryn, Shannon, Braelyn, Blake and I all helped! We were so fortunate that my friends stayed at church for 'Break the Fast' so we could drop the order off to them still. We met them at like 6:45. It was intense!!!! Too much pressure.  (Shannon sat where the ribbon sits and notice the baby in the bottom of the picture~ haha)

THURSDAY

I had quite a big day on Thursday. Blake took the day off for some well visit appointments so we hung out. In between appointments he and I went to see Twilight. I felt like the last one on earth to see the movie but learned since then that there are 'others' who are still in the dark. haha

I loved the movie. I had no expectations for it because I had heard both good and bad things. I was pleasantly surprised. I just thought they could have cast Jasper and Emmett better mainly. Maybe Esme too. Okay, and Rosalie and Alice as well. haha I liked Edward and Bella! So, besides the casting of the vampires the rest was awesome! 

After the movie I was so excited because I got to drive Blake's car. It is a stick shift and I hadn't driven one since high school. I know, right, forever ago!!! Like 11 years. I was so nervous at first. Right Blake!!! :) I did pretty good after driving through the parking lot at the movies and gave him the keys back. He insisted I drive more (he heard me talk about wanting to drive it for a month now and we never had a good time to do it) so I got to drive on a main road by our house. This main road had like 30 stop signs (no exaggeration- Champions Forest) so I was scared to stall the whole time. But I didn't. Yay me!!! haha I felt sad because I couldn't do my usual Cali stops that I do in my automatic ;) 

To finish a great Thursday I want to write quickly about Survivor. The end of Survivor had me biting my nails. Can I just say that I hate Corinne. Is that nice? I don't hate much- but I really, really can not stand her. She is a wretched, miserable and horrible person. She is plain nasty! I was sooo happy she was voted off! Here are her parting words to those who are left "I hate all of them, I hope they all have miserable lives." So endearing and just one example why I think so highly of her! Go Matty! He's my favorite!