Merry Christmas!

The kids in their Christmas jammies and cookies for Santa

The year has just gone by too fast once again.
Our Christmas this year was wonderful. I think the past 2 Christmases, even though ok, were harder on us because we had still been living somewhere that really wasn't our home (at my parents house). This year, we are in our own home and we were able to have a great 1st Christmas in our home.
Christmas Eve the kids and I made cookies for Santa and then they frosted them and put in sprinkles. They left Santa one from each of them and some chocolate milk. Joseph practically ran to bed he was so worried that Santa was going to arrive and no one would be asleep.
Our Christmas Day was very quiet. The kids woke us up about 7:15ish, maybe a bit before, and we enjoyed opening presents and then watched new movies we got and waited for the turkey.
We just enjoyed being together all day long.

Slacker Long Enough

Ok. It has been much too long since I have last updated. It's so much easier to just post some pics on facebook and call it good.
So much has happened since my last post way back in November (which was on Halloween!).
This post will not include any pics as I don't want to mess with any tonight. Perhaps I will post again soon and include pics!
Well, to start, we started looking at houses last fall. I think we started at the beginning of November. We probably looked at between 20-30 houses in Maricopa. We had originally hoped to find something in Chandler to be closer to my work, however, the neighborhoods we could afford was something we had run into back home, so we didn't even bother looking. We knew we could find a nice, newer home in Maricopa (and in Queen Creek, but that's further away and we didn't want to look there), with good neighborhoods, so we decided that we needed to look there. Maricopa is where we had been living with my parents since we moved down here. It does take about 20-30 minutes to get to Chandler, but the drive is something I am so used to, driving it 6 days a week, to me it only seems like 10-15 minutes. Anyway, I digress.
We made offers on two houses before we got our offer accepted on a 3rd. And out of the houses we put offers on or considered putting offers on, when we looked at our house, I walked through the rooms thinking how I could definitely see us living there. It felt SO right!
We made an offer the Sunday before Thanksgiving and it was accepted the next day. It was a short sale, so we had to wait for all the banks and lenders and everyone involved to approve everything. We had a green light to proceed by January and we closed on our house at the end of January! We officially moved in by mid-February after getting the carpets professionally cleaned, getting new appliances for the kitchen (dishwasher and fridge), as well as a new kitchen sink and getting the whole inside and outside sprayed for bugs! ;) We weren't taking chances on finding unwanted visitors!
I just love our house. We've been here for about 5 months now. We've done a lot of things, but of course, there is so much more to get done. We still need to paint, we still need to get a few window treatments, we still want to landscape the backyard, etc, etc. But we have just felt such peace since we bought our home. I KNOW that we were supposed to buy this home and that Heavenly Father led us to it. We had wanted our own home for years, and that was one of the reasons we decided we needed to move down here (besides family help while Steve returned to school). I had a feeling that we would be able to buy a house down here. A nice house in a nice neighborhood.
Our house is 1672 sq ft. 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms 2 car garage :) corner lot. built in 2002
Love it!
That is our biggest thing that has happened.
All the kids have had birthdays since my last post. Larissa turned 4 in December, Sara turned 10 in January. Joseph turned 7 and Seth 3, both in May. And Steve and I celebrated our 12th anniversary, also in May, this year.
The kids are enjoying summer, even though it is hot, we are in our own home and they have their own backyard to play in. Although, it is just dirt right now (and one tree!) they have a sandbox and we are working on putting up a swing set. At some point we want to landscape and put in grass (most likely fake so we don't have to water it) and a few more trees.
Steve completed enough hours to apply for his Associates Degree, so we are waiting on that. In the mean time, he's in the midst of summer classes, trucking along. He is really enjoying our home, too, and basically single-handedly removed all of the weeds in our front yard alone (no small task as we have a corner lot), and has kept on top of house projects and the front yard landscaping watering and kept on top of those weeds!
Work is going well for me, but I am busier than ever. I was trained in the book-keeping software for my school site tuition this past year. I am still the assistant director, but am now doing the book-keeping for BOTH of our sites. I work very closely with our new director at our site, as well as the director at our other site and our owner. I do enjoy what I am doing very much and I am so grateful for the experience I am getting and being able to really contribute to our team. I know the Lord has put me here and is giving me what I need and I am so very grateful.
I do still so miss being with the kids and Steve more, but at least I enjoy my work and I am happy that I can support my family and support Steve in his education. We are doing what we need to be doing for now. And as long as we thank Heavenly Father and do what we need to do, He will continue to bless us.
Anyway, that is some of what has been going on with us. Hopefully another update soon!

Halloween pics (updated post below)

me with some of my co-workers on Halloween

me, towards the end of the day after my black wig had about had enough

Sara - Halloween party at their school did face painting. She wanted a bat.

My ninja with a pumpkin painted on his face.

Woody at his Halloween party at preschool.

The rare spotted tiger at preschool :)

All 4 of my ghouls

quick update

I know that I have been slacking terribly here at my blog.
And now here it is mid-November. Where has the time gone, honestly?
Summer literally flew by. I worked just about every week all summer, taking 2 weeks off. It wasn't until probably August or September that I started complaining about the heat. After so many months I was just ready for something other than 100+ degree heat. I was happy even if it was 98! It is perhaps a bit sad that I can tell the difference now between 110 and 98 degrees.
My school (where I work) started the Fall semester the last week of July, and things are going well. I am learning how to do some book-keeping and it is a good skill to know for sure. I have had to figure out the software which I am pretty comfortable with, but some of it just isn't making 100% sense all of the time. But I do feel like I know what I am doing with it, so that is a huge plus!
Larissa and Seth are able to come with me Tuesdays and Thursdays, so that is nice. I am so very grateful to have them with me 2 days a week. Just having them in the building with me so I can peek at them every now and then is huge for me.
Sara and Joseph started school mid-August and I am very happy about their teachers this year and they are both doing very well in school.
Steve is trucking right along with his school studies. He should, as long as everything continues to go well, be able to get his Associates this coming spring. But he will need to continue with his studies, so it will be a while yet. But it's going well and he is doing awesome!
For Halloween (pictures will need to be posted in a different post), Sara was a vampire-witch, Joseph was a ninja, Larissa was a spotted tiger and Seth was Woody from Toy Story.
I also dressed up for work. I donned a long black wig and said I was a vampire.
We did trunk-or-treating at church and then did hit a few houses in our neighborhood.
Well, of course there is more to update on, but this will have to be it for now, I think... Pictures coming up in a seperate post.

I swear I will update soon. A real update.
We have been busy.
School has started out here.
Sara is in 4th, Joseph is in 1st, Larissa and Seth are going Tuesdays and Thursdays with me at the preschool.
Steve kept going with school all summer, but his fall semester has started as well.
Work is good. Busy, but good.

Anyway, as I said, a real update soon. Hopefully very soon.
:)

May

Easter, which I believe was the last time I posted anything, is long gone. I can't believe that it's the last week of May and that the kids will be out of school for the summer!
May has been a busy month for us. Steve and I celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary, today was Joseph's 6th birthday, Friday is Seth's 2nd birthday. Plus lots of end of the school year activities for both Sara and Joseph at school - a couple field trips, water day is tomorrow. Joseph's kindergarten graduation is this week. Sara had her dress rehearsal for her ballet recital last Saturday, this Friday is the actual recital. Larissa had her last day of preschool last Friday, ending the year with a splash pad and ice cream day. Steve started summer school session. And at my work May consisted of a lot of summer prep, including me and the director going over summer staffing (it's going to be tight but we'll survive somehow!), getting lesson plans ready, class lists. Also starting on advertising for Fall after school and starting to work on class lists for that already as well. In short, May has just been packed with busy activities.
This week I have my first week of summer vacation. This won't be a relaxing week, but that's ok. I'll get to help with water day tomorrow, the as I mentioned already, kindergarten graduation. 2 year old pictures with Seth will happen this week. My VTers are supposed to come visit (Finally! I've been here over a year and will I finally have VTers???? That visit???), Seth's bday, Sara's ballet recital.... plus other things that I can't even think of right now! I have another week of vacation in June. Unfortunately, it looks like we won't be able to go home to CO to visit (lack of money), but we'll have to think of fun things to do here... that are cheap.
Anyway, a few pics.......

Today at Chuck-E-Cheese, which is where Joseph wanted to go for his bday lunch, the kids' favorite game was Spider Stompin.

Joseph posing for his 6 year old pic!


Seth and Larissa enjoying the slide

Joseph and Sara
We also went to the park this evening at 6:30 when it cooled down to about 90. We played for about an hour, on the playground and in the grass. The kids were beat tonight and went to bed pretty early -woohoo!!

And then here's Steve and me 11th wedding anniversary pic. We celebrated by going to lunch at Rainforest Cafe, and to see the new Star Trek movie.

Here's hoping that I update again sooner rather than later! :)

Happy Easter from the Brocks!! :)