You've Seen the Before, Now for the After

It only took a week to finish our landscaping and new sidewalk, that included no work on Thursday and Sunday and only a couple hours on Saturday. The kids and I were in Ohio, and by the time we got back the sidewalk was almost finished and all that was left of the landscaping was the mulch and the monkey grass.

To go with our home's new face lift, we power-washed the siding. As a side note, we will not wait two years to do that again! I painted the banisters and freshened up our door. It was previously a reddish/orange/brownish-rust color. So I went and bought barn red paint. Yes, I bought a gallon of barn paint for the door. It says, "Come on it, take your shoes off, and kick back and relax a while."

We had the flower beds along the retaining wall removed and new beds added along the porch. Now we have one large bed that swoops out to about the tallest half of the retaining all. It opened up the yard even more. The landscaper even leveled up the yard several feet at one end since.

Here's the new sidewalk. The old one went straight down from the driveway to the porch. It was only two feet from the side of the garage, making that flower bed impossible to do anything with. The small bushes kept growing over onto the sidewalk and the ground cover was getting out of control. Now it is opened up and you can enjoy a winding walk to the porch past delicious smelling roses and the sweet bay magnolias.

We decided to let the yard grow in where that terrible, horrible flower bed used to be. Really, it had potential. I have no idea if it was never finished or if, at one point it had been and half of the contents were removed with the new owners or what. However, the owners that we purchased from were not the gardening type. The bed had been unattended for a year and half while they lived here. Then it was all but abandoned when we bought the home. It was three months of the growing season between when we closed and when we moved in, at that point it was too far gone. The only thing we put back was the Japanese Maple. At least we can mow the weeds now.

Blue is the Best Color

It doesn't seem like that long ago that we were taking a two year old Calen to Tweetsie Railroad to ride Thomas. Here we are five years later taking a train-crazy, Thomas-loving Jackson to do the same thing.

Here comes Thomas! Jax can't contain the excitement. Riley is gripping my arm and shaking like a leaf. There are squeals of delight as all the children see him pulling into the station.

ALL ABOARD! Jax is ready to go.

Calen is relaxing and taking it easy.

That is one cute chick!


Hurry, Thomas is getting ready to go again!

When Jax was Riley's age, he went to Busch Gardens and rode the rides with Calen. He even rode the merry-go-round by himself! Riley? Not in a million years. She had to watch from the sidelines. Maybe next year...maybe...big, big maybe.

Meet Jax's little friend. Jax walked around feeding the animals one grain at a time. He wanted to make sure everyone got a bite and that it was as fair as possible. This little guy came out to see him and followed him around. Jax would have spent the entire afternoon hanging out with this cutie!


Jax riding the black plane. He would only ride the black one.


Can we bottle this moment?

Road Trip

Danny had a meeting to go to in Nashville. The kids and I tagged along. That's reason 1,086 why I love homeschooling- Edventures! We take off for a "vacation" that will count as school because our adventures always have education woven into them.

On this particular trip we headed out to explore the Natchez Trace Parkway. Along the way, we stopped at Meriwether Lewis' death and burial site.

We also made a stop to explore some falls. It was all the boys could do to keep out of the water.

Here's the bridge where we accessed the parkway. The boys really loved the view.

Enjoying the view and the brotherly love.

Calen and I had just finished studying Greece. Since we were going to Nashville, I figured we might as well go visit the Parthenon. It is much cheaper than traveling to Greece. Although I do hope to do that one day!

A Blast from the Past

Summer is in full swing here in the South. After a few days of extremely hot weather, I thought I would cool off by looking back at our winter wonderland. As Riley found out, snow does not always taste as good as it looks.

A Piece of Cake

Here are some of the cakes that I've done. They are not in order as I have done them.


This one was for a little boy who loves John Deere tractors and horses.


This one was for a baby shower and was my first "sale" cake.



Here is for an"Over the Hill" party. All the tombstones have "over the hill" sayings.

This was a baby shower cake for Danny's nurse. She's expecting twins.

This one was for a 70th birthday, and it was my first repeat customer!