oop, one more!

phoenix! check it this one is awesome! can you IMAGINE!?!?!

phoenix!

another cool one, matt showed me this one!

love it!

oh man, this makes me want to be there so bad...

oh my gosh, saw this on a friends facebook post and just goes to show how much awesome, beautiful stuff is happening out there. this was in Paris, honestly makes me want to be there so bad. if i was on the street or in that hallway when this happened...i WOULD have cried! no doubt. it's just moving in so many great ways! i like the hoodie guy, he's just adding his part, so modest.

i can't believe it's only been a year since we were over in europe, this time last year! i want to go again so bad.

i just googled more and there are so many great videos out there. you can see a lot more, just google!

lyrics: i wonder what this means?

Lyrics to For Emma :
Narrator:

(So apropos:

Saw death on a sunny snow)

Him:

"For every life..."

Her:

"Forgoe the parable."

Him:

"Seek the light."

Her:

"...My knees are cold."

(Running home, running home, running home, running home...)

Her:

"Go find another lover;

To bring a... to string along!"

"With all your lies,

You're still very lovable."


"I toured the light; so many foreign roads for Emma, forever ago."

another awesome greece shot

love this one...

by my cousin katie!

house update!

with new door

this pretty little house is just screaming for some landscaping to be put in!

laundry!

front door!

kitchen is coming along!

it's all about ELLIE today

poor baby has started crying more...i think her tummy has been hurting her :( so it is sad to hear her cry, but mason and kelly do such a good job taking care of her...but all these pictures show the wonderful time we had with her and as a family together on saturday!

this is how mason had her when we got there! In her baby bjorn

go ellie! lovin it!

grammy!

chillin with the wonderful weather on the front porch!

kelly, mason and ellie!

getting her 3 month bday gifts!

i got her that little butterfly outfit. perfect timing for the cooler weather!

ooohhhhh. smiling! go matty!

so cute!

what's out there?

lookin'...

cute picture!

matt's iphone show and ellie!

what a fun weekend! my parents came up earlier than usual to go to matt's iphone show, which had such a great turnout. we also got to see my brother's friend ned and baby state slusher with a mustash! ellie was a trooper and it was FUN showing her OFF! we love her SO much! thanks for coming out mason and kelly!

with dad and mason

i love her!

SMILES!

with state in stash!

KERA interview! go matty

the only pic of matty we got with his work not directly behind him but behind the blond hair!

with ned and noel

ellie came to visit

tailgate fun!

mason, kelly and ellie at TCU's tailgate vs. Baylor!!!

my cousin's in greece!

oh my goodness, my cousin, katie, is studying abroad in greece this semester. i wish i was there, bringing back memories! check it!

let the sheet rocking BEGIN!

good news, we've FINALLY passed the plumbing and framing inspections so we can start sheet rocking TOMORROW!

labor of love...

this is from an email that my aunt sent on...just thought it was interesting and so true. you gotta read all the way through...love is not easy, but SO worth the efforts, to have a partner, you'll love forever!

i love you matty!

DID I MARRY THE RIGHT PERSON?

During one of our seminars, a woman asked a common question. She said, "How do I know if I married the right person?"

I noticed that there was a large man sitting next to her so I said, "It depends. Is that your husband?"

In all seriousness, she answered "How do you know?"

Let me answer this question because the chances are good that it's weighing on your mind.


Here's the answer.

EVERY relationship has a cycle. In the beginning, you fell in love with your spouse. You anticipated their call, wanted their touch, and liked their idiosyncrasies.

Falling in love with your spouse wasn't hard. In fact, it was a completely natural and spontaneous experience. You didn't have to DO anything. That's why it's called "falling" in love... because it's happening TO YOU.

People in love sometimes say, "I was swept of my feet." Think about the imagery of that ___expression. It implies that you were just standing there; doing nothing, and then something came along and happened TO YOU.

Falling in love is easy. It's a passive and spontaneous experience.

But after a few years of marriage, the euphoria of love fades. It's the natural cycle of EVERY relationship. Slowly but surely, phone calls become a bother (if they come at all), touch is not always welcome (when it happens), and your spouse's idiosyncrasies, instead of being cute, drive you nuts.

The symptoms of this stage vary with every relationship, but if you think about your marriage, you will notice a dramatic difference between the initial stage when you were in love and a much duller or even angry subsequent stage.

At this point, you and/or your spouse might start asking, "Did I marry the right person?" And as you and your spouse reflect on the euphoria of the love you once had, you may begin to desire that experience with someone else. This is when marriages breakdown. People blame their spouse for their unhappiness and look outside their marriage for fulfillment.

Extramarital fulfillment comes in all shapes and sizes. Infidelity is the most obvious. But sometimes people turn to work, church, a hobby, a friendship, excessive TV, or abusive substances.

But the answer to this dilemma does NOT lie outside your marriage. It lies within it.

I'm not saying that you couldn't fall in love with someone else. You could. And TEMPORARILY you'd feel better. But you'd be in the same situation a few years later. Because (listen carefully to this):

THE KEY TO SUCCEEDING IN MARRIAGE IS NOT FINDING THE RIGHT PERSON; IT'S LEARNING TO LOVE THE PERSON YOU FOUND.


SUSTAINING love is not a passive or spontaneous experience. It'll NEVER just happen to you. You can't "find" LASTING love. You have to "make" it day in and day out. That's why we have the ___expression "the labor of love." Because it takes time, effort, and energy. And most importantly, it takes WISDOM. You have to know WHAT TO DO to make your marriage work.

Make no mistake about it. Love is NOT a mystery. There are specific things you can do (with or without your spouse) to succeed with your marriage.

Just as there are physical laws of the universe (such as gravity), there are also laws for relationships. Just as the right diet and exercise program makes you physically stronger, certain habits in your relationship WILL make your marriage stronger. It's a direct cause and effect. If you know and apply the laws, the results are predictable. .. you can "make" love.

Love in marriage is indeed a "decision"... not just a feeling.

ART FOR SALE!!!

looking for some art to fill your bare walls?

click here to purchase some of mine!!!

white house

it's coming along!

they're painting existing beige windows frames white today!!!

we can envision landscaping will work wonders as well!

dirt's in...

matt calculated with out 4 pallets of dirt, jointly we carried and dumped 10,000 pounds of top soil over a span of a couple days to fill behind that retaining wall!

yikes! we're very pleased with what we worked so hard for, now we just pray it withstands time

love this bedding!

just gotta show little brooks!

our friends jacob and lauren and their little baby boy Brooks!

(stole these off FB to show here)

matty shot i like

kelly and ellie!

Sara Bareilles - King of Anything...

thought i'd post this music video, sara's been on the Today show a couple days in a row now and i guess i really like how this song sounds...

funny thing is that i've heard it 1,000 times cause it plays all the time at my store (Anthro-they really do play some good songs there, and some bad ones, too)

i like the clapping...

...the fruits of our LABOR / day !

looking for a house update,

well, there really isn't one...DANG IT!

you'd think there would be since it's been almost 3 weeks since the last photos were taken....

long story short...

we tried going the no permit route (b/c we were told it wasn't a big deal and we probably wouldn't get caught), well we ended up getting busted and are coming up on THREE WEEKS OF NOTHING! we are praying that it'll get back going the end of this week!

matt and i are SO ready to get this thing back up and moving...well we've done so much this past holiday weekend. sat and sun we worked 8-5 and monday we pulled a 12 hour day! but we completed our project: a retaining wall in the back to sort of even out our unlevel backyard! it looks great. at first we had our doubts. digging the trench was a nightmare and then we got smart and called home depot. there Keith recommended a ditch witch and matt and i agreed it was the smartest $100 we'd ever spent. but even with the ditch witch, it took the better part of 4 hours to dig that trench!

we poured concrete on the back side of the wall, covering some bricks that matt's friend, Justin, suggested we stair stepped up to create support from all the dirt we'll have to put in it. sweet justin came over for about 4 hours and helped on monday!

getting busy, we love our new trusty wheel barrow, we've already used the heck out of it these past 3 days!

PRIMED house...but seeing that it's supposed to rain the next 1 1/2 weeks, probably will stay this way a little longer. final colors are white with grey trim!

side of house. was completely overgrown and we took charge and cleaned it up!

matty renting the ditch witch!

putting it to shame! that thanks shook him crazy! he was beat at the end of the day!

dirty matty

before picture of the back yard before wall went up...

our wall!

i looks so good. can't believe we did it actually! that was not an easy project!