It's official! Let the fun begin.

I canNOT believe I now have a teenager!

Yup, thirteen years ago today, this little girl entered our world.

My, how thirteen years have flown right by!!

You're not a little girl anymore!!!

Ashley is pretty awesome.
She rocks some amazing talent.

Look what she created on the computer....

 She loves anime', and is currently perfecting her ability to draw it. This blew me away, because I just think it was amazing she created this on the paint pad on the computer. Wow!!!
Ashley is in love with vampires and werewolves and zombies. She likes to play with make-up, but not in your typical teenager kind of way. She likes special effects makeup, and so likes to zombify herself. I'll have to post a photo one day. I'm thinking I'll let her do all of our Halloween make-up this year.
Her favorite group is My Chemical Romance, and she's dying to dye her hair black. I'm still debating the issue. I might let her go brown. We'll see.

Happy, Happy Birthday to my amazing and talented young woman. I'm excited to see what the future holds for you Ashley. But, I'm in no rush!!!!

Just two things....

One.

The first turned leaf of the season (at least the first one to fall on my doorstep).

And two.

I just adore those freckles (not to mention the cute little face that goes with them)!

Happy Monday

(that's like an oxymoron isn't it?)

thoughts on home decor

I canNOT wait to move! We put our application in for the condo on Friday. The lady called yesterday and said everything looks good. I'm super excited.
Now my mind is spinning with ideas to decorate the new place. The kitchen isn't huge, but there's definitely more space than we have in the apartment. It's got pot shelves, which I love. We had them in our house, but the apartment doesn't and I've missed not having them. I love decorating them for the holidays. We'll be moving in in early December, so I'm pretty sure Christmas decorations will be the first thing I unpack. lol

The dining room wall is what I've been thinking about a lot lately. I think I want to do some kind of collage with family photo's and "family" themed things. I've seen those awesome letter art items on various websites

Saw this in my email this morning, and I'm seriously thinking I love it:

What a great deal! It's only available til Friday though, so click on my linky here if you want to take advantage of it:  http://www.broadcastbloggers.com/deal.php?i=96&a=1068803


I think I would love the family one in my dining room, and I like the idea of the love one over my headboard in the bedroom.

I think the thought of moving is rejuvenating me. I feel like I'm finding some sense of purpose again. I have been missing it since we moved.

a little help, please!

So, I have a little dilemma....

Hopefully, at the end of November we will be leaving this dive we call home. Ok, it's not really that bad, it's just too small. I hate not having a bigger kitchen, a separate dining area and a few other little things about this apartment.

Someone from church is moving away about the same time and they want to rent out their condo out for considerably less than we're currently paying (our rent here will jump $200 when the lease is up--there is NO way I'm gonna' pay more to be unhappy!). So, it will work out perfectly.

The condo is still an apartment (and on the THIRD floor--yikes!), but it's SO much nicer than this place. So, I'm uber excited at the prospect.

Here's my current dilemma.
I need to start packing up the stuff I'm not gonna' be needing.

So, I'm going through stuff, trying to weed out more unnecessary items.

Enter these two little characters:

These little girls were given to me after the passing of my grandma(s).

I think each one is from a different grandma, although I can't even remember for sure.

I don't love them.

Any other thing,  and it would be no problem. Into the donation box you go.

But, they're really the only little memento's of my grandma's that I have.

They don't necessarily remind me of my grandma's--other than I know they belonged to them.

So do I get rid of them, or hold onto them?

Opinions please.

are those sharks in the sky?

Got up to take Ashley to the busstop this morning.

She pointed out the the clouds looked like triangles...

 trippy right?

I thought they looked like upside down sharkfins.

 a whole sky full of them.

I wonder what makes them form that way?