It's been a while......

Wow! I can't believe how long its been since I have written anything. A lot has happened since big sis came to visit! Big sis moved in with us! lol. Marie wanted to move back up here from NC, so we let her and the kids stay with us until they could get on their feet. Now it's 3 months later and she just got into her own place. I am so happy for her and happy to have my house back =D It was hard having another family live with us, but we all handled it pretty well. I pray that everything works out good for her and her family. Ben has started a new job since the last time I wrote. He now works in construction and he finally has a set schedule. I love that he is home with us more and through the night! This job is just temporary though. Ben will leave for bootcamp on July 1st of this year for the Navy =( It will be a major adjustment for our family, but he has my support. We both feel that it is the best decision for us at this time. Brandon is doing good. I now have weekly visitation with him and he will live with us for most of the summer. It is such a blessing to have more time with him. I hope sometime in the future he will be living with us primarily. It was really hard for him to have his cousins live here with us, but he got through his frustrations of it all. Kirsten is growing so fast and it is such a joy watching her learn new things. She is crawling a little now and she sits up on her own really well. I started her on solids at around 5 1/2 - 6 months because she would watch us eat and try grabbing our food to put in her mouth. I have been wanting to post some pics of her for a while now. I also have a video where she scooted from the middle of the living room floor all the way to her daddy in front of the sink in the kitchen. She was so cute!! I didn't catch the very beginning, but I caught most of it. I was geeking, so don't pay attention to me in the background, lol. I sound so silly, hehe. I took Evelyn's idea of making a collage of some of the pics, thanks Evelyn! And for me, I plan on continuing my education for a degree in computer science with taking online courses starting this summer. I'm still not working right now, but my uncle said he is finally picking up more work, so he might need me to start back soon. The good thing about working with him is the fact that he will let me bring Kirsten to work with me. That is so awesome!! I am really not ready to leave her for more then a couple of hours. I also received my calling recently to teach 6 year olds (CTR6):o That really scares me as I have not done anything like this before. It will definetly be a learning experience for me. Other then that I just enjoy being at home with Kirsten and helping others when I can. I need to go for now I want to watch a movie with my hubby before we go to bed ;) Tata for now, lol. I will leave you with some pics of us and a cute video that took FOREVER to upload, lol.
Kirsten enjoying some peas and mashed taters :p and she sure made a big mess :o I think she got more on her then in her mouth, lol =D Kirsten playing with her toys :) I'm normally not very photogenic, but this one came out pretty good I think. I really love this pic of me and my Kirsty Bear!! My two angels! It looks like Kirsten is trying to make Brandon smile. I loved this pic & the one above it so much I had them printed off so I could frame them. Kirsten really loves sucking her thumb!!

Kirsten & daddy! The flash causes her to close her eyes, lol.

Awwwwwww!! Need I say more =)

Here is the video I was talking about earlier. This is the first and only time we seen Kirsten do this so like I said, don't pay attention to me geeking, lol =)

Big Sis Came to Visit =)

I've been wanting to write about my sister Marie coming for a visit for some time now, but it has been hard to get any free time to do so. Kirsten is napping so I have a little bit of free time to be on the computer. My sister and two out of four of her kids came up from Bailey, North Carolina to visit us and it sure was a crazy weekend. My cousin Cathy and her daughter Jessie drove them up here and I thought that they were going to stay with her dad in Chesapeake, but found out they needed to stay at our house as well. We really had a full house that weekend. Everytime Kirsten would fall asleep for a nap someone would start yelling and wake her up, poor baby :( Despite not getting her naps she was in a suprisingly good mood for the whole weekend. This was my sister's first time seeing Kirsten, so I was excited to show off my beautiful baby girl :p Kirsten just loved Marie. She had Kirsten talking and giggling. I really enjoyed seeing them together. Their was some annoyances that weekend, but over all it was a good weekend and I was grateful that Cathy was able to bring them up for a visit. Here is some pics of our weekend together :)


Marie and Kirsten :)


My beautiful niece Alexis :)


Alexis and Brandon acting crazy =)


My cousin Jessie, I just realized I didn't get any of her mom Cathy :o


One of my other beautiful nieces Kasey and my beautful baby girl :)


Alexis and Kirsten :)


Her arms were wrapped around the lil bear till I grabbed the camera ;)


Kirsten and Momma :)

There wasn't any really good ones of Marie and Kasey or her other two kids since they weren't here, so these pics are from other visits.


Kasey :)


My nephew, Marie's son, Patrick and Brandon stuffing thier faces :p


My beautiful big sis Marie :)


From left to right, My neices Qwenlyn (my lil sis's daughter), Linda, and Kasey (both Marie's) =)


My beautifil "goth" lil sis Jennifer with her baby girl Azaelah :)


More beautiful nieces, Qwenlyn and Azaelah (Jen's daughters). They are older now, but I don't have any recent pics. I keep forgetting my camera when I go visit :)

That's all for now. Kirsten is starting to wake up, so I need to go. I'll write more and post more pics as I am able to.

Kirsten is Sleeping in her Crib :)

When Kirsten was born she would not sleep in her bassinet. Due to our living arrangements at that time we did not have her crib set up to see if she would like sleeping in there instead, so she has been sleeping with us for the past 3 months. Ben wants her to sleep in her own bed, like she is supposed to, so that we can cuddle and stuff. He has been telling me I need to start putting her in her crib for naps so she will know that it is her bed and get used to being in there. When Kirsten is sleepy she gets cranky, like her momma (lol), so yesterday when she got cranky I knew she was ready for a nap. I decided to take Ben's advice and lay her in her crib for a nap. She fussed for about 10-15 mins and I just would go in and put her patsie back in her mouth and she finally went to sleep. She slept for about 30 mins and I was happy thinking it's a start. We normally go to bed between 11-12 and around that time she started getting cranky so I asked Ben to lay her in her crib to see what she does. Ben laid her down, turned her mobile on, and shut the door. She went to sleep! We didn't hear a peep out of her! I was so suprised that it was so easy. I mean I thought we would have to let her cry :( which will make me cry :( for a few nights or weeks even before she will just lay down and go to sleep. She is such a good baby. We are so blessed to have her and we love her so much. She slept until around 4:45 and then she woke up hungry. I then put her in bed with me since daddy left for work at 4:00, hehe:) I sneaked in and got a pic of my precious lil angel after she fell asleep.

So much to do and so little time to do it in...and a liittle about Kirsten

We had lots to do this weekend and of all those things. Brandon completed his project today!! It looked so good. He had to do a 3D layout of the state of Virginia and label all the mountains, rivers, and color it. It really turned out great. I think Barbara was more nervous than Brandon was because she told me "I don't know if I can do this. I don't remember ever doing this in school." It was just so cute because you would've thought that she was being graded for the project. Here's some pics of the project=)






The Finished project and we think he did good. Hope he gets an A!!


Being the working stiff that I have become I had to cut my time with Brandon short cause I picked up some much needed extra hours at my part-time job today.
Kirsten is just so Beautiful. She is giggling more than ever and loves it when mommy and daddy play with her. She is just so precious. And when we are at the table eating she will half cry half not, as if she were complaining about us not giving her our full attention. Then, when I look at her (cause she usaully is doing it to get my attention) she'll stop complaining and look back with her big round Hazel eyes ("like her daddys" Barb says). Like a deer would looking into the headlights of an oncoming truck. Suddenly she'll scrunch up throw her hands to her mouth smiling as big as she can and giggle at Daddy. I love it so much I just melt inside.
Barbara is excited to start a business that she has been introduced to. And every chance she has she is asking if we can start it up. With all that we have going on she comes back and tells me we should wait. She also has to have a puppy!! And not soon I mean she wants one like there will never be one available to us, ever!! It seems everyday I have been at work this past week she has been texting me that there is a new puppy that she fell in love with and just has to have. I love it though she is just so cute. I swear I am falling in love with her more and more each day. Well, I really should be getting to bed. Especially since my wife is sitting right next to me and will start asking questions about what I wrote and interrupt my train of thought. lol!!

My "Unicorn"

Finally the car is running. I had a genious idea to put some aftermarket parts on to make it faster and ran into some problems. I just recieved a part yesterday that resolved the problem right away. I couldn't believe it! It was just too easy. I hadn't made the expense for the part because I wasn't prepared for the cost of the part and thought that I could use a similar part and make it work. Well, it ended up burning up several spark plug wires which forced my hand to get the right part and new spark plug wires. Oh well!! It is running like a Mustang should. I can't wait to see what it does in the quarter mile. I have been talking about my car at work for the past month and I can finally show off one of my joys. It has been fun!!

Kirsten in the Step & Play:)

My grandma gave Kirsten this activity center called a Step & Play Piano just recently when we went to visit and Kirsten just loved it. I was thinking it would be another month or so before she would be able to sit in it, but we tried it that night just to see what she would do and she really liked it:) It was such a joy to watch her in it and to see her face just light up when the music and lights came on. Her daddy showed her how to push the buttons and she tried, but she wasn't pushing hard enough. So she used her toes, even though they barely reached the keys on the bottom, and just lit up with excitement when she saw the lights. I couldn't figure out how to change the size to be able to upload it in the blog, (if anyone knows how please let me know), so here is the link to watch it on utube. Just copy and paste in your address bar.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Efjo-ub4x1U

"My latest"

I have also been busy with my '93 Mustang LX 5.0 (what a mouthful!) I am waiting on some parts and it has been quite the adventure working on this car! I have always wanted one of the "Foxbody" style Mustangs since I was 16. After selling my '95 Mustang I purchased this one 'cause I just had to. Well, after buying I parked it so I could do some work on it. Extensive work. And it has taken almost 3 months to get it to where it is now. This Wednesday it will be up and ripping and roaring!! I am really excited. I just had to write about it. There is more to tell I just don't want to write too much to bore anyone with the specifics of what I have done to it.

If you know anything about these cars you will be able to tell what has been changed. There is other work that has been done to it and it would take a real enthusiast to take a look around the engine compartment to notice the changes that have been made.