I've been tagged...

I was tagged by another blog a while ago to share seven things that are interesting of not well known about me. I have been struggling with this, but decided to finally give it a shot.

1. I am not much of a night person. I prefer my mornings. I can get grumpy at night and just want to be left alone and allowed to sleep.

2. I absolutely love planning events and such, but often times am too lazy to actually do it. It's amazing that you can be lazy to do something that you love, but that's what I do.

3. I have always dreamed of going to Israel. I think it would be amazing to walk where Jesus did and see the history of my faith in real life. It would make the Bible stories come alive even more.

4. When I was a kid I wanted to be a vet... now I really don't like animals ( I will not use the word hate here and I am sure I would get many complaints)... sorry Shawn and Amber. Jay finally talked me into getting a dog, who I am putting up with, but don't really love.

5. I pre-wash my dishes before putting them in the dishwasher. Don't really know why, just the way I have always done it. You would think that if I am too lazy to do something I love (#2) that I would definitely be too lazy to do something I don't really enjoy, but that's not the case.

6. I have a huge sweet tooth. It is a blessing that I get that sick feeling after having too much sugar, otherwise, I would eat sweets, breakfast, lunch and dinner and then be very ill and about 400 pounds.

7. I am not into sports. I wish I was, but never had interest as a kid. Then when I was older and had a little interest... all the other kids were so much better than I was that I never gave it a try. I would love to be more athletic, but as my husband so gently says it "I can't walk and chew bubble gum at the same time", I don't think I am really cut out for it.

So that's me in seven little points. I would love to hear what anyone else has to say about them, so... I tag anyone who reads this blog.

Big savings...

The last two months I have been learning a lot from a friend of mine about saving money through coupons and tracking sales. I have been getting better and better at it. When I first started I was saving between 12% and 15 % just by hitting sales and with my couple coupons.

Now I am up to about 35% - 40% savings every week. My friend Amy saves between 70% and 90% every week. This is my goal, but I am still learning. Today I ran out to get a few things that I forgot to bring coupons for yesterday when I went grocery shopping. Above is what I got.

Toilet paper: sale $.99, coupon $.50 off, doubled means FREE

Energized batteries: sale 5 for $10 or $2 a piece. I had $1 off coupons and then there was an instant rebate sticker for $1 on each of them... FREE

Halls cough drops: sale 4 for $5 or $1.25 a piece. I had a coupon for $.50 off, doubled is $1 off. Total... $.25 each.

You still have to pay the sales tax on everything, but my total was $21.02 and I walked out paying $1.40. I am very excited!!!

what a mess!!

This was Brooklynn's room after she thought she was "done" cleaning it! Nice try Sweetie!!

Here we come...

Hawaii, here we come, that is!!

Jay and I are planning to go to Hawaii in just a couple weeks. I can't wait! He has a business trip down there for a whole week. I'm coming toward the end of his week and then we are staying for three more days after he is done working!! The only things we have to pay for is my airfare and two nights of hotel. Jay's company is covering the other nights and his airfare as well as a rental car, so it's a pretty cheap trip to Hawaii.

He gets to be there for 10 days... me, only 5, but I don't have to do any work while there!!

A few months after we were married we took a trip to Branson, Missouri. It was fun, but the next youngest people in the whole city were about 65! We haven't been on a trip/ vacation since then except to visit family. It's going to be great.

My parents are coming up to stay with the kids. Gotta love grandparents!! Thank you mom and dad... you will never know how much this means to us!

Introducing...

Joel Robert Sippy
Born: Oct. 17,2008
8 lbs 7 oz

My sister, Julie, had her baby this weekend. Here are a few pictures. We are so excited for them.

Baby Joel


Kendall and Joel

First cousin picture!!

pumpkin patch

This morning I took the kids to the pumpkin patch with my MOMS group. It was a lot of fun. They loved trying to get through the corn maze... which really was hard. It was 20 acres of corn!!
Anyway, here are a few pictures.

adoption

For awhile now, Jay and I have been praying about adoption. We still don't know exactly where or when the Lord is leading, but we are trying to get educated and allow our hearts to be open to whatever He may have for us.

On November 22 we will be attending a meeting in Colorado Springs about adoption and the foster care system. Focus on the Family has a mission to unite the Colorado churches and provide homes to all the children in the foster system that are able to be adopted. What an amazing mission. We are called to take care of the orphans and widows. What an amazing example of Christ's love this would be!! I would hope that it would only be the beginning and that other states would follow. We have so many great families that could change these precious children's lives and offer them a future that they may never otherwise know.

Here is a link to the invitation to the event. I would encourage any of you who live in the area to pray about attending and passing the news along to others who may be interested.

http://www.icareaboutorphans.org/Default.aspx?Menu=8&Article=24

Please be in prayer for us as we are not sure this is what the Lord has for us right now... maybe, maybe not. We want to be open to wherever He leads. Pray that we will hear His voice clearly and know beyond a shadow of a doubt what He wants us to do.

our tree

We had a huge tree in our backyard that we had taken down last week. We have a fairly small yard and it took up a lot of it. It was also having its roots come up all over the yard, making it hard to mow or even walk across the grass... so we decided to get rid of it. Here are a few pictures. It was neat to watch as the guy had to climb to the top and drop the limbs with rope. The girls loved watching!!
Before: Sorry, I don't know how to turn it, but this is from our deck which is on the second story.

All the mess down in our yard.

After. It looks so different... good in some ways, bad in others.