Day 290 - Craziness

Let's see. So much has happened in the last 19 days. I'm exhausted, but wanted to add some pictures and let family know what's going on.

We left for Texas on the 19th of December. The drive went quickly and without any problems..... Thank goodness! We had a wonderful time with friends and family! I was also so excited to catch up with longtime friends from college. I miss those girls and can't wait to be in Texas to watch their kids grow up!

The kids had a wonderful Christmas and received some great things. We missed Daddy terribly, but were able to use speaker phone with him while opening presents that morning. Its not the ideal situation, but much better than the last Christmas he missed.

We celebrated Gracen's birthday by going to the Magic Time Machine in Dallas. For children who just returned from Disney World, we were all surprised how much the kids enjoyed the restaurant. They were both wide-eyed and couldn't believe the characters wandering around.


I'm still mourning my baby turning 5. To me, age 5 is no longer a baby or toddler. She won't even be a preschooler much longer. She is growing up to be such an amazing little girl... drama, yes.... but still amazing.

My dad decided to follow us back to Tennessee. We went back and forth about this for several days, but I'm so glad he's here. When we arrived late Sunday night, the master bathtub faucet had burst and my entire bedroom, bathroom, closet were flooded. We went the night with no water sleeping in a house wreaking of mildew.

We found out the next morning from the plumber that the temps got down below freezing around Christmas and the pipe had been spraying since about that time.

Later on Monday, a crew of water restoration people came out and completely tore apart the area. My heating and air vents were also filled with water and had to be shut off. Thankfully, they were able to block those where we could still run the heat without heating our crawl space under the house.

They set up 8 huge fans and 2 even bigger dehumidifiers and those have been blowing for over 48 hours now. Thankfully, the damage was not as bad as it could have been. Most of the water spilled into our crawl space and didn't go into the living room or hall bathroom.

Here's some pictures of the setup right now. The contractor told me they won't start at least for another 8 to 10 days and then will take several weeks to finish. It looks like I'll be without my bed for several more weeks! :-(



Today, between workers coming in and out, Dad and I were able to make several runs to our storage shed. I'm packing up everything we won't need in the next 6 to 9 months and trying to declutter every room. It has been and will continue to be a huge job.

Here is a picture of Dad's truck after I asked him to go to Walmart and pick up some boxes. I don't know why I was surprised when he opened his topper! I've been packing like crazy ever since!


Now for the biggest news..... our newest family member. We've adopted him from my Dad who rescued him from a bad situation in Kansas. He's an amazing dog and I know Scott is going to love him as much as we do.



We went round and round deciding the best name for him. Dad named him Chipper, but we wanted to choose something else. So after many, many days of consideration and Luke spouting silly nicknames for everything we liked, I made the executive decision to name him Jack. (Scott wanted Montana for the illustrious Joe Montana, but Luke ruined that when he asked if he could call him "Hannah" for short. YIKES!) So Jack it is and we hope and pray he adjusts easily to life here.

Finally, today is Scott and my 14th wedding anniversary. I'm so proud of this man and love him more now than I did that day. Life has been a rollercoaster ride for us, but we always survive and end up closer for it.

I can't wait to see what the next 14 years have in store for us!