Happy Birthday Amanda

Happy Birthday Amanda Joy Forston! You are the ripe ol age of 24! I am proud to be your sister. You are an inspiration to me in many ways. I hope you have a wonderful birthday because you deserve it!

Work School and School School

It can get confusing when talking about work or school when you work at a school while going to school yourself. Friday Shawnee and I were driving back from getting massages. I pointed to Dallas Baptist University and said "That's my school". Obviously that isn't very clear. So she said "Wow that is why you get paid so much!" I was confused so I just kindof laughed. She said "Is that a private school". So I said, "Yeah, that is why it is so darn expensive". Anyway, after a few more questions, we cleared things up that DBU is the school I am a student at, not a teacher. haha! Anyway, work school is going well. Only 3 more weeks and we will be done! This year has gone by fast but at the same time has dragged on. It will be sad to see a few of my kids go. I wasn't as close to this class as I was last year's class. Maybe because of all of the challenges I had. Not sure. Evan is really excited to work summer school where he will get to see his kids Monday-Thursday. I will be working a summer camp at another school Monday-Thursday where I will teach 2nd graders and I also get to do Arts and Crafts! Every Thursday we take a field trip, so basically I only have to teach Monday-Wedensday. Then I have a Tuesday night class and a Thursday night class. I also have an every other weekend class. I'm about to start a mini mester that meets every night for 4 hours for 2 weeks. Needless to say, I am going to have to be REALLY good at time management over the next few weeks. I actually really enjoy taking classes. It provides an outlet outside of work to talk about and get advice on the teaching profession and counseling from many different perspectives. Anyway, that is what's goin on with work school and school school.

"Family" Pictures

My sister and I decided to get together and take some pictures for my mom for Mother's Day. We chose a nature preserve close to her house. We had alot of fun! I nonchalently mentioned how great it would be if we could actually let our dogs off their leashes and expect them to not run away. As soon as I finished speaking, Landon decided to try this idea. He reached over and let Bella off her leash. Bad idea. As soon as we saw her disappear into the very tall grass and out of sight, I got a big pit in my stomach. Fortunately, Evan is pretty fast. He ran and caught up with her. She didn't stay in the tall grass long and chose to run down a very narrow stretch of mowed area. Luckily she loves her daddy and she came running back. I don't think we will try that again any time soon. We got a few cute pictures before the sun was too low.

Pictures of House!

I have hesitated putting up pictures of the house because each time I think about putting up pictures, I want to fix or do something. Until finally, a friend said "there will always be something you want to fix". So I decided if I wanted to post pictures sometime this century, I would just go ahead and do it.

Things on the to do list for the month of May:

*replace chandelier with 2nd matching ceiling fan
*change shell sink vanities in bathrooms
*paint master bedroom a light gray color
*purchase new bedding for master bed
*make cabinet doors for front of built in in living room
*put doggy storm door in

And of course our house wouldn't be complete without a photo of our two children. Aren't they adorable in their daddy's off limits massaging recliner?! :) You can see the guilty look on Barkley's face!

We would like to thank craigslist.com for the majority of furniture you have seen in these pictures. I was literally obsessed for a few weeks there, but I have limited myself to only looking once a day now. We are loving living in Mansfield! Everyone has been EXTREMELY nice in our ward. We even have been invited to dinner at another couple's house next Sunday! Hopefully we will make more friends over the next few weeks. The drive to work has been lengthened by about 10 minutes. We have decided to stay working at our school in Irving next year (my last year teaching). Then I will go wherever I can get a position as a counselor. Evan wants to take over his lead teacher's position when he finishes his degree in 2 years. We feel very blessed to be where we are!

Bella!

I can't believe I haven't posted about Bella yet! At the end of February, Barkley's owner contacted us. She said that her and her husband decided they didn't want any dogs anymore. They had another puggle, Barkley's sister, and they wanted to know if we would want to buy her. We had thought that maybe Barkley had been abused by his mannerisms. When we sat down to talk about it, we just couldn't bare leaving Barkely alone all day while we were at work. So now we have Bella! Bella is has more pug qualities such as a shorter snout, breathing problems, and a constant need for affection. She is adorable though! Her and Barkley just love playing with each other. We feel like a complete family, for now.

GLEE!!!!!!

Evan and I are GLEEKS!!! We are in love with Glee! Maybe it's the show choir in us both, but we think this is one of the funniest shows we have seen in a while. We have even bought the soundtrack. Yall should all check it out! The new season starts on Tuesday on Fox. Love it!

Busy, Busy, Busy......

Wow, March has been a BUSY month so far! It all started with my 25th birthday on March 4th! This year was AWESOME! Evan really is the reason it was so awesome. We both took off work and had so much fun. The highlight of this birthday was the purchase of our new fridge for our new home. We found a fridge that retails for over $3,000 for only $1,400 at Sears Outlet in Arlington. So exciting! Evan surprised me with a hotel stay on Friday night. It was nice getting some alone time since we have been staying at my parents and don't get alot of privacy lately. Amanda Churak made it great too! It was fun hanging out with her and my family that Friday.

Then I had one of my Masters classes end on March 9th. This is a critical class in which alot of info is given, but it is only 6 weeks long. It ended in a final project. I had to take a day off of work to complete it because it was just so time consuming. Here is the cover to my final project.

On March 11th, we had open house at my school. This means that there wasn't a real routine the days prior to open house because we were creating things for visiting parents. We had fun making 3D solid figures (hanging from the ceiling), clay insects, and silhouettes. Evan and I decided to stay at school until after open house rather than going home. It was a LONG day. Then after we got home (around 8pm), I had to stay up and bake the cakes for Summer and Aaron's wedding. I ended getting to bed close to 2am.

Friday, March 12th, after work, Evan and I loaded up the baked cakes and all of my decorating supplies and headed to Oklahoma. Summer is one of Evan's friends that I got to know on my many trips to Oklahoma. She is awesome, and so is her new hubby Aaron! This is the largest cake I have made before. Needless to say, after 12 cake mixes, 5 pounds of powdered sugar, and various other ingredients, a wedding cake was born! It was time consuming but fun at the same time. She wanted the icing color to be "M&M blue". Poor Evan had to go to the store SEVERAL times to get things for me when I ran out. I definitely underestimated the quantity of some of the ingredients.

So anyway, now we are just waiting to close on our house over spring break. Our fridge gets delivered and we just bought a kitchen table and chairs on craigslist. I hope all of you have a wonderful spring break!