Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Can't believe it's the last day of March! April will be flying by with Easter, Miles' 2nd birthday, Britton's 30th birthday, our house closing the 27th and a new, name-less baby girl coming. There's much to do! Now if I could just remember what it is that needs to get done...

Yesterday evening, I was fixing supper for Miles & Britton. My sweet, precious, wonderful in-laws (who have this blog set to their home-page...and are letting me live in their house...that's why I'm sucking up...) went out to dinner for their anniversary. My mom-in-law showed me where some veggies were in the cabinet, so I grabbed a can of Mexicorn to go with our loaded baked potatoes. Sounded good to this preggo.

I turned the stove on and began to warm the corn.

I got a phone call.

Miles busted up his train track and needed help.

And then House came on. I got distracted. I sat down. Sue me.

Pretty soon, I heard some noises.

Popping noises.

Mexicorn is not supposed to become Mexi-popcorn. But that's what it smelled like. And that's what it sounded like. And until now, no one has known about this catastrophe but me. But I got nothin' else to blog about today.

So Linda, if you're reading this, please don't revoke my kitchen privileges... I really am a competent woman. Even though I'm pretty sure I left the grapes on the counter today and you had to clean up after me... for the hundredth time.

Now what was I about to do?

Sunday, March 29, 2009

The search is over. We have a contract on our new house. And it's a pretty good story how this is all working out. But I'm gonna wait 'till later to share all that...

It seems too good to be true. I feel like the deal will fall apart or that I'll wake up from my nice, yellow farmhouse filled dream.

God has been so good to us. I don't deserve it. I don't understand it. I'm just thankful for it.

It's a great house and a great property. I can't wait to share it with you in the future. But since I didn't want to freak the owners out by lugging my camera in the door last night, I'll just show you some more of the pics I took from across the road. Don't you think it's much less stalkeresqe to park my vehicle across from the house and whip out my heavy-duty-paparazzi-looking camera & zoom lens? Ppppffff...

We spent the afternoon with friends. Good friends. We consider them good friends because they invited us to stay for a home-made, Thanksgiving-ish dinner. Turkey, dressing, corn, green beans, potatoes.... it was gooooo-oooood!

Miles also did a little outdoor exploring while we were there.

He'll love that about the new place.

Saturday, March 28, 2009

Miles gets referred to as "she" or "her" on a weekly basis by some stranger. "Oh, she's so sweet!" or "O my, what pretty eyes she has".

I can see why they're confused. He IS a beautiful little boy (said his mamma...).

Big 'ole eyes, long eye lashes, rosy cheeks... I'm melting.

Today I watched him watch the "nooooow" for a long time. He just stared out the window.

(PS - Yes, I said snow... in Oklahoma....at the end of March...)

Then every once in awhile he'd touch the window and say "coooooolddddd".

*****

Will give you updates tomorrow, but Britton and I are going to meet with the folks who own this...

at 8pm tonight to work out the details of our contract.

Cute little yellow farmhouse on 3 acres. Yea!!!!

Cross your fingers. Pray. Do whatever you do. We'd really like to close in 30ish days so we could be in around the time baby-girl-no-name gets here.

The saga continues.

F.

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Alrighty. You spoke. We listened. And we still have yet to make any formal decisions. If anything, you've all muddled up the whole process. Look how close the voting is!! (hahahaha)

Baby Girl Buss Naming Poll Results:

If the name received a positive comment, it got a vote. I'm a simple girl.

A. Abigail Elizabeth Buss - "Abbie"
8 votes
B. Addison Elizabeth Buss - "Addie"
6 votes
C. Avery Elizabeth Buss
5 votes
D. Hannah Elizabeth Buss
7 votes
E. Hayden Elizabeth Buss
2 votes
F. Katie Elizabeth Buss
7 votes
G. Merrik Elizabeth Buss
9 votes
H. Remie Elizabeth Buss
11 votes
I. Ryan Elizabeth Buss
5 votes

Some of you asked what the names might mean to us.... Here's my best shot at an answer.

A. Abigail Elizabeth Buss - "Abbie"
A couple of months ago, I would ask Miles "where's the baby?". He would respond by poking my belly and saying "Abb-bbbie". It was so cute. I thought it might be a good story that he named her. Plus I just like it.

B. Addison Elizabeth Buss - "Addie"
I've liked this name for a long time. Don't know where I heard it. Only after it was at the top of my list did I learn that it's the chick's name on Private Practice...

C. Avery Elizabeth Buss
No story. Just ran across it and like it... Well, I did have a huge crush on Brave's third baseman Steve Avery when I was a teenager, but that's irrelevant.

D. Hannah Elizabeth Buss
Have liked this name since I was a teenager. In fact, Britton and I discussed it as our top pick for naming a baby girl when we were dating.

E. Hayden Elizabeth Buss
Save the cheerleader. Save the world.

F. Katie Elizabeth Buss
Just a sweet, timeless name. Can't help but love it. I remember that it was to be my brother's name if he was a girl.

G. Merrik Elizabeth Buss
My mom came up with this one. I like it's uniqueness.

H. Remie Elizabeth Buss
Heard it on TV. A doctor on House. But they never call her by her name. We really like it's uniqueness.

I. Ryan Elizabeth Buss
Ryan is my middle name. I've always liked boyish names for girls.

So do the meanings change any of your votes?

Friday, March 20, 2009

A little outdoor playtime this afternoon.

Filling his bucket with rocks from Papa's driveway...

He's so diligent when he works. He won't be bothered by his silly mother trying to get him to look at the camera. I wonder what goes through his little head.. "don't look her in the eye...maybe she'll go knit..."
.

Matching his persistence and diligence is Cooper... His mind is as one-tracked as Miles'. All he thinks of is his ball.

He wouldn't look at me for a photo either. So I just took his ball and held it above my lens.

See? Here they are together.... neither one will look at me.

Back to the rocks....

Sometimes you take 100 pics just to get the fun one....

After all our fun with Cooper and the rocks, we went for a walk further down the driveway just in time to see "Da-yee's Truck" pull in. Miles got to drive the rest of the way back.

Again, look at that focused little face.

Good thing they weren't going very fast.... 'Cause yes, I'm chasing them.

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Well, the baby naming poll has been fun. I think I'll let a little more time pass before I share the results. They're still coming in...

And for the record, my mom really doesn't care what we name the baby. We're just having a little fun. She'd call her "Fred" if that's what we decided.

****

HOUSE UPDATE:

Today was the court date we've been waiting on to see what may or may not be happening with the house we want. We sort of sent a spy to check it out. That person shall remain nameless. And we did call ahead and ask if the public could attend, so this is all on the up & up.

****

WARNING: Get a Kleenex. Especially if you're pregnant and emotional. Oh, that's me.

Just wanted to mention that today was a big day for my sister, Rachel. She had to put down her horse of 15 years. And if my stuff wasn't spread out over two storage buildings in two towns, I would find and post the video of the first time we met Chief. But I have no idea where it is....

It was Christmas Eve 1994. For fun, our folks loaded us (Me - 14, Rachel - 10 & Drew - 6) and our horse Buck, who my brother called "Bucket", and drove us to Ada to ride horses at a friends ranch. When we got there and began to saddle Buck, our friend brought Chief out of the barn. Drew exclaimed, "that horse has a big red bow on it!".

Did he ever....MERRY CHRISTMAS! It was one of the most memorable days of my childhood. And not to get too emotional on ya, but it also marked the last Christmas we spent with my dad.

Though we all have a special place in our heart for Chief, it is Rachel who has loved on and cared for him every day for all these years.

So here's to Chief.

Love you, Rach.

And just so we end on a happy note...

BOOM!

Go and be happy!

F.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

There are only 45ish days until baby girl Buss will be here...

We have no house.

We have no name.

You can't help us much with the house (unless you're praying, and for that I'm so grateful!), but maybe you can give us your opinion on the baby names from our short list...

If you can't figure out how to post your comments on this blog, just shoot me an email at frbuss@hotmail.com. I'll post feedback I get from there on the blog.

Ultimately, Britton and I will pick what we like. This poll really holds no bearing on our decision. We just thought it would be fun.

But I'm also trying to prove my mother wrong. She adamantly opposes one of these names.... She says NO ONE will choose it out of a lineup. (**wink, wink mom***)

We'll just see now, won't we?

So here we go...

We know her last name will be Buss.

Elizabeth is her middle name by default...it's a family name on both sides.

A. Abigail Elizabeth Buss - "Abbie"
B. Addison Elizabeth Buss - "Addie"
C. Avery Elizabeth Buss
D. Hannah Elizabeth Buss
E. Hayden Elizabeth Buss
F. Katie Elizabeth Buss
G. Merrik Elizabeth Buss
H. Remie Elizabeth Buss
I. Ryan Elizabeth Buss

Let us know what you think!

F. & B.

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

I got to work on a fun project today...

A few weeks ago I photographed the kids in the nursery/toddler room at Cornerstone. I edited the pics and had them printed as 8 x 10's. Then I totally ripped an idea off of a friends blog for displaying the pics. Here's a few that I really liked...

My madre helped me hang them today and we thought it turned out pretty good. Some of the lights in the room need to be changed and it's not the greatest pic, but you get the idea.

I think I'll do this in my new house someday...

when I get a new house.

F.

Sunday, March 15, 2009

We've put MANY miles on the Jeep this weekend... and we've uncovered streets and neighborhoods that we never knew existed in Shawnee. And that's coming from a professional garage sale-er..... you'd think I would have found some of these beautiful homes and bought their junk before.

If we see a FSBO, we call the number to get the info, but if we see a home listed by a realtor, we pull over and Britton checks the price by getting online via his fancy iPhone. Sometimes he lets me do it.

Today, when we were pulled over checking prices, I noticed this...

I hope it makes you giggle like I did.

And believe me, I needed a giggle.

F.

Saturday, March 14, 2009

Today...

7:00am - Miles woke up...... "MAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!" I brought him to bed with me and we slept 'till....

8:30am - Miles was officially done with sleep and I turned on Sesame Street music videos online.... The computer is right next to my bed, so he was entertained and I kept sleeping until...

9:30am - Britton, Miles & I got up and ate waffles & scrambled eggs.

12:00pm - We piled in the car to go look at some FSBO houses...

1:00pm - We looked at a FSBO.... it had green shag carpet, popcorn ceilings and 70ish wood paneling and wallpaper throughout... EEEK! And they wanted $130,000 for it.... Bye-Bye.

1:30pm - We ate at Billy Boys BBQ.... I'm slowly being reminded of the good things Shawnee has to offer...

1:45pm - The Goss Girls (Debbie, Olivia, Maris & Bizzy) met us at Billy Boys to discuss more houses.... They made some calls and found us another FSBO to look at...

2:30pm - We went to a cute little 2 story farm house on 3ish acres and looked in windows and around the property because nobody was home. Maris let Miles play on the trampoline....

Which he thoroughly enjoyed...

It's a cute house, so we've got an appointment to look at it tomorrow at 5pm. (But my heart still hopes for the Midland house, which has made little to no progress.... Britton says God might be trying to teach us patience.... I said "I wish He'd hurry up".)

3:15pm - We headed to Del City to catch my awesome, volleyball playin' niece, Carly, in the finals of their tournament at Christian Heritage Academy.

They won the gold medal!

But there was no gold medal, only the $75 Chili's gift card you see the girl on the front row holding.... Carly was not at all impressed by this. She wanted an actual gold medal to hang on her wall.

I thought is was much better than a medal...

must be the pregnancy talking.

I love this picture...

Britton's wearing Carly's shades... I swear they aren't his.

Though he wears them nicely....

But Miles won't be outdone by his Dayee...

We went to Target after the volleyball tourney was over and bought Miles his very first pair of shades...

6:30pm - The sunglasses were on his face...

6:31pm - The sunglasses were on his head...

6:32pm - The sunglasses were back on his face....

6:33pm - The sunglasses were back on his head....

etc, etc, all the way home....

All the while counting "one, two, free, four, fie, SIX!"

Friday, March 13, 2009

I believe we're in need of a recap on this blog. The last week has been CRAZY! March Madness has taken on a whole new meaning this year.

First of all, last Wednesday night there was this....

Britton's last official night as C3's youth pastor brought out the Sampras and Nadal of jungle pong.

It also brought out some white legs if you ask me.

The word on the street is that the old guys schooled the youth.

Must have been the Nike head bands.

***

There was lots of packing.

Miles liked to organize the boxes.

And after all his hard work, he liked to stuff his face.

There was much needed relaxation and time enjoying the last few days in our little house.

When the packing became to emotional, pink things brought me great joy.

There was loading the trailer...

And keeping Miles entertained...

There was a blow up mattress the last 2 nights because Mackey talked me into letting him take my bed to storage.

Miles had much more fun on it than this pregnant girl.

There was a cookout on our last night at 327 N. Pecan with some of our favorite people.

When we closed on our house in October of 2004, we spent the first night with a group of friends from Cornerstone, some grub and no furniture. We just wanted to go out the same way we came in....

Moving weekend has been provided by:

Chris Mackey
Suzy Mackey
Zack Mackey
Luke Black
Dylan Black
Brian Black
Erin Black
Jeff Cawthon
Bradford Bonar
Drew Molleur
Anne Molleur
Rachel Molleur
Angela Morrison
Ed & Linda Buss
Josh Wright
Wal-Mart, Sharpe's & the cardboard recycling bins in the alleys of Pauls Valley
Mazzio's (because we only ordered 2 pizzas, yet there were 3...)
Sharpie
Dr. Pepper
MacArthur Street Storage
Garvin County Abstract Co.
First United Bank
Deanna Joy Stephens