Just Being Married

Ever since the A&M Game on October 8th, we have been enjoying the routine that comes with just being married. I've mentioned this before, but I feel like this is the first time we've really been able to settle into married life since our wedding back in January.

Of course, we're still both staying very busy! Rob gets up and goes to work around 6am just about every Monday - Friday. Every once in a while he'll be back home by 3 or 4 but it's usually just about dinner time before he gets here.

I divide my time between working, taking care of the animals and all the typical house stuff. I am definitely very blessed to have a husband who works so hard for us!

I've been giving riding lessons to Paige since this past May, and a couple of months ago also began giving lessons to another little girl here in the neighborhood. I really enjoy it, and it helps to off set the cost of the horses, which is nice too :)

Halloween weekend around here was CRAZY! We had over 400 trick-or-treaters over the course of two evenings and gave out close to 1000 pieces of candy. It was nuts.

That is one of the reasons we moved to the neighborhood though.... and we are already looking forward to the fun Christmas celebrations coming up in December :)

I also started participating in our neighborhood Bible Study -- we meet once a week and I've really been enjoying it! It's been a great way to meet some of the other ladies in the neighborhood, which one of the other reasons why we moved here!

Things with SendOutCards are beginning to fall into a routine too. We recently implemented a system for meeting new contacts each day, which has been awesome so far. I see a lot of growth for our team over the next 6-12 months!

I'll do some more detailed posts about what's been going on over the past month later, but for now this short update will have to do. Nothing too terribly exciting has been going on, which is really really nice for a change :)

Classics for a Reason

All my life I have loved to read. I still remember finishing my first "chapter book" while driving to our lake house when I was 8 years old. It was the first book in The Babysitters Club series, and my parents' couldn't believe I had finished it so fast.

It was, as they say, all over after that -- I begged my Mom to take me to Barnes And Noble like most kids begged to go to Toys R Us. When I was grounded, it was from reading instead of from TV... usually because I would rather have my nose stuck in a book than to be doing my chores.

When I got to High School English though, that changed -- for some reason I hated every book we had to read. I loathed English class, and getting through the pages of the books we were assigned was worse than a trip to the dentist.

For the longest time, I simply held the opinion that I did not like classic literature unless it was authored by Jane Austen or Charles Dickens. It was a simple explanation, considering those were the only two classic authors whose books I had ever enjoyed.

They were also the only two classic authors whose books I had read prior to 10th grade English.

Over the past couple of years though, I have come to a more reasonable explanation for my apparent hatred for classic literature. The conclusion is that I don't hate it at all. I simply hated the way it was presented to me.

There is no better way to kill one's imagination than to be forced to hold a red pen while you read so you can underline and mark every piece of imagery, alliteration, oxymoron, paradox or syntax. I don't want to write a summary at the end of each chapter or check out 8 books from the Tech library so I can write a 12 page research paper on the author. I want to get lost in the story.

When I read a book, I like to become completely lost in the characters. For me, a good book is one that will transport me to the time and place in which it is written and leave me feeling like I've had the opportunity to live in a completely different life by the time I close the last page.

It's impossible to feel that way when you are required to stop every 2-3 sentences to make an analyzation!

So, over the past several years I have re-read almost every book we read in high school. It was a great surprise to me (especially at first) to learn that I have loved every single one of them! To Kill a Mocking Bird has to be one of my favorites... The Scarlett Letter and Ethan Frome are close seconds. Right now, I am reading Wuthering Heights and can hardly stand to put it down.

There are only two books that come to mind from my high school days which I cannot bring myself to read -- those are Moby Dick and Portrait of a Lady. I particularly loathed those two novels. I loathed them to the depths of my soul. In fact, I loathed Moby Dick so much that I wrote a speech about it for speech class and Mrs. Boyle made me read it to her in a closet in order to not illy influence the younger students in the class who had not read it yet. Oops.

I will re-read each of those books one day. And, I am certain, I will love them both. But I know one thing for sure... I will get new copies of each so that I do not have to look at all that darn red ink!

Those two books aside though, I have found that I absolutely LOVE classic literature! I love it so much that I have even bought a few books that we didn't read in high school -- last month I read The Count of Monte Cristo. I've also recently finished Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. I cannot wait to re-read A Christmas Carol this December.

Even more strange than that... I love to analyze the books too. But here's the kicker -- I like to analyze them AFTER I read them! Finishing up The Count of Monte Cristo led me to a 2 hour google session learning all about the life of Alexandre Dumas... how in addition to being a novelist he was also a playwright, and that his father was also an author -- I was also amazed to discover the parallels between the lives of Edward Dantes and Alexandre Dumas, so similar in some ways and yet in others so different.

It has been refreshing over these past few years to discover that not only do I NOT hate classic literature, but I also don't hate studying it on a deeper level. I enjoy learning (I always have) and it bothered me to think that I disliked learning about one of my favorite subjects: books.

So, I will continue to read classic literature for the rest of my life. I have made it a personal goal to read every classic novel I can find and to take what I learn from each and use it in some way to improve my life.

I love classic literature. I love the stories, the people, the relationships and the lifestyles that are portrayed in its pages. I love the glimpse it gives into our history. I love just about everything about it.

I guess they really are called Classics for a reason :)

Home to stay :)

Well I think we are finally done with the marathon of busyness that has been our life for the past year. I was thinking about it, and our life has literally not been in a routine since last November when we left for Florida to go on the 21TEN cruise -- I have to say, it feels good to be home to stay for a while :)

As busy as the past year has been though -- the past 2 weekends had to have been two of the most fun.

On September 30th we woke up at 5:30am and jumped in the car to head to Houston for Trayce and Ger's wedding. It was a long drive, but Rob and I really enjoyed the 18 hours (yes, that's right.. EIGHTEEN) we had to spend together in the car just talking and hanging out. I think I might have actually ran out of things to say by the time we got home!

We pulled into the hotel around 3 and took a quick power nap before meeting everyone at the church for rehearsal. When that was done we had the BBQ rehearsal dinner then went out with the wedding party later that night.

The wedding was at 2:00 on Saturday -- so after waking up and getting ready we met Danielle and Tucker for lunch before heading to the church to help Trayce get ready for the big day! The wedding was beautiful and the reception was SO much fun. We had a blast hanging out with everyone then got back in the car and headed back to Lubbock the next morning.

The Thursday after the wedding our friends Britt and Lance flew in from Austin to spend a few days with us for the Tech/A&M game. It was so much fun having not only them in town, but so many other people, too! At one point on Friday night I think I counted at least 16 friends gathered around our table at Mesquites... it's so much fun when everyone comes to visit for Tech games :)

We went out each night and tailgated the whole day of the game -- I definitely wouldn't want to live the college lifestyles EVERY weekend anymore, but once or twice a year when we have all of friends around, it's fun to relive the "good ol' days"!

As fun as the past two weekends have been, I'm so excited to get into a routine for the next several months. We are officially home to stay until January 1st when we head out to Park City, Utah for a few days of snowboarding before attending the SOC Recruiting Mastery event that next weekend in Salt Lake. Then in March, we will hopefully be flying out to Hawaii for a few days courtesy of SOC on the 2012 Incentive Trip! We are currently qualified, but definitely need to keep our heads in the game to make sure we STAY qualified over the next few months!

If I think our days from now through January will be boring though, then I obviously must not be thinking straight. We have several more big Tech games coming up where I know we'll be hanging out and cooking with family and friends, the Vintage Adult Halloween Ball, and two nights of giving out candy to trick-or-treaters here in the neighborhood. Before we know it, we'll all be gathered around the table watching the 'Boys play on Thanksgiving, then celebrating Christmas soon after that.

It's crazy how the time flies and how life is always so busy. We are SO blessed though -- because 99% of the things we do are so much fun, and we are always making memories. If you ask me, that's really what life is all about :)

Crossing the Finish Line

Fall is definitely in the air and we are finally crossing the finish line in this crazy marathon-like schedule we've had for the past several months.

This past weekend was the Treat 'Em Right event for SendOutCards in Dallas. Unfortunately, Rob wasn't able to go due to some last-minue work stuff that came up, but those of us who did make it had an amazing time!

The team has been growing lots this week... much due to the inspiration we all received in Dallas. We've added a new team member and quite a few customers to our numbers, and I am so excited to continue to watch things grow!

We leave again in 2 days to drive to Houston for Trayce and Gerry's wedding weekend! I'm so excited to be included in their special day, and can't wait to see everyone and celebrate with them while we're there! And call me crazy, but I can't wait to spend 16+ hours in the car with Rob... he's been working so much lately I feel like I've hardly seen him over the past couple of weeks so it'll be fun to hang out :)

Next week is the biggest football week of the year -- TTU vs A&M! We have tons of friends coming in town, and I can't wait to see them all :)

After that we'll be settling into something we've not been too familiar with lately -- routine! Ah, what a wonderful word! I love travelling and being busy, but I love having a routine, too. This weekend marks our last trip until January 2nd! Yay!!

I'm sorry... We've been so busy!

Wow -- I can't believe it's been this long since I blogged. On the other hand though, I can... because we have been soooooooo busy!!

The last two weeks of apartment life was hectic and slow all at the same time -- we had tons to do, but it felt like the time would never pass. Lo and behold though, it did. And on Friday, August 5th, at approximately 10:05am we officially became home owners :)

The move was pretty seamless. The only major issue was that our a/c was broken for the first two days... which caused the upstairs to get strangely cold and the downstairs to be unbearably hot. To be honest though, we were so wrapped up in our new home-ownership-bliss that we hardly noticed (not sure I can say the same for our helpful moving volunteers... but they survived :))

1 week after the move we hosted Trayce's wedding shower at my parents' house -- we had SO much fun hosting, and I hope she enjoyed it as much as we did!

3 days following the shower we were on a plane and Las Vegas bound for what would come to be known as 5 of the BEST days ever. We had such an amazing time at the SendOutCards Convention... it was truly an incredible, heart-changing experience.

4 days following our return from convention I left town again and headed to Austin for Trayce's bachelorette weekend! Again, what a fun weekend it was... hanging out on the lake and partying it up on 6th Street :)

In case you lost track... that catches us up to September. Yep -- we had almost been in our new house for 1 whole month! Although, it hardly felt like it since we'd been gone so much.

Labor Day weekend was a busy one... Baby Stetson Wayne Schneider was born on Thursday, September 1st!

That kicked the weekend off and then Friday night we had mine and Rob's joint birthday party. We had a lot of fun and received SO many wonderful cards -- it was definitely one of the best birthday's either of us had ever had!

The next day was the first Tech football game!! It was a bit sketchy at first, but we came out and won 50-10!

The weekend after Labor Day we hosted a Vintage Showcase of Homes and opened up our home for prospective Vintage neighbors. We had a lot of fun meeting new people, and the open house made us hurry up and finish all of those last moving-in projects :)

The day after the open house we moved Maggie and Ken to a new barn – it sounds silly, but I can already tell how much happier they are there. The space is so open and green, and just a relaxing place to be. It’s still very close to the house, but feels a little more country 

And that pretty much gets everything up-to-date. Work with SendOutCards has been going phenomenally since we returned from convention almost a month ago -- in fact, Rob and I promoted to Senior Distributor a couple of weeks ago and to Manager just a few days after that! :)

We received a gift card from my Mom (our sponsor) this week as a congratulations, and are headed on a date tonight to celebrate.

I'm so excited to see where the future goes over the next few months -- we are truly living the dream, and feel so blessed to have so many wonderful things in our lives!

T-minus 2 Weeks and Counting!

We are OFFICIALLY 2 weeks away from closing!!!

I've said all along that living in this apartment would REALLY make us appreciate our house more, but I don't think I even understood how much so until recently. I know we would still be very excited, no matter where we had been living for the past 3 months, but this apartment has made the thought of our upcoming move that much sweeter :)

Now don't get me wrong... this apartment has been good to us. And I am not at all knocking apartment-living in general. But the combination of the 1-bedroom apartment with 3 dogs, having almost everything we own in storage, and the actual apartment unit we ended up with has us really looking forward to the day we lock the door never to return!

The house is really starting to look great! They have finished the paint, trim, cabinet work and have the yard all ready for Dad's crew to come in and start next week. Our appliances are in the garage awaiting installation as well as all of our light fixtures.

Really, the only major things left to do are:

• countertops


• flooring


• finishing the outdoor paint (garage door, porch railing, front door)


• yard


• appliances

I'm sure there are a million little things left to do that we haven't even thought of, but we spoke to the builder today and he said we are still completely on track for closing on August 5th!

Yippiee!!!!!!!!!!

Riding :)

Until purchasing Kenney 2 months ago it had been 4 years since I'd had a horse. Even with Rocket being as big of a pain as he was, I still enjoyed being able to go out to the barn whenever I wanted and just hang out. Riding was like therapy to me, and I have missed it SO much!

Since selling Rocket I have said that my #1 requirement in my next horse would be personality. Of course I had other things on my wish list too, but to me it wouldn't matter how much training a horse had if he wasn't fun to be around.

After two months of owning Kenney I can honestly say I succeeded -- he has one of the best personalities of any horse I've ever met! He keeps me smiling all the time, and genuinely loves being around people.

On top of his personality, he also has the perfect amount of training for what I'm wanting to do right now -- he knows just as much as do, so I can go out and ride by myself (without lessons), work on the skills that I'm sure have suffered a bit of neglect over the past 4 years, and not get bored.

I'm having so much fun coming home after each ride and finding articles online to help me work on different things we're having trouble with, or stopping in the middle of a ride and thinking through all the things I know Lisa would say if she was there.

Since I'm not really trying to learn anything new, I have confidence that I'm not going to teach myself or Ken any bad habits... and I know that being able to get my skills back up to speed will REALLY help me when I do get ready to start taking lessons and showing again! My progress by working on my own is definitely a lot slower than by taking lessons... but it gives me something to do and I'm having a lot of fun, which is really all I'm looking to do right now :)

Officially Mrs. Ramirez :)

Okay call me lazy, a procrastinator, or anything else you want but today I FINALLY made it down to the DPS to get my name changed on my drivers license.

To be honest, I have been waiting on the new house to be ready so that I could change my name and address at the same time -- and we are finally close enough to moving in that by the time my new license arrives at 11404 Topeka, there will actually be a mailbox there for the postman to leave it in :)

It was a relatively painless trip to the DPS though, and I was in and out with a new last name in under 30 minutes. Who would have thought it could be so easy? :)

More and more shopping :)

We really need to hurry up and move in so I will stop buying so many new things :)

Between not seeing 85% of our belongings for the past 3-4 months (including all of our wedding gifts... which we literally boxed up the week after our honeymoon), and then all of our new purchases it's going to feel like we're not only moving into a brand new house, but filling it with all brand new things too!

We really haven't bought THAT much stuff though, and I am very happy with the purchases we have made, including the things we bought yesterday.

We found some barstools we both love at barstools.com (who would have guessed? :)), and can't wait for them to come in... I can already imagine us sitting down for dinner at the bar in our kitchen each night, and I know these stools are going to really be put to great use!


We also made a trip to Bed Bath and Beyond and Target to purchase the few remaining items on our wedding registry. I was SHOCKED at how little was left... our friends and family truly blessed us at our wedding!

There were a few things we still wanted though, so this weekend we bought a waffle maker, measuring cups, a new trash can, kitchen soap dispenser, guest bathroom accessories, a cake dome, and a welcome mat for the front door with a big "R" on it!

We came straight home and put it all in a box so it's sitting here waiting on the move -- we move in on a Friday and my goal is to have the kitchen in order enough to be able to cook waffles Sunday morning!

POP Goes Perfection!!

I'm sure just about everyone remembers this unnerving childhood game where you set the timer and do your very best to get all the puzzle pieces put into their proper place before the POP that sends them all flying into the air again.

Remember that "feeling" you would get as you played? You started off calm, cool and collected... after all, you've got plenty of time! But after one or two misplaced pieces the sound of the timer would begin to get to you... you'd go a little faster, and a little faster, and a little faster so that by the time you got to the end you were nearly frantic!

Sometimes, you would win. But other times you'd be "so close" and then here that fatal noise...

POP!!

And there would go all of your puzzle pieces.

Rob and I have decided that our shower at the apartment reminds us of this game.
The fact is... scalding hot water is going to come shooting out of the shower head at least 10-15 times during an average 10 minute shower. The only thing you have control over is doing your best to be standing as close to the back of the shower as possible when it happens.

You lather up with soap, stick out your hand and wait for the next "scalding episode" to happen -- then, as soon as it's over, you quickly jump under the water to rinse off. The goal is to be rinsed and standing in the back of the shower before the next scalding episode occurs.

You usually have anywhere from 30 seconds to a minute.

The worst is when you're washing shampoo out of your hair, because for one thing it takes longer than just rinsing soap off of your body, and if you "miss" and get scalded the water is pouring down your head, face and shoulders.

In effort to make the best out of a hot situation, we've turned it into a game...

kind of like Perfection.

"I took a 15 minute shower and only got scalded once!!"

or

"Wow, I was really out of it today... it got me 6 times!"

As fun as this game is, I have to say we are both looking forward to being able to take a long, relaxing shower while thinking about things such as what's on your "to do" list for the day, your plans for the upcoming weekend, or even thinking nothing at all instead of having to constantly calculate how many seconds you've been standing under the water :)

In any case though, the shower has made for quite a few laughs over the past 3 months.
Only 19 more days to go :)

Closing Date :)

We FINALLY got a closing date on our house yesterday!!

Friday, August 5th, will be our first official night in our new home!

Something about having a closing date makes everything seem closer. I began packing yesterday, and have 3 boxes done so far... not a lot, but most of what we have is in storage so we really don't have much to pack.

The house is coming along too -- the painters and tile people are there right now, and as of last night the trim and cabinets inside were all painted and both bathroom showers were being tiled.

It's starting to feel real... like oh my goodness we're really moving!

Only 20 days to go!

Goodbye, Dear Friend.

Well, tonight it ends. We've known it was coming for years now, but that doesn't make the moment any less climactic. I've read the book a million times... so many times that I know I will not be suprised by any of the scenes in tonight's movie. There will probably be nothing that makes me oooh or ahhh... the images on the screen are simply the same as those that have been in my head for the past 4 years, finally brought to life in a way that others can enjoy them too.

If you're not a Harry Potter fan, this post will probably make you laugh. But if you are, then you not only understand where I'm coming from... but you are feeling the exact same things yourself.

Since reading the last page of the first book we have always had the anticipation of "what's next" -- a new book, a new movie, a new theme park -- but tonight when we walk out of that theater we will know that there is no "next". This is it. The Harry Potter story is over.

I wonder if J.K. Rowling realized how powerful the text she was writing would come to be? I'm sure she didn't... as I'm sure no one could have. After all, who could have predicted that 7 books written about an orphan-boy-grown-wizard would capture the world's attention in the way that it did?

Over the past 11 years I have read the Harry Potter books no less than 11 times -- re-reading them at least once a year, and sometimes twice. I put fake covers over the "evil" books in order to be able to take them to school, because the administration had banned them and dismissed them as wrong.

If only someone in the administration had read them. They would realize what amazing story it truly is... and how many lessons could have been learned from their pages.

To me, the story of Harry Potter is the ultimate story of Good v. Evil. Of Life v. Death. It's a love story.

The story of an orphan boy, saved from evil by nothing other than the self-sacrifice and love of his own mother... thrown into a world where he was never loved by anyone only to find, 11 years later that not only was he not weird, not an outcast, but someone special... someone looked up to and honored by his peers.

I'm sure everyone has felt like that at one time or another... that they didn't belong, that they just didn't fit into the world they lived in. And to imagine that something so magical could happen, that out of nowhere you could be swept off and placed into a world where everything just felt right... that is the story of Harry Potter.

It's a story of doing the right thing, no matter how hard it is. It's a story of standing up for what you believe to be true, even if an entire world is against you. It's a story of going for it... even when the odds seem stacked against you, and a story of unconditional love, of being willing to sacrifice a part of your own self to save those you care about.

The story itself is pure genius... to begin with a baby in a crib, who's life was saved by his mother giving up her own and to end... 17 years later... with that "baby" marching to what he believes to be his own death in order to save the lives of his friends.

The fact of whether Harry truly gives up his life or not is irrelevent... it's the fact that he was WILLING to, that is monumental.

Throughout Jr. High and High School Harry, Ron, Hermione, Hagrid, Neville, Luna, Cho, Cedric, Fred, George and Ginny were some of my closest friends. Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle were the school bullies, and Snape and Umbridge were those teachers you just couldn't stand.

For the past 13 years, Hogwarts has been real. So real that when I visted the train station in London I would not have been suprised to see oddly dressed children running in a dead sprint towards the column between platforms 9 & 10 in effort to make it onto Platform 9 3/4.

When I got my first house and discovered a family of owls living in the building behind it... I imagied them simply waiting for the call to deliver their next letter. I remember curling up in the chair on my back porch, reading the books while listening to the owls call to one another in the darkness -- it made everything seem even more real than it already was.

Over the past 13 years, the story of Harry Potter has been more real to me than many things.

I remember my disappointment with the first few HP films... I'm not sure if they've gotten better over the years or if my expectations have simply been adjusted and I've realized what they truly are meant to be. Either way, it is impossible to capture the magic that lies on the pages of those books, put them into a movie and expect the same type of impact -- it's just impossible.

So tonight, I am prepared to say goodbye to one of the best stories ever written. I am prepared to overlook the small details that don't line up with the book, and to fill in the gaps the film-makers miss.

I'm excited to see the reactions of those who don't know what's coming -- to watch some of the most "evil" characters become completely redeemed in the eyes of the viewers.

I am prepared to laugh, to cry, and to ultimatley walk out of that theater knowing that it's over.

Knowing that even if J.K.Rowling decides to ever write another Harry Potter book, it will be to keep the story alive for a second generation of readers, and not because there is more to be written.... because there isn't.

I'm grown up. It only makes sense that they should be grown up too.

Harry Potter's story, whether it is truly "over" or not, is complete -- when you turn to the last page of any true Harry Potter fan's copy of The Deathly Hallows I'm sure you will find tear stains on the pages... tear stains because it's over, because it could not have ended any better, but it's still over, just the same.

I expect the same reaction tonight when the credits roll and the lights come up -- there will be many tear stained faces, and a somber crowd will be exiting the theater, because they will all know, it truly is "The End".

The Days Drag On Forever...

... and this apartment never ends!

I swear, July is going by SO slowly! I feel like we've been at or around the 3-week mark for a while now, and we are both just so ready to move!

I was telling Rob last night -- it's not that the apartment is even that bad, because most days it's really not, it's that this upcoming move is so thought-consuming!

I wake up in the mornings, go feed the horses and... drive by the house, just to see if anyone's there.

Rob comes home at night and the first thing we do is... go see the house.

I am just SO ready to be moved in and to have my mind free to be consumed by other things. I'm so grateful that the Vegas convention for SOC is 2 weeks after we move in -- that gives us just enough time to get settled and then we will come back from Vegas pumped up and ready to really focus on SOC throughout the fall!

I can't wait!

We are either right at or a little past the 3-week mark now... and I'm hoping that once we hit the 2-week mark things will begin to go more and more quickly. We'll have to start packing and getting everything organized for the move, but now we are just kind of stuck in that "so close, and so far" stage!

Hanging out and Shopping :)

Rob and I had so much fun hanging out all day... this is probably the time we've spent all day together just the two of us in over a month, and we thouroughly enjoyed it :)

We used our free day to go all over town shopping for new things for the house -- we went to Home Depot, Lowes, Target, World Market, Wal Mart, and Bob Mills. Wow, busy day!!

We were looking for some patio furniture for our front porch, but really didn't find exactly what we were wanting so decided to just use what we have for the rest of this year and then buy what we really want when all the new stuff comes out next spring.

We did already purchase a new dining set for the front porch, which I found on clearance at Wal Mart of all places! I hardly ever shop there, but I happened to find this online and it's supposed to arrive the week before we move in! Perfect!!
We also went to Bob Mills looking for a new coffee table. We had a credit there from a deposit we put down on a bedroom suite several months ago but had changed our minds on.... and we knew we definitely wanted a new coffee table.

I love my living room tables, but the coffee table has all kinds of scratches on it. I've only had it about 4 years, but to be honest I just didn't take the best care of it back then!

I didn't want to replace all of our tables, so we decided to look at cocktail ottomans and found the most BEAUTIFUL one that looks like it was just made to go with our furniture -- the top is a chocolate colored leather, and the bottom is a wood that just matches our other tables almost perfectly. It's going to look great in our living room!

I couldn't find a picture of the exact one we got... but this one is close:

Oh my goodness... our house looks like a house!!

This has probably been one of the most fun weeks of the building process. Of course, the framing was cool... but over the past week we have had the trim crew in our house sun-up to sun-down installing kitchen cabinets, baseboards, closet shelves, stair railing, doors and all kinds of other fun things!

Here are a few pictures of this week's progress:

Locked and Loaded :)

We were finally able to lock in our interest rate today!! We are so excited because we were able to lock in at 4.62, which actually ended up being lower than what we were originally quoted 3 1/2 months ago.

It made our house payment go down a whole $20 each month! (Hey, every little bit counts... right?)

I guess that means the move is really happening.... in 3-4 weeks we will be OUT OF HERE and in our beautiful new home!

Can't wait :)

First Fourth of July at Vintage

This year was our family's first 4th of July at Vintage Township! They had a parade and we got to help the neighbors behind my parents' decorate their golf cart and the kids got to ride in it with them!

We had so much fun eating hot dogs and ice cream, playing in the water toys and hanging out with all of our new neighbors -- it kind of made up for the fact that there were no fireworks this year due to the drought.

I'm looking forward to many more years of 4th of Julys at Vintage :)

Schneider-Ramirez Staycation

Last weekend my Mom decided to suprise my Dad by inviting his best friend from high school and his wife Marta over to the house for the night. Dad and Jeff hadn't seen each other in 20 years, so it was a HUGE suprise and they were both so excited (and confused) when they saw each other!

To help them out, Rob and I took Clay and Paige out for the night as well -- we stayed at the Arbor Inn and Suites here in town and had a LOT of fun!

Once we got checked into the hotel we went to see Cars 2 (hilarious, by the way!!) then went over to Vintage to see some of the parade homes.

The next morning we woke up and had Texas-shaped waffles on the patio then went to the pool for a couple of hours before heading back home!

It's things like this that make me SO glad we are able to still live in Lubbock -- I love hanging out with my brother and sister all the time... and especially since our age difference is so great, I would miss so much of them growing up if we didn't live here!

House Progress this Week!

On Monday, our house looked like this:

Today, it looks like this!!!



Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Air Conditioning and Drywall

Well we went ALL day without air conditioning in the apartment. Thankfully today was Paige's lesson day so we spent all morning at the barn and I was then able to spend the afternoon working at Nana's house.

It was already so hot in here this morning we both woke up, got ready and got out the door as quickly as possible. We even ate breakfast on the front porch because it was actually cooler outside than in!


The a/c is finally fixed though -- and although it's still warm, the temperature is slowly going down. Looking forward to a comfortable night's sleep :)

We were also excited to find that they have begun putting drywall in our house! Steve said after drywall comes texture, then cabinets then trim work. After that they'll do all the finishes like the flooring, counter tops, paint, etc. We can't WAIT!!

Really, I hate this apartment.

I try to be positive about living in this apartment. Really, I do.

I try to overlook that the carpet smells like dog pee no matter how many times I use the carpet cleaner on it, that I can't do laundry or dishes while I'm working because the washer, dryer and dishwasher all make my computer screen shake, that when we get in bed at night we have to listen to our nocturnal upstairs neighbor bang around his apartment all night and that it seems like anytime anyone in the whole building turns on any water the shower gets either burning hot or freezing cold.

Really, I try to overlook it.

But today is not one of those days. I give up.

Today our a/c decided to go out (after the office closed, of course) and it is currently 85 degrees in here.

So today I give myself this right to post this one very negative entry:

I really HATE this apartment. I cannot WAIT to get into our new house. And I promise to be more positive tomorrow... IF they fix the air conditioning :)

Ice Cream for Everyone!!

A couple of days ago Nana and Paige came by to pick me up and go for ice cream. Of course, I had to take Fugitive April with me, so she got to enjoy an afternoon snack too! She was SO excited when they gave us a puppy cone JUST for her -- she loved it, and I'm sure can't wait to go back and get some more :)

Paint = Done!!