KG's Hideaway

I just came back from the first game of Ryan's basketball tournament. They won by 15, thank God, so now we don't play again until Saturday morning. Ryan has an appointment in Arlington later today so I'm just taking her to my class with me afterwards.

There has just been so much going on around the house lately its hard to keep up. I was going to post sooner but I've been cleaning out the files on m computer in anticipation of my new computer getting here, but it won't be here until Saturday (=o( so I thought I'd go ahead.

I had a guy come out yesterday to look at doing some roof repairs where the tree branches had drug off some of the shingles and caused leaks in the roof. He came out and told me that there was alot of hail damage up there. Hooray!!!! That means the insurance will pick up at least SOME of the charges!! wooo hoooooooo So as soon as that's started Craig is ripping out ALL of the carpet that's left in the house (except the front living room) and putting in the wood laminate. We're also ripping out the vanity in the front bathroom and putting all new stuff in there. As soon as all of that's done, we're ripping out the kitchen cabinets and putting in all new. Other than that, we're just scraping the ceilings and retexturing them and the walls in every room.

Anyway, that's all for now. I'm out the door!

Posted by at 11:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I've been trying to get all the "prep" cooking done tonight so that tomorrow will be easy. I'm having a tough time getting it done, though. We've had the tree guy out here for two days trying to get all the trees cut back and "dressed", but I think the scope of it has shocked even him. We have 24 trees on this lot and they are just choking out any chance for a lawn to grow so he's cutting down 3 trees in the front and one MASSIVE tree that is growing RIGHT at the back of our house. He's only charging us $2200 to do all of that and grind the stumps, so we're happy but I guess he needs the money because he is even working tomorrow.

I flew DeMarcus in for Thanksgiving and I'm SOOOOOOOOOOO happy to see him. I only get to see him about twice a year now that he's living so far away, but oh how I love him! I think he and Ryan are were the cutest couple. I'm just thankful they've stayed the best of friends!!

Woody really needs to get his teeth cleaned!!! Oh, how I love this dog!!! (Actually, both of them, but this one is my baby!)

Jade has to wear her "bonnet" until the stitches come out of her leg. She's blurry in the background but you get the idea.

Posted by at 8:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Tonight Ryan and Kyra had basketball. The girls played LD Bell and we SHOULD have wiped the floor with them, but instead ended up only beating them by 4 points. Before the game, Craig took me to Circuit City and bought me a longer lense (75-300mm). This was my first time using it and I really have alot to learn. My goal is to take pictures like Wendy. She takes the BEST pictures!! (Clayton's pictures are a whole other level and he should be considered a pro, so that doesn't count for us. So THERE! LOL)

Anyway, here are a couple of the pictures. I also have some pictures from the day Ryan signed but they're really big files so I've got to play with those a little before I post them.

These three are pics I took the day I got my camera. I should have changed some settings, but whatever.
I love this picture of Kyra. Can you see how much she looks like Craig? Sometimes I think she's got some of her mother's features, but times like this I think she's the spitting image of her dad!

Sweet picture of Ryan and Craig.

And here is the picture of Ryan with the trophy she won (Outstanding Offensive Player) in the tournament.

Posted by at 11:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've already posted about Ryan signing her National Letter of Intent last week, but I didn't post the pictures. Well, here they are WENDY!!!! The first picture is of her actual signing, but the second one is just the "fake" signing so that they can have a ceremony at school. But besides all of this I have some great news! (after the pics)

Austin and Ryan's dad, Marshall, is the really old looking guy on the far right next to Ryan. I'm SO pissed that he managed to come to her signing but couldn't manage to make it into town to see her game the night before. She totally wrecked on the team we played and showed just how much further she's come since last year. That bastard lives only about 2 hours away (but his mother lives 7 minutes from us) and he only sees them on Thanksgiving and Christmas. What an idiot. The kids were pissed that he brought his new girlfriend to the signing but I personally think it's great. When he's happy, he isn't such an ass!

Here is an article on the UNT website regarding Ryan (and the other girls) who signed.

On Thursday, we left for Austin and the Capital City Showdown basketball tournament. We played a few 5A teams (we're 4A) and we did really well! We went undefeated until the Championship game but we only lost that one by 4 points. AND we played against Mansfield Timberview, who should have kicked our ass. The girls played SO good!

Ryan had an "ok" tournament, in my opinion. Not great, but considering she played with the flu, I think it was alright. The tournament officials saw it differently and she was awarded the Outstanding Offensive Player of the tournament trophy. Really cool.

Both the girls ended up feeling really crappy and Kyra ended up puking ON THE BUS!!! WTF? I asked her why she didn't say anything to the coaches before she tossed her cookies and Ryan said that she never got a chance because the assistant coach sort of stopped quickly and when the bus lurched so did Kyra's stomach. She learned the hard way not to spend ALL DAY eating. Live and Learn.

Posted by at 10:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

For Pete's sake! I can't believe I woke up at 4:45am. That is freakin' ridiculous! Bah! Oh well, I've got a boatload of things to do so I guess it's just as well.

First off, Ryan had a HUGE game last night. We lost to Arlington Seguin, but Ryan REALLY stepped up last night scoring 23 of the team's 45 points. (Here is the box score in the paper.) She was ready this time! Seguin is a better team than we are, and we were slated to get our asses handed to us but ended up only losing by 9. Luckily, this is still a preseason game so the loss doesn't affect us. I used the new camera and will post some pictures later today.

She signs her NLI (National Letter of Intent) this morning, but the ceremony (where she'll sign a copy) isn't going to happen until 2:30. She's very excited (me, too!!) and had a hard time going to sleep last night. We leave for Austin at 7:30 in the morning, so she better get some sleep.

Jade is having her ACL surgery on Friday morning while the dogs are at the vet for the weekend. I'm a little nervous because the last time one of them had surgery Woody nearly died. Litterally. I am keeping my fingers crossed!

Posted by at 5:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

This has been such a busy weekend. Friday was basketball, as usual. Then Saturday was spend ripping out the shrubs in front of the house. We have SO many trees so when you combine them with the shrubs, its just too much. So they are gone and many of the trees are trimmed back. I still have to get the HUGE Live Oak trimmed and a massive tree in our backyard cut down completely. Hopefully, this week.

Then, on Saturday night, Craig and I went to see Lions for Lambs. It wasn't a fantastic movie, but I did think it was good. Tom Cruise, Meryl Streep and Robert Redford were all good in it. But it was definitely missing something. Don't know what that "something" is, but its missing.

Then, while Austin and Craig spent the day doing more yard work, I went shopping. I've got about half of my Christmas shopping done as well as having the gifts for Ryan for her signing day. I can't say yet what it is because she sometimes reads my blog from school, but its really cute and i can't wait to give it to her. Truthfully, I can't wait for the whole thing to be done. I just want to hurry!!! gah!

I managed to get some really cute stuff yesterday at the Parks Mall. I'm normally not a fan of that mall because it's pretty big and I feel overwhelmed sometimes. But when you need to get the shopping DONE, that's where you go!

later

Posted by at 3:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Last night Ryan's team played Mansfield. We were the definite underdogs but ended up winning the game by 11pts. Ryan was the high scorer with 15pts, and she finally started playing the way we expect her to, but she really didn't get into gear until the 2nd half. She said she's really sturggling to "get going" but hopefully she'll figure it out.

After the game, we met Jamie and Jess for drinks. I think the picture clearly establishes the "drinks." Craig wont drink and then drive so he was the lone holdout. We had a great time and eat lots of crap we didn't need.. All in all, a good night!

Craig and I are on the right

I've really been wanting a Nikon D40, but I also wanted a digital video recorder and last night at Ryan's game one of the moms I've known forever told me about the digital video recorder that takes great action still shots as well. I'm very partial to Sony products so when she said it was a Sony dcr-sr42 I was thrilled.

I didn't wait, I just went and bought it this morning. I got the extra battery, the memory card and a smaller tripod than the one we use for our regular camcorder (also a Sony. As a matter of fact, all three of the digital cameras I've bought are Sony). All of it cost me just about $750 bucks. I was prepared to pay that for just the digital camera. It has a hard drive and a mdocking station that allows one touch down loading. Yay!!!

Posted by at 6:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

edited 10:14am- I just found out who is victim is and I'm appalled! I'd forgotten that his ex-wife was now working with Craig. He ran into her at the benefits meeting and she spilled the beans. Trae is screwed... and he deserves to go away for a long time!

So after our dinner of misery last night I came home, made the post, did my homework then went to bed. I got woken up from a DEAD sleep at almost exactly midnight when my cell phone started ringing. (Trust me, there is nothing quite as exasperating as waking up to the song from the LittIe Mermaid, "Under the Sea!). I grabbed it and was ready to throw it across the room when I caught myself and realized what I was about to do. that finally cleared my head, so I answered. It was Austin. He was at my (ex) mother-in-law's house watching the news.

He asked me if I remembered the name of one of his classmate's fathers. He knew full well that I'd know the name because I was dating that guy when I met my (now) ex-husband. I couldn't help but ask why. He said that Trae (that's what was was called because he was the 3rd person in his family with the same name) had been arrested for MOLESTING a CHILD. Ummm, excuse me?

http://www.star-telegram.com/news/story/297237.html

Sure as shit, there it is! I knew he'd gotten busted from detective to patrolman because Craig and I witnessed a pretty bad wreck one night and Trae was the one who responded. I also knew he was kind of always in trouble at work, but I had no CLUE the extent of the reality!

His kids are each a month different in age than mine. And he adopted his 2nd wife's daughter... and to make THAT matter worse, is wife is also a cop in the CRIMES AGAINST CHILDREN department!!!!

What a dipshit! Wanna know what's even worse? This is the 2nd person with whom I graduated who has been arrested for sexual contact of some kind with a child. Alfred Villanueva got busted for having sex with a 14 year old while posing as a 19 year old. This was like 4 years ago... so he was 35 or 36!!! I couldn't believe anyone would believe he was THAT young until I saw his mug shot. He DID look that young!

omg what is wrong with Crowley High School class of 1985?

Posted by at 8:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Ok, today was just a waste of time. I'm so pissed off at all of the kid right now that I could just gnaw my own arm off!!!

I guess I should have known it wouldn't go well. Ryan had just gotten out of practice and Austin just came in from work. Lovely! At least Craig was happy with his Philadelphi@ Eagles jersey!

Today is Craig's birthday so I planned a family dinner at a restaurant where they all like things (you'd be surprised how hard this is to accomplish!). Towards the end of the meal Austin and Ryan started arguing like 1st graders and just pissed me off so bad... and I was already pissed off at Kyra for just sitting there and litterally saying NOTHING for the full hour before they started bickering. I was seriously pissed and I hated it that Craig's birthday was (semi) ruined. I mean, it wasn't bad but their bitching is really annoying and they both say the stuff that they KNOW will piss the other off!

And I really thought today would be good. We got the official notice that Craig's exwife is moving to Midland (blech!!!) at the end of the month. It shouldn't have any effect on us, really, because Kyra doesn't see her mother at all. But, both before we moved back here from California and as soon as we got back here we had to endure two custody battles that ended up costing nearly $25,000 between the California attorney and the Texas one. The only reason her move affects us at all is just that feeling that another custody battle is not ever going to happen because she's gone. I guess it's never really over but she'd never have a leg to stand on to fight us again. It may not seem like it should be a big deal, but if you knew all the trouble she caused by LYING to the court (thank GOD they didn't believe her!) you'd understand.

I really did think it was going to be a great day. Ah well, I guess you can't win them all!

Posted by at 8:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Tonight, Craig and I went to dinner before heading out for Ryan's game. Actually, it is Ryan AND Kyra's game (Kyra is the manager for the team) Ryan played most of the game, but only had 10 points. But still, it was good. I've been waiting for this for a long time!

All of the pictures I took are crappy; except including this one. But Ryan thinks it's pretty cool because everything but including her is blurry..

She signs her papers for the scholarship a week from tomorrow. I can't wait!!!!!

Posted by at 10:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Good Lord, what were we thinking trying work on the house? We just got started and I'm already whupped! Today was spent installing the new dryer, hanging all new doors on every room and closet in the house, cleaning out Austin's trash heap of a room...

Next weekend it's installing two new toilets, ripping out the carpet in the livingroom and hallway plus Austin's room and preparing the floor for the wood laminate. We're not putting the laminate down until the first week of December because we're scraping the popcorn stuff off the ceiling and then retexturizing all the walls and ceilings. Then, we'll put the laminate down, then hopefully the first part of January of February we'll be ripping out the cabinets and installing new cabinets and countertops. We've already put in all the new appliances so we don't have to mess with anything except the stove top. That, we're buying when we do the kitchen but we had put all new everything else in last year.

Oh yeah, I forgot one thing. Our front bathroom has the really old looking wall heater that we've been unsure what to do with since we bought the house. We'll also be dealing with taking that out and re-doing the walls and the gross baseboards in there. Oh how fun that sounds

Posted by at 5:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My sister pissed me off pretty bad last night. She had called me last weekend to see if I'd babysit this weekend and I said I could but Craig and I had alot to do so we wouldn't be there to sometime around 7 and I needed the baby fed and in her pajamas. That way, we could still do the shopping we needed to do and she could just fall asleep whenever and I'd just put her in her crib when we got here. No big thing.

So on Thursday I called and left another message confirming our plan to be there sometime late in the evening and I'd call her when Craig was on his way home. I guess that wasn't good enough because she texted my phone "911" and when I called her it was ONLY so she could see if the baby could come sooner. I was PISSED, but I didn't say anything because she was at work and didn't want to get her in trouble. But after we got off the phone I texted her and told her that was BS. You don't do a 911 thing for that!

So anyway, we got to her house about 6:45. The baby hadn't eaten and was still in her regular clothes. I made a comment to my sister about it and off she went. You cannot argue with my sister... at all. So I put the baby down and walked out. A few seconds later she was walking out behind us and kept asking what I was doing. "I'm leaving. Not gonna argue with you" is what I said. It really pisses her off if you don't argue with her but if you do you'll never get a single word in edgewise. The only thing you can do with her is walk away or stand there and take it. If you stand there and take it, it gets worse the next time so I just walk away to avoid fighting. I used to get mad and stay mad for a day or two when that'd happen, but I've found that if I can manage to walk away I don't stay mad at her, so its better all the way aroun.

Last weekend, my mother was over there and call me from her cell phone. I said something about Rusti not returning the 3 messages I'd left for her. She head me say it (because my mom was on speaker phone) and commented back that she'd never even gotten any messages. She started to say something else but my mom stopped her. Then, later in the day, she called and said she DID get the messages but could only understand parts of it. WTF? So I called my mom asked if Rusti did indeed say those things and she said,
Yeah, why?" So I explained my call from her. Maybe her MRSA has gone to the brain!!!

Posted by at 8:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

A few people know, but most don't. Last August, Austin was arrested.

(Just a little back story) His whole life I've told him that I better not ever get a phone call that he'd gotten into a fight... and I damn well sure better not get a phone call that he was in JAIL for a fight. It was a great sentiment, I think.

He always walked away from confrontations... always. Just a month after he graduated from high school a guy he knew tried to start a fight with Austin up at the rec center after he heard that Austin made a comment about his girlfriend. (To be honest, Austin DID say it... a year before that) Austin had a soft cast on his hand because he'd had surgery two days earlier. The guy hit Austin once on the side of his head and knocked Austin's hat off. When Austin just bent over to pick up the hat rather than fight back, all their friends started laughing at the guy and calling him a wuss. That enraged him and he hit Austin again. This time, a cop was standing there. He patted Austin on the back for not fighting. The second time was about 6 months later when Austin showed up at his girlfriend's house to get his stuff because they'd broken up (she'd started doing drugs). One of the guys there was coked up and hit Austin right above the eye then turned and punched out Austin's window on one of his back doors. Austin didn't press charges and just asked the guy to pay for the window.

Now, to what happened that night. Austin was with a family friend because the kid had gotten himself into a mess with a friend (some friend!!) and was Austin was trying to talk him out of it. The kid (Zach) told Austin that this other guy (Will) wanted to talk to him and they were meeting him up where he worked. So Austin took him but when they got there Will immediately hit Zach and knocked him out COLD with the first punch. Then Will jumped on him and kept punching even though Zach was unconcious. So Austin tried to get Will to stop hitting hiim when he couldn't defend himself but Will was just going off. No one else would try to help, so Austin picked up a stick and hit Will. It did nothing so he swung again. This time it caught Will in the back of the head, but he still kept fighting. A few minutes later some guy came out of where Will worked and they were able to pull them apart. It all broke up and everyone left.

About an hour later Austin got a phone call that both Zach and Will were at the police station so he went up there. About 10 minutes into it they arrested him. The charge? Assault with a deadly weapon. Class 1 Felony punishable by up to 99 years in prison. I got the phone call about midnight and went up to the police station (two blocks from my house). The cops were pretty cool about it and said only Austin and Zach were charge. They said they didn't charge Will because he was "hurt." WTF??? So anyway, all this time we've been scared shitless. But the case was finally dealt with and the judge told the deputy DA that only in Crowley would that have amounted to a felony rather than a ticket, so most of it was dropped and Austin was given probation with deferred ajudication (meaning if he doesn't get in trouble it all falls off his record when he's done).

Since it all happened Austin has stayed away from Zach and Zach has gotten himself into some pretty deep crap. He's just trouble... but I still see that little boy who was just SO cute and just wanted his parents' attention. Maybe he's finally gotten it.

Oh i forgot... the whole thing about getting that phone call? I always swore I'd let him sit there if he got popped for anything (but especially fighting) but when that phone call came I was damn near panicked. They let me see him right away-with glass between us- and he just had tears running down his face. No matter what I said (cuz I was going between crying and being mad) he just kept saying, "Momma, I'm sorry" and shaking his head. The last year has been hard on him. At time's he's been pretty depressed, but now there is a VISABLE weight off his shoulders and I think he's learned a pretty tough lesson.

Me, too.

Posted by at 10:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Warning: This post will contain many swear words. Skip it if you don't like it.

Well, thank GOD I went to meet with my professor last night to catch up on the info from class. WTF? I'm pretty sure that the stuff we're supposed to be doing isn't any form of math but rather we are having to learn Russian. This stuff is seriously crazy. Whatever.

So anyway, last night I was really flustered but Craig flew in and wanted to go to dinner after I got done with the prof, so we just met at Spaghetti Warehouse. I walked, damn near in tears, and there he is with a gift bag and flowers. and what's the first thing I say to him? "Why did you buy me something?" Crappy, I know- but I didn't mean it that way. So I look in the bag and it's Godiva chocolates on top... then, a bottle of perfume. Unfortunately, it's the same one that I just bought a month ago. I tried to just say "Thank you" but he said, "I know you said you were out..." so then I told him, "No, I said I'm out of the Armani, not Mackie." Again, shitty... but I didn't mean it that way (my recurrent theme evidently) So today, I'm exchanging them. If I wasn't almost out of Armani Code (OMG this stuff smells the BEST!!!) I would just keep the Mackie until I needed it. So again, I don't mean it shitty...

Let the cussing begin. I'm about to throw my fucking phone into a fucking trash can. I am so fucking tired of everyone hunting me down on my fucking cell phone. Do you even TRY my fucking home phone? noooooooooooooo! My phone rings all fucking day for bullshit stuff and I'm just fed the fuck up. My sister is the worst offender. If you don't answer the damn phone she will continue calling every ten fucking minutes until you give in and answer. Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Posted by at 10:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)