The Fair and a New Friend.....

So here it is, folks! The offical pictures of the Mannington Fair in all its glory. Enjoy! We certainly did!

This child had no fear! He made friends on every ride he was on.

This is the most awesome picture, simply because this is what we did that night at the fair (watch Kole), and because of Dad's expression!!!

Kole waas obviously excited.....the entire night.

This ride scared me. Kole kept ducking down to where I couldn't see him over the edge. Not good !

SO fun, and he made another friend...!

The alligator roller coaster. Hands up and screamin' like a girl the whole way!

This was so funny to watch.

Any ride that goes up in the air with my child is terrifying to me!

Look at that sky!

This was actually the first ride of the night. He was so pumped!

Here are a few pictures of another friend. We often go as a family on walks on the rail trail. There is often pretty flowers and good scenery that we enjoy. On our last walk, Kole and I collected some queen anne's lace and some green wheat looking plant. We put them in my mason jar flower vase and they have been very pretty for a while now on my kitchen table. As I was sitting at the table the other night, I saw something unusual on one of the flowers. Here it is:

He must have been very small when we picked the flowers and grew on my kitchen table! On claser inspection, I noticed that a few of the queen annes lace looked as though they had thier head eaten off. Haha. This is how he grew so big!!! By eating my flowers!!!!







I promptly took the whole vase outside, where this little guy, along with the flowers, now live on the patio table.

I took so many photo's of him because he really is a good lookin' caterpillar!

Thats all for now.

The house is offically under contract!

Here it is my friends and family! This is the house that Kole and I will be living in until october the 4th, when Zach will join us. In approximately thirty days (right when school starts....ahhh!) we will be moving! Now, this is all dependant on the inspection, which we think will go just fine (positive thinking). Everything else is well underway (scheduled the inspection, financing, etc.)

I am so excited I could pee my pants! Haha. Tiff will get that one.

Other than this big news, all else is going well. I am ready to start packing.

We are supposed to be relaxing.......

It is summer. I am not working (except for an occasional day at the daycare). I am not sure how I ever found time to work with the busy schedule that I have been keeping! But we sure are having fun while being busy.



There were several things I wanted to do for fun this summer and so far, only one has been accomplished. Between registering for gifts, house hunting, traveling to the wedding site to pick out flowers and a menu, house hunting, figuring out wedding invitations, house hunting, keeping my favorite neice, house hunting, and ...........so on and so forth, we haven't stopped yet.



We spent an entire day looking at houses yesterday. We went everywhere, and out of ten, saw three that we liked. One was a flip house that was nice, but on closer inspection, there were some things left undone and it had puddles in the basment. Not good. Another was extremely nice, with an awesome kitchen, right price, modern everything, and a nice backyard. But, it was in an undesirable location. The third that we liked was awesome. Cathedral celings, nice size bedrooms, an awesomely redone basement (or man cave as Zach called it), and an acre of yard for the man. It is pricey though and is in Colfax, which will mean a bit of a drive for both Zach and I for work. But we do have some good friends who live there and could walk to thier house. There were woods behind the house and a horse pasture beside the house. Both great views. It had a nice deck as well.



Heres a link to it if you want to take a look. http://www.idxvow.com/cgi-bin/ncwvidx/pitrolo/mls.cgi?view=res.cgi&show=yes&mls=10060688



We were so tired yesterday after it all, that we haven't fully discussed the next step. I'm not sure if we are going to keep looking or make on offer.....

So there is the update on the house hunting.



I have kept Keirrabelle a couple of times the past few days. I got to pick her up last night and keep her today while Kait and Cerik work on their trailer. She and Kole have been enjoying each other and Kole is learning how to deal with a younger kid being around and needing attention. I think it is good for him. Keirra is such a pleasure to have around. She is so fun and loving and energetic! Here is a picture of them hanging out.

Planning for the wedding has taken up a good portion of my time this summer as well. Stuff is getting done though. The bridesmaids dresses came in, Zach picked out and ordered his tux, the flowers have been selected, mom got to see the site in Buckhannon, the registry is complete (only a few minor fixes and additions...), the tree farm has been contacted about the favors, the wedding coordinator is getting together a menu for the rehearsal dinner and finalizing the wedding menu, the invitations and being printed today by an awesome graphic designer friend, and the guest list is complete! The shower is still a work in progress and there are some other minor details that need to be addressed. But the show is on the road! I would like to have all of the main stuff out of the way by the time school starts because I know I won't be able to think much about the wedding when it does.

On a completely different note, please keep Zach's mom in your prayers. She will be having back surgery on the 28th and we all are a little nervous. In addition to some other current unfortunate events , this time is very stressful and scary for her. Keep her in your thoughts and prayers.

Let me see, what did I forget???? Probably a ton but my brain is a little scrambled and overwhelmed right now. I'll post more later.

An update

We have successfully completed one of the summers to do items. This past weekend was the dave concert. It was definately interesting to say the least. Here are some pictures of the crazy hippies that I call friends.

The tailgating, BBQ fun.

My sweet fiance sucked it up and had an alright time=).

SO it was a fun and interesting concert. In other news, Tiff got me this lily of the valley plant for my birthday from proflowers. It was delivered to my door, where upon opening I realized I actually had to grow them! Now, everyone knows I love plants, but I do have a black thumb. I just can not keep them alive. I was a little afraid that this birthday gift was not going to blossom. But, low and behold, they grew so fast! Here is a picture from a week ago. I am so proud of them=). They have actualy continued to bloom and look even better currently.

We also had a great memorial day weekend at the lake house. Here are a few pictures as proof.

I hae mixed feelings about this photo. Its cutesy and artsy with the large drift wood in the back. But we all look stumpy and fat! We are a pretty short lil' fam. Except for Kole. He will be towering over both zach and I before to long!

Kole is posing in front of one of the water falls at the Swallow Falls State Park. This hike was super fun!

Kole was brave and sat on a rock in the "river" by himself!

So its a small update but an update none the less. Back to cleaning and organizing. Arg.

Yippee!

I am finally done with school! Graduation was on saturday, and though I did not attend, I stil get a diploma. This is so exciting to be finished. Well, until grad school. Ha.



It feels really strange to be done. I was so stressed out, and overwhelmed that it almost became a normal feeling. Now that I don't have anything extremely pressing to do (other than laundry, cleaning the apartment, wedding planning, house hunting, organization of clutter, switching winter clothes for summer clothes, getting my car inspected, and getting on the sub list with the board of Ed) this new feeling of freedom and relaxation is so stinking strange. So yes, there are many things to be done but none of them seem as daunting or as stressful as this past semester was. If I could get through that, I feel like I could do anything. Like fight an ogre. Or drive a stick shift. Either way, what a good (and strange) feeling it is.



So my last blog was about sled riding. Sorry. I was so swamped with school and student teaching, I barely had time to breathe. I have big plans for the summer. I am going to sub (hopefully) till the end of the school year. Then I might work a few days a week at the daycare Kole attends. I also want to go to:

Carnegie Science Center

www.carnegiesciencecenter.org/

Kole has been really interested in Anatomy. I am not even kidding, though I wish I was. There is an awesome bodies exhibit at carnegie and I think he would really dig it.

I hear they have an awesome Dinosaur Exhibit as well. Kole will go nuts!

The Pittsburgh Zoo
www.pittsburghzoo.org/

We didn't get to go last summer and Koley just loves it, and so do I!!

Dave Matthews Band Concert

www.dmband.com/

Its May 31st and we are pumped! Well I am. Zach is tolerating the idea=)

And possibly.........

Maine

Zach and Cass have invited us to visit them in Maine this summer. The idea is sounding better and better.

So there is is folks. An updated blog for all of you out there is cyber space. Much love to all.

Sled Riding=)

Well, as most of you know through Zach's blog, things have been kinda crazy with the Koleman these past few weeks. This week has been so much better! I am not sure if he just got the mommy time he needed, or the new discipline routine of behavior charts, time outs, and restricted tv time is working. I really don't care which, I am just glad to have my boy back! He seemed like a different child there for a while!
Student teaching is going just fine. I am a third of the way done, though I feel like it has been a year instead of just four weeks. I am getting good reviews from both my cooperating teacher and my supervising teacher. They say I am organized (i do not feel like I am at all!), seem very comfortable while teaching, and have connected with the students. I think that I am doing OK though I am very ready to move on with life and get this crap done with. High school students are......well....you already know what I am going to say. Most of my students are doing well (the ones who come to class), and I do really enjoy most of them. Haha.

The weather here in good ole WV has been, well strange lately. We had such a beautiful day on Sunday. The kinda weather that makes you want to be outside so bad, not only because the sun is shining perfectly, or because the temp is oh so right, but because it was the first perfect day since winter hit. We played outside, went on a walk, had a picnic, and looked at some historical stuff at Prickets Fort. The midweek forecast was dreary, rainy, and gradually got colder. Finally, it snowed today. Hopefully our last snow of the year. For this reason, I figured that Kole needed one last chance to get out there and be a kid while plummeting down the ever so high hill on Wind Ridge Manor. The wind was whipping, our faces were rosy (and numb!) but we had so much fun!

I just wanted to share some photos with all of you bloggers out there of the last of the winter (hopefully) sled riding adventures.

Kole is so excited and ready to go! Hurry up Zach!




Kole was the "pusher". Zach is about to go down the BIG HILL!!!

We went down together this time. I was praying we wouldn't topple. I did NOT want snow in my face!

The ride down. We were squealing the whole way!

Kole was brave and went down by himself! This was the little hill. He actually went down the big hill twice! We did not get any pictures of that because it was a little nerve racking so I wanted to be sure to have my hands free! He got down the big hill and said "Mommy, that was so fun!!!"

The dreaded walk back up.

Kole was trying to catch snow flakes on his tongue.

After we came in, I made some snow ice cream and some hot chocolate. It was a perfect ending to the end of winter (I hope). If only we could figure out some way for it to snow every morning (for 2 hour delays) and be 70 degrees for the rest of the day.....hum.

Avoidance and Fibs......

I am offically avoiding planning for my first class as a "teacher". I tend to do this when somethings seems so huge and daunting. I find many other little things that just HAVE to get done right now. These things are normally things that I would put off on another day but I will do them to avoid something else. For example: I haven't cleaned out my car in months. it is normally not that important and the poptart crumbs ar ein the back seat so I can't see them. Today though, it seems like the perfect activity to do so that I can feel productive and not work on lesson plans. I am terrible!

Yesterday, I walked into the daycare to pick up Kole and his teacher had him by the hand, walking down the hall way to Becky's office (the kids call her the principle but she is the owner and director). I thought, great, what did he do?!? His teacher said, "he's not in trouble, he just needs to tell Becky something". So, understanding that it wasn't that important, I made my way to his cubby, gathered his things, and signed him out. When I got back to Becky's office, three teachers and Becky were staring at me with questioning eyes. I knew something was up because Kole ran to me and hid his face. Finally, someone had the guts to ask "Are you pregnant?" I laughed and said, "No! Why?" I was told that Kole had informed everyone at his school that Mommy had two babies in her belly, that come out sometimes to drink the milk from her boobies." WHAT?!? Where did this come from? And how did he know about breast milk!? His teachers asked him if I had told him that and he said, "No, I told me that! When they marry they will have a baby on Thursday." His timeline is off=). That said, he knew he had been caught in a story because he was so embarrassed. I probably shouldn't have, but I felt so bad for him!

Kole often talks about having a brother or sister ( he said when he gets a baby brother he wants to name him TOOTS!). I think that many of his friends at school are getting babies added to thier families and he really wants one too. My response to him was that when mom and zach get married, we can have babies too. He seemed to take that response and be fine with it, but I thought to myself, how will I explain to him the "right" way to go about these things when I was not married when I had him? How do I let him know that he is so awesome and I wouldn't ever change anything about the choices I made because I got him in the end, without making it seem like those choices were wise choices to begin with?

His imagination never ceases to amaze me. He is full of questions that I would have never expected at his age! How do you explain these things to a four year old without giving too much information?! What is the right way to handle this? Now I am the one with too many questions and a way personal blog.

Time to try to be productive=).

Student Teaching.....

Well, It has begun. I went to my student teaching placement today for "visitation". I am placed at East Side High School. It is a nice school and I do like my cooperating teacher. Most teachers and administrators I met today knew either my dad, worked with my dad, knew my grandfather, or worked with my grandfather. This is a plus because they were/are good men that people respect and look up to. So, when people found out who I was, they generally liked me. Rock on for the awesome well known fam.

All this being said, there is a down fall. Even though I live on East Side and the school is East Side High School (even though it is almost in south Fairmont), Kole's Daycare is in the West Side area of town. School at EFHS also starts at 730, teachers need to be there at 700. Kole man's daycare doesn't open its doors until 700. There is the problem. Luckily, my teacher is usually late, coming in around 715 so I think I can make it at the same time. Poor Koley Oley though. He has to be the first one in the daycare in the morning and stay until 4ish. And thats only if I don't come home after school to work on the numerous things that need to be done this semester in silence (or without having to fetch a cheese stick or entertain).

I hate having a real (ish) job. This one sucks even more because I'M NOT GETTING PAID! Soon enough I tell myself. I can't wait to be done. At this rate, I could have been a doctor.

A day at the farm

Well, school has started and is already in full force. I have started block this semester. We are in class for four weeks and then finish out the semester in student teaching. There are so many assignments due already that I might just have a heart attack!

Kole and I got back from Arkansas this past Thursday. Overall, the trip was miserable but I was so thankful for the peaceful and relaxing (yet few) moments we got out at the farm. It is so cool to be able to hang out with your grandparents as an adult.

I heard many stories about my mother, aunts, and uncle (which were hilarious!), and just generally talked over coffee in the morning about random things that were on our minds, or not so random things that were serious.

All this said, Mamaw's and Papaw's farm is awesome. I was so sad to leave them at the end of the week but also happy to get back to my fiance and life in WV. Here are a few pictures from an afternoon on the farm.

Kole was so excited to get to ride in the FRONT SEAT with Papaw around the farm land.

Another picture of Kole throughly enjoying himself in the truck. Papaw and Kole were buddies.

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Trying to get a better look at the cows.

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Mamaw helping Kole over the stile (is that how you spell it??)

He was really having fun even though his face looks terrible in this photo!

I think Papaw enjoyed sharing the time with Kole man.

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They match! How stinkin' cute is that.











Papaw had to fix Kole's strap=)











Kole really wanted me to take a picture of the cows butt behind him so I kinda camoflauged it with Kole in the front. Look closely, and you will see the nasty cow butt he was so excited about!












Mamaw had just explained to Kole that No, those weren't four "pee-pee's" but a cows teet that calfs drink milk out of. So funny!












I think Mamaw was explaining something to Kole here and he had finally figured it out.











Tara and Kole just chillin' out after an awesome lunch cooked to perfection by Mamaw herself. It really was so so so delicious.

Like I said, the "other" reason we were in AR was not so fun, but our time spent with beloved family was so priceless and I was thankful for it. I have the most wonderful, selfless, spiritual grandparents in the world.