It's set

I'm having a "blah" kind of day today! ugh

But enough with all that. My LASIK surgery is set for Monday at 2:00! Yes, this coming Monday. Which I'm still pretty nervous about but I'm happy it's so soon. I CAN NOT stand wearing these glasses. After surgery my vision should be pretty clear in 24 hours. I will go back the next day for a follow up with the doctor just to make sure everything is looking right. So keep me in your prayers in the next few days.

This past weekend Taydem had the FLU! Now I think Leven is getting it. I helped my brother out with a catering Saturday afternoon in Tyler so Leven had to stay home with her. She's 100% better today, but still has some congestion.

This weekend Danin, Taydem, Mom and I are heading to Houston to visit my cousin and her new baby girl. She had her in November and is doing wonderful so far. We are all excited to see and hold her! Taydem will think she's one of her babydolls I'm sure. Taydem is such a good momma to all her babies!!

Recently we purchased a pool table and put it in our gameroom. I didn't think at first we would use it, but so far every night Leven and Trever have played on it, Trever has had friends over to play on it and we've even had 2 poker games on it! Worked out perfect for that.

I also recently chopped Taydem's hair off, again. I swear that I would never cut my daughter's hair...but her hair isn't like my hair! She's has really thin, fine hair and it looks stringy when it gets long. So when I have it cut it looks all thick and bouncy! This time it's in more of a "bob" style...she's cute with short or long hair!!!!

Say what?

I took Taydem to get her ears tested yesterday morning. In the past few weeks she's got to where she says "huh", "what", or "What did you say Momma?" all the time. Usually after every thing we say to her. At first I just thought she figured out what those words meant and wanted to bug the crap out of me by saying them. But with her sensitive ear problems that she's had in the past I decided to get them checked out. The doctor did a few activities to get her engaged (she's still pretty young) so he could do the testing. The end result............She has mild hearing loss. tear...He said it looks like the tubes have fallen out and she has fluid back behind her ear drum and that's causing her not to hear well. Back in November I took her to the doctor bc she had a cold and the tubes were still in her ears. So sometime between that doctor visit and now they have fallen out. I really think it's been about 3 weeks ago bc that's when I started noticing the "huhs" and "whats". So I made an appointment with her ENT doctor so he could take a better look and let us know what we need to do to take care of this. We DON'T want this to be permanate.

Please keep her on your prayer list.

A Change is Gonna Come...

I am so nervous right now talking about this that my hands are starting to sweat (but if you know me, hand sweating is not that unusual with me!) But anyways...I am going next Tuesday to see an eye doctor in Nacogdoches to talk with him about having LASIK eye surgery done!!! Like I said, I'm nervous even thinking about it. I have to wear my eye glasses for a week before the consultation next Tuesday. Ugh...I hate wearing these things. I get a head ache at first bc I'm not use to wearing them. I put them on at night while laying in bed watching TV and that's it. If I am considered a candidate next Tuesday, hopefully I will have the surgery scheduled ASAP.

I started wearing glasses in the 6th grade when I complained to my mom that I couldn't see the overhead clearly. Sure enough the eye doctor told me I was nearsighted. My sister's eyes ended up being worse than mine!! We get it from our Mama!! My mom is crazy blind!!! ha

I got my first pair of contacts the summer before my freshmen year and they have been a part of my life now for the past 15 years. I think a small part of me is going to miss them...tear. But WOW! When I can say goodbye to my glasses, contacts, yearly visits with an eye doctor, eye insurance, etc., that may just be one of the happiest days of my life!

But...I'm still nervous.

Check out my totally cool black and purple glasses. Hot, right? ha
I need some sun.....

Rub my back please....

This past weekend I had another volleyball tournament, this time in Grand Prairie. Leven and I headed to Whitehouse Friday afternoon to watch Trever's basketball game before heading to Burleson. We made it to Burleson around 10 and stayed the night with his friend Danny. We didn't end up going to sleep until after 1 and had to get up bright and early for the tournament. Got to the gym around 7:15 and didn't leave the gym until 7:30 that night. Whew....long day in one gym. My girls did an excellent job once again. I think we ended up 5th again. Now you must remember....my team are all girls from Pine Tree. We are playing teams that are considered "select" teams. Dallas teams that are put together after tons of girls have tried out!! So we are doing really well to keep up with all these teams and beat most of them!! I honestly couldn't move when we started walking out of the gym. I felt like I had been hit by a truck. I was soooooooooo tired!! I can't imagine how my girls felt. Heck I didn't even play! We finally made it back to Longview after 11 and I don't think I have slept that hard in a long time. I didn't wake up until 12 the next day. Thanks to my parents and Danin for watching Taydem all weekend.

Here's my team minus one player!

"Monsters in my Room!"

I have talked about this before, but our child is a huge night owl. Yes I will admit, it has A LOT to do with Leven and I. Let me tell you our schedule right now:

Mondays---Our one night we get to sit down and eat supper together and watched our 
TV shows
Tuesdays---Trever's basketball games. If it's a home game, Tay and I will watch Trever and head on back home. If it's an away game we usually won't get home until after 9.
Wednesdays---This is "Pizza Night." I have church choir practice and Leven stays home with
 the kiddos, and buys pizza.
Thursdays---I have volleyball practice until 9:00.
Fridays---Trever's basketball game

So as you can see we are way busy and Taydem's schedule is our schedule. So if I put her in bed at 8, she stays in her room and plays until usually 10 that night (She usually comes out of her room at least 3 times and we have to put her back in bed). It's crazy I know. She tells us all the time, "But I not tired no more!"

So last night she comes in our room around 9:30 and tells Leven that she saw a monster in her room (I was hiding in the bathroom so I could listen to their conversation). How can you not laugh at this?? So of course Leven is eating it up and keeps asking her all these off the wall questions about this monster. She finally tells us that it was a Spider Man!! She was so serious too. Poor girl. So I finally took her to her room and turned on a couple of lights for her so she could go to sleep. She is staying the night with my sister tonight (who she loves!) and so all week that's how I've been getting her to go to sleep. Bribe!!!

I love this age

She's something else

I bought these boots for Taydem yesterday and she loves them!! The toes "light up" when she walks. When I dropped her off at school today all the kids wanted to see her new boots. They kept saying, "ooohhh Taydem your new boots are so pretty!" Taydem was eating it up. She kept jumping up and down so they could see how they lite up! She's something else........♥ her!

A little nippy outside

This weekend went better than I ever imagined. My girls had their first volleyball tournament in Ft. Worth. We stayed with my cousin Beth and her family since Southlake is so close to Ft. Worth. They were only about 15 minutes from the gym. On Saturday my girls were a nervous wreck, but we ended up winning our pool! That's the first time EVER for me. So I was so excited as well as the girls and their parents. The next morning we were to play at 8 that morning but the weather was going to be taking a turn for the worse. We knew that the temperature was going to drop and they were calling for snow, but heck we made it to the GOLD BRACKET. We didn't want to back out now. So we showed up ready to play at 8 and the team we were to play backed out and headed on home. So that was a win in our book!! We ended up losing our next game 21-25 and 24-26! So close. I was so proud of them. We ended up 5th out of 33 teams. Not to bad for our first tournament!!

We jumped in the car and headed back to East Texas. The ride home was a bit scary. The roads started to get pretty bad and we hit a pretty big snow storm outside of Canton. The snowflakes were the biggest we had ever seen! It was beautiful! By the time we made it home East Texas was already covered in white! Taydem and I slept for 3 hours that afternoon, Leven had a fire going, and I made a wonderful pot of tortillia soup that night! Life was so sweet.

This morning it is 25 degrees outside! As I'm typing I'm drinking a cup of hot chocolate with cool whip on top! I HATE coffee....

Today at lunch I am going to look for a rug for our gameroom. We are getting a pool table and rearranging that room a little bit.

Also, I want you to keep my sweet friend Alicia and her family in your prayers. She had her little girl Addison at 26 weeks. Addison is doing well, but will need as many prayers as she can get. Follow her story at this website: http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/addisonsmith

DAY 25- First 10 songs on my ipod shuffle

Got Whatever It Is- Zac Brown Band

Tonight I Wanna Cry- Keith Urban

Girlfriend- Avril Lavigne

More Like Her- Miranda Lambert

I Let Her Lie- Keith Whitley

Highway 20 Ride- Zac Brown Band

Break Even- The Script

I Can't Get Over You- Julie Roberts

Our Kind of Love- Lady A

Hips Don't Lie- Shakira

DAY 24- Something I've Learned

I'm almost finished with this little challenge. It's starting to wear me out! I've learned quiet a lot in my 30 years. I think I have really learned (and taken it all in) the most since being married. I have learned to control my stress level probably the most. The docs could never tell me why I had those seizures but I really feel they had a lot to do with how much stress I put on myself. After my last seizure I had to really learn how to control my feelings, thoughts, anger, etc. In the past I have ALWAYS kept everything inside. Now if something is bothering me I handle it pretty much right then. I can't go to bed upset EVER. I usually keep Leven up talking and talking about whatever the problem is. He usually just lays theres and listens quietly. I haven't had a seizure in 5 1/2 years.

DAY 23- Favorite Vacation

I have had some really really good vacations. I thank my parents for providing most of these opportunities for us growing up. While I was teaching in Mexia I had students who had never been out of the state of Texas. Some had never even left Mexia. If you can give your children one thing---take them places. Growing up we drove everywhere. We couldn't afford to fly a family of 6 around. The first time I flew I was 14! And it was to Hawaii of all places. I didn't think we would ever see land again. I was involved in our church youth choir and every other summer we got to travel and sing in a different state!! So my first trip was to Hawaii. How awesome is that?? We went to a luau, climbed Diamond Back (volcano), toured and sang at Pearl Harbor (moment I will NEVER forget), snorkled, saw waterfalls, etc!  Two years later we headed up to Boston. I loved Boston so much! If you like history you better make a trip to the Northeast. We toured so much while there. We saw a Boston Red Sox game, saw Plymouth Rock, sang on the library steps at Harvard University, saw the Boston Pops (4th of July) just pretty much walked that city up and down! All the while singing and praising our Lord to hundreds of people. My last trip with our youth choir was to Seattle! All three of these cities are so different from each other. Seattle was a little more laid back, but we still did some major walking. We went to a minor league baseball game, saw fireworks over the harbor (it was the best firework show I have still ever seen), went to Pike Place Market, the Space Needle, we sang to inmates in a prison there, and enjoyed the beauty of Mt. Rainier! Again singing for our Lord! I wish I had pictures to post from all these trips. They are still at my parents house!

I have also enjoyed my trips to Tennesse with my family. My dad's family is from East Tennessee (home of the Smoky Mountains) and we used to go up there every summer! Cold streams, gorgeous views of the white top mountains, Cade's Cove, FAMILY, Gatlinburg, and my grandparents little house!

I have been to Cancun 3 times now!! I went there on my senior trip (awesome!), my honeymoon!, and 3 summers ago we went with my cousin and her hubby and some friends!

Florida-- I honestly don't know how many times I have been to Florida. We went quiet a lot with my family growing up. We also went for my sister's senior trip and another time in college with about 15 other people!

Vegas-- I went with my parents, my sister and my Uncle Ed right before I started my first job in Mexia. We had so much fun. My next trip to Vegas will be for Leven's 40th!

Oregon--I have already mentioned our trip to here! One of the best ever....can't wait to go back!

Skiing---We spent Thanksgiving one year in Colorado with family. Then I took a trip with 3 other couples to New Mexico to go skiing. OMG! We were 20 and that trip we all thought we knew everything---we felt so old and grown up. Had a blast...memories!

New Orleans- I have been twice. I went one time with the Maxey's when Meagan and I were 16. Then we went one year for New Years. I had just found out I was preggo (6 weeks), so no partying for me...but it was still one of the best vacations. I think we were with about 15 of our friends and family. FUN!

Where I want to go--- New York City, California, Chicago, Bahamas, and of course England, France and Italy!

DAY 22- What's in my makeup bag

Mascara, bronzer, eyeliner, blush, powder and lipgloss of some sort!

Here lately

Our holidays and New Years was very relaxing this year. Yesterday school started back up and Leven and Trever had to get themselves back in gear. Trever starts district basketball tonight and has been playing really well. He was one of the starting five at the last game and scored I think 9 or 11 points. I can't remember. My parents bought him some cowboy boots for Christmas and they look so cute on him. He also got a giftcard from Dustin and Molly from Cavendars so I bought him a belt and jeans yesterday. He sure fills those jeans out! 

Taydem is talking up a storm and her new thing is saying "huh." Everything we say we hear "huh" right after. It wears me out!! She is the biggest night owl ever. The girl loves to stay up. She will wake up in the middle of the night and play. And she always manages to crawl into our bed usually around 5:00 every morning. She's a cuddle bug that's for sure.

I have my first volleyball tournament this weekend in Ft. Worth. Thank goodness we have family and friends up that direction to help save on hotel costs. We are staying with my cousin Beth and her family. I don't get to see her but like once a year so this is nice. They live in Southlake. I love love love my team! They are the sweetest girls...sometimes too sweet. I'm looking forward to the next few months working with them. Wish us luck!

DAY 21- A Picture of Myself

I don't have too many pictures of myself saved on this computer so I had to steal them from my facebook page.

Shortest my hair has EVER been!

Probably the longest my hair has ever been

DAY 20- My nicknames

Alot of people just shorten my name and call me "Dev." Leven has been calling me "Mamma" before I was even pregnant and today still calls me that. My dad has called me "Peevine" since I can remember. I was a huge breakfast eater (still am) and he would always cook me breakfast in the morning before school. I would walk through the kitchen hearing him say, "Deevine she's so fine and she's mine." Deevine turned into Peevine!! Up at work has gotten crazy with my name. A guy named Ryan (he was an intern last summer) started calling me Devin-eesha bc of my rims on my Yukon! (They all give me heck about those rims). After he left the name stuck and Natalie started calling me Devro-neesha. Now Robert just calls me Neesha! That's no lie! I guess I have more nicknames than I thought.

What's your nickname?