OK, OK - The house!

Too many of you have been bugging me to post pictures of the house.  You've worn me down. I'll do it.  I much prefer you come for a visit and see it yourselves, but the photos will do, for now.   

We are definitely blessed beyond anything we deserve and are extremely grateful for our home. We were in our last home for over 14 years.  We grew into and out of that house over the years! We welcomed three more children in to our family while living there and shared many wonderful and memorable moments together on Yeary Road.  We will always remember our years there...

Now, we find ourselves out in the country - in Prosper, Texas.  There isn't much out here, which is part of what we really like.  We have a Subway, Sonic, Mr. Jim's Pizza, CVS, two gas stations, a car wash and a few other Mom and Pop outfits.  No grocery store.  Our one four-year High School has around 750 kids.  It's a typical small Texas town - everyone goes to the football games, and I mean everyone.   

The kids are loving their schools.  They've made lots of friends and are getting involved.  All in all we are happy.  

Here's the story.

Moving in.... 

We thought this day would never arrive.  Actually, we thought this day would follow Moving OUT day, but that wasn't in the cards.  So we moved into the hangar for a couple weeks.  For those of you who haven't been to our hangar, don't feel bad, we weren't sleeping among the planes, tools and car parts.  We have a small apartment upstairs.  We had beds.  And a kitchen.  And plumbing.

As nice as the hangar is, and as much fun as we have with our friends up there, we were very happy when the house was "done enough" and we had a Certificate of Occupancy.  So we moved in.  Our first load came on Saturday, August 23rd and the second on Monday the 25th (the first day of school).  We will be finished unpacking by the time Molly moves out - I'm sure of it.

The truck came bright and early!  Before it came I ran around taking pictures of the house.  I knew it's wouldn't look so neat and tidy again for a while.  

Here's the outside with our newly installed landscaping.  Some of the cedar hasn't been stained yet.
Come on in!

This is not how our front door looked on moving in day!  This is it today, decorated for fall.  It's fun having some space on the porch to add some seasonal decor!

Here are some shots of the downstairs.  Please don't feel obligated to view the whole bunch of them!

Upstairs has the kids rooms and a few other spaces...

We are very happy here - even though there are so many things still to do.  There are lots of boxes yet to unpack, empty spaces to fill and decorating to do. That will be a slow process.  We hope to have many visitors.  We have plenty of room.  We also have a pretty fun back yard, which I'll blog about later.
Hope to see you soon!

A giggle break....

This is too cute not to share. This is one thing I love about kids. They are pretty darn sure they can do anything and will show you just how good they are at it. Jon always asks the little kids, "Can you sing? Can you dance? Can you draw?" And the answer for the young ones is always "YES!" But somewhere at about 15 years old we start doubting ourselves. By adulthood there is usually a resounding "NO!" as an answer. I love to see the little ones sing, dance, draw - and even do gymnastics! They are wonderful examples of finding joy....

This is entitled "Griffins Floor Routine"

Mamaw's Birthday in San Diego

On August 15th we (Molly, Will, Drew, Jon and I) got back in the plane and flew to San Diego to celebrate Jon's mom's 40th birthday! (grin)  Lucy had to stay home because she was performing a solo in a show in Plano.  The flight was long.  It's unbelievable how long it takes to get outta Texas - even in a plane!  The scenery wasn't bad though....

It's all kindof a blur to me now, but I think we stopped in Las Cruces, New Mexico for the night. Dinner choices were limited, so we ate at IHOP and stayed in a Motor Inn that was right out of the movies.  We thought we could do the rest of the trip the next day.  We were wrong, but we did learn a few things.

1.  Molly gets motion sickness.

2. Will gets sick when Molly gets sick.

3. Drew doesn't have the reflexes of a parent yet.

It was pretty exciting for a few minutes.  After that, we decided to land and give the kids a break  - and clean up the plane!  We stopped in Yuma, Arizona and stayed the night there.  The kids had pizza delivered and Karen and Jon stopped at a Vegan fast food restaurant.  Thankfully, the flight to SD from Yuma is short.  So we arrived Saturday morning in plenty of time to get to Alpine for the party.  The kids (yes, that includes Sam) had a great time in the pool.

Mamaw was the main attraction, but Parker was the center of attention!

Uncle Will loves Parker

And Parker LOVES Uncle Will!

This was the first real belly laugh we heard!

Molly is a great baby-holder!

A favorite picture of mine!

Of course there was a birthday party involved here.... Happy Birthday Mamaw.  We're so glad we could all get together to celebrate!  Doesn't she look great??

One Last Oshkosh Post

You're probably all bored to tears with this, but there are a few more things to share about our week in Wisconsin.

In case you can't picture what this event looks like, here are a couple photos from the air:

This one is a shot of a small portion of the exhibit area.
This is one of many, many parking lots.  There are several areas this size full of campers, too!

One of the highlights of the week was Jon receiving an award for the plane.  He received a "Bronze Lindy" for Best in Class of the vintage airplanes of his "type".  He could totally explain it better.  Maybe one of these days I'll get him to contribute here.  In the meantime, here's a photo:

Molly was thrilled to join him on stage!  

One night we hit the town and found this really cute drive in that reminded me of "The Spot" in Kenosha, Wisconsin where I spent my early youth.  

Here's "The Spot"

And here's Ardy and Ed's in Oshkosh

It's super cute with orange building.  And I love the retro star on the sign!
The kids had a blast sitting on top of the car.  They ate their meal up there!
The trays that hook on to the window were just like the ones at the spot.  Of course, we had to have Root Beer!  Molly got the cutest little tiny mug you've ever seen.

The kids made friends with all the servers (who were on roller skates, btw) by the end of our dinner!  It was really a fun time!

Soon we were back on our way home to Dallas.  We were ready to get home.

The kids were pretty tuckered out....

We stopped in Milwaukee, where we put Lucy on a commercial flight to Salt Lake City for EFY (a summer church camp at BYU).  Then we continued south along Lake Michigan right past Kenosha and then Chicago.  It was pretty fun to see the city from the air.

The flight back was great, and we arrived home ready to move out of the house and into the hangar!  Our new house was not ready yet - surprise, surprise!

Just a Little Strange

So, I was checking out the Anthropologie website today.  I make the rounds of some of my favorite retailers fairly regularly.  Today I was cleaning the floors and sat down at my computer for a spell.  Anyway, I stopped by Anthro and they've changed the site a bit since my last visit (last weekend).  And I find it just a wee bit frightening.  Check it out and let me know what you think.  

 (click here)

Be sure to look at the ADORNED link.  I think Look Closer, Wonderland, Pas de Deux (ah, the memories of ballroom dance lessons) and Spectra are really cool - but those Masterpieces give me the heebie jeebies.   

But these.....

They bring me right back to fourth grade with Miss Schmoekel (I still can't spell her name) she taught us to macrame instead of social studies for a few weeks.  We made these really great owls between two sticks.  I actually have mine.  If I ever unpack it I'll take a picture of it and post it.  She was the coolest teacher on the planet.

I L-O-V-E this little table.  It would be fantastic next to Lucy's bed... It's a ridiculous amount of money, so instead I'll watch for a Craig's List item that I can paint.  

Ah, the shoes.  Hold me back.  There are only about 25 pair I think I must have.  Do you think they'll lower their prices now that the economy is in the toilet???  Please?

Well, this was a slight departure from the Scholl family doings - kind of.  It was the Karen doings, anyway.   More on the happenin's soon.

Keep Checking

Will and Molly both have new posts on their blogs!  Check them out by clicking on their links!

Oshkosh Continued.....

I guess some of you may be asking, "What IS Oshkosh?"  Well, it's a city in Wisconsin, but one week a year the Experimental Aircraft Association hosts a ginormous air show where people from all over the world gather to.....well, to do what airplane people do!  There are vendors selling their airplane related stuff, exhibits of the old and new airplanes, classes, workshops, food, entertainment and more.  Molly said it best when she said, "People in Oshkosh are OBSESSED with airplanes!"  

There's a really great museum there.  We had a great time there:

Lucy isn't in any of these photos because she was off on her own adventure with the "Women Soar" conference where she did cool stuff like build wing ribs, learn to weld and hear great women speakers. She had a great time.

Oshkosh B'gosh!

We took a lot of photos while in Oshkosh. The thought of blogging about all of them is a wee bit overwhelming, so I made an album to share some of them. There are more coming! Enjoy!

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