Clark's New Ride

Some of you already know that last Monday we bought a new minivan. It is a Toyota Sienna and we love it! I should have taken a picture earlier but didn't and now Darren has my camera. So I'll post a picture later. Anyway, it's a great car. The story I want to post tonight is the sale of our Geo Prism. I looked on the Kelly's Blue Book website and found that for the condition and miles of our car I could sell it for $1800. We priced it at $1200 or best offer so that it would sell fast. Darren said if I sold it, I could decide what to do with the money. So today I contacted the local papers to put adds in the classifieds and I also put a "for sale" sign in the car itself. This week I planned to drive that car around and park it on the street at work so it would be more visible. Tonight I drove it to Albertsons to pick up some chicken for dinner (it was cheap chicken Monday). A couple met me at the deli counter and asked if I was the one selling the car. I said I was and they said they were interested. So they met me at our house about an hour later, test drove the car, and offered me $1000 for it. Darren and I had already decided that we would accept that if someone offered. So I sold my car in one day. And that's my story.

Deep Copper

A couple of weeks ago Kristi came over and helped me paint the kitchen. A few months ago we took the wallpaper down and it has been that way ever since - which means it wasn't looking very pretty. So here is what the new phase looks like. When it finally warms up and dries up enough outside we will do the cabinets and trim. More on that later. Darren and I attempted to change the outlets to white but found that it's more complicated then we thought. We figured the old ones would have to do for now.

















Kristi on top of the fridge. She looks like she's having fun, doesn't she?















Finished product
















Another finished product

Space Derby

I am supposed to be doing taxes right not but the software is not working as it should (actually it's probably me not knowing what to do with it on our Mac). So I have to wait for Darren to help me and decided to make good use of my time by updating my blog. I have a lot of pictures for blog entries so the next three entries are new. Make sure you check all of them out :-) You never know what you might miss.

Thursday night was Kevin's first Space Derby at pack meeting.



















Here are Darren, Kevin, and Ethan sanding down the rocket.















This is what Jake was doing during the rocket making. He was more interested in dinosaurs at the time.














Putting the finishing touches on the rocket.















Getting ready for the rocket to fly. Darren and I often take turns going to Kevin's functions because Jacob is at a difficult age to take to some of them. Darren usually goes to pack meeting but decided he wanted a break from this one. That was fine with me because it was my turn to go. That is, it was fine with me until I got there and realized this was almost as much a dad event as it was a cub scout event. I was the only mom helping a scout. There were moms there watching but it was the dads that were involved the most. Then when they told me his rocket wasn't ready to fly I did not know what to do. I hadn't done anything with making it, that was all Darren. So I didn't know what it needed. I had to borrow a pocket knife from one of the dads, look at someone else's finished rocket, attempt to make some notches in the bottom and borrow a piece from another scout to make the rocket ready. We did get it done and Kevin's rocket won both times it raced. So it all worked out in the end. But we will know at the next derby, Darren must be there. And in all fairness to Darren, he didn't know it would be such a dad event, either.



















Kevin and his winning rocket.

















Kevin's rocket "in the air". His opponent's rocket didn't even make it far enough to be in the picture.

Miscellaneous

Below are some miscellaneous pictures I have taken recently to use on my blog but have never added them. Since they don't really go with any other pictures, I have just combined them.















Our beautiful blooming Christmas Cactus.















The serving bowls my parents brought me back from Costa Rica. They worked great when we had taco soup.














Kevin and Jacob doing their morning ritual - watching cartoons in my bed. Ethan requested that I take this picture so I did it to humor him. But it is cute.

Snow

You've all seen Darren's blog and the many winter photographs he has been taking. In fact, he's out right now doing some more. Here are my snow photographs. I know, they don't compare to his but it's the best I can do.



















Darren shoveling snow. Look how much snow we have shoveled from our driveway this year. It's almost as tall as Darren is.
















This is the flower bed by our front door. I love this spot for early blooming flowers because it is against the south side of our house and is the first place the snow melts completely. In the past four winters we have lived in this house the crocuses start popping up in late February, early March. I don't think it's going to be as early this year.















Ethan and Kevin like to come out and "help" us shovel the driveway. They get the shovels out for about two minutes and move snow around, then play in the snow. Here Ethan has made a bed in the snow.

















Kevin's bed in the big pile of snow next to the driveway.

















All the boys on the sled at Snowfest (see Darren's blog for more info/pictures on that).