Jared's fun, games, and... a lizard!

 

  Jared has his own way of settling in to a house. While I'm unpacking and Ryan's fixing things up, Jared's finding new places to play and things to play with.

  Also, getting into a new routine. He's enjoyed having his own bathroom and his own bathtub. He's really gotten to where he loves going in and brushing his teeth or washing his hands. He always comes and shows me his hands after he's eaten or played with something messy, and he likes getting out his toothbrush several times a day.

 While I was packing a few things back away, he found my teddy bears from when I was a kid. He decided they should be kissing bears.

  This is a little gecko I found and caught in his room. It was a cute little thing once I realized it wasn't a spider. I've noticed them crawling on the bricks of our house since then. We've also seen a few frogs in the backyard.

 For a while Jared would do this, one of the first things every morning. He would go and take all the games and movies out one by one and look at each of them. He's such a funny boy.

 He got himself stuck in the bar stool a little while ago. I'm still not quite sure what he was trying to accomplish.

 He's also discovered where our blanket shelf has been unpacked to and has gotten back to his old habit of pulling all the blankets down so he can have a nice pile to play in.

 When I was getting dinner ready the other day, he wanted an apron too. Luckily, his Aunt Alisha had made him one, so he was able to wear one of his own. He really liked that. After I tied his for him he wanted to tie mine for me, so I let him give it a try and helped him finish.

He's really good at doing all he can to Not get the flash in his eyes!

 He was a very good helper! We had fun! He's always such a fun little guy!

There's a hole in our ROOF!

Four weeks in to being home owners and there's a hole in our roof! There has been a lot to fix or tweak since we've been home owners, but we are glad we're finding these things early and getting them taken care of. Ryan had a really long day on Saturday, though, getting our roof patched up. I'm so thankful he know how to do this kind of thing, or at least that he's able to figure it out. My husbands AMAZING!!!

 This scary slab of wood was part of our roof. There wasn't a big hole in it, like there is now, but there was rotted wood where the hole is now. Ryan barely touched it and the rotted wood all fell out. We discovered this problem during our last heavy rain storm. Water was leaking down the light fixture in our kitchen, so Ryan went and took a look in the attic and discovered the spot of rotted wood.

 That was last weekend. So, this weekend Ryan had plans of fixing it. It was a lot of work up on that roof in this Houston heat. We were both very grateful that it didn't rain that day though, that would made things more difficult. Ryan took off the shingles to find what a bad job the previous roofers had done of laying down the tar paper. He took that off and then cut the rotted slab of wood out.

 He made a trip to the hardware store and began patching the hole the whole back up with new wood, tar paper and shingles.

 I'm betting he did a great job, it looks really good, but he's still curious to see how it does after the next rain storm. The patch is a different color, but we have plans to re-roof in December when it's not so hot out, so this will be great for fixing the leak 'til then. I'm so glad he was able to get this done. Yay! Thanks Ryan!! =)

Pie Baking Again

It's been a while since I've been able to make pies very much. Luckily the Wells let me make them some pies while we were in Michigan this summer! But, now I finally got to fill my own kitchen with the yummy smell of pie baking again!

 Here's one of my little pleasures in life, having an empty pie crust ready to fill with whatever I choose. This time I chose to fill it with four big, juicy, freshly peeled and sliced peaches.

 I topped this one with a heart shaped peach because it was a special thank you pie for our new friends in the ward for helping us get our appliances to the house a few weeks ago.

 It smelled soo good coming out of the oven, but I never got to see how it tasted. That's the only hard part about making pies for others, not getting a slice. But, it's still fun to share. =)

 I did make two more pies that same day, though. One large Pecan Pie for Ryan to take to work to share and one half size one for Ryan and I. This was the first time I'd made Pecan Pie and it didn't turn out too bad.

 From what I heard, everyone (who wasn't on a diet) loved the pie at work and the plate came home empty (with some help from Ryan, I married a good pie eater ;)). As for our pie at home it didn't last long enough, but it was fun to try out the pie plate Ryan made me in his ceramics class; perfect for making half pies. =)