No Shame

I finally gave in to the Ad Sense thing on this Blog site, so you'll see some random little ad banner across the top of our blog now. For any click thrus on this banner, we see a little thank you of sorts from Blogger, and it seemed like a nice way to contribute a few nickels and dimes to Brenna's college fund.

More Brenna!

Three days in a row, how do ya like that! Here are some more Brenna shots from around the house. I might be able to milk a few more for tomorrow, we'll see.

I also am uploading some zinnia shows for the Hoes blog, with it heating up in the absence of the monsoon, they're starting to struggle, but four of them are blooming right now.

Tuesday

Welcome back to This Old House. In today's episode, I managed to remove our old medicine cabinet and replace it with some sheet rock bought at a local hardware store. The drywall screws I bought were absolutely worthless, I opted to go with some other wood screws I had laying around. Once we get our hands on a trowel, I'll put the tape and mud up, and paint over it. The new medicine cabinet we bought has a scratch in one of the mirrors, so I'll get to replace that in the near future. In the coming week we'll be buying our new vanity/cabinet and faucet. Emily has cleared out about a dozen (well, not really) trash bags of stuff from this room, so we're about ready to do the old switcheroo. We've also decided to pull the tile out of here and replace it with something more along the color scheme of the bedroom, that'll be next. Stay tuned, I can hardly stand all of the excitement.

Here are a few shots of Brenna at church this past weekend. Apparently they went camping for a time.

And finally, a nice shot of Brenna that Emily took I would suppose after eating her favorite Mac & Cheese dinner. Mmm, tasty.

Monday Post

Hard to believe it's been three days since I uploaded something here, seems like yesterday.

Here are a few shots of Brenna reading on the couch on Sunday. She told me "no thanks" when I asked her if she wanted me to read to her. Okay, then.

Emily took a lot of good pictures from the last few days, so I'll upload them as we go along this week. I'll also have some new bathroom renovation pictures soon, our new medicine cabinet is hung and I've pulled the old one out (I'll be putting in sheet rock to cover the gaping hole left behind tonight, I hope).

I don't think it got over 100 today, and it wasn't humid (not a cloud in the sky, actually), seemed a little like early June or late May, not bad out there.

Referrals

Today I have nothing to share on this blog, HOWEVER, if you go to the OTHER two blogs, you'll find the following:

Brenna's Art Gallery - A few pictures of Brenna's most recent tub art

Addicted To Hoes - A few updates from around the yard, including the extension I'm building onto our back deck

Last night we had a few sprinkles, but I took what I hope were some good pictures of the lightning that preceded the storm. I'll be developing that film soon, am crossing my fingers that I caught some of it, it was pretty impressive. Too bad the rain portion of the storm didn't deliver. Here's hoping that Dolly lowers her boom on us this weekend.

Quick Brenna Update

Here are a quick couple of pictures from today, including her swinging (again), and sitting around in the afternoon watching a Diego program.

One Last Storm Look

I've been blogging about the microburst that hit Mesa on the Hoes site, but thought I'd share this final look at the storm here on the Brenna site, because I have no new Brenna pictures to post at the present.

Pretty ominous, no?

Would You Like Fries With That?

It would be so much easier on me if I would just post something every few days here so I don't feel like I have to post fifty pictures to make up for lost time. But here I am, catching up for the past week with no updates to speak of (other than that sweet Sean Penn picture of Brenna that I posted yesterday).

I'm happy to announce that for the first time, Brenna slept through the night in her own room. Last night she went down short of 10pm and didn't get up until nearly 7 this morning. When we checked on her at about 6, she had rolled off her mattress and was curled up in the corner of the room like a dog. She looked pretty comfy to me, and it seems easier to have her sleep on a mattress that's 6 inches from the floor than in a bed with a rail. At any rate, maybe it's a coincidence, but I've had more energy today than I can remember in a LONG time. Once I'm done with this post, I'll be heading out to the garage for some torture on the treadmill.

You'll also find an Art Gallery and Hoes update, since I love you all so much.

We're still working on finishing up the bedroom renovation, but in the meantime, here's the medicine cabinet we're putting into the bathroom to replace the full wall mirror that I've loathed since the day we bought this house six plus years ago. I could understand it if there were two vanities in there, but it would have made more sense to me anyway if they put in that room a shorter mirror and some extra cabinets on the wall for storage.

And here is our filthy bathroom, partially painted to match the bedroom. We're getting rid of those horrible "Showgirlesque" lights for a more appealing fixture. Once that's done we'll start scraping up the funds for the storage rack that Emily saw at Lowes, and a single vanity/cabinet combo that will take up a fraction of the floor space. We'll then move on to replacing the peach tile in there with something that matches the rest of the renovation. Just in case you were really wondering.

And what do we all think about crown moulding in a bathroom? Part of me thinks it would make sense as the bedroom has it, but then is the room too small for moulding (5 feet by 10 feet)? A question for the ages.

Moving onto things Brenna related. Sorry, all I have to share today are more Brenna in the swing pictures. Brenna has taken a shine to the angel statue in the middle of the yard, and calls it the pink angel baby.

She also regularly points out that the angel has no pants on. Or in her language "Pink angel baby no pants".

Here we are admiring a sunflower that refuses to die near her swing.

And a few more pictures in the general vicinity.

I could keep typing, but at this point I better get up before my shoulders seize up on me. Might be hard to run with my arms by my side.

And finally, for your final consideration, this weeks CD of my choice, Diamond Head's "What's In Your Head", a fine album from the band that started much of the NWOBHM (new wave of british heavy metal) in the early 80s, a huge influence on Metallica and others. I really dig this album, despite the fact that they've joined the ranks of other bands, sharing their opinions on the war in the Middle East (Iron Maiden and The Cult have also chimed in with their two cents). Why can't these melon heads stick to what they know best, making good music, and keep their hats out of this ring? If you can't support folks doing their jobs over there, you may as well not say anything at all, in my hat-nearing-the-ring-itself opinion.

Technical Difficulties

With Brenna sleeping in her own room now (which happens to be right next door to blogging headquarters), posting here at night when she's asleep is no longer permitted (in fact, heavily frowned upon).

I have a few new pictures and some videos to upload, and hope to do so during the upcoming week. Bear with the changes here and many thanks!

Post 'O' Plenty

I won't lie. For a minute I thought about spreading this blog out into two or three posts, since I'm covering a number of subjects here. This would give the "illusion" that I'm working hard to keep you updated on our little lives on a daily basis. But that would just be silly, wouldn't it?

Well, here we go, we'll see how I manage to segue from one topic to the next.

First off, I took yesterday off, and spent my time putting up new blinds in our bedroom, and started painting in our bathroom (carrying the green color over from our bedroom). I couldn't find a decent roller, so I did the old Tom Sawyer trick with a (gasp) paintbrush. What a pain that was. Considering we'll need two coats, I guess I can manage that until I find that darned roller for the second coat.

Anyway, the only thing left in the bedroom is hanging a few more Hawaii pictures, installing a new ceiling fan (when my wife is around to call 911 in case I electrocute myself) and possibly putting another coat of paint on the crown moulding (the unmotivated voice in my head is telling me that the blemishes give it that aged look that's all the rage these days).

I can't figure out how to install the cords on these blinds, so I hope my plants don't mind living the rest of their days in semi-darkness.



That huge palm front on the wall there will double nicely for making pizzas once I build that brick oven I've been dreaming about.

Now that Brenna is sleeping in her own room (three nights running, she's doing so well), this room no longer exists to her. This is the one clean corner of the house that I'll be holding onto with an iron grip.

Hey, anyone like scary looking bugs? This guy showed up on our back porch last night. Emily says it's a Palo Verde beetle. I enjoyed watching him scuttle and fly around... from the other side of the glass. He must have been about three or four inches long.

Ok, so I'm not doing well in the segue department. We're going from things that look like cockroaches to our daughter vegging on the floor. Here are some various lounging poses from the last few days. Pretty soon she's going to be as tall as her mom (ha!).

Be sure to check out the Hoes and Art Gallery blogs, while I'm feeling ambitious I'm going to put some things out there on those sites for your viewing pleasure.

Weekend 'O' Fun

My, what a weekend we've had since the rain incident of Thursday night.

Brenna got her nailed trimmed, woo hoo! Big times in the city!

Here she is enjoying her lollipop after being good during the toe torture. The Dora band aid is still a fan favorite these days.

And we are lounging afterwards.

On Saturday night Brenna slept in her own bed for the very first time. There was much belligerence for the first 10 or 15 minutes, but she did very well the rest of the night. I officially slept in our new bed for the first time since we bought it maybe eight months ago. It would have been glorious except I pulled something in my back working in the yard and woke up with a shooting pain back there every time I rolled over.

Brenna was jumping on the bed in these two shots, her hair isn't quite that wild on its own.

Wild And Crazy Night

Tonight Emily drove into town to do a paid survey thing for the local power company. Little did she know that she'd drive through a typhoon on the way home. Check out the Hoes blog for a snapshot of some of the insane rainfall totals over in Mesa from this evening. This huge storm just missed us to the west (although we got a quarter of an inch earlier in the afternoon), and I'm kind of glad it did, given the wind and hail that probably came with it.

Brenna and I spent some time swinging tonight to kill time, and there were numerous requests for photo ops from her, including:

- Brenna and Diego

- Brenna's toes

- Brenna swinging

- Brenna

- And Brenna and Daddy

About the time the photo shoot was wrapping up, while I was pushing her, she pointed back behind me and started saying "Danger, danger", repeatedly. Sure enough, she was pointing to a wall of black clouds that were looming over the house. Thankfully there was no lightning, and Brenna was tickled silly when it started raining on her, and I had to drag her back in the house sopping wet when it started pouring and she refused to come inside.

Tuesday Pictures

Well, look at me, posting two days in a row. It's like old times, no?

Don't count on another one tomorrow, ha!

Anyway, here are a few pictures from this afternoon of Brenna watching Wow Wow Wubzy on one of the four channels we have left on our satellite dish, since we slashed our programming package. I did learn today how to build a trash hideaway on DIY, so that was something. I also learned on DIY today that the cool looking flowers Emily's mom had volunteer in a pot a few years ago are Moonbeam Coreopsis.