Mandatory Vacation

It rained a lot last thursday. Then I noticed the my shower was draining very slowly. Then we heard our toilets burping all night. Then water was coming up the upstairs bath. I called our builder's emergency line at 5:30am, but they didn't deem it an emergency, but they eventually sent a plumber out at noon that day. He worked a while with a snake and a camera from the main line in front. He deduced there must be a break in the pipes because he was hitting mud. So I began calling and emailing and submitting "service requests", but Standard Pacific's computer and phone lines were down. Eventually someone got back to me and they said it was too wet to send a backhoe out until monday...they said they would put us up in a hotel. So I said, "so you will put all 8 of us up in a hotel all weekend?" and the lady said, "well that is an unusual amount of people to have in one house, so we may not cover it all." I was so insulted and pissed. We BOUGHT this house, we are not tenants that have to abide by their rules. It's their fault not mine. Plus, we needed a hotel that took dogs. So they called back and apologized (apparently the builder was arguing with their in-house mechanic contractor on who was responsible) and said they'd pay $600/day for food and lodging. So we booked 3 nights at NYLO in Plano, near John & Jim's work. The hotel is where I used to play music--it's all modern and artsy and industrial, but we figured it was probably the nicest/cleanest we would get that took pets. It was a horrible night.
    All cement floors don't work when you have 2 babies that won't sit still. Tyrone was barking at every noise, the bathroom was tiny and provided no privacy, and there was no bath for the babies. John had to work too, so I would be alone with all 4 in a cement room, with a barking dog that needed to be let out. I decided to go home--it'd be better to let Tyrone have the yard, and the kids have the game room to play in, even if we couldn't flush. Here's some pictures of our bad night--Ironically I took this photo in the middle of the night after feeding Eustace,

and JOhn took this photo while he got ready for work at 5am. We both must have thought someday this will be funny..when we have 8 kids and we can say, "remember when we just had 4?"

   Anyway. they came and found the problem Monday, which was this: They used to have a construction trailer on our lot, and they had their plumbing hooked up to the main city sewer line. When they decided to build the house here, they cut the main sewer line instead of their separate trailer plumbing. So when they hooked up the plumbing for this house, they didn't know the pipe they were connecting to, led to nowhere...led to mud 7 ft under the house. I don't know how that passed any inspections, but whatever it's fixed. Heres the hole in the front--which is now refilled with mud and our sewage:

   They are coming to repair the sprinklers and lay new sod next week. Thank God it rained as hard as it did, because if not, it would have taken a long time to find out our pipes led nowhere, if not for the saturated dirt. And by that time, the builders might have said it's not their fault.

    Everything is working and draining well now, so I hope to move passed this, but I am anxious to rent his house out and buy elsewhere with another builder.

   Anyway, here are the kids' costumes so far:

And a shot of Frankie's diva face:

Kids started a ninja warrior class tonight. Pictures soon. 

BBQ and Halloween Costume Stuff

We finished putting together our room and mounting the dang TV. It has been years since we have had a TV in our room...as evidenced by our 5 kids. But we didn't want a TV in the game room/classroom so Lucas wouldn't be distracted for school or play. :)

We put up blinds in our bathroom, Jim's bathroom, and the study finally.

 John was on nights--this was after baby bath time. They were so cute I actually got the camera out lol. It takes a lot to do that anymore.

 Olivia is going to be Coraline from her favorite movie, so I ordered her a rain coat and boots, and blue wig. I also went to Hobby Lobby and got the materials to make her Coraline doll--it was fun to do!

 Frankie is so expressive...and his grimace/scowl is so scary lol. He came in the study like this, and then started dancing to some music I had on.

 Here's a cute one of Frankie and Tyrone waiting for Daddy to get home from work :) Frankie likes to carry around his purses everywhere he walks...

 This little chubby bubby is so cute when he's not screaming. He's really still teething badly but he's able to eat more foods so he enjoys that. He has such clear skin so I am glad he hasn't had gluten.

 Here's some from right before we had our BBQ---Tim and Teresa were coming over to check out the new house, and Emily came with her roommate Chainey, and my mom came too. It was really fun and John did an excellent job cooking and cleaning up too! Shrimp, sausage, chicken, burgers, hot dogs, corn, mom's potato salad yum. TNT brought our regular desserts---from their friends' restaurant DeVivo's. So good!
   Anyway these pics don't even look like us--my phone must automatically edit and photobrush because our skin looks so smooth..? It must also force you to make silly "selfie" faces.

 Lucas has decided to be Peewee Herman for halloween, so we got him a little buzzcut haircut. I am still looking for a gray suit but it's been hard. Hope we pull something together in time!

 Food & Fun (sorry they aren't the best pics--I didn't have a lot of patience or battery in the camera so I took some and put it away):

 Lucas was about to show us the Peewee "Tequila" dance :)

 Teresa brought all these cute clothes and shoes for Olivia from their other Godchildren in IL--like new nice stuff. Olivia loved it.

 She liked these pretty sandals:

 The end :)

And then we went upstairs in the game room to play with the kids and talk about church and school and work! 

Stuff

Some pictures from my phone recently...holding off on all the pics of the house til we are done installing, mounting, unpacking and cleaning etc.

 Made a little headway with the downstairs.

I bought this premium mural that just sticks to the wall like a decal. Awesome and easy :) This is right above our bed. I bought another one (not premium...regular glue with 8 pieces) that we will install in the dining area..kinda intimidated. Hope we do it right. 

 Eusty has been standing unassisted for a few seconds. Pretty proud of his 9 mo old self :)

 Mr. O came out to stay with us one night last week with his wife Kim---they were taking a road trip to explore places they might possibly move to next :) It was fun to catch up and i'm sure they missed their babies--Kim was so good with all ours. Unfortunately they got some horrible news that their home in CA was broken into so that put a damper on the night and this was the only photo I got :(

 Today was my mom's bday. We met up at the protestPP rally in Lewisville and prayed for hearts and minds to change and be informed. L & O were kinda scared but really want to help "save babies" :) All 4 behaved well and there were no violent outbursts, just horns honked and some dirty looks. As you can see, the planned parenthoods are always in the most fun neighborhoods...check into cash is always nearby. 

 Then we went to lunch at a new cafe in Frisco, The Black Walnut Cafe. The food was fine, and the kids were grateful for GF pancakes....but the service was terrible, and the "do everything yourself" style restaurant just doesn't work for families. Going to write a review soon...
  After the babies napped and John left for night shifts, we took the kids to the park and got ice cream. My mom looks cute on her bday huh? Happy Birthday mom!

We Have Moved!

We moved in last tuesday and it was very hectic. I caught a bad cold and am still recuperating but tuesday was the worst; constant sneezing (and thus peeing) and my head was so congested I wanted to just relax in a hot bath. But we had too much to do. Thankfully we had a lot of help from my mom and Emily watching the kids. The movers did a great job and reduced their price significantly since John and I had packed so much ourselves. (I'm talking from >$4k, to $2200 total!)
    The house is still in disarray. While I like the layout and the quality of the products used in building it, the storage is really lacking especially compared to our Savannah home. Our cabinets and drawers and closet shelves are so shallow, much of our stuff isn't fitting in them. The one basin kitchen sink is not really great of course, but it would be manageable if the garbage disposal were working correctly (someones coming to look at it today from Standard Pac). There is still so much to put away and install, but we have made some headway--I put up sturdy baby gates (mounted) up and downstairs.
    Pics to come soon--we don't even have any curtains or blinds, just pinned up sheets in the bathroom. It will be nice living here for a few years once everything is unpacked and cleaned up. But I can see us running out of space real fast once #5 comes. Before we move next time, I will definitely be getting rid of more stuff that we have but don't need! These are a few I took recently, but I was too sick to get any pics during move. After I arrange our stuff and clean i'll take new ones :)

 My 24 wk sonogram--confirms Toni is a girl :) And I didn't have gestational diabetes thank God. No profile pics as she was facing down.

 And we are all getting over this cold, but Eusty is also cutting more teeth so he's very whiny and drooly.