6 down 14 to go!

I heard that it's okay to sit on your pity potty every now and then, just be sure to flush when you're done. So I'm flushing that last post and posting a MUCH happier one. :) Things have been really busy lately! I don't know how that happened. I thought I'd have time to sit out by the pool and catch some rays (with my SPF 50 sunscreen, of course) and have plenty of time to clean but no. Not at all. Since June began I've only seen that house twice. CRAZY! But good.
We've been busy spending time with the teenagers at Flagstone, dog sitting, baby sitting, and our usual daily jobs. It's been a lot of fun! But that's not the best part. Three amazing things happened this month. First, we got another car! Second, we celebrated 2 years of marriage!! Third, my loans are PAID IN FULL!!!

Before I get into that I want to tell you about our sweet car. :) It's a 1999 Crown Victoria. That's right, don't be too jealous. It was owned by my grandparents. If you haven't driven one, they're a smooth ride but also very large. My grandfather is the one who usually drove, but since his passing last year my grandma drives it. Well, my uncles didn't want my sweet little grandmother driving it around so they bought her a smaller car. But she wouldn't drive it because she was used to the crown vic. So they decided to sell it. Just so happens that my father was visiting her when this conversation happened and he told them me and Scotty could use it! So we bought it from her! I don't know about Scotty, but I feel a little more free. It's a serious puzzle when you have so many things going on and only one car. One of us was bound to get stranded somewhere. Thank you to anyone who gave us a ride somewhere! We appreciate it!
In case you're wondering, Scotty is driving it around. He even bought some aviators to complete the look. People have to look twice to make sure he's not a cop. Lol.

Now, onto the other exciting part of the month....I AM DEBT FREE!!!!! We paid the last payment early this week. It feels so good! Scotty told me I need to pick what I want to do to celebrate...but I haven't a clue. I just want to keep paying hard on his! Then we can really celebrate!! I remember last summer we were making 5 different payments and now we are down to one! Of course, that one payment takes care of 14 different loans...but I don't even care...as long as it's one payment, I can deal. Thank you to everyone who has kept us in your prayers. Those prayers are definitely being answered. Me and Scotty are overwhelmed with your encouragement and love!! We truly feel blessed!

Needless to say, June has been a great month!

Warning: Pure Frustration

If you don't want to hear me complain, then you DON'T want to read this. I have had just about all I can take...and we have 2 more years to go. I don't even know where to start...
My biggest issue I'm dealing with right now is our living situation. All me and Scotty want right now is our own place. We don't care if it's as small as a cardboard box, we just want something of our own. The number one response I get to that is "then, why don't you just move out?" Well, the reason we can't is because we pay 4 digits every month to get this over with as fast as we can. Scotty's minimum payment is already as big as a mortgage payment. Can you imagine trying to pay a mortgage payment ON TOP of another mortgage and bills AND trying to find something to put in savings? Some people can do it...but we can't. Financially, we can't. If we decided to just pay the minimum payment and move out we might not ever get these loans paid off, and I'm not willing to be in that kind of debt the rest of my life. His entire paycheck goes to these loans and mine goes to bills/savings. There is no extra spending money. If you see us at a restaraunt or out shopping it's because we have a gift card of some kind. It's never our own money. And we work more than just our daily jobs to earn an extra buck.
Now, when I say we don't like our living situation it's not because it's not our own...it's what goes on here that we don't like. I feel bad for Scotty because there are days when I feel like all I can do is complain to get things off my chest. I, sadly, am one of those people who fester on problems. I poke at it and poke at it until there's nothing left to poke. Thank goodness I married a patient man. Scotty is used to the way this house is ran because he grew up with it. He doesn't like it as much as me, but he's used to it. I, however, am not used to it and I don't want to get used to it. I try to hold my tongue most of the time but there are moments when I can't. I don't think I'm ever mean about what I say but I am very honest.
What I really need is a change in attitude. Scotty is such an amazing example when it comes to attitude. Things that would eat me from the inside-out would just roll right off Scotty's back. I wish I could do that. It's going to have to be a process. A long, long process. I guess I just need some serious prayers for my attitude and my sanity.
On a happier note, next month we will make our last payment for my loans. It's a relief. And there was serious divine intervention there. Maybe someday I'll tell you about it.
Keep me and Scotty in your prayers. We only have 966 days left to go (Lord willing). I'm sorry for giving you such a mean/depressing post. Everyone is allowed to have a moment.

Marathon...and other things.

Scotty, his former professor, Jody Jones, and Jody's son walked the half marathon Sunday. I am SO proud of them!! 13 miles!! That's a lot! Lisa (Jody's wife), their daughter and myself were their cheerleaders. It was a lot of fun and incredibly inspiring. My favorite part was getting to cheer my husband on as he went across the finish line. It was awesome! I am so proud!

Speaking of my husband...we had quite an adventure last night! Not one I would like to experience again. Scotty loves softball. Any chance he gets he'll play. Last night he had a game with his coworkers. Last week there was an incident where one of our players got creamed in the face with a softball. He was slightly conucssed and his eye swelled shut but he was back in the game last night. This week, it was Scotty's turn to get hurt. I didn't appreciate it. He was the first to bat. He hit a grounder out to the left field, ran to 1st and headed his way to 2nd. He slightly passed 2nd so he dove back to tag the base before the guy tagged him. Well, I guess the guy tagged him because the ump called him out but the guy also stepped on his hand. Scotty stood up to walk off, but he paused and grabbed his hand. Sometimes he does that just to be silly but it was different this time. My thought process was "is he joking?.....yeah....no...no he's not!" So I ran over to the dugout where I met him but he wasn't showing me his hand! I'm thinking something is broken. He had his back to me and showed a coworker...his coworkers face was priceless. "Uh..Scotty, I don't think your finger should bend that way." So I said WE'RE GOING TO THE ER NOW! He still wouldn't show me. Scotty was pretty calm, a little shaken because he's never seen his finger bend that way, but he was calm. As we were walking to the car a caught a glimpse of his hand and yes, his pinky finger was bent the wrong way. I picked up the pace and drove him to the ER. He was being his usual self the whole way there. I, of course, was in a panic. I knew it was just dislocated and that's an easy fix. But I didn't want MY husbands hand to look like that. I never want to see my family in any kind of discomfort or pain. He really only experienced pain when it immidiately happened which is what keeps flashing in my mind like a nightmare. At the ER he was just shootin' the breeze with all the nurses and doctors. Instead of asking him if he was okay they were asking me! So when they went to set it I stepped out of the room because I didn't want to see him in pain! But they numbed it so he didn't feel a thing. Praise the Lord! Today it's pretty swollen and he said it's sore. He asked the doctor if he could have just set it himself, and yes, he could, but something could have been broken. Thankfully, nothing was! I've decided that when we have kids, they are going to live in a bubble. It was just a dislocated finger, but I was a hot mess. Someone called me a sissy for not looking at and that irritated me. I've seen worse...but this was my husband. It's different. He was a good trooper and the x-ray tech gave him a spongebob sticker. Precious.

On another note, this Sunday is our family and friends day at Flagstone! If you're in NWA we'd love to have you there!! flagstonecoc.org

It is time....

Hey there, Scotty here...I haven't posted in a long while.

This Sunday morning...EARLY morning...I will embark on my first ever 1/2 marathon. Above is a map of the route that I will running/walking/crawling/be dragged this Sunday. Pray for me...it will be a long 13.1 miles.

Duck Season or Rabbit Season..

I'm not sure if it's duck or rabbit season right now but I do know it's allergy season! And it hit with a vengeance this year!! I think I skipped all the usual symptoms and just went straight to a sinus infection. Awesome... Thankfully, I'm recovering after a week of feeling ill. From what I understand because we had that snow in late March it caused some things to bloom later than usual, so now everything is blooming all at once. I don't know if anyone has noticed their cars having a yellow tint to them...but that's pollen. Ick. I've never seen it so bad before.
We're trying to clean our deck off and seal so we can enjoy it this summer but we can't be outside for too long without sneezing our brains out. So needless to say, it's a slow process. But it's looking good. I'll post before and after pictures.
I think the worst part about having allergies besides the constant sniffling, sneezing, itchy, watery eyes, and pressure that makes your head want to explode is the fact that I'm stuck inside!! Since the weather has been so beautiful all I want to do is be outside! Or if I'm inside I want to open the windows...but that can't happen. I have tried just about every at home remedy you can. I know I'm exaggerating a bit, but I have still tried a lot. I did the Nettie pot for a while but that never worked for me. My sinus cavities are so swollen that the water won't go through. My grandmother told me to snort salt water instead. It cleans out your sinuses but won't reduce swelling. I did that for a while and it really does help! I have also tried drinking apple cider vinegar mixed with water. That surprisingly helps too...but it's not something I could do everyday. I want to gag with every sip I take. I have gone to bed with a warm wash cloth...I drink hot things throughout the day...I let hot water hit my face in the shower...I've used nose sprays...I take Zyrtec everyday...I inhale steam...I eat spicy foods...etc. etc. etc. There's some I forgot, I'm sure. As you can see I've tried a lot. Some work great, some work okay. I think I just want a cure, and as far as I know, there's not one. Hopefully once everything is done blooming it'll get a little better. If you are a fellow sufferer of allergies, I'm sorry. You're not alone!

Express 101

I've been getting some questions about the mouse situation so I figured I should give an update! Since our last blog last month we haven't had any more mice. We still have 3 snap traps set up just in case though. I keep telling Scotty we need to take them down because one day I will forget they're there and step on one. But I just have a feeling that as soon as we put them away another stinky mouse will show up. But, no, we haven't had any more mice!

I have even better news than that though! Early this month me and Scotty paid off 3 more loans!! AHHHH!!! It's getting very exciting. We still have 15 more to go, though. But whenever we pay off a loan (big or small) we like to celebrate! It helps to keep us motivated. Since we paid off 3 at once we decided to celebrate a little bigger than usual. Typically we just go out to eat where ever we have a coupon...which is usually Red Robin (YUM...). We had planned on going to the movies because we hardly ever go. We are both huge Disney fans and Alice in Wonderland just so happened to come out this month so that's the movie we chose. Part of the reason we chose to go to a movie is because we had movie passes. We're cheap...not poor. So any ways... We went to see Alice in Wonderland and it was awesome. That Johnny Depp never disappoints! After the movie we had some lunch and walked around the Promenade. It was really nice. Then that evening we went out with our super good friends Sarah and Mikey. When we go out with them we always go to Taco Bell then Chuckey Cheese. I guess we were feeling a little crazy because after Taco Bell we ended up going to Target instead. Sarah had informed me of some awesome sales going on so I wanted to check it out. Scotty and Mikey ran off to do their guy thing and me and Sarah shopped till we dropped! It was so much fun! My favorite purchase was pair of shoes. I am a shoe fanatic! I used to buy them all the time and Scotty picks on me for having so many. BUT I haven't bought any for over a year now...that's a record. I made a deal with Scotty that if I buy a pair I will get rid of a pair. But what made this pair so awesome is that they were slightly damaged. And when I say "slightly" I mean it. They were just my size and cheap but Sarah told me to ask someone if I can get a discount because they are damaged. So I did...and I got them dirt cheap!! It was awesome. But there was one more exciting purchase that Scotty made and that's the GT Express 101! If you don't know what it is, look it up. It's amazing. It was marked down also because there is a newer version out. You just HAVE to look it up. We made our first meal on it, and it is EXACTLY like the info-mercial. Amazing!

So that was our big day of celebration! We have set out a time-line to see when we will be done and it looks like we'll be done in April of 2013! And that's with paying a TON extra each month. However, we have an expert goal of December 2012. And just a side note, but we are 7-8 months AHEAD of schedule! If we were to pay the minimum amount we wouldn't be done till 2025. LOL! That's a joke. So we're still slaves to Sallie Mae, but not too much longer. Thank you, to everyone for being supportive and understanding. It really makes a difference to us and keeps us going!

Hickory Dickory Dock....

For those of you who are friends with me or Scotty on facebook you may know that we are currently dealing with a little mouse problem. This is a common problem in this house because we're out in the country. Just about every winter we have mice. However, most of those mice hang out on the 1st floor in the kitchen. For some reason the mice found their way upstairs.

We first noticed the mice when Scotty was home on a sick day. He was laying on the floor when he saw something out of the corner of eye. At first he thought it was just a bug, but he knew it was a little too big. So he watched the floor closely to try and see it again. And in the blink of an eye the little creature zoomed past him on the floor and then he knew.....it was a mouse. If you are on facebook you probably saw Scotty's facebook status that said "I don't like mice." Scotty hates mice. I don't blame him. Since Scotty was on the floor he didn't want to be down there with a mouse. So he decided to sit on the couch and not touch the floor at all. The next thing he knows, he is playing games on his computer when he looked over and there was the mouse...ON THE COUCH....watching him play games. As you can imagine, that is terrifying. So Scotty ran downstairs and didn't come back up till I got home.

Because there are mice just about every year Scotty's parents have a ton of traps. We only set one and put it on the floor where we saw him run before. We put a little peanut butter on it because apparently mice love peanut butter. We went to bed that night hoping that when we woke up there would be a dead mouse. As soon as I got up I checked the trap and there was no mouse....but he did eat the peanut butter. That jerk.... So then I realized this isn't his first rodeo. So we had to get smarter. The next day we reset the trap and left for the day hoping that when we come back it'll be dead. And it worked!

After that, we figured our mouse worries were over...but I thought wrong. I did a little research on the web to get more info on mice. I found out that mice are nocturnal, they can hardly see, and they can squeeze through spaces smaller than the diameter of a dime. That is small. Worst of all, I discovered that if you have one mouse you have SEVERAL!! Seriously? That's just great. We reset the trap just in case we had more and for a couple of days we seemed mouse free. Until one night when I was upstairs relaxing I saw another one. The trap was still set and the mouse ran right over to it! I watched him at first but when he started to eat the peanut butter I quit watching because I didn't want to see him get caught. I held my breath, closed my eyes and waited for the trap to go off. And I waited...and waited....then I finally looked and the mouse was sitting ON TOP of the trap just casually eating the peanut butter. I ran down stairs to get Scotty and tell him what I saw. He set more traps hoping that at least one would get him. He went back downstairs b/c he didn't want to see it happen so I stayed upstairs to make sure he would be dead. But no....he just kept eating all the peanut butter, like it was some kind of buffet! That jerk. Me and Scotty finally came to the conclusion that the traps were just too old and not sensitive enough. The next day Scotty bought new traps. They were more updated and A LOT more sensitive. Scotty's dad also bought us some sticky traps. For those who don't know a sticky trap is pretty much a piece of cardboard with extremely sticky glue on it. It's to catch mice or insects. I read on the internet that they are very effective and more humane than the traditional traps. Well, I could care less about being humane. Mice carry bacteria and diseases and they will eat just about anything and I wanted it OUT OF MY HOUSE! So we set 4 new traps and the sticky trap. The next day I was home alone, getting ready to go to work. I was putting on my make-up when I saw the mouse in the bathroom. He ran behind Scotty's dresser. I saw his little head peak around the corner to make sure all was clear but I moved and scared him. So then he peaked his head around the other corner, I moved and scared him. I played this game with him for a good 10 minutes. I couldn't get away long enough to grab something to get him. He finally braved up and just ran for it and that's when I found out how they were getting in. The mouse ran under Scotty's sink. The hole is very small, but he fit through. When Scotty got home we did further investigating and found lots of mouse poop under the drawers in the vanity.

What we have assumed has happened is that these mice made a home in the attic. The attic is attached to the upstairs. When we were getting christmas decor we put floor down and completely reorganized, probably interfering with their homes. So, of course, they wanted to make a home in our bathroom. We strategically put the traps where we knew they would go. We went downstairs to wait. An hour later we GOT HIM!! We were so excited. I came upstairs to check out the damage and I saw ANOTHER mouse. For Pete's sake!!! I'm not running a mouse farm here... The mouse ran behind Scotty's dresser again and the game started over. But this time I wasn't home alone so Scotty got in on the fun. We put a trap at either end of the dresser. He was really trapped. After a minute or two the mouse got tired of this so he made a run for it. He took a large leap of faith and WHAM!! The trap went off. I screamed and ran, Scotty ran after me. Scotty yelled "WE GOT HIM, WE GOT HIM!!....wait....I didn't see if it really got him.." So I run back upstairs and the trap was somewhat under our laundry basket. I pick up the basket and the trap started moving!!! I screamed again and ran for it. The trap got his back leg and the mouse was trying to get away. Me and Scotty are wimps so we made Scotty's dad come empty it. The mouse was still alive so Darrell took him out back and killed him. What a brave man.

So we were hoping that was it. No more mice...please! We put all the traps back up though just in case. We are about to go to bed, laughing, still about what just happened and we hear SNAP! Oh my goodness....yes....we just got another mouse. I go back to the bathroom to check it out and it got the mouse right across the body. His legs couldn't move but the rest of his body was still eating the peanut butter like nothing happened. Darrell had already gone to bed so we couldn't get him. Scotty got a box, scooped him up and threw him outside so the cats will eat it.

Unbelievable. 3 mice. Gross. Finally, we hop in bed. We both had a feeling like this just isn't over yet. Scotty had fallen asleep and I was almost asleep when I heard some shuffling around across the room. I sit up to see what's going on and then I hear "squeak squeak." GROSS!!! Another mouse got caught but this time in the sticky trap. It took me forever to go to sleep because of that. Humane my foot. That mouse suffered a lot more than the others who died quickly. EWE!!

Our traps are still set but it's been a good, solid week and no mice. Well, actually we saw a mouse but it ran downstairs. We saw it trying to get back up but it couldn't. We closed off all the holes we found in the bathroom with steal wool. Mice hate steal wool. That's why that mouse ran downstairs....we locked him out of his house. :) We are mouse killing machines and we don't feel bad about it.