Forest Festival Fun!

Today we took Meredith to the Texas Forest Festival. She got to ride on the carousel and the Ferris wheel, pet a few goats (which she absolutely loved!), taste her first funnel cake (which she didn't like), and see a real zebra up close. Court won her a stuffed Elmo, which she immediately hugged tight and said... "Ooohhh...Melmo!" I got bamboozled by a carnie...seriously, I'm an idiot! It was at the "Throw-a-dart-and-pop-a-balloon" booth. She said it was so easy and she'd let me have the prize even if I missed. So I threw the darts and got all 3 balloons. Then she said "Ok, five more and you get that frog right there." It was a cute stuffed frog I thought Meredith would like...so I threw five more darts. No, she meant five more DOLLARS for THREE more darts. But I threw five more darts.... So we ended up spending 10 bucks to win the lame stuffed frog. Ugh! Court spent $2 to win the Elmo. I'm such a dork. Oh well, Meredith liked the frog...for a minute anyway...then she kept dangling it over the edge of her stroller like she was going to drop it on the ground and looking up at me and Court to see what we'd say. We finally had to take it away and put it in the stroller basket so it wouldn't get dropped. For dinner we got a smoked turkey leg, which was delicious. Of course, Meredith ate 5 times more than I did. That girl can put away some turkey! Anyway...we had a lot of fun. Here's some pictures...







Here's some video of Meredith on the Ferris Wheel. When the ride started she kept saying, "Whee!" It was so cute, I wanted to get it on video. Of course, as soon as I started recording, she wouldn't say "Whee!" anymore. As soon as I stopped recording, she started saying it again. Such a stinker!

Cupcakes!

We had cupcakes for Family Home Evening tonight. Meredith went to town on hers. When she was done, she pushed her chair back and put her foot on the table and started babbling. I guess it was a good cupcake. I've been trying to teach her to not put her feet on the table, but this time was so funny I had to take a picture.

An Itsy Bitsy, Teenie Weenie Thing They Call Love Bugs

These dang bugs are EVERYWHERE in Texas! Ugh...I keep finding them in my car, my house, on my clothes...I even found a pair frozen in the freezer! And today, Meredith was holding a dead set in her hand! Ugh! What if she had put that in her mouth?! ICK! For those of you that don't know...these are called Love Bugs. They fly around attached at the rear like this, which means they are always flying low and slow and getting into your hair, eyes, etc. Court and I were joking that their little bug intercourse must be really good because they won't even move out of the way before getting squashed. They just sit there, crawl around slowly, or fly low and slow. If anyone had told me there'd be bugs like this in Texas, I may have had a second thought about moving here. They are so annoying! Their dead carcasses are embedded in the front end of my car - the car wash couldn't get them out! Even after a hurricane, they are still all over the place! I'm told they will go away "soon"... in the meantime, they are making me CRAZY!

Finally! A New Post!

Hello Everybody! I'm finally starting to feel human again, so I thought I'd do a post and give an update on what's been going on. It's been a crazy month. We started our move, waited out hurricane Gustavo, finished our moved, lived through hurricane Ike and lived without power for four days, all while I have been deathly ill. It was nutty.

After we moved the 1st half of our stuff to the new house and waited out Gustavo, I got sick. It started as a really bad sore throat...I thought I was coming down with strep...then it moved into my chest, giving me a really painful cough. I went to the Dr. a week ago Monday and he prescribed me the antibiotic Keflex. The day after I took the Keflex, I started having difficulty breathing...I had had bronchitis before, but I'd never had the wheezing and difficulty breathing. The next day, the fevers started and by that night, I was dealing with some pretty bad diarrhea. I dealt with that and the fevers for about 24 hours and then the vomiting started. I spent an entire night getting up every 20 to 30 minutes to vomit and/or have diarrhea. The next day I looked up Keflex on the internet because I was getting sicker and sicker and wondered if it had to do with the antibiotic, rather than the bug. The website I found said that if you are allergic to Penicillin, which I am, you probably shouldn't take Keflex. I looked at the symptoms of an allergy to the drug, and I had everything that fell under the category of "Severe allergic Reaction" except for the impaired vision and rash. So I stopped taking the antibiotic and called the Dr. His nurse was less than sympathetic. She said to take some immodium and "if you still feel bad tomorrow, you can come in and see the doctor. But we might not be open tomorrow because of the hurricane." So, I asked her what to do if they weren't open? She said, "Well, you could go to the ER if you want. Or just try us again after the hurricane." Great...hopefully I wouldn't be dead by the time "after the hurricane" got here. When Ike hit, I spent most of it in bed, getting up a few times to look outside, simply because I didn't want to spend my first hurricane in bed. I was stressed because I didn't want to deal with the vomiting and diarrhea with no power or running water. Fortunately, we never lost the water. Court is from Beaumont, which was very close to where the eye of the hurricane was headed. So, his family had to evacuate indefinitely from the area. We housed some of them at our place and Court's sister, Caryn, had some at hers. Fortunately, the stint without power wasn't too bad because we have a generator. So we could have light at night, watch TV and keep the refrigerator cold.

Today, I'm feeling better, but still having bouts of nausea and diarrhea. Especially when I try to eat anything. I've lost about 7 pounds so far. This morning, Court went down to Beaumont...our church has asked the wards in our area to assemble teams of able-bodied men to head down and help with the hurricane clean up. I'm glad Court can go, but also a bit bummed because we still have a lot to get done at our house and I need his help. But, I guess that can wait. And, since I still don't feel well, I was looking forward to the weekend when he'd be here to help with Meredith a little bit. Oh well. I have to admit that the last couple of days I have been wishing we lived in Utah again. It's hard to move to a place where you know hardly anyone and then to be sick and have to go through a natural disaster all while taking care of an active 15 month old. I've been missing my family and friends a lot.

Anyway....here's a few pictures of the new house. We have video of the hurricane hoopla, but I don't know how to get it off the video camera and onto my computer. So, I'll have to wait for Court to help me. Whenever he'll have time to do that.

I love, love, love our back yard. It is so pretty!

Notice the beautiful 70's light fixture? We took that down and put up a ceiling fan. And, once we own the house, I'm going to paint over the blue. Not my favorite choice for that room.

The living room with our stuff in it...we're still trying to unpack and get organized!

I love this fireplace too. Although I'm not sure how often we'll use it?


The Kitchen - I love the tile work, although keeping the grout clean and all that will be a challenge. And, yes, you can see the kitchen from the front door. Not my favorite thing, but for the price, I'll live with it. Notice the beautiful stove/oven. It's original to the house. We'll be replacing that eventually. Right now we are renting the house, so we don't want to put too much money into it. We wouldn't want to up the value before we've had a chance to buy it.


Meredith's Room Before



Meredith's Room After

We call this the "Time Warp Hallway" because once you step through, you are transported back to the 70's with the wood paneling and all. The bathrooms have hideous gold and brown wallpaper and light fixtures. We still have some work to do on the house. But I'm excited to be able to work on it and make it look the way we want it to. Of course, we're so broke after having to rent a moving truck twice and the hurricanes, that it will be years before we'll be able to do much. Anyone want to make a donation to the cause?? ;)

Ike 0 Fruge Family 1

Ike came and went and all we got were a few branches down in the yard. We are however at about 36 hours with no power currently. I'm making this post using my cell phone as the internet connection. Anyway back to business.

We are all fine. No damage other than the power being out and I think we might have lost 3 shingles.

Click Here for some pictures of Orange County. We lived about 15 minutes away from most of these pictures until about 3 weeks ago. Now we live about 100 miles further north. The link is from one of the local radio stations. If it's not working correctly go to kogt.com and then the photo gallery.

We have quite a bit of video but I'll have to wait until the internet is back for real to post it.

I Like Ike

Actually, no, I don't. I think earthquakes are much easier to deal with because they hit without warning and are over in a few seconds and then you can deal with the aftermath. I hate this watching and not knowing. As I sit here watching the Hurricane Ike coverage, it occurs to me that any number of things could happen...tornados...power outage...so, I figured I should do one more post before Ike hits...because after ike strikes (I'm a poet!)...who knows how long it will be before I can post again? Hopefully, we'll make it with little damage...but based on the reports on the Weather Channel, it'll take some serious luck. So, pray for us. For the first time, I'm actually feeling a bit afraid...I've never sat through a hurricane. What if the roof gets torn off? What if a tree falls on me? Or worse, what if something happens to Meredith or Court? I couldn't bear that. We're far enough inland, that I would think we'd be okay...I mean we'll get some wind, but surely not hurricane strength. But then, what do I know? Court says he's not worried. I'm worried enough for the both of us, I guess. So, wish us luck. And, if, by some crazy fluke, we don't make it through...always remember I love ALL of you! (I'm a poet - AGAIN!) ;) I'll try to get some video of the storm to post on here whenever I am able to post again. Love from the Fruges!

Go Away, Gustavo!

I officially hate hurricanes. Seriously, they are stupid. We spent 3 or 4 days watching the news and waiting for it to hit...we spent hundreds of dollars on emergency supplies (we're going to be poor for the next 10 years as a result)...family members evacuated inland....and for what? All we got were some sprinkles. I guess we're lucky...it could have been worse. But Gustavo decided to show it's ugly face the same weekend we planned to move. We rented a smaller Uhaul trailer thinking we could make a few trips to get all our stuff here, but due to mandatory evacuations, we only got about half our stuff here. It's been frustrating... Last night, Court decided to make a hole-in-one for dinner...he got the bread and eggs into the pan and then realized that all our spatulas and cooking utensils were still in a box down in Port Neches. So, he used a butter knife and fork and just scrambled his eggs and bread together. It was funny. I took a shower and realized our towels were still in a box in Port Neches, so we went to Target and spent a bunch of money on new towels. Meredith's room is all ready, except her bed is still in Port Neches. Ugh! Moving is bad enough without a lame hurricane complicating everything! But anyway...sorry for the rant. We'll head back down and get the rest of our stuff on Saturday, so we can finally finish the move. I have to give thanks to my wonderful mother-in-law and sister-in-law Caryn, who have made things bearable and have helped get what we could do, done at the new house. I'll post pictures once our internet is hooked up. Right now I'm on the 'net via my cell phone, which means my connection is slightly faster than dial-up, so I'm not even going to try to upload any pictures. But we are alive and well...or at least surviving until we can get the move finished. Sorry for the venting post...just letting off steam. I mean, I'm sure the people in Lousiana probably wish they only got some sprinkles. So I know I'm just feeling sorry for myself. And at least now everyone knows why they haven't heard from us in a while. Life has been crazy. I'm exhausted!