The House of Zog

Religion and Science

2009-09-18T20:21:00.006-04:00

Many times you will see a title such as this titled, "Science versus Religion." I used the "and" rather than "versus" because the latter gives the connotation that this is a conflict, as if the two are completely separate entities that cannot exist together. I don't believe this is true. I believe religion and science do exist together.

As a science educator who is a christian, and more over a christian who takes the bible literally and not figuratively, I am constantly evaluating my belief system. I'm not sure if that is my scientific nature taking control of my thoughts, or simply human nature to question everything. Either way, on a daily basis I'm thinking about the evidences of God that I see in science.

Webster's Dictionary defines science as, knowledge or a system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific method. Many people argue that religion cannot meld with science because religion, such as the creationist view of the origin of the universe, cannot be tested through the scientific method. This means that the creationist view is a hypothesis about the origins of the universe and there are no scientific means of testing this hypothesis. Therefore it cannot be changed into a theory, much less eventually made to the law status. Scientist really don't like a hypothesis that cannot be tested. It's the unsolvable problem. It drives them nuts.

Religion, according to the great Webster, is defined as a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ador or faith. I think that last word is the stumbling block for most scientists. They say faith is something that the ignorant hold on to. Faith is the excuse you give when you can't prove the actual. I think they have more faith than they would admit. Faith is defined as something that is believed with especially strong conviction. The definition doesn't suggest that the "something" is not tangible. As I write this I'm sitting on a bench at the end of my bed that I bought at a thrift store for $3. This bench is a tangible piece of material in which I can see and feel. Yet I have faith that it is sturdy enough to resist gravity pulling me towards the earth. Just because you have faith, doesn't mean you are religious. Though I think many scientist, specifically anti-creationist, are religious. Remember the definition of religion was a system of beliefs held with ador. Scientists are married to science. Their entire existence, figuratively and literally, is glued together with science. This is a system of beliefs, and they ador it, just as I ador God. Science is their religion, yet they are blind to that. Don't forget this is biblical. Jesus said that many will hear but few will understand. Many will argue until they're blue in the face that science and religion do not mix. It's ironic to me. Is it to you?

About 90% of the earth's oceans remain unexplored. No human as ever been there. Let's say you are a marine explorer and you are on a dive to explore uncharted ocean floor. You're in your little subterranean vessel and crawling along the ocean floor. In your view you're seeing sand, rocks, fish, a lot of water. Suddenly you see something in the distance. You slowly approach. You begin to make it out to be square in shape and motionless. You creep up on it and begin to study it. To your amazement you realize that it is a computer, a laptop specifically. You use your robotic arms on your vessel to press the power button and discover that the laptop works, underwater. Suddenly the cooling fan turns on and it slowly zooms away from you into the darkness. Now, your first thought might be, "How in the world did a laptop get 7,000 feet into the ocean?" I would think your second question may be, "How did that laptop even work in the water?" I think anyone, scientist or not, would say their logical reasoning for this would have to be that another human was already down here and created a waterproof computer that can use it's cooling fan as a prop to maneuver. Would anyone have the guts to publish that they found this item and that they truly believe, through scientific "reasoning", that this object must have slowly changed through time, adapting to it's environment and is surviving on it's own. No WAY! The logical assumption is that someone constructed it and put it there.

This story may seem crazy but I would argue that human beings are much more complicated than computers. And here we are, living, breathing, reproducing, doing things that seem so monotonous but in reality are incredibly complicated. It would seem that the logical and most simplistic (to follow Occam's Razor) explanation is that we were created. I don't want to downplay what I believe in, but to me it seems that it takes a lot more faith to believe that our incredibly complicated and delicately balanced existence is all due to an unimaginally long and extensive series of chances. Talk about faith! I used to agree with it. But as I got older and began to really study science and how things in this universe work together I see more and more evidence that I was put here by a creator. My faith is that creator is God and not some alien race, which is another hypothesis of how we got here. It's ironic to me that scientist put so much faith into ideas of how we arrived here, such as the Big Bang Hypothesis though there are many more, and it's just a bunch of ideas. Notice I called it the Big Bang Hypothesis. That's what it is. It's not a theory. A theory only becomes that once it's been tested using the scientific method. We cannot test the Big Bang. We've tried, but to no avail. The theory of evolution, in terms of creating living beings, is using the term "theory" very loosely in my opinion. How can that be tested? Sure we've found evidence that certain species have adapted to their environment but that is still a long way from suggesting that we started as a single celled organism and slowly developed into the complicated beings we are today.

So how do science and religion fit together? I believe that science is a gift from God that allows us, the created, to peer into the realm of the creator. I think that God allows us to discover and invent new things in His timing. It's all there, in front of us, science that is. We are blinded to it until He decides it's time that we can handle the knowledge. If you look you will see evidence every day that He gave us this universe. Some are as common as the wind blowing, or how trees defy gravity by transporting water up, or how they take something that is bad for us, carbon dioxide, and produce something that is a necessity for us, oxygen...how crazy is that? Some are more complicated, like if the molecular structure of water was linear and not bent then there would be no liquid water on the earth...which would make survival a problem; or if the earth were just slightly smaller in mass there would not be enough gravity to hold our atmosphere and it would be blown away by solar winds like on Mars. Is it coincidence that the earth's magnetic field protects us from the extremely harmful radiation of the sun? God gave us the Northern lights to remind us of this, just as he gave us 7 other examples of planets who's factors for life to survive do not match ours. Why did he give us the universe? Well, maybe it's just there to humble us in His magnificence. We are NOTHING compared to the vastness of space. But the crazy thing is that the God who created it knows your name.

Science is a gift from God to allow us to see what he is capable of doing. Don't be scared of science. Many people are afraid that science is going to lead them away from God. Satan does that, not science. Science and religion are one in the same. Science constantly reaffirms my belief that God is real. In today's world, isn't that an ironic statement?

-j

Summer pictures

2009-08-08T09:38:00.002-04:00

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2015702&id=1287395227&l=ad32e99bc8

You can click on this link to see lots of pictures from Summer. They are much easier to upload to facebook than the blog.

I told you so

2009-08-04T20:01:00.004-04:00

In my last post I said I was thinking about getting some chickens. Well, I did. I got four little ladies, hopefully no roosters. I'm not sure why though. I just thought it would be cool to have some chickens. So I built a chicken coop and run.

Then I went to see a man about some chickens. I bought one Barred Rock, two Black Maran's and one that was a cross breed of a Copper Maran and an Araucana.

They'll start laying eggs in a couple of weeks probably. Ethan likes to go into the run with the chickens but only for a minute. Once they start moving he gets scared of them and wants out. Kimberly hasn't been in yet. I must admit that I'm not used to dealing with chickens either. Every time I go into the run I try to catch one by hand. I think I'm a little chicken to grab the chicken.

Just in case you were wondering...

2009-07-11T22:14:00.002-04:00

They make clothes that tell you how to put your kids to sleep. Isn't this funny!!??

Popping up to say hi. Such a big girl!

Rain Barrels, Composters and Gardens

2009-06-19T21:47:00.007-04:00

So for some reason since we moved onto the Hartzog Homestead I have become very interested in some minor self sufficient lifestyle tasks. While I think it would be awesome to lead a completely self suffcient lifestyle, I think the reality is that we won't. But it's still fun to do our part to become less dependent on a few things you would normally just buy from someone else.

One of my most recent projects was this rotating composter. I ran across this on the internet, which is where I do most of my research. I built a large composting bin last year out of old crates but I saw this and had to make it since I had the materials sitting around. It's made from a 55 gallon drum, a piece of rebar, and a couple of 4 x 4 posts I found. You throw your scraps in there and give it a twirl. I haven't had this one long enough to know how well it actually works but it looks good in the garden none the less. Just to the right of the picture you can see our cucumber vine growing up the tee pee arbor.

This is my 275 gallon water cistern. This was last year's project that started out as a 55 gallon drum. I quickly discovered I could fill up a 55 gallon drum in about 15 minutes of good rain so naturally I had to expand this project. I'm glad I did. So far this year we havn't had to use any city water to keep our many plants and our garden growing.

I bought this drum thinking I would not need the metal cage that normally comes with it...I was very wrong. Since most of my projects involve recycled lumber and materials you can see that I opted to build this very attractive wooden cage to keep the cistern from warping when full of water. It's definitely a project I have to revisit when I come up with something better looking.

I have a 3/4 HP submersible sump pump inside the cistern that I found on clearance somewhere. When I plug in the pump it will pump very easily uphill to our garden. I really wanted it to be a gravity fed system but with all the trees we have our garden had to be where it is, which is not close to the downspouts and is on the high side of our yard. You can see the white PVC pipe with the green water hose attached to it. That leads up to the garden.

This barrel was the original one I had attached to the downspout. It now sits in the garden and I pump to it with the sump pump mentioned before. The other day I built a drip system using 3/4" PVC pipe and 1/2" black tubing. I didn't have a good pic of the entire system so you can't see the tubing here but the system works great. It's gravity fed from the barrel, most drip systems are pressurized. I had to drill holes in the black pipe that were large enough to drip with only the weight of the water in the barrel. I love it because I can pour my fertilizer directly into the barrel and turn on the drip system and I don't have to stand there and water the garden by hand.

Here are some pics Kimberly took of our Better Boy tomatoes. These pics are about 2 weeks old now so we should have some good and ripe fruit soon.

These are our first grape tomatoes. We also planted cucumber, watermelon and a bell pepper plant. I planted lima beans but not a single seed sprouted. That's two years straight that my beans flopped. I guess they're my huckleberry. I'm going to keep trying though.

This next project I'm seriously considering...chickens!

A month of pictures

2009-05-28T11:55:00.012-04:00

Being a month behind on the blog, I just decided to do one mega blog filled with pictures. Sadie is now 2 months old, weighing 10 pounds 10 oz. Such a sweet girl!! Did I mention that she's been sleeping through the night since 5 weeks?? Ethan is still a great big brother. We've only had one incident with biting! I really think he didn't mean to, just got a little carried away with kissing on his baby sister and decided to take a little chomp. These pictures include random shots of Sadie and Ethan, Sadie's baby dedication on Mother's Day, pictures of family with Sadie, Ethan's face paint from a birthday party, Ethan being Daddy's big helper planting plants in our yard, Ethan and Daddy's big camp out in the back yard along with some serious smores, Ethan and his buddy Rylan Mattox's bath together after becoming covered head to toe from the sand box, and the baby shower (Welcome Sadie Party) some friends from church came over and gave us since I was put on bed rest when they were planning her shower. All in all, we've had a busy month. Enjoy the pictures!

Happy Easter...

2009-04-14T15:31:00.007-04:00

I absolutely love this picture of Ethan and Sadie, just HAD to share it. This is how sweet Ethan always is with his little sister. He loves to get in her face so she sees him, give her kisses, sing to her and of course bring her "Sadie bear" when she gets upset. He is just precious with her and it melts my heart! Here they are Easter morning...well afternoon, after church. Jeremy had to be at church early to run sound and I had to get two kiddos ready, myself ready, feed everyone, and get out the door before 9:00. Let me tell you...that's no easy task!! So, Easter pictures were taken after we got home.

Sunday afternoon we headed over to Greta and Dennis's for dinner and some Easter egg hunting. Here's my comedian with his basket on his head.

Daddy and Sadie time during the egg hunt...

Taylor with a basket full of eggs.

Ethan finding one of his prize eggs, one that we dyed and put "Cars" stickers on. I think this was his "Mater" egg and he was very excited to be the one to find it.

Tanner and all his eggs.

Here's my Sadie girl...

where has the time gone already??? She'll be one month old tomorrow and I just can't believe it! I weighed her yesterday and she's somewhere between 8 lbs. 14 oz. and 9 lbs. Getting to be such a big girl! We go next Monday for her one month appointment so we'll have real stats then.

Sleepy girl! It takes a lot of work for a baby to grow like this.

Sadie's first outing

2009-04-05T17:00:00.014-04:00

Okay, so I can't get these pictures to post in the order that they were taken. Guess I'm having blog trouble, but you can see the pictures and that's all that matters. Who has time to arrange pictures in order anyway???
A week ago Monday, when Sadie was not quite 2 weeks, we headed out for an afternoon at Stone Mountain Park for a picnic and play time. The weather was great and we enjoyed some Arby's out on the lawn. Sadie missed the whole thing, never even knew we left the house...sleepy baby.

This is still the hair cut where Ethan has his "face cut out of his hair".

Brother and sister time in our bed one morning. I don't know if you can tell in this picture, but we got Ethan's hair cut short this time. No more "face cut out of the hair" as Jeremy called Ethan's last hair style. He looks so big now!!

5 weeks of bed rest and 13 novels later...

2009-03-27T15:10:00.005-04:00

We have a baby girl!!! I had planned on updating this blog a lot sooner, but once getting home and adjusting to having 2 kids and now with Jeremy being back at work...I'm just now getting to it. We were not able to access the blog from the hospital for some reason so I hope that you were able to keep up with updates and photos from Jeremy's facebook link that he posted. We are doing great adjusting to being a family of four. Lots of work and time management skills to juggle between two kids, but it's going great!! God really blessed me with an easy delivery and a great recovery. I have my sleepy moments, but I managed to get out with Sadie and run some errands on Tuesday. We also had her pediatrician apnt. Monday and she had a great check up. She had lost down in the hospital from 6 lb. 11.4 oz. to 6 lb. 5 oz. Monday she was back up to 6 lb. 8 oz. She already seems to have changed so much to me. Her little face is starting to fill out so much. She's staying awake for little spurts throughout the day, last night she decided to stay awake at her 2 AM feeding..urgh! I'm feeling that one today! She's also trying to focus on things as she's looking around. The occasional smile slips out which absolutely melts our hearts. Jeremy's been enjoying his daddy daughter time when he gets in from work and Ethan has been such a great big brother already. He sneaks kisses from her throughout the day and anytime she seems to be unhappy he says "Sadie wants her bear!" and runs to get her bear that he made her at build-a-bear. He's a very gentle and sweet big brother and we couldn't have asked for a better transition...so far :)
We had so many pictures to post, a slideshow was the best way to show a clip from our first week with Sadie.

The Day After

2009-03-19T19:53:00.006-04:00

Well, at this point Sadie is a little more than 24 hours old. Everything is going very smoothly so far with mommy and baby. Sadie was 6 lbs 11.4 ounces and 20 inches long when born at 4:48 on March 18, 2009. Sadie nurses very well for 30-50 minutes at times, something we never experienced with Ethan. Mommy is doing well, other than feeling very sore and uncomfortable for obvious reasons. We should be going home tomorrow around mid morning. I have limited internet access here, which is the reason I've not updated the blog. I can barely upload text much less download a picture to the blog. Check back tomorrow and hopefully I'll have an update with some pictures in it.

By the way on my previous post the D Day title stood for Delivery Day. Kimberly thought it was a bit of a negative title. I'm used to people not getting my humor.

This link should take you to a site where you can view some pictures: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=96985&id=541570991&l=cca694ee8d

D-Day

2009-03-18T10:15:00.003-04:00

Well, we're here at the hospital. We got in a room around 6:30 am, started the potocin at 7:50 and broke Kimberly's water at 9:00. The process is in motion! We'll have a baby girl here in no time! I'm having trouble accessing the blog while at the hospital though I'm not having any trouble accessing Facebook so check in there if you have my account and look for our status! We've been hearing about a lot of our friends praying for us today and we are very thankful for you guys. Keep the prayers coming!

Big day tomorrow!!!

2009-03-17T16:45:00.003-04:00

Well, here we are...hours from going to the hospital to have Sadie. I got a phone call Monday morning saying that they scheduled our induction for Wednesday morning at 6:00 instead of Thursday. They moved us up a day! So here I am...last day pregnant with Sadie, knowing that our world is about to change forever. We are very excited, anxious, nervous, etc...I'm sure you could imagine. I told Jeremy this morning that I think the difference in having an induction planned out a week in advance vs. just going into labor has got to be a lot less sleep. For the past few nights, every time I wake up (and I do wake up because there's no just rolling over in your sleep...too big for that. I've got to wake up and consciously roll my body over to the other side) I'm having a hard time going back to sleep as my mind races 100 miles a minute counting down the days and trying to think of what is to come.

So tomorrows the big day!! We have to call at 5:00 AM to make sure they have a bed for me and then we're off. We are taking our laptop and plan to update the blog throughout the day and when she makes her grand arrival!! We appreciate any thoughts and prayers as we go in tomorrow.

Here's the final shots of my big girl belly. The first one is a bit blurry but you get the idea. Stay tuned tomorrow for our news!!

We Have A Date!!

2009-03-10T15:49:00.006-04:00

I went to the doctor today for one of my biweekly apointments. He's scheduling me for an induction for next Thursday March 19th. So 8 more days after today!! Now it's getting real!!! We're ready to meet this little girl, hold her and see that she's all healthy.

As excited as I am to get off of bed rest and have her out and healthy and ready to be a family of four...I can't help but think of how things are about to change for the rest of our lives. It's no longer going to just be us and our little buddy Ethan...all we've known for the past 3.5 years. It's such an exciting time and Ethan seems very excited and ready to see Sadie, but the thought still lingers in the back of my mind wondering how things are really going to change. God has blessed our family with so much and the thought of adding another child is overwhelming. I can't help but think back to this insert that I read on a friend of mine's blog back when I first found out that I was pregnant. It touched me then and I feel like it's my heart now as we approach these last days before Sadie's arrival.

Loving Two

I walk along holding your 3-year-old hand, basking in the glow of our magical relationship. Suddenly I feel a kick from within, as if to remind me that our time alone is limited. And I wonder: How could I ever love another child as I love you? Then she is born, and I watch you. I watch the pain you feel at having to share me as you've never shared me before. I hear you telling me in your own way, "Please love only me." And I hear myself telling you in mine, "I can't," Knowing in fact, that I never can again. You cry. I cry with you. I almost see our new baby as an intruder on the precious relationship we once shared. A relationship we can never quite have again. But then, barely noticing, I find myself attached to that new being, and feeling almost guilty. I'm afraid to let you see me enjoying her -- as though I am betraying you. But then I notice your resentment change, first to curiosity, then to protectiveness, finally to genuine affection. More days pass, and we are setting into a new routine. The memory of days with just the two of us is fading fast. But something else is replacing those wonderful times we shared, just us two. There are new times -- only now, we are three. I watch the look between you grow, the way you look at each other, touch each other. I watch how she adores you -- as I have for so long. I see how excited you are by each of her new accomplishments. And I begin to realize that I haven't taken something from you, I've given something to you. I notice that I am no longer afraid to share my love openly with both of you. I find that my love for each of you is as different as you are, but equally strong. And my question is finally answered, to my amazement. Yes, I can love another child as much as I love you -- only differently. And although I realize that you may have to share my time, I now know you'll never share my love. There's enough of that for both of you -- you each have your own supply. I love you -- both. And I thank you both for blessing my life.

Snow day!!!

2009-03-04T08:17:00.006-05:00

Got my snow suit on...all ready to go out and play!

Ethan and Daddy playing in slushEthan and Nana catching snow flakesMaking the game plan for building the snowmanEthan catching a snow ball from Daddy...in his lavender gloves!! He didn't have any water proof gloves and it just so happens that I found a pair on clearance at Target the week before I was put on bed rest. The only catch is they were lavender so I got them for Sadie to grow into. Little did I know we were going to need them in the next few weeks.Ethan and his new buddy

We ended up with somewhere between 3-4 inches of snow!!We thought we were going to lose power because it kept flickering off and on. We set up camp in the living room by the fire. We never lost power, but Ethan thought it was great...so...he slept in the living room by the fire all by himself. We stayed with him until he was almost asleep and then he was ready to camp out all by himself. Here he is on his air mattress the next morning. A look at our house the next day...
My boys...
Checking out the snow in the trees...
I don't have pictures but only video of Jeremy and Ethan sledding. Ethan was having a great time until his sled stopped on a patch of dirt and he kept going. Hoping to post that video soon!!

And then there's me...
36 weeks on the way to one of my twice a week doctors apnt. This has become the highlight of my week being that I can get up, ready and out for a little while. Fresh air is nice, even when it's 20 degrees outside. Doctor says everything is checking out good with me and Sadie. My blood pressure is maintaining itself...which makes me feel like I can get out and about again...BUT my doctor strongly advised me not to think that way and be reminded that things are good because I'm on bed rest. This I know, but lying and sitting around all the time is starting to get tough. He wants me to go 2 more weeks, to 38 weeks gestation, and then we'll induce. I've been told by many to try to enjoy this time of rest because in 2 weeks...they'll be no such thing. We'll be in full swing with 2 kids...family of four.

Same Song...Second Verse

2009-02-19T10:39:00.004-05:00

As you might remember when I was pregnant with Ethan, I ended up on bed rest at 34 weeks due to high blood pressure. This is where I like to say Same song...second verse...

This past weekend my doctor placed me on bed rest due to elevating blood pressure. He told me I could be in one of three places, my home lying down, his office or the hospital. When I'm at home I can't do anything but rest, preferrably on my left side to keep the blood pressure down and the circulation flowing to the baby. Oh, I am allowed to get up about every 2 hours or so for about 15-20 minutes and then back to the couch. This is a bit hard with a three year old. Jeremy has become Mr. Mom as he likes to call it. Not only is he working, coaching and taking an online class...he is now doing laundry, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning and managing all of Ethan's doings (potty time, baths, dressing, meal time, play time, etc.) He's got a whole lot on his plate right now! We are very blessed to have my parents next door. My mom has already been a huge help!!

My doctor didn't seem to think I'd go past 37 weeks but he's hoping I at least make it to 36. That's where I was when Ethan was born. If you think of us, please pray that we make it 2 more weeks without any complications and pray for Jeremy in all of his responsibilities right now. Until next time...just being a couch potato!!

6 weeks to go...

2009-02-08T17:01:00.005-05:00

So I've come to the realization that I've got 6 weeks left to go in this pregnancy...and I'm big!! I guess you just forget from the first time how big you actually get and for sure you forget how big you feel. You also forget to do things like take pictures of this journey in pregnancy. Jeremy and I have realized that we haven't taken a pregnancy picture since the last one we posted which was when we found out we were having a girl. Wow!! We've got to get with it. Here's me and my little buddy today after church...Jeremy recently posted the pink room...(that would be the post before the one where he had so much fun with shaving) He did such a great job with the room!! Pictures really don't do it justice, the lighting never seems right in pictures. Anyway I find that I love going into her room looking around and feeling so blessed that we are adding a new little one to our family, and have I mentioned that we are thrilled to be adding a girl?? Here's a few closer shots of her bedding that some of you had requested to see. It's super cute!! It's lady bugs and dragon flies, called "Just Buggy" by Glenna Jean. And for the news of this post...We've got a name!! We've actually had a name for over a month now, but that's just to show how ridiculous I am at blogging these days.

Sadie Elyse Hartzog!!!

Here's another shot of her name above her crib.

and another shot of her room...

Things are happening pretty fast these days so we know that 6 weeks will be here before we know it. Especially being that Sadie is going to be born right in the middle of soccer season, in which Jeremy is coaching.

And for a quick shot of the one who keeps us laughing these days...
Here's Ethan enjoying every bit of his bubble bath. He was playing Santa Claus in this picture. He is such a big boy now and such a little helper. He seems very excited about Sadie and is looking forward to her arrival.

Fun with Shaving...

2009-01-30T09:46:00.007-05:00

So I was inspired by a friend of mine named Jason that posted a blog last year with the same title. In this blog he document the stages of shaving his face. I've been sporting a beard for about 4 months now and the other day Kimberly so nicely asked me how long I was going to keep it...which means it's time to shave. So I took the hint and put the razor to it today. Here you go...

The Standard

It not quite a mountain man but it was getting pretty long. I could have braided parts of it I think.

The Friendly Mutton Chops

According to beard.com this is called friendly though I'm not sure how friendly I look. My chin actually felt a little cold at this point...it was weird.

The Bridge

I couldn't really find any documentation of this style so I named it myself. I bridged the mustach and the side burns.

The Cowboy

Jason was right, this one does make you feel a little macho. I really wanted to keep this one.

The Mustache (accent on the second syllable)

It's no Magnum PI but I didn't think it was too bad.

The Pencil Stache

There are no words for this.

Bare

I can't call this normal for me since I always have some facial hair going on. Ethan says my face feels like candy now...I'm not sure what that means.

PINK!

2009-01-04T21:33:00.005-05:00

For weeks now Kimberly has been pondering exactly what her vision for our baby girl's room is going to look like and this week she put me to work on it. In other words, break out the pink! Below you can see the before and after pic's of part of the room. As painful as it was to my patience level to paint the many, many stripes, it did turn out nice in the end. Kimberly kept saying that the baby girl is going to love it. I told her that she'd better becuase it's going to be this way until she moves out of the house! -j

Christmas time is here...

2008-12-17T11:15:00.007-05:00

One of my most favorite sounds on TV is the theme song to A Charlie Brown Christmas. I would get so excited as a kid when that would come on TV and I still do as an adult. It's just another reminder that we are in the Christmas season and I'm here to tell you that I can't believe the month has already almost past us by. So many times we get so busy with our "to do" lists that we hardly get to enjoy and focus on the season...and most importantly...the REASON for this season. It has been so much fun this year as we have a little one that is starting to comprehend things. This has been the first year that Ethan was of age to understand and enjoy doing our Advent book. Each night he gets so excited for us all to sit down together and he gets to open a new door to learn about the "Coming" of our Lord. It blows my mind how much he is learning and retaining at this age.

The holidays got here quickly for us this year. Just before Thanksgiving my grandfather got put into the hospital with bad pains in his back. Within 2 weeks from the time that they admitted him, the ran many tests to determine it was bone cancer and there wasn't much they could do for him at his age...3 months short of 90 years old. They ended up putting him on hospice care at home and he passed away within 2 days of being home. This all happened so quickly that it was a bit hard to process but we are thankful that it did happen quickly and that he didn't have to suffer from that pain. This picture was taken last Christmas of PePaw with all of his great grand children. What a treasure!! He's been in such good health and just a few weeks before going into the hospital he was still driving himself around, we never would have thought last Christmas that he wouldn't be here with us this Christmas. After the funeral, we left to go out of town for a few days with my parents. We went up to Sky Vally and stayed in their time share that we've gone to ever since I was 2 years old. It's always a special time to head up to Sky Valley. Despite the freezing cold, we had a good time messing around up there. We also carried on the Hartzog tradition of going up into NC to cut down a tree from a local Frazier Fir tree farm.

We rushed home Tuesday before Thanksgiving to get our house all ready for Thanksgiving day. Jeremy's mom's family, mostly from Florida, came up to spend Thanksgiving day with us. We had a house full...19 to be exact! Like always, we ate too much but we had a great time visiting.
After Thanksgiving, we immediately got into Christmas mode and started with the decorating. Not to mention I ended up doing a few things before Thankgiving. Jeremy even participated in the day after Thanksgiving shopping...a first time ever. They say if you are going to do it, you might as well make it count...so he did!! Yep, the alarm went off at 3:30 AM and he was at Best Buy by 4:00AM. After waiting in line at 2 different stores...in the cold... he finally got the magic ticket to purchase a laptop. The doors at Office Depot opened at 6AM and after he got in with his ticket, he ONLY had to wait another hour and 45 minutes to check out!! Again, we call that taking one for team Hartzog.
Our big helper in decorating our tree this year...
He made sure that all the branches near the bottom had about 6-7 ornaments per limb and he liked to group all the "friends" together. All the snowmen were on the same branch, all the bells were put together...etc.
A visit with Santa at the local bank...

Each year, Santa comes and the bank caters The Varsity for all the customers to have all you can eat chili dogs, chips and drinks. This has become a tradition for us since we've moved to Loganville. Santa's great, but who can pass up free Varsity?? Ethan was ready to visit with Santa this year. He walked right up to him and began to tell him a few of the items that he's had on his wish list all year. When we are in a store looking at toys and Ethan starts insisting that he has to get something. He's learned that he has to put it back and add it to his wish list. I'm here to tell you that he's remembered a good bit of his wish list this year!
whispering to Santa...

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Love

The Hartzogs

Jeremy, Kimberly, Ethan & baby girl (coming soon)

It's a.....

2008-11-14T20:24:00.005-05:00

It's a...

Profile...It's...

Feet...

(one leg crossed over the other, looking up from the bottom of the feet)It's a...

That's right!! We're very excited to announce that we are having a BABY GIRL!!! This was no surprise to Ethan since he's been referring to the baby as a "gil" and his "sister" about the entire time that I've been pregnant. I must say that he really had me thinking it was a girl before we found out by the way he would talk about the baby.

We just wanted to share our exciting news and now we're just left to wonder who she's going to look like. Did I mention that I'm going to be in trouble when it comes to refraining from buying those cute little girl clothes. AHH!!

For those who have been asking to see prego pictures...here I am, 20+ weeks pregnant...with a BABY GIRL!! Getting big!!

Day out with Thomas

2008-10-30T12:37:00.008-04:00

Our birthday present to Ethan was tickets to spend the "Day Out with Thomas" in south Georgia. So...the weekend after his birthday, we headed south with Ethan and my parents, and boy did we ever have a day full of Thomas. Ethan was so excited!! There were all kinds of activities for kids ,and adults, to participate in. Anything from a maze, to jumping blow up things, train tables with all the trains you could want to play with, putt-putt, face painting, Thomas tatoos, a video and reading station with Thomas stories, the meeting of Sir Topham Hatt (the controller of the railroad), pictures with Thomas and then the 30 minutes train ride with Thomas leading the train. We had a very big day and I'm sure I don't even have to tell you how tired we all were! Enjoy the pictures!
The week before we went to see Thomas, Jeremy was out on fall break. We headed up to the mountains for some rest and relaxation. Here are a few pictures of Ethan enjoying fall and all the pretty leaves up there. The picture below is overlooking from Black Rock Mountain in Clayton, GA.

Ethan and daddy sporting their Georgia shirts at Bridal Falls in Highlands, NC.and as for me and that baby...

We're doing good! Growing as you can see. I'm 18 weeks now and we'll be finding out what where having in less than 2 weeks now. I can't believe I'm already about half way, this pregnancy is flying by!

Until next time...

Happy Birthday Ethan!!

2008-10-19T16:05:00.002-04:00

Today is our little man's 3rd birthday! Wow, where has the time gone!! He is such a big boy now, as you'll see in the slide show. We celebrated his birthday yesterday with a farm party. We had so much fun visiting with friends and family, stuffing our faces with hot dogs, opening presents, having cake, visiting granddaddy's goats and the best was granddaddy's hay ride. Lots of fun to make Ethan's 3rd birthday a memorable one. Thanks to everyone who came and celebrated with our little man. Enjoy the pictures!

Overload of pictures

2008-10-10T16:15:00.003-04:00

Here we are in Toccoa headed to Jeremy's class reunion. His 14th class reunion!! They never had a 10 and it took them 4 more years to get that going so here we are...14th class reunion. Anyway, you can't tell too much from my crazy shirt, but my baby bump is showing at 13 weeks. I'm 15 weeks now, growing and doing good. I will try to get some more preggo pictures posted...when I think to take some.

September 24th, I had a doctor's apnt and Jeremy took the day off to go with me. Since the apnt was in the morning and it was a beautiful day, we decided to take Ethan to the zoo. We had SO MUCH FUN!! This montage starts with pictures from the zoo and then it goes to Stone Mountain. October 3rd, Greta and I took the kids to Stone Mountain for the fall festival and had a great time. Taylor, Tanner and Ethan got soaked from playing in the bubble/suds at the end of the maize. Anyway, if you have a few minutes check out our video full of pictures.

How do I follow that blog post??

2008-10-02T14:42:00.002-04:00

So it seems as the Hartzogs have been checked out from the blogging world for a while. I'm not too sure if we still have readers since we've been checked out for so long. Jeremy did pull through for us with the last post...Roxanne...and if you haven't read that one, you've got to scroll down and see what my husband adopted into our family. All I've got to say is that the last fill up got him 36 mpg!! We are gladly parking his 14 mpg truck in the garage as he drives this hot rod to work.
So how do you top that post?? It was a pretty good one, but I'm pretty sure that I've got one to top it. I'm pregnant!! That's right, baby #2 coming April 3rd or sometime around there. I'm 14 weeks pregnant and totally showing. Stay tuned for a picture. Has anyone ever told you that second time around you show much quicker? Well you do! Ethan is very excited and I know he is going to be a great big brother. He is so sweet around babies! He cracks me up because when he's around a baby, he changes his tone (just like I do when I talk to a baby) and gets that sweet little smile on his face. He pokes at my tummy a lot and talks about the baby. This 3 1/2 months has already flown by, minus the few weeks that I was feeling yuck at night and then the whole sciatica thing. If I was up to date on blogging skills, I would put a link on the word sciatica so you could read about it if you are not familiar. Let me just tell you, it's a terrible nerve that starts in your butt and travels down your leg. I got it with Ethan at 16 weeks pregnant, but this go around, I first felt it at 9 weeks. Every time I get up to walk, this pain shoots down my leg and I've got to stand there just a second before I can walk. Other than this little pain that's probably not going to go away until I deliver and no longer have something pressing against this nerve, this pregnancy is flying by. We feel so blessed that I'm pregnant and we are excited about adding another little one to our family. Stay tuned for more updates and pictures!

Roxanne

2008-09-23T18:35:00.004-04:00

When you read that title you have to hear Sting singing Roxanne in the background. I'd like to say that when I drive Roxanne to work and back each day that I listen to her theme song on the radio...but the radio doesn't work...in fact, there aren't even speakers in the car. Roxanne is a 1995 Ford Escort 2 door hatchback 5-speed in prestine condition. Don't let the exterior fool you, she's a muscle machine. Okay, so really she's about 1.5 levels up from a piece of junk but what's really imortant is that Roxanne gets about 31 mpg! She may look like a nightmare, but she runs like a dream! You may be thinking to yourself, what would one pay for a beauty such as this...$700, $1000, maybe even $1001. But no, Roxanne cost a miraculous $300...yes, that's $100 off the sticker price, or at least the piece of cardboard that was in the front windows saying it was for sale! The guy I bought her from was asking $400 but using my cunning ability to sweet talk he came off the price $100. So this baby is a cheap Escort that doesn't have to turn on her red light anymore! I know what you're asking yourself now...and no I will not sell it to you!

So here's the deal. My truck gets about 14 mpg and it's paid for and I love it so I just won't sell it. So all summer I was looking for something very cheap to drive to work and back each day with gas prices the way they are. That was my motivation. So now I'm a member of http://www.junkycarclub.com/ and I'm proud of it! This is what I like to call, taking one for team Hartzog!

Around the house

2008-08-20T13:31:00.003-04:00

Ethan and I made cookies the other day. This little boy was all about making some cookies, especially with m&m's in then. He was my head baker all decked out in my apron (rolled up and folded at the waist of course). Here he is, ready to get started...Once we got all the ingredients in the bowl, Ethan was busy stirring for a while...the best part of making cookies...and for the finished product....YUMMY!!The other night after bath time, I heard this clunking sound coming from the living room. This is what I found. Ethan with my shoes on, of course on the wrong feet. He had a great time marching around.
Going for a ride with Granddaddy on the tractor. Ethan loves it when my dad is passing by on the tractor because he always stops to give him a ride. There's usually tears involved when it's time to get off and let Granddaddy get back to work.
Ethan's new love is coloring. He loves getting his craft box out that's full of coloring books, crayons, and color wonder markers (My love when Ethan's coloring b/c they don't write on anything but his color wonder books)

Our days are pretty busy while daddy's at work.

Until next time...

Innocent...???

2008-08-13T13:51:00.003-04:00

So take a look at this little face. Pretty innocent huh?? He fell asleep on the couch the other day and, like all moms, I managed to get a picture of this preciousness before I scooped him up and put him in bed. What you don't know is that Ethan had a pretty busy day before crashing on the couch. His main accomplishment was placing my cell phone in a cup of water. Yep, it's fried!! When I saw what he did, he looked up with an innocent smile like he was all proud and said "I washing it for you mommy!" So how do you discipline that??!! First of all, it was totally my fault. I left my cell phone in my chair, next to my cup of water on the table and stepped away for a few minutes. I did have to put him in time out but that didn't help my phone any. This happened last week and just today I took my old cell phone in and got it reactivated. Between this incident and potty training...that's enough for my week!!

Here's Ethan and his new favorite food. Silver Queen corn on the cob from Peepa's garden (my grandfather that's 90 and still has an awesome garden)

Over the weekend we went to Carrollton to visit with Jeremy's cousin who has just taken a position as a professor at West GA College. Here is a picture of Ethan and his 2nd ? 3rd ? cousins. Two weekends ago we had a fun surprise visit from one of my college roommates Liz. She was in town for a wedding and stopped in to spend the night with us. Of course it wasn't long enough to really catch up, but we had a nice visit trying to catch up on the past year of our lives :)

That's all for now....

From this...To this...

2008-07-27T17:23:00.001-04:00

So just a few weeks ago, we were getting our pop up out and all cleaned up to go camping. We decided while we were camping that we should try to sell our pop up and see if we could get an older travel trailer camper for about the same price. We just thought we could use something that might have a little more room now that Ethan's a toddler and all over the place. So after that camping trip, we came home and posted our camper on craigslist.com. 24 hours later, someone called us and said they would take it and pick it up on the weekend. That's just what they did. So the weekend after we camped, someone came and paid us about the same price we bought our camper for 5 years ago. Pretty good deal we thought... Then the search began...we were looking for a used camper, probably older than our pop up but something with more space for about the same money that we sold the pop up. Long story short, after about 3 weeks, we came across this Jayco camper, JUST HAPPENS to be the same year, 1999 and the lady came down $1300 because she had been trying to sell if for a while. We got a camper the same year and for the same price that we sold our pop up. That my friends is a deal!!! After we cleaned it with a fine tooth comb, we took it out last weekend to Fort Yargo. We just wanted to go somewhere close by to check everything out good. Everything works and is MUCH bigger so needless to say we were proud of our new camper. Anyone want to go camping this fall???
Here are some shots from Fort Yargo. Since we were so close by, we had some friends come hang with us and cook out both nights.

Ethan and Rylan enjoying playing trucks in the gravel.
Jeremy grilling us some awesome steaks...on this tiny grillErin took Ethan and Rylan down to the lake to feed the ducks. Kelly was out of town so Josh came and brought their kids, Duke and Carolina. Fletcher in his camping bandanna...
After homemade ice cream, Ethan and Rylan hit that time of night...they needed to be contained. So, we fixed them a little drive in movie and they sat back and watched Finding Nemo.

Panama City Beach

2008-07-14T22:50:00.004-04:00

We took a little trip to Panama City to see family and hang out at the beach the week of July 4th. Jeremy's mom's family lives down there so we got to stay with his Aunt Nancy and Uncle Bill and had a great visit. Did I mention that we got to eat at Boondocks and ate some SERIOUS fried pickles??!! Bryan (Jeremy's brother), Kelda and Kalleigh were also down there on vacation with Kelda's family. They got to come hang with us some for a family cookout and some riding on Uncle Bill's boat. Lots of fun!! On the 4th, we actually drove over to Sea Grove to hang out with our friends Dustin, Erin and Rylan...and Kyle (Erin's brother) and his wife Tiffany and their precious little baby Cohen...and the rest of their family. We had a great day at the beach...couldn't have asked for better weather. Anyway, here's a slideshow from our vacation. Enjoy!

Obituary 1950-2008

2008-07-09T11:48:00.005-04:00

On Tuesday, July 8, 2008, at approximately 8:00 pm the great old tree pass away. The great old tree lived a mysterious life but yet a very structured and static life at the same time. There are no records of family for the great old tree but after interviewing some of the tree's neighbors it seems that the tree had many friends that stood by its side in its last moments. The tree passed away at home, but not quietly. The tree met his demise when a lightning bolt met the tree during a storm. It is always a tough way to go for the trees but a least it fast and painless.

The great old tree is estimated to have been born circa 1950-1955. The post World War II era was a tough time for trees in general, hence the poor record keeping of the tree date of birth or lineage. Luckily for the great old tree he was of the Sweet Gum clan which was not as preferred in the mills as the unfortunate Pine clan which are heavily preferred in the wood mills and grown in huge concentration camps even to this day.

In honor of the great old tree we remember the saying, "If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, does it make a noise?" Well, I'd say that this tree went out with a flash of light and a bang. And I do not believe that this tree did not die alone as it was surrounded by loved ones in which it protected with it strong and tall frame. Unfortunately for these loved ones, they are now the tallest trees around so I'm sure they are a bit concerned.

Arrangements will be held at the Hartzog Land today only between hours of sun up and sun down. It will be an open casket viewing. In lieu of flowers donations can be made in honor of the great tree to the "Jeremy will need a New Chainsaw after I Cut this Beast off my 4-Wheeler Trail" Fund located at the Bank of America in Loganville.-J

Visit from the Malloys...minus Gerald

2008-07-01T15:02:00.005-04:00

Our friend Tammy and her two boys, Miles and Gavin, were in town so we got a fun visit today. Ethan, Miles and Gavin playing upstairs. The boys had so much fun playing together, only a few time outs from "lack of sharing"...but we're working on that :)It's been almost a year since Ethan and Miles have seen each other, but they remembered playing together, and they both talked about our vacation that we took together Spring Break of 2007. That was a year and half ago and they are only 2 and 3 now. We were impressed!Gavin having a ball riding that horse...Ethan and Miles sharing...Hugging...and just hanging out.

Before they left, Miles got a quick ride on the four wheeler.
Fun times!!

Cleaning the camper

2008-06-23T22:36:00.003-04:00

This past weekend we went camping with Jeremy's brother and family (Bryan, Kelda and Kalleigh). For some reason, the only pictures that I have are from the day before we left when Jeremy was cleaning the outside and our "little camper", Ethan, had to help out. He loves to wash cars and as you can see in the picture he has to hold all the sponges and brushes as he cleans. Such a big helper!!
We had a fun time camping, but you'll just have to take our word for it. I'll try to take pictures next time...that was so unlike me!!

Weekend away in the mountains

2008-06-18T09:33:00.008-04:00

This past weekend we headed up to the mountains with our friends Dustin and Erin for a relaxing get away...without kids. We did miss our babies, but we didn't quite know how to handle ourselves for 3 days, 2 nights without baby monitors, diaper bags, dirty diapers, sippy cups, toys, strollers....you get the point. We had a great time!! The first night, we headed to the Dillard House for dinner. The food was wonderful and the best part was that we got the "local" discount at 40% off. Can't beat that!! Here are some pictures outside the Dillard House.After dinner, we headed up to Sky Valley to site see and check out the waterfall up there. Here's one of my favorite pictures from the weekend so I had to post it even though it's out of focus.Back at the cabin, Jeremy is mapping out some adventures for the rest of the weekend.Dustin having a good ole time with his guitar...Erin and baby girl Mattox getting a snack...We found a nice little park beside Lake Burton for us to eat our "Oinkers" Bar-B-Q. I'm not going to mention how long it took us to find this park...due to my lost sense of direction...sorry guys! Anyway, when it was all said and done, we had a very nice sunset dinner by the water.On our way out Saturday morning, we had to stop by the Clayton Pharmacy to get a coke from their old time soda fountain. To our surprise, the pharmacy was celebrating their one year in their new building so they had these crazy cheap prices for cokes, ice cream, hot dogs, and hamburgers. If you know anything about Erin and myself and how we like to shop, this news was music to our ears and we all but danced in the middle of the store. $0.25 soda fountain drinks here we come!! We had a wonderful weekend full of site seeing, eating, antiquing, eating, playing the Nintendo wii, eating, playing guitar and singing, eating, playing some serious games of Phase 10, making homemade ice cream...and did I mention eating???

Happy Father's Day!

2008-06-14T21:28:00.003-04:00

Happy Father's Day Daddy!

Love Ethan Author Unknown

God took the strength of a mountain,

The majesty of a tree,

The warmth of a summer sun,

The calm of a quiet sea,

The generous soul of nature,

The comforting arm of night,

The wisdom of the ages,

The power of the eagle's flight,

The joy of a morning in spring,

The faith of a mustard seed,

The patience of eternity,

The depth of a family need,

Then God combined these qualities,

When there was nothing more to add,

He knew His masterpiece was complete,

And so, He called it...Dad

SURPRISE!!!!

2008-05-20T15:23:00.003-04:00

As I mentioned in the last post, last week I had a monumental birthday. Last Wednesday I turned 30...and instead of going out to dinner, we spent it in the ER while Ethan got stitches above his eye. It was totally fine with me that we didn't go to dinner, I was just bummed that my baby was getting stitches!! As far as the birthday celebration goes, I was okay with not going out to eat because Jeremy and I had already decided to celebrate this past Saturday because that was in between both of our birthdays (mine being last Wednesday and Jeremy's being yesterday). He decided to plan where we were going because he wanted to surprise me by taking me somewhere nice. Fine by me because I love surprises :) In the midst of his planning it crossed my mind that he might try to plan a party...SO...I began to start asking questions. Even though I love surprises, I still try to figure them out. I started casually asking my family what they were doing that weekend and as it turned out, no one acted strange or had anything out of the ordinary to say. Actually, my mom and dad were supposed to be out of town in the mountains so I was sure that Jeremy wouldn't plan something and not include my parents. With this I began to put most thoughts of a party out of my mind.

As I was still wondering what Jeremy could have up his sleeve, I was trying to read into his response when I would ask him questions. Where we live, there are a few different restaurants that you get to eat free when you go on your birthday. So basically I proposed that I knew that we talked about doing something on the Saturday night for our b'days, but wouldn't it be more cost effective to eat out on my b'day, where I eat free, and then go again on his b'day, where he eats free. Sounds like a reasonable idea, right? Well, he sat there for a second and then told me he was really hoping to take me to the particular place and he had already lined up some childcare for Ethan. All he would tell me was that the place was in Athens. OKAY...so it was really sounding like we were going out to eat and having a surprise date night for me. Now I was starting to relax and not feel like I was having to prepare myself for a surprise party. Does that make sense?? Anyway, I confirmed with my cousin and sure enough Jeremy had asked her to watch Ethan so we could go out to dinner.

So where were we going??? Hmmm, I was trying to think of all the fun restaurants in Athens. Then I wondered if Jeremy might have invited some people to be at the restaurant, but that just didn't make much sense that they would drive all the way to Athens. At one point I think I even asked him if it was just us going or if anyone else was going with us. He was like "What? No, it's just us". After that, I felt bad that I asked that. I didn't want him to think I didn't want it to just be us, ya know? No I think I had exhausted any possible question that I could think of so I was now ready to enjoy our dinner out together...but still...where were we going??? I was so curious and couldn't wait to find out where!!

So Saturday night rolled around and we got ready for our big date. While I was getting Ethan ready, Jeremy mentioned that I might want to pack him some PJ's because it might be around 9:30 or so before we'd be back. So I did that and packed him some dinner and then we were on our way. Hmmmm, 9:30....I wonder if we're going to see a movie or something after dinner???

So we get to Greta's house, get Ethan out, grab all his bag and dinner and stuff and head him inside. We open the door and like always there were Taylor and Tanner running to the door yelling "ETHAN!!!", we came in and turned the corner and there were about 30 people looking at me yelling "SURPRISE!!!" I couldn't believe it!!! After all of the ruling out that I did!!!!....how did they pull this off??? My whole family, Jeremy's whole family and some friends from church filled Greta and Dennis's house. I was seeing double, my mouth stayed wide open for at least 2 whole minutes and my hands and knees were shaking like crazy!!! I didn't get the chance to prepare myself for a surprise party, so yes they got me good!!! My father-in-law was in charge of taking pictures and he emailed me a few so I'll post some now and then catch up with all the rest later. Here's my big mouth wide open as we turned the corner...

Still shaking, I had to contain my hands :)

Ethan and Tanner comparing boo-boo's. Tanner had to get stitches above his eye about 2 weeks prior to Ethan's crash. Guess that's what happens when you raise boys!!

30 candles might have set the smoke alarms off so they went with 3...each representing 10 years

Thanks to everyone who helped Jeremy pull off a big surprise for me. Needless to say, I had a wonderful night visiting with everyone and eating all kinds of good food. So far 30's treating me pretty good and after all...it's just a number right??

It was bound to happen...

2008-05-16T21:20:00.007-04:00

This past Wednesday was my birthday...the big one...30!!! I think it's caught up with me that I've been telling Jeremy for the past 3 years, since he turned 30, that he's "getting old"...well now...I am too!! I'm not so sure that it's 30 that bothers me as much as it is knowing that the next big birthday is 40!!! What in the world??!!!

What did we do to celebrate my big milestone, hmmm, not exactly what anyone would want to do on there birthday or any day for that matter. We spent the afternoon in the emergency room with Ethan while he got stitches. Ugh!!! My baby busted his eye on the bottom of a slide and boy did he have a deep gash!! So...I called Jeremy at work and he met us at the pediatrician's office. We wanted to see if he need stitches for sure or if they could glue it back. The answer was that he needed stitches, SO off to the ER. The ER that we went to had a children's ER. This was VERY HELPFUL!! The people there knew how to work with kids and were very good and patient with Ethan as we were getting checked in. He got to ride in a wagon back to his room...very cool... and while we waited for his pain medicine and his "goofy" medicine, Versed, to kick in, we got to sit back and watch the movie Shrek. Finally, we had us a medicated, silly little boy and the doc came in to do the stitches. Ethan was in la la land and I've got to say that Jeremy and I were cracking up at him. 8 stitches later, we were on our way back home. The medicine effected Ethan in a way that was funny at first, but after a while when we were home and it still had not worn off...that was another story. We couldn't let him down because he couldn't walk. He was staggering all over the place and very likely to crash again so we had to contain him. Trying to contain a 2 1/2 year old that is medicated and VERY determined that he was not going to sit with your or rest with you or watch a movie with you or ANYTHING... is VERY difficult. After about 3 hours of fighting with him, he finally gave in and went to sleep. I put him in the pack-n-play in our room b/c I was afraid he would try to climb out of his bed and crash. We were very thankful that he slept well after he finally got to sleep. We were all COMPLETELY EXHAUSTED. Here's a picture the morning after of our little buddy. He's doing great now, he'll just tell us everyone once in a while that his eye hurts. Guess I'll never forget how I spent my 30th birthday :) A montage of our big boy...

Spring Break Fun

2008-04-29T21:51:00.009-04:00

So we had loads of fun over Jeremy's spring break TWO weeks. He was out for two weeks because our county has an intersession week before spring break where kids that are doing bad can come in for extra help during that week. That gives the teachers not participating TWO FULL weeks off. We were so busy that I think Jeremy could have used a third week just to recover.

Although he was out of school, soccer was still going on. He either had practice or a game everyday of the break. His team is doing really good!! They are in the state playoffs and tonight they play to see who makes it in the final 8, so we're headed out for a late game to support daddy and his team. Ethan likes to yell "GO WHITE" at the games.

So what did we do over the break:

Bryan, Kelda and Kalleigh (Jeremy's brother and family) came for a weekend visit and we all went to Stone Mountain.Ethan and Kalleigh enjoyed cruising aroud the park in the wagon. This was so nice!! I'm not sure that we'll take a stroller to Stone Mountain ever again. Ethan actually enjoyed this ride. He's at the age now were everytime he has to go in the stroller it's a battle.Grammy went with us too. While we were there she renewed our yearly passes to the Mountain for our early birthday presents. Thanks Grammy!!Back at home, Kalleigh and Ethan had a ball playing together. I love this picture of Kalleigh's little pigtail on top. She is cute as a button!!! (What does that really mean?? Any way cute button's out there??)The next week Stone Mountain was doing all kinds of special events because it was spring break. We called up the Mattox's and they joined us for another fun day and night (we stayed for the lazer show again) at Stone Mountain. Here's Jeremy, Dustin, Ethan and Rylan checking out the monster trucks. Okay, so mostly Jeremy and Dustin.Believe it or not, but the veggies tales were at Stone Mountain!! Ethan was very excited to see them...from a distance. Up close...not so much. When we got up there to them, he kept telling me "too big!" as he would lean in and hug my neck.He preferred Bob and Larry to be this size.Here we are playing in the Great Barn with all the balls. Ethan loves to fill a bag with balls and carry the bag around sticking balls in any of the tubes or holes that he sees. He's not quite old enough to understand the games that you can play there, but he loves playing with the balls.Rylan also had a good time with the balls, but he took a break for a quick tummy slide. There he goes!!After picknicking on the lawn we headed for a round of putt-putt golf. Ethan and Rylan's first experience...and an experience it was...FOR US!! Here's the golf lesson on the grass as we waited for those to finish in front of us.

I know I just threw my ball in this bush!!?? Hmmm....There it is!!!Ya know...really...what's the point in trying to keep score when you've got two little munchkins running around, standing in your path when you're trying to putt, picking up your ball, throwing balls and putters...I think we decided half way in that next time we would just ride the train instead :)The train came by while we were playing and Ethan was very excited to see the train. He wanted to make sure the train and the people on the train saw him too.Rylan just wanted to show them his ball.After a fun but very tiring game of putt-putt, we relaxed on the lawn and waited for the lazer show. Next event: The Farm

Did I mention that between us and my parents who live next to us we have 5 dogs (we have 3 they have 2), they have a cat, a horse, a cow that has no tail and a bum leg...so a 3 legged cow and two goats. Well now they have three goats. Yep!! Didn't even know that the goat was pregnant and when my dad went to feed them there was the little surprise. Look how cute!!! Ethan loves visit the baby goat.The next weekend my sister-in-law Jenn and all the kids came to my parents. Jeff was bringing his college group up for the Passion conference in Atlanta and Jenn was going to join them with Jacie, the youngest. Mom and Dad were keeping Joshua, Jacob and Jeslyn for a few days so we got lots of hang out time. Here's Ethan with Jacie before she and Jenn left. Ethan loved being around Jacie and was always hugging and kissing and wanting to hold her. They were big buds.We took turns taking the kids on four wheeler rides, but here's Nana for one special lap with all the kids...going 2 mph.Here's Jacob with our dogs Fletcher and Walker. He loved playing with the dogs. Every time I turned around Jake was hugging on one of the dogs.While they were here we celebrated Jeslyn's third birthday that was coming up real soon. Here's a few shots from the party.Ethan crying because the cake and party were not for him. Yes we're at that age with him!! A very busy but fun Spring Break spending time with family and friends!!

The Lord's Prayer

2008-04-26T14:39:00.003-04:00

Ya'll HAVE GOT to watch this video of this little girl singing The Lord's Prayer. This is so stink'n cute and I can't believe how good she is!!! I don't know who she is, but she is super cute!

Check back soon for updates from us. We've had lots of events over Jeremy's spring break to share...I've just got to find the time to pull all the pictures together.

Enjoy this precious little girl!!!

A little bit of this and a little bit of that...

2008-03-26T20:44:00.002-04:00

We've had lots of events, adventures and visits in the past two months. With so much going on...like always...blogging got left behind. I created a quick little video that shows play days around the house, a trip to "Imagine It" in Atlanta, a trip to Toccoa, a visit from Jeremy's grandparents, some from Jeremy's soccer games and lots of other fun times. Check it out when you have an extra 3 minutes or so...who knows...you might be in some of the pictures!!!

Happy Easter!!

2008-03-25T15:07:00.003-04:00

Happy Easter from the Hartzogs!!! Ethan's really getting into saying "CHEEEEEEEEESE" these days...sometimes with his whole body as you notice him lunging forward.One of my favorite pictures because Ethan is always busy playing with rocks or in the dirt. He's just not interested in looking at the camera anymore...afraid he might miss something there on the ground...just too busy!!
Checking out his Easter basket Sunday morning. Even halfway asleep...very much aware of "Cany" (Candy) in his basket.Time for some Easter egg hunting!! He did great finding the eggs and putting them in his basket...until he would get to one that had a prize in it. Then he'd have to stop, open it, and see what's inside. At that point he didn't care that Taylor and Tanner were finding all of the other eggs.
Tanner on a mission...
Taylor winning...

We hope everyone had a blessed Easter!!!

Ethan said...

2008-03-04T19:18:00.006-05:00

Okay, so this morning I'm in my room looking for a missing book and Ethan's playing with his little potty in our bathroom. I hear him stirring around in there, but he's always in there putting his trains in his potty and playing so I'm not even paying attention to what he's doing. Then he says "Look Mama!" I turn around to see him at the door with the toilet seat over his head and he says "I'm potty man!!" This has cracked me up all day long!! He totally made that up himself, calling himself "potty man" How did he come up with that?? He is so funny coming up with new phrases everyday! For those of you that are way grossed out right now because you see my son with a potty seat around his head...don't be...he's only played with his potty...hasn't used it yet. We're getting ready to work on that."Potty Man" sitting on his throne...Another fun adventure we had the other morning was pudding paint. Not too long after we had breakfast Ethan decided he was hungry for pudding. I decided to have a little fun with this snack time, so I wrapped part of my table with plastic wrap, pulled up his sleeves, put a bib on and let him go to town. He had a great time finger painting and eating pudding too. After he was done, we got him all cleaned up and I pressed a piece of paper down on his master piece and now we have some nice pudding paint art."Look mama, it's all over my fingers"Yummy pudding paintFinger lick'n good!!Another fun adventure for Ethan was playing in the hay with Grammy. Jeremy's mom came over one afternoon to play and she took Ethan for a wagon ride out around the yard. They ended up in the barn playing in the hay. Ethan had so much fun throwing hay and playing in it.

Fun Times!!!

Happy Birthday Mom!!

2008-02-25T16:44:00.002-05:00

Today is a special birthday for my mom. She turned the big "6 0"!! I know, I know...you're never supposed to tell a woman's age, but on those milestone birthday's...you've got to give credit where credit is due :) To surprise her at work, my cousin Greta and her kids Taylor and Tanner, and Ethan and I, we popped in early to take her to lunch...only after trecking through the lobby of her bank and down the hall with an arrangement of flowers and black balloons with a mylar that said something about turning 60. Her secret was out!! Now everyone at work knows how young she really is. She doesn't look a bit of 60 so we had to let everyone know that this was a big birthday :) Mom asking us if we really got her black balloons and one that said 60 on it

Happy Birthday Mom...We Love You!!!

(After work we're off to celebrate again at the Blue Willow...Yummmmm!!!)

Did you say Puppies???

2008-02-20T08:55:00.008-05:00

Okay, so here's a few weeks of catch up from our family...

Something came over us and we decided to add 2 new puppies to our family. A stray dog found us and had NINE puppies on our land. Believe it or not, we found homes for all of them. We decided to keep two instead of just one because when we had Fletcher as a puppy, we said that we would never again get just one puppy. He whined and barked and wanted our attention ALL OF THE TIME. Babies...yes we'll give that kind of time and attention to...Puppies...NO! Fletcher was so much work we really said we wouldn't have another dog so we really surprised ourselves that we took on TWO more!! They really are better off to have a pal, they curl up at night and play together during the day so it's not been a huge demand from us. The puppies are really cute and we thought it would be fun for Ethan to interact with them...although at one time I looked up to see Ethan holding one puppy by his back leg and holding it up in the air. Here's Ethan playing with some of the group before we gave them away.

These are our new little buddies...Walker and TexWalker...and Tex...Fletcher warming up the Walker and Tex. They all do really good with each other. It took a little while for the puppies to learn that they could not nurse on Fletcher. He did not like those attempts at all!!Ethan loves to put the pups in his pull along train. First Walker...and then Tex gets his turnMore less exciting happenings from our family is that Jeremy came down with the flu!! This was one of his better moments but for about 4 straight days he felt horrible. Luckily it hit near the weekend so only missed a Friday and a Monday at work. If that wasn't enough...he passed it on to Ethan by the next Tuesday. We tried really hard to not get it. Jeremy said I made him feel like a germ, lysoling everything right after he touched it. All that and Ethan still got the bug. He was sick until the next Monday. What was so bad for him is that he could'nt keep the tamiflu down (medicine given for the flu) so it just had to run it's course with him.Ethan had the flu last year too and thankfully this year's case was not near as bad. Although he had a fever he still had some energy to...

Climb inside the dryer when I wasn't looking...Spend some time on his new Thomas the Train computer...Play outside in the dirt... Play with his new puppies...
Ride his new tricycle that Papa and Gege gave him for Christmas...

and just look cute!!!

Adventures in Bathing

2008-02-11T21:15:00.000-05:00

This little boy loves his bath time. If you ask him if he wants to take a bath, his answer is "no"...like all little boys I'm sure. He's usually to busy to stop and think about bath time but when we remind him of his "froggy bubbles" and his "wetters", letters that stick on the side of the tub, he usually races me to the tub. Here's a few shots from bathtime fun.

This is my new device that I use to keep Ethan in the same area as me while I try to dry his hair. I put him in our clothes hamper and he loves it!! Before I thought of this, it was about all I could do to try to keep him in the reach of the hair dryer. I would try books, toys, stuff out of my drawers and cabinets, but he was just too much of a busy body to get his hair dried. This basket solved all of my hair drying worries!!
(Making crazy faces for Daddy as he was taking our picture)

All Clean!!

What have we been up to...

2008-01-28T15:25:00.000-05:00

Well, this past month has been another busy one, but I've come to realize...they all are! Here's a few of the things that we've encountered this past month.

SNOWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!
Yep!! We finally got some snow in Georgia!! Two different snow days at that! Not too much either time, but enough to enjoy. I wanted it to snow so bad this year. As we were building our house, we would get so exciting just thinking about our first snow in our new house. Watching the snow fall in the woods was so beautiful. It didn't stay too long because the temp just wouldn't drop below 33 degrees. So...we didn't get to build a snowman this time but we sure did enjoy watching it fall as we sat by the fire. Here are a few pictures that we took.

And here's our poor Fletcher with snowflakes on his head. We brought him in the garage to warm up after I took this picture.
Our other big encounter a few weeks ago was a WRECK!! That's right, someone hit my mama mobile. We were so thankful that it was just a little crash and nothing else major. Everyone was okay and thankfully Ethan was not with us. Jeremy was driving, our friend Josh was in the front and I was behind Jeremy (the crash side) and our friend Kelly was beside me. We were stopped at a 4 way stop, waiting our turn and I just happened to look out my window to see a motorcycle headed straight for my door. The guy was coming from our left trying to turn right to go by us and instead, he lost control of his motorcycle and drove straight in the side of my van. He fell over under our van and his motorcycle fell on top of him. He was bruised up quite a bit but okay. Thankfully Jeremy put it in park and didn't move the car at all because the guy was partly under our car right by the tire. Long story short, we are so blessed that everyone was okay but my car did take a little beating. We're still in the process of getting that worked out. Needless to say, we really enjoyed the snow encounter much more than this one.

I can't post a blog without showing the sweet face of our little buddy. Here's Ethan in his playroom having all kinds of fun. This is a toy bin that Ethan's great Grandmama and Papa Don got him for Christmas. He enjoys emptying the toys out of it as soon and I can sort them and put them away.

More of the Holidays...

2008-01-05T15:32:00.000-05:00

So here's another quick slide show of a few more pictures I gathered from the holidays. The first ones are of our new baby niece Jacie Mitchell. Isn't she precious?! These pictures were collected from the Mitchell family gathering and then some were from the Hartzog family gathering in Montgomery. Some were with our friends Josh and Kelly who gave us Aquarium tickets for Christmas. We all went down town New Years Eve to tour the Aquarium and it turns out that we were in all the "Orange" crowd from the Clemson / Auburn game. There just happened to be a parade with Nemo the fish flying by. Ethan thought that was just great!! We also had some New Years Eve pictures from when we had some friends from church over to celebrate. Again, just too many pictures to try to post individually. Enjoy the show!!

Hartzogs are back in town...at our new house!!!

2008-01-04T20:53:00.000-05:00

Okay, so this is the first of the "One True Media" slideshows, as you can see from the sideways picture, but we were so behind on blogging and had so many pictures to share...this was the only way we were going to catch up from the holidays. Some of the first pictures were back at Thanksgiving. We have much more to share, but I'm still trying to find the time to get on the computer to put it all together. It's pretty bad when you can't find the time to blog in about two months. We are in our new house and we did make it by Christmas. It was such a blessing to be in our new house for Christmas. Hoping to get more house pictures posted soon. We're finally settled and starting to feel in the swing of things. Maybe now we can find some time to catch back up with everyone. We hope you all had a blessed Christmas. We didn't make it to the Christmas cards this year so I'll probably be sending out an email soon with all of our updated contact information (pretty much our new address, everything else is the same)
Happy New Year!!!
Love
The Hartzogs

Trick or Treat

2007-11-10T18:59:00.000-05:00

I've got to tell you all that Ethan was not very happy about his costume this year. This was a selfish year for mommy. I decided that this was probably the last year that I got to choose what Ethan was for Halloween. Next year he'll probably want to be some super hero, so I chose him to be a cute, cuddly lion this year. It took some persuading for him to wear his costume, but once he knew candy was involved, it wasn't too bad. He learned to say "trick or treat"and "candy" and then he would get candy in his pumpkin. Here's a few pictures that captured our Halloween this year.

Just not too sure about this costume, practice run at home

"trick or treat" Okay mommy, is that good?? Can I have some candy now??Before lunch on Halloween, we went around town to make some visits. First stop was Nana at the bank. She was dressed for a luau and so were all of her coworkers. Ethan got his first experience of "trick or treating" here. He went around to the different departments and got some candy.After we left the bank, we went to visit Grammy at her school. Ethan was quite the little lion cub there. He put on a show for Grammy's students. She stood him up on a desk and asked him what the lions says...he bravely let out his lion roar and all the kids laughed. What a little ham!!Now for the real thing...it was time to head out in the neighborhood for some trick or treating. Our church didn't do the trunk or treat this year so we stayed home and hit up a few houses of people we knew in our subdivision. We went out a little early to visit some family close by but they were all at church. Our wagon sure was handy for trick or treating!! I think daddy tried to get in with Ethan a few times. Nana came over to walk the neighborhood with us and our friends Josh and Kelly (they just live a few houses down) They dressed their dogs for Halloween:)
Trick or Treat!! He actually requested something red at this house :)
AND he got it!! A red mini tootsie roll pop!!! Just wanted to share a few pictures of our cozy lion cub.

Yes we are still building a house

2007-11-05T13:59:00.000-05:00

So much work and time is going into building this house that so little time is left for blogging. I've just noticed in looking back that I've not posted anything new about the house in a while. Last I posted we had just gotten sheet rock up, now we're about three weeks from being done!!! YEAH!!! It's really been a fun process and we've learned so much about building a house, but I think we're over it. We're ready to get settled in our new house and get our life back :) Below is a glimpse of the past few months.

Painting our new sheet rock...
We purchased a sprayer to use on the walls since we were doing all the painting ourselves. We thought this would save us lots of time, but instead it used WAY too much of our paint. After using an entire 5 gallon bucket of primer just to prime the master bath, we QUICKLY changed our plan to rolling the entire house. Yes, I did say rolling the ENTIRE house. This has taken us FOREVER and we're still not totally done. Many thanks to those who have helped us with this task.

Kitchen wall looking into the dining room.My RED dining room! The flash changes the color a little, but this room is called cinnamon cherry.Daddy, I can help you build the porches...Here, do you need this piece of wood?? Oooo, it's "HEABY"!!Jeremy's dad came down and spent the week with us while Jeremy was out on fall break and helped us SO MUCH!!! While he was here that week they got all the porch hand rails and pickets done, steps off the front and back of the house, steps in the garage, ALL of the trim in the house (base boards, crown molding, window and door trim) and they hung all of the interior doors. I guess we were all so busy I failed to take any pictures that week. Back porch all ready for screen and hand rails down the steps Here's Jeremy building our step treads for the upstairs.
Our fireplace and mantle that was cut off the property. Yep, that was one of our pine trees that we cleared to build the house....well part of a pine tree anyway.Our cabinets!! I think this is my favorite thing!! I love my cabinets, the guys did such a great job.Tile in the laundry
Master bath tile
More to come hopefully in the next few days. I've just got to remember to take the camera while we're out working.

What a difference a year makes

2007-10-29T15:11:00.000-04:00

Last fall we took Ethan to Stone Mountain to play in the pumpkin patch...

This year we took him to the same pumpkin patch at Stone Mountain. The pumpkins looks the same, but our little "punkin" has changed SO MUCH!! I can't believe it's been a year and when I look at these pictures and see how much he's grown, I smile but yet I want to cry. How did our little baby grow up so fast??!! Really?? I know I mention this in most every blog, but really!! Look how big he is now!! Running, Jumping and Climbing all over the pumpkins. He couldn't even walk this time last year.Okay, sappy moment over. I just really can't believe how much kids can change in one year. I and so thankful that I can stay home with him and enjoy every day and watch him learn, grow and change.

We did go to Stone Mountain to enjoy some of the fall festivities. These include climbing on the pumpkins in the pumkin patch, riding the "choo choo" and then something new this year was a huge area of bubbles. You'll see this as you scroll down.Cool Cat in daddy's sunglasses sitting with Grammy "Gammy" about to fall asleepAnd then there's the bubbles!! Ethan thought this was the greatest bubble bath with his clothes on that he had ever had!!

Happy Fall!!!

Welcome Jacie Lizabeth Mitchell

2007-10-26T13:48:00.000-04:00

Congratulations to Jeff, Jenn and their family (my brother and sister-in-law) on the birth of their new little girl, Jacie Lizabeth. What a cute name!! Isn't she precious??!!
Baby Jacie with mommy (who looks great after just giving birth by the way!) and big brothers Joshua and Jacob.

Jeslyn loving on her new baby sister.

Jacie and daddy.

Congratulations you guys!! We can't wait to meet her!!

Ethan's 2nd Birthday

2007-10-23T09:11:00.000-04:00

ALL ABOARD!!!
ETHAN'S BIRTHDAY EXPRESS

Ethan had his 2nd birthday on Friday and we celebrated with a Thomas the Train party on Saturday. Wow, where have two years gone??!! We can't believe our baby is really not a baby anymore. He's no longer classified as a "_ month old", now we just say he's 2. I guess we could still say he's 24 months or 25 months, but that's a bit extreme.

My cousin Greta made Ethan's birthday cake and she did a GREAT job. Isn't that a fun cake??

We had to wake Ethan up just before his party so he started things off a little on the sleepy side. It didn't take him long to get into his conductor clothes and start playing trains. We celebrated with friends and family and had a full house of about 30 people.

Ethan with Taylor and Tanner

Time to open presents!! (With blue cookie frosting all over his mouth)

Ethan opening more trains and Rylan very interested in checking them out. Kalleigh's on her way over to play.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR ETHAN, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!!!

Ethan all ready to blow out his candles (we've been practicing for a few weeks.) He did great and didn't even spit on the cake!!

Now mom, can I get that train off my cake??

Ethan and David having a talk all about trains.

Thank you to everyone who helped us celebrate Ethan's big day!!

My battle with a COPPERHEAD!!

2007-10-03T14:53:00.000-04:00

Before anyone freaks out...I won this battle. Yes, I am still freaking out about an hour later, but I did win this battle!! For everyone that knows me, you know that I'm terrified of snakes, much less poisonous ones. For the record, I did not know this was a copperhead until the battle was won. Okay, here's the story as it happened...

Ethan and I were inside playing when we heard Fletcher (our dog) going crazy outside in his kennel. It was his aggressive bark, but I just figured another dog or animal was in our back yard. I let him go on just for a minute and then I decided I better check it out. When I opened the door Fletcher was in his kennel (it's a rather large kennel, not one of those small travel ones) and he was just standing in the middle with his head looking down and the fur on his back standing straight up. If it had been another dog, Fletcher would have been all up on the fence of his kennel trying to get out, but he looked scared. I bit my lip and made myself go out to see what it was. As I had dreaded it to be, it was a SNAKE! A rather odd looking one to me, so this lead me to believe it might be poisonous. I don't know my snakes, but it was no black snake. It was light brown with dark brown markings, with a lighter head. Sorta just looked like a "copperhead", but that's just me freaking out on the inside (thinking it's the worst snake possible, as they all are to me) Surely it's just some rat snake or something. Well, it was right at Fletcher's kennel with his head rared up. Looked a little too interested in Fletcher. I grabbed a broom and I bravely started swatting towards it and banging on Fletcher's kennel, thinking I might scare it off. Instead, it quickly turned it's head and looked RIGHT AT ME!!!! I think I screamed a little and ran back to the patio to head inside. After doing my little "freak out dance" and calmed my chill bumps and my overall feeling of the "willies", I had to toughen up here. This was one of those moments where you have NO CHOICE!! Jeremy was at work, I was afraid that Fletcher might get too close to it if I let him out of the kennel, and I sure couldn't let it get any closer to Fletcher. Adrenaline pumping, motherhood instincts to protect her young (Fletcher in this case) I had to do something. No questions about it, I was going to have to do something. At first I tried the wimpy approach. I went back inside where Ethan was watching me through the window, headed to his room with a squirt bottle. He thought this was great. We opened up his window and squirted the snake. He cracked up!! He loves squirting things with our squirt bottle and the fact that I was using it to spray through a window to get a snake, he found very amusing. The snake didn't move as I had planned. He actually was moving closer to the kennel and I just knew that if he got in the kennel and got under the wooden pallets that are in the bottom of the kennel, it would have been over. He continued to slither along the side of the kennel and then he turned and started in around the dog house, which is also inside the kennel. This was my make it or break it moment. I had Fletcher out of the kennel at this time and I just had to leave him in the yard, make a mad dash for the garage to find some type of "weapon" and get back before he worked his way into the kennel. I found some flat hoe looking thing. With the handle it was about 3 feet long. The snake was about 2.5 feet long. I got close enough and with ALL THAT WAS IN ME, I forced the hoe thing right onto his head. I pushed with all of my might, screaming all the while!! I continued to push, and I wedged his head back and forth between my hoe thing and the ground. The thing that's going to give me nightmares tonight is the visual of his body flying through the air as I had his head trapped to the ground. Again, he was so long, his body was flying about .5 of a foot close to my hands. After killing this snake and hauling him out to the woods, I rushed inside and did another "freak out" dance. I grabbed my camera where I had taken some pictures from Ethan's window. I quickly got on the computer, downloaded my pictures and went to Ask.com and searched snakes. I found this one to verify that my snake battle had just been with a very poisonous COPPERHEAD SNAKE!!! Praise the Lord that Fletcher is okay and that I WON this battle with the snake. I hope that this is the last of my snake battles.

All of this long story to share my adventure of the day and for everyone to please be careful being outside, playing, cleaning, raking pine straw, cleaning gutters, etc. I had a patient a few years ago at Piedmont Fayette that had gotten bitten 3 times from a copperhead while cleaning his gutters. He just reached into leaves and pine straw and it struck him 3 times on the arm. He was very sick and in the hospital for a few weeks.
This was my picture of the snake on the left. The one below is from the website that verified this to be a copperhead.

Be Careful Out There!!

More to show

2007-09-23T22:05:00.000-04:00

This past week we got the outside of our house and trim painted. It's hard to tell from the pictures but the color is a mix between a light olive green and a dark taupe. It's has tones from both of those colors.

The bead board on the ceiling is painted a few shades lighter than the siding. There's two holes cut on the on the walls, you can hardly see them on each side of the door way. This is where we'll have carriage lights. We also got our dry wall done this past week. They have a few more days of sanding to do, but we plan to be painting the inside by the weekend. We finished getting all of our interior paint today and we bought a sprayer yesterday so we're ready to go. Here's a look from the master bedroom hallway into the living room. The foyer is to the left and the breakfast nook is to the right.

Looking into the master bedroom.
Standing in the breakfast nook looking into the kitchen to the right and the living room to the left. The fireplace is in the middle so that wall will be rock on all sides.
This is upstairs in our bonus room. The big column in the corner is our chimney coming up. It makes for a cozy back corner. Hmmm, nice scrapbook table area :)
Standing at the back wall of the bonus looking out at the dormers. The wall to the left is the stairway going down.
Beyond the stairs is another side to the bonus which will be our office.

This last picture is looking through the french doors from the living room to the back porch and back yard. Just another random picture I took.
This part of the building phase is really starting to get exciting!! It's so fun seeing walls and I'm so pumped about getting some color up by the weekend. Stay tuned for more updates!!

First trip to the fair

2007-09-23T21:17:00.000-04:00

We went to the Gwinnett County Fair last week with our friends Dustin, Erin and Rylan Mattox. This was a first for the Hartzogs. Although we didn't get to ride much, we had a great time. The kids have to be at least 36 inches to ride most all the rides. Ethan needs about one more year and then it'll be on full blast. However, we did find this one amusing exhibit. It was not a ride, just a car to sit in and let me tell you, Ethan and Rylan thought this was the greatest thing of the night! After driving the car, the petting zoo was a big hit. Ethan was interested for a while and then his attention turned to the bark chips that we were walking on so we had to get him out of there. He is all boy!! Always wanting to get on the ground, get dirty and rub his hands in dirt...pine straw...bark chips...you name it! Before we lost his interest, here he is checking out the bunny.First time petting a bunny rabbit. Ethan calls it a "raddit"Ethan and Rylan petting the baby goat. Ethan "poking" the baby chick.
As we left the petting zoo they were giving everyone a Mayfield chocolate milk. This was Ethan's first chocolate milk and he LOVED IT!!!! Beware mom's who've not yet given their kids chocolate milk, I now hear at least once a day "chocat milk mommy".
Here's Ethan and I on the merry-go-round. Jeremy was using his photography skills and caught us on the move. He got us in focus and the background blurry. It's a little dark, but I thought it was a cool picture.We had a great time at the fair and look forward to going back next year.

Our house...

2007-09-18T15:46:00.000-04:00

Yet another busy week, but a very successful one. We passed our framing inspection!!! Praise the Lord, we can continue with our house. While we were waiting for the last inspection, we (Jeremy, our friend Josh and I) wrapped our porch columns to make them look nicer. You can notice the difference in this first picture. The far right column is not wrapped.Our supervisor at work. There's nothing Ethan loves more than playing in the dirt. (Maybe Thomas the Train, but he LOVES getting into dirt and pine straw)This past week we also got insulated. For those of you who highly recommended us insulating our interior walls, we did!! Thanks for the advice!Here's a shot of the HUGE boom truck that stretches out this huge arm to put our dry wall in through the upstairs window. You can hardly see it above the porch. This was a cool process to watch. What was even better was watching this truck get in and out of our driveway and not hit a single tree. This truck was twice the size of a concrete truck. They started putting up our dry wall yesterday and they plan to have it up, taped and finished sometime next week. Then is when the painting fun begins. Anyone up for a paint party???Here's back at our house. This was a split second that I left the room while Ethan was nicely coloring in one of his coloring books. No lie, I was out of the room maybe 1 minute and he got down from his chair and proceeded with his coloring, on our kitchen floor!! Thank goodness for Mr. Clean erasers!!
After a very busy week of back and forth to the house, days at the park playing, and just other weekly duties we have...Ethan gave it up one day at lunch. He hasn't done this since he was like 6 months old. He totally fell asleep in his seat eating lunch. I had to check his mouth to make sure he chewed up his last cracker before I put him down.Here Ethan is showing his buddy Rylan (Dustin and Erin Mattox's little boy) all about his trains and how to properly put them back in their carrying case.Okay Rylan, this is where they go. (Notice Ethan about to close his hand in the train case)Ouch, my hand!!
I think Rylan totally understands playing trains now!!

Mommy's big helper

2007-09-10T14:22:00.000-04:00

It was so nice this morning, we were outside playing and then I decided I needed to was the car. Ethan helped me and we got out the bucket, soap, sponge and water and started washing. Ethan was my big helper. He had so much fun playing in the soapy water...scrubbing the car...he would say that we were giving mommy's car a bath...eating the soap off the sponge (GROSS!!)Okay, lets go to the other side...I'll get the bucket!After the car got a "bath", Ethan thought his slide needed a "bath" AND he had to eat some more soap before it was all over.He was very wet and all soapy by the time we finished. I had to strip him down to get him inside. Very fun and successful first car wash for Ethan!

Visit To Alabama

2007-09-07T21:55:00.000-04:00

We got to sneak away for Labor Day weekend and make a very overdue trip to Alabama to visit with Jeremy's grandparents (Mema & Papa, pronounced Pawpaw). We had a great visit and they really got to see how much Ethan has changed...and how much he is SAYING!! Our little boy is a motor mouth:) He now repeats about everything that we say. We'll be in the kitchen and he'll be playing in the living room, not even thinking that he's listening to us and he'll pick up on one word or sentence from us and just repeat it(he's now saying 4-5 word sentences). Needless to say, he entertained Mema and Papa the whole weekend.

Papa teaching Ethan about the "little piggy that went to the market"I'm not sure what they are all looking at but it must have been fascinating. Jeremy doing something crazy I'm sure. Reading books with Mema

Sunday after church, Mema really wanted to take Ethan to the mall to ride the merry-go-round. We rode in Mema and Papa's car and we didn't even think about not having our stroller until we were inside the mall. Luckily, Mema had a ride of her own!! Ethan thought he was big stuff riding on Mema's walker.

Checking out his horse, making sure it was very sturdy before he turned loose.
Okay, feeling pretty good...ready to ride
Oh yeah!! I'm a big boy riding my own horse!Just chilling out with Mema after a busy day at the mall. This is rare, Ethan doesn't just chill out...he's just too busy and always on the go.After a busy weekend, he gave in on the ride home. Tuckered out!! This one was just too precious not to post. Why can't I have those eyelashes??

As far as the house goes...not too much new this week. Just trying to pass inspections. Boy...the codes that you have to meet to build a house can be irritating at times. We've decided it's a good way for the county to make extra money because when you don't pass an inspection, you have to get whatever it is fixed and then pay to have another inspection done. Our framing inspection did not pass because ONE WINDOW in our house wasn't meeting their "egress code"...blah blah blah, whatever that is. When you open this window, the opening is ONE inch too short and ONE inch too narrow. Doesn't matter that it's PLENTY OF ROOM FOR ANYONE TO GET IN OR OUT...It's a total of 2 inches too small. The window is 15 feet off the ground, no one's going to be going in or out of that window...BUT we've got to cut something out of the window sash, only for Jeremy to have to put it back in after we meet code and pass our inspection. SO...now that this has held us up a whole week if not a week and a half, we'd like to get on with our house. We have someone coming first of next week to do insulation and then hopefully we'll get started with drywall before the week is out. I did get my cabinets finalized on Thursday so that was one task complete. They'll start building them now and they should be ready in about 4 weeks. I'm very excited about my cabinets!! Thanks for checking in on us and our crazy busy lives :)
Until next time...

More to share

2007-08-27T16:24:00.000-04:00

(This turned out to be a long post, you can skip the tour if you are not up for it)

It seems like lately we've had some really long days, especially Jeremy. He has been working so hard on our house. He gets up and leaves the house by 6:30 to be at work, works a full day with teenagers, comes home to change clothes and grab a quick snack and then he's off to the house to work. This past week, he's not been getting home until after dark...only to eat, take a shower and hit the sack, preparing to do it all over the next day. Sometimes Ethan and I try to go over to the land with him, but there's not too much I can do to help when I have Ethan, so... we usually stay here. Besides, the mosquitoes are so bad that we really aren't too interested in being out there. They don't seem to bother Jeremy, but they chow down on Ethan and I every time we are out there. He's got some scars on his legs where he scratched about 4 bites on his legs until they bled. All this to say, we are so proud of Jeremy and all of his hard work that he's putting into our new house.This past Friday, our brick guys got started on the bottom of our house. Here's a picture of the base of the garage and part of the front porch columns.

We ended up getting quite a bit more clearing in the back yard than we had planned for. Our septic guys had to dig our septic lines back here because in the original spot, they hit rock while digging. One of many minor problems we've faced in our building process :) Thankfully, each obstacle we've faced so far has had a "workable" solution. Septic tank and pump system below the basement. This is the trench that Jeremy dug by hand all the way around the basement for our pump lines to connect to the septic lines. When the septic guys came, they of course had a great machine to finish the digging in no time. A look at all our wires from our electrical and security systems.Okay, I'm not even sure why I'm going to attempt this, but I'm going to try to give you a little play by play of an unfinished house...without drywall, so bare with me.

This picture is looking into the garage (Y'all with me so far?) :)As you enter the house from the garage, you are in a hallway. This hallway is the home of my bench on the left side. Can I just tell you how excited I am about my bench!!! This will be a bench with drawers or shoe racks underneath, a bench to sit on, hooks to hang coats, purses, diaper bags, etc. and then cubby's up above for "stuff that clutters". This bench is going to take clutter away from my floor and counter tops in my kitchen.
To the right of the bench, is the door to the powder room. To the left just pass the bench is the doorway to the laundry room.
Looking into the laundry room.

Okay, now I'm standing at the end of the hallway, looking through the breakfast nook (which is over to my left) and into the living room (straight ahead).If I turn right, this takes me into the kitchen. The wall on the right is the side of the nook where my fridge goes. The wall on the left is the back of the fireplace and will be a solid rock wall in the kitchen. Where that stops, the rest is a 9 foot wall that has my oven/cook top slide in and cabinets all around. The doorway straight ahead goes into the dining room and looks out onto the front porch. To the right of the dining room doorway is a wall of cabinets, then my sink is in the corner under the windows and then cabinets go down the wall to the right of the sink.This is standing in the dining room doorway looking back into the kitchen. There's a black cup on the floor, look just past that and that doorway is my pantry. The opening to the right of the white pipe is where my fridge will back into. Behind the fridge is the hallway that we came out of the garage.Standing at the rock wall, pantry straight ahead, kitchen sink in left corner.This is from the dining room looking straight back to the breakfast nook.From the breakfast nook, looking into the living room. Stairs go up to the bonus (ah, the bonus...forgot to take any pictures up there, more to come later) and the opening to the right is our foyer. Just as you step into the foyer, look at the floor and you'll see a hallway to the left. This hallway leads to Ethan's room, stairs to basement, guest room and bath. At the bottom of the bonus room stairs (far left in this picture), there's a little mini foyer that leads to the master bedroom. From here, looking into the foyer, the dining room is over to the right.
Have I confused anyone yet????!!!!!

This is standing in the foyer, looking into the living room. Breakfast nook, back left corner.

Walking in the front door, standing in the foyer looking left into the dining roomStanding in the living room looking back into the foyer. The left is the hallway, just past the hallway is a coat closet and then the front door (temporary front door :)After coming in the front door in the foyer, this is looking down the hallway to the right. As you turn right and go into this hallway, the basement stairs are to the left, the guest room is to the right, the bathroom is straight ahead. The hallway turns left at the bathroom and then Ethan's room will be on the right.Looking down the basement stairsLooking into the first bedroom on the right, which overlooks onto the front porch.Looking into Ethan's bedroomOkay, back on the other side of the house...our bedroom door was at the bottom of the bonus room stairs. Here's looking into our bedroom. This is very dark, but when you come into our room, over to the right is double doors going into our bathroom. The tub is in the corner straight ahead covered up with plywood.Looking to the right of the tub will be my vanity and then Jeremy's closet is past that.

Looking to the left of the tub will be Jeremy's vanity, then the shower, then the toilet room, then my closet is past that.Shew!!!!! How many of you did I lose on that tour?? Are you all turned around?? Like I said, not real sure why I attempted that, but some of you had asked about the inside of our house so here it is...a work in progress!!! This is what we see right now. Hopefully this week, if we pass both electrical and framing inspections, we'll be ready to insulate and then drywall within the next two weeks. It'll look more like rooms with drywall, right now you just see into other rooms so it's still hard to picture everything. Thanks for hanging in there for the tour :)

Here's a quick look off our front porch. And then the chief behind it all.....our little buddy. Ethan's been sick a little over a week and is just now getting over his cold. He gave it to both Jeremy and myself, so we've been the house of germs. You can tell in this picture how red and puffy his eyes and sinus area are. Glad we're getting over this!! I think now we've passed it on to my mom. Sorry mom!!!

Until next time...

Life as we know it

2007-08-15T13:29:00.000-04:00

As we continue in the house building business, we have a few pictures to share of our progress. A few weekends ago, Jeremy, his dad (Ron), his brother (Bryan) and our friend Josh installed the windows in our new house. After that, our siding guys came and got most of the siding done. One window was missing from our order so we're waiting on that to come in so we can put it in and then the siding can get finished. Shortly, we'll be ready to paint the outside...that is...after we decide on a color. We'll also have the brick guys come out soon. As you look at the pictures, we'll be doing brick columns under the porch and brick along the bottom of the house under that piece of 1x10 trim.Here's a look with the windows in and most of the siding done.That's not the front door we'll be using, just a temporary so that our real one doesn't get messed up in the process.Here's one quick shot from the inside. I was hoping to get a room by room and walk you through it, but the septic guy drove up right as I started snapping pictures. More from the inside to come...In all of the craziness of building this house...our lives do go on. Jeremy has started back to school and as he was getting his bag ready for the first day, Ethan decided to pull out his backpack and wear it while Jeremy had his out. Had to capture a picture of this!We had some visitors from Newnan. Our friends Donald, Amanda and Emily came for the afternoon to hang out. Ethan and Emily had lots of fun playing. They had a few "stare off's" but warmed up to each other quite well and before the day was over, they were sharing toys and looking at books together.Ethan's cousin Kalleigh came to hang out while their daddies installed windows in our house.Ethan had so much to say to Kalleigh about how to use his exersaucer. He wanted to make sure she was doing it all just right.Ethan was my helper the other day as we made a dessert. Of course he got clean up duty, the best part!This is Ethan's new interest...the computer! I found some games for toddlers to play on the computer. If you are interested, check out Ethan's links on our blog to get the sights. Let me warn you, now that Ethan know's how to play on the computer a little, he thinks that every time it's on and one of us are in here that he can just get on and start pressing keys. Even though that drives me crazy at times, it is lots of fun watching him as he figures things out on the computer.

Until next time...

Ethan's photo shoot

2007-08-07T17:08:00.000-04:00

We spent the weekend in Newnan a few weeks ago and we stayed with our friends Matt and Jenn. We had a great weekend of catching up and of course we had to get some photography in there!! Jenn does such great work!! You can click on her link over to the right and get her contact information and see a little more of what she does if you are interested. Here's our latest photo shoot of Ethan. Nothing better that getting pictures made while we play!

House Pictures

2007-07-28T08:54:00.000-04:00

Another few days of work and we now have a front porch!! Now it's REALLY starting to look like our house. Just this week they got all the shingles on, the dormers framed in ready for windows, the porch roof finished, the wrap on the side of the house, the plumbing all stubbed out and our bathtubs installed, and the HVAC came yesterday and are still there today installing our heating and AC system for the main floor and the upstairs bonus. It's been another busy week and with all that going on, Jeremy started back to work. Teachers had to report back Thursday. It's still moving pretty quickly, but we know it'll slow down once we start doing inside stuff. We're just glad to have the roof on the the house dried in. We install our doors and windows next weekend. Enjoy our progress! Until next time....

Trip to Newnan

2007-07-24T14:07:00.000-04:00

We don't have too many pictures to show for it, but this past weekend we traveled to Newnan. First we had a gathering with some friends that went to college with Jeremy. Below are Ethan, Miles (Gerald and Tammy Malloy's son) and Kendall (Kenneth and Heather Aycock's daughter). There were a few others and their babies but the toddlers kept us on our toes so I later noticed I didn't have any pictures of anyone else. Sorry:(After our cookout at Kenneth's, we spent the night with our friends Matt and Jenn Riggs. We had a great time of catching up with them and their family. We also got to go to SonRise (our Newnan church home). This was the first time we had been back their since we've moved. It was so good to see people from our church and small group. It felt like we never left. In all of our excitement of seeing everyone and catching up, we forgot to take any pictures. Sorry:(

Here is Ethan snuggling with his prayer bear. Ethan snuggling with "ANYTHING" is such a big deal to us, it's so cute!! He's not a cuddler or a snuggler, he never has been, but you better believe that I pin him down and make him cuddle with me at least once a day!Okay, here's a few new pics of the house. These were taken yesterday. It's really starting to look like a house now!! Just since these were taken yesterday, they've now started putting our shingles up, the wrap that goes on before the hardy plank siding, the plumber is currently there putting in our tubs and plumbing the main floor and we still have the framers there working on the bonus room, fire place and the front porch roof. As of yesterday, we got dormers as you see below. Until next time...

Just like that!!

2007-07-20T08:07:00.000-04:00

First we got basement wallsThen a roof on the basement and a floor to the mainfloorOur first wall on the main floor. This is the doorway from the garage to the house.Little by little, they raised the walls of our main floor.This is looking into the back of our basement from our daylight side. Yes, that is a puddle of water. We've all prayed for rain and it has rained just about everyday while we framed our house. :)Looking at the front. This is the main floor without our front porch. The porch will wrap around the whole front except for the garage. Here they are just framing the garage on the left.Basement and main floorStarting the work on the front porchIn the basement, looking out the daylight sideMy dining room...and yes, you see more rain puddles...in our house!Looking across part of the front porchThe back of our house. Far left is the master bedroom, then you see the back porch and then the breakfast area and then the solid wall is the back of the garage.Looking from the side of the house at the start of the dormers and the front porch.Working upstairs on the bonus room and the roofThe bonus room getting a roof It's looking like a house!!

Back of the house and covered porch Standing in hallway to the master bedroom, looking upstairs to the bonus, living room is to the right and the entry way is just beyond in the distance.
Just sharing our progress from our BUSY week!! Until next time...

Hartzog Happenings...

2007-07-09T14:19:00.000-04:00

We had a very eventful "4th of July". Ethan attended his first "local" parade (he saw a few at Disney), we had a great BBQ lunch from the VFW and then we cooked out for dinner w/ my cousin Greta and her family and celebrated Tanner's birthday. Tanner turned 3 on July 4th. He thinks all the big celebration (parades and fireworks) are for his birthday :) After dinner, we saw Loganville's first ever organized firework display... which was really good. Ethan had a big day!! He loves waving his "sag" as you see in the pictures below. Here is it about a week later and he still runs around the house waving and yelling "sag, Sag, SAG..." as he waves his flags.Ethan, Taylor and TannerLast week, our friends Amy and House and their little boy Nathaniel came over for a cookout. Ethan and Nathaniel had lots of fun playing and fighting over toys :) Nathaniel is 4 months older than Ethan and in September he'll be getting a little sister. Okay... here are the pictures that Ethan is really going to have some words with me over this in about 15 years. Ethan has his own little potty and he loves to sit on it and talk about it. We're not at the potty training stage yet, but he is very in tuned to his potty habits and usually tells us when he "poo poo's". Who knows, we may be potty training earlier than I expected. I've got to say though...I sure am dreading those days!! Any moms out there that have some good advice of methods that worked for their kids??? Here is Ethan after his bath wanting to sit and read on the potty
So...updates with the house...We now have the concrete floors poured in our basement and garage. We've not done anything else this past week. We sorta lost a week and a day because our framer had to finish another job and the rain sorta set him behind too. That's okay because we really needed the rain and it gave Jeremy and I another week to shop (pick out our windows, shop for appliances, etc.) We also got to sneak in a 2 night 3 day trip to my mom and dad's place in the mountains. That was a really nice get-a-way for the three of us and we got to do a little geocaching!! Our framer starts tomorrow morning so we should have some exciting updates over the next few weeks. We'll be able to see walls and rooms. That's when I think it's going to get fun!!! Below are the concrete men working hard to smooth our basement floor.If you look to the right of this man, you'll see a passage door. That is our "storm shelter"!!! We really wanted a good place to go for storms, so what better than a concrete room underground!!! If there's a bad storm in our area, you are welcome to come use our shelter :)Jeremy back filling dirt after his waterproofing job dried.Of course here's Ethan loading dirt with his "tactor" too. Can I just tell you that this boy is all about some dirt and tractors right now!!!

Happy 40th Anniversary Mom and Dad!!!

2007-06-25T09:14:00.000-04:00

To celebrate my mom and dad's 40th anniversary, we all took a trip down to Disney World. My brother, sister-in-law, 3 kids and (one more on the way, due Nov. 4th) met us down there for a week vacation. Disney gave "Happy Anniversary" buttons for my mom and dad to wear to the parks. Ethan's first thoughts of Disney WorldJeff, Jenn, Joshua, Jacob, Jeslyn and (baby J #4)Meeting Daisy DuckMeeting Minny MouseBeing Mickey MouseSeeing Daisy again but meeting Donald Duck for the first time. He wasn't too sure what to think of the Disney characters, but he did great!Meeting Rabbit and blowing him kissesTouching his noseFirst carousel ride...what a big boy!!Jeslyn and Jacob posing for the camera while Jeff and Joshua ride Space MountainEthan's tuckered out after hours of Magic KingdomOn Daddy's shoulders for the light parade. So much to process!! We kept wondering the whole day what he was thinking of Disney World.Here's the gang at Animal KingdomHanging out at our house. A day by the pool...Family picturesWho would have thought we'd run up on a "Hartzog Rd". Had to capture a picture of this!!Traveling back to Georgia, asleep with Mickey
We had a great vacation and a celebration of Mom and Dad's 40 years together. Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad!!

(Now, back home to building our house...)

We have walls...

2007-06-13T14:41:00.000-04:00

These past few weeks have been the start to a VERY BUSY summer for us. As we mentioned in the last blog entry, we are building a house. Contracting it ourselves will save us a lot of money, but there is a lot of work involved. We are so thankful for the timing of this and how God has blessed us so much in this process. When we look back over this past year, we're blown away at how He has worked out every little detail in making this happen for us. When we first started pondering and praying about the idea of moving out here from Newnan, it was hard to process. We loved living in Newnan and really didn't think we'd ever leave, but we were feeling drawn to move to Loganville to live near family. God quickly made things happen for us. We sold our house at our asking price, Jeremy got a new job within 3 weeks of our first mention of moving, and we were given the opportunity to rent from my parents in there new rental house...that JUST came availible at the time we were talking about all this. When we talked about moving, my parents offered to give us land to build on. Since then my dad got his loader/bobcat, which is what has allowed us to save ~ $10,000 in the process of starting the house. So far, Jeremy and my dad have cleared our land, graded it and dug out the basement with the loader. This past week we hired out our first contractor to pour some concrete footings and walls in our basement. Today, seven concrete trucks came in to do job. All this to say that we are so excited of this process and are so thankful for all that God has blessed us with. There's nothing like being where you are supposed to be. If we had any doubts about it, God has made it crystal clear over this past year.

Below are some catch up pictures of our progress...and of course some pretty cute pictures of Ethan.

These first two pictures are of a guy that we hired to come out and bring his portable saw mill and cut our Pine Trees and make some lumber. Our fire place mantle was cut out of this along with hundreds of boards to make a fence. The wood has to cure for a few months and then we'll treat it before it can be used.

Jeremy and my dad digging out the basement and then checking to see if they were levelThe basement all dug out and the footings pouredOur first basement wall being setToday we had seven concrete trucks make their way through our wooded drive to pour our basement wallsMy dad practicing his Spanish with some of the workersIn the midst of our big project...we still do our daily tasks...PLAYING. Here are some new pictures of Ethan. The other night when we got in, we had a few new plants that needed a quick drink of water. As we were taking care of some yard matters, Ethan decided he wanted to play in the water. Memorial Day weekend, we went to the mountains with my parents. From there, we went up to North Carolina to visit my aunt and uncle. Ethan had a great time exploring a new yard with lots of fun things to get into.

If there's water involved, Ethan's got to check it out. Here he is, Nana's big helper.

We're building a house!!

2007-05-24T09:34:00.000-04:00

So our latest project is a big one. We are building a house!! We are going to contract it out ourselves, so we're serving as our own builders...with the help of my dad and some friends. My parents decided to give us some land next to them when we moved back to Loganville. We so graciously accepted and are now the proud owners of 3 acres. We are so excited to finally get this project up and running. After looking through hundreds and hundreds of house plans, over a year and half of time, we found one that we wanted. Even on the plans that we got, we still had tons of changes to make to the plans. We now feel like this is our custom designed house that we're building! We started clearing underbrush and marking trees that we wanted to keep/take down back in February before everything started blooming, growing up and turning green. Then this past month we got serious with the clearing. We now have a lot that we can start to see where it's all going to come together. Below are a few pictures of the process so far.

(Picture #1-Looking up from the driveway, the bobcat is where we're putting the house. You can see where the driveway comes up and then will turn left to go in front of the house)

(Picture #2-In the driveway at the turn, the house is again where the bobcat is, over to the right)(Picture #3-Standing in the driveway in front of the house, looking at where the center of the house will be. The crooked dogwood tree on the left will be about 20 feet from our front porch. Our driveway comes in from the road and then crosses over in front of the house and you enter the garage from the left of the house.) (Picture #4-The pictures above were taken in February, these were a few weeks ago. In this one I'm standing in the driveway where it turns and starts to cross over in front of the house. The house will be up on the right)

(Picture #5-Another shot from that same angle, you can see more is getting cleared out where the house will sit)Our main contractor at work!!
(Picture #6-Okay, this is where the driveway is going to meet where we turn in for the garage, on the upper side of the house. From where this picture was taken, the house will be straight ahead but facing to the right of me, the driveway is coming in from the right and will turn into this little opening which heads up to our garage)(Picture #7-Here is that opening cleared and graveled. )

(Picture #8-If you scroll back up and look at picture #3, you can see this is the same view w/ the crooked dogwood to the left. This helps you see how much has been cleared. Currently those big pine trees in the middle have been taken down. We need a few more updated pictures)(Picture #9- Jeremy driving the bobcat and my dad guiding him in where to move the logs) (Picture #10- Jeremy having WAY too much fun driving the bobcat)Ethan had to sit with Daddy and ride the "tactor" so he calls it

Anyway...this is our latest project so stay tuned for many more months of updates :) I know these pictures are a bit confusing when you really can't comprehend where the house is actually going to be. It's hard to get the big picture from a blog! We'll keep you posted as we go through the steps. Thanks for checking in!

Happy Birthday Jeremy!!

2007-05-20T22:15:00.000-04:00

Saturday was Jeremy's 32nd birthday!! To celebrate, we decided to go for a hike up Stone Mountain. We haven't actually hiked the mountain since we were dating and this was Ethan's first hike/ride of Stone Mountain ever. After some good 'ole strawberry muffins, we packed up and headed to the mountain. We did a little geocaching along the way to the top. Check out the geocaching link to the right if you are curious in one of our favorite hobbies.

Jeremy and Ethan taking in the scenery.My favorite boys!! Ethan shows us how he is a master climber and let me just tell you, the boy climbs on EVERYTHING these days!
Happy Birthday Daddy!!! Stay tuned to another blog of our latest project....

A day at the park

2007-05-10T17:11:00.000-04:00

I spent the day at the park with my friend Rylan Mattox. Mommy and his mommy (Erin) came too. We had lots of fun strolling while mommy and Mrs. Erin walked. Rylan and I had some games we would play while our mommies pushed us...like who could throw a hat or a juice cup the farthest and without our mommies noticing. It was pretty funny!

Mommy asked to see my teeth so I showed her. I think she asks me that when she wants me to smile.Here I was feeding the ducks or whatever those things were. They were as big as me!! Mommy caught me in action, just as I was about to throw some bread.Me and my buddy Rylan.Rylan and his mommy. Mommy wanted for us to take a picture, but I just wasn't interested. I would have rather been digging in the dirt and trying to put acorns in my mouth. I pitched a little bit of a fit when mommy picked me up. I don't think I'm supposed to do that because mommy had to have a little talk with me. Mrs. Erin caught me getting in trouble with the camera.
All better now!! Ready to find the playground!

Prom 2007

2007-05-04T10:43:00.000-04:00

Anyone out there still go to prom?? Well we went last weekend with our friends Josh and Kelly to Loganville's prom. The funny thing was, we had people asking us all night what prom we were going to and we kept having to clear it up that we were not students but that Jeremy and Kelly were teachers. Maybe we're starting to appreciate being mistaken for 18 year olds! We had a nice night out to dress up, enjoy some Blue Willow Inn all you can eat country cooking and the seafood buffet...ummmmm, and a short visit to the prom in Athens. Surprising how kids dress and dance these days. Guess that's a sure sign that we're getting old when you notice things like that!! Hee Hee!! Thanks for checking in.

Ethan and Chocolate Pudding

2007-04-26T19:36:00.000-04:00

Click HERE to see the video!

What a week!!

2007-04-17T16:32:00.000-04:00

We seemed to have had a really rough week of battling the flu, high fevers, no appetite, no energy, and then Ethan developed Roseola (a viral infection that is common in early childhood, very high fevers followed by a rash on the chest, back, neck and face. Once you have it, you have a life long immunity) With our little buddy already feeling so terrible, it was really bad timing to develop Roseola ON TOP DEALING WITH THE FLU!!! I didn't even mention that the rest of our week involved Ethan teething, he's cutting all four of his Cuspid teeth at once, Jeremy's soccer team getting beat out of going to the State Playoffs and we (not going to mention any names, but it wasn't me and Ethan doesn't drive yet) hit a mailbox (that sticks out way too far in the neighborhood) and took off the passenger side mirror on the Odyssey. Yeah that was a little pricey mistake! I think we need another vacation!!!

It's now Tuesday in the next week and we are all doing much better. Thank everyone for your prayers for Ethan's quick recovery. Here is a picture of his rash. It's kinda gross, sorry, but you might be interested to know what it looks like.Here's our little guy feeling much better. He and Daddy were cutting up after dinner the other night and it was so good to see him smiling and laughing, I had to capture a picture of the moment.
Here's Fletcher giving Ethan the look, "Wanna Play?"

Paradise Vacation to Sick Baby Blues

2007-04-10T11:54:00.000-04:00

We spent Jeremy's spring break on vacation in the Florida Keys with our friends Gerald and Tammy and their two boys Miles and Gavin. We stayed in a condo on the island of Marathon, the third island down of the five islands. It was SOOOOO beautiful there!! We had great weather and enjoyed some pool and beach time. This was Ethan's 2nd trip to the beach, but the first one that he could play in the sand and really have fun. Sorry for the overload of pictures, but when you have a digital camera and a baby that likes to play in the sand, you come home realizing that you took over 300 pictures so that makes it a little hard to narrow down which ones to share. We had a great vacation but we were glad to return home last Saturday afternoon after being gone for nine days.
After returning home from a nine day vacation, everything is in disarray, from dirty laundry, to no grocery's in the house, to just trying to get back into routine. After coming home from church Easter Sunday, Ethan started acting a little fussy and wouldn't eat his lunch...just not acting like his normal self. After taking two really long naps, he woke up from one feeling warm. Running a fever Sunday night and Monday morning with no other symptoms, I really didn't think it was more than him just teething. I was out Monday running some errands and Ethan was just fussy and he had started shivering, which I've never seem him do before. I battled in my head about what to do and I just decided to take him on to the doctor and I guessed I'd just be one of those overprotective mom's that can't handle her kid having a fever with teething and I'd have the doctor tell me he was fine. Come to find out...Ethan has the FLU!!! He has the flu and a double ear infection!! What in the world!! Our little boy is so sick!! He's been running fever's up to 105.3 There is nothing worse than having your little baby lying in your arms, lifeless, and burning up. He's taking some medicine that will hopefully shorten the duration of the flu, but she said to expect him to be sick for a good five days. So, if you think about Ethan, please pray for a quick recovery and that his fever might stay down.
Thanks for checking in and I hope you enjoy our vacation photos.

All of us packed into Gerald and Tammy's van like Sardines. Tammy, Gavin(in the infant car seat) and myself in the back, Ethan and Miles in the middle and Gerald and Jeremy in the front. We traveled together from Fort Myers, where they live, to the Keys. About 4.5 hours.

The view outside our condo.

The pool at our condoEthan and Daddy ready to hit the beachEthan could have done this all day long.

Ethan and Miles taking a moment to enjoy the scenery.

Check me out!!Praise the Lord!!Jeremy found the best place of all...the hammockWe drove all the way down to Key West one day. It was another hour from where we were staying. We ate some serious seafood and enjoyed the day walking around checking out all the shops. This was the "Southernmost Point of the US", had to get a picture.

We had to capture a picture of the famous "Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville" Here we are, eating some great Seafood at this restaurant called Turtle something, I can't remember, but it was awesome!!
Ethan had to give it up and catch some zzzzzzzzz's
Here's the gang, minus me. Jeremy and Ethan, Gerald and Miles, Tammy and baby Gavin.

Family photo by the pier
Sunset in the Keys, taken outside of our condo.

Ethan pointing to some birds while I was snapping photos.
Mommy and Ethan walking on the beach

My precious boy!

Family photo in the sand

Wow, I can't remember the last time we had a picture of just us...let's see...probably about 17 months ago :)
Another day at the pool

Easter Sunday

Ethan checking out his basket of goodies from the Easter bunny.

We went over to my mom and dad's after church to celebrate Easter with some good cooking. Jeremy's mom also came to be with us. After such big lunch, we attempted a little Easter egg hunt with Ethan, but this was about the time that he started showing signs of not feeling well. He did have a little fun just picking up and throwing the eggs. I think we are still a year early with him for the egg hunt.

I Caught You!!

2007-03-20T11:21:00.000-04:00

One of Ethan's favorite things to do lately is play in the dirt, of our INSIDE plants. If it's not the plants, it's driving his trucks in the fire place ashes...yeah, that one makes a big mess. He also has this intrest of throwing things into the trash (toys, books, puzzle pieces, trucks, shoes...whatever he can get his hands on) Although very annoying, I've got to say it's pretty cute to see his face when I catch him doing one of these things because he KNOWS he is not supposed to be doing them. As they say..."toddlers get into everything"!

"Yikes...I didn't see you coming!"

"Okay, so you caught me...but this is pretty fun" "This is like a tree with dirt inside the house, you are asking for me to dig in this""Mommy, this is fun!"