What Could Go Wrong?

Clint and I bought a fan in College Station and just recently decided it was time to hang it before it got hot.

What could go wrong?

Clint (an Aggie) asked John (a Wildcat) to help him hang said fan. It was to go in the living room to replace the existing light fixture which couldn't be more than 30 years old or so.

They began by taking the light fixture down. Unfortunately, the hole was too small. No big deal, John has lots of tools! So they make the hole bigger. Oops! Some of the ancient sheet rock cracks. Once again, no big deal! We can fix that easy!

Issue number 2: The existing brace can't take the weight of the fan. No big deal, Clint can get into the attic and put in a new brace.

What could go wrong?

Well, apparently, when you are in a dark attic, it is hard to tell the difference between the joists and the ceiling. So, if anyone would like a sky light, Clint can help you out! Clint decided that while he was up in the attic he would put a sky light in our bathroom.

So, we now have a fan, with no light (because the wires are so old, electricity isn't running to it), no blades (because they need rubber washers that fell out at some point during the move) and a sky light in the bathroom.

What could go wrong, apparently a lot.

Thank you John for having the expertise and tools to help patch the ceiling AND area around the fan. Your experience in handy man work was invaluable! Thank you also to my lovely husband who keeps it interesting around here (and will also eventually get the fan working).

This experience also proved that an Aggie and a Wildcat can get along just fine! Just don't ask them to put a fan up together.

Blair Lee Gaines

Blair Lee made her debut March 17,2009! She weighed 6 lbs. 10 oz. and was 19 inches long. She was about a week early. Kassie and Justin got to the hospital around 12 in the afternoon (with family racing there soon after) and she had Blair around 9:20 that night. Kassie was so amazing and I think Justin did pretty well himself. I only took a few pics but hopefully will have more tomorrow. Unfortunately, Blair had some problems breathing, we only got to see her through the nursery window that night. Around 3:30 in the morning they transported her to Baylor in Dallas and that was really scary. That was a very emotional and sleepless night especially for Kassie and Justin. Luckily, she improved so well the next day they took her out of the NICU and was moved to the normal nursery. Justin called me tonight and she may be going home tomorrow. I'm soooo excited for Justin and Kassie. They are going to make great parents.

(Disclaimer: The pictures are out of order, obviously, I wanted Blair's pic to be first but that didn't happen. And also, Kassie didn't want her pic taken so that's why mama isn't in any of these.)

UNCLE Nathan, talking to Pierson, our cousin's little boy. At this point we were waiting, waiting, waiting....

Can you tell mom is a school teacher? They had a dry erase board in Kassie's room, so mom decorated.

Justin had just told us that Blair had come. You can't tell from this pic, but he definitely had that "new dad" look. It was so precious!

BLAIR LEE!!!! The nurse was putting her under the oxygen hood. She hated that thing. She kept scooting out from under it. Like I said, she was having problems breathing so she was under that thing almost all night. Thank God for nurses and doctors.

The nurse was having to do a lot of work on Blair. She was with her for probably 2 to 3 hours straight. She gave Blair her first bath. Blair was really not happy about that! You can also see some of that dark hair. When I finally got to hold her, I just wanted to hold her forever!

I can't wait to see her again! Sure no one got any sleep Tuesday night and we all missed a few meals (Kassie more than anyone!) but it was absolutely worth it. I love you Blair Lee! Thank God for little babies.

Book Blog

I just finished "Leaving the Saints" by Martha Beck. It is about a woman who grew up in a conservative Mormon household. In fact, her father was a very prominent member of the Church. She left Mormonism later in life and found her own faith. She writes how she grew up in a very dysfunctional family. There was abuse and sexual abuse. When she got older and had kids of her own she began a search for what she truly believed and when she researched some of the Mormon beliefs she felt that they didn't check out. She now believes in God but doesn't attend any type of church and doesn't prescribe to any religion. It was an okay read. She is a little weird for me. It did get me thinking about all the things that I truly believe in and why that is. So in that way it was a very good book. Also, she talked about how she believes God is in everything and I really loved that. Sometimes I get so busy and forget to see God in the little things. A sweet little lady from Curves, rain, my husband's smile, singing to the radio at the top of my lungs...

Ladies Night

Yesterday I said goodbye to the hubs and met up with 2 of my two girl friends. We decided to go to Granbury and shop, eat, etc. We went to a tea room first. I had a bowl of broccoli and cheese soup (yummy) and tea. We then walked around the town square. It's a really pretty town, very historic looking. The shops are all very unique, some were pretty "touristy". We went to a gourmet kitchen accessory shop. It was soooo cool! I could spend a lot of money in there. They had everything you could possibly need for a kitchen. I thoroughly loved it! We also went to D'Vine Wine. They actually make the wine right there in the building. We decided to do a wine tasting and Lindsay was going to buy a bottle of whatever we liked best. The guy that was serving us was an older man and we found out he actually owns the place. He taught us the "proper" way to taste wine. It was really neat because doing it the proper way, made you take a long time drinking each glass. The owner started talking to us and it turns out he is a DO in family practice. He told us he went to TCOM. I told him how Clint is at TCOM and wants to do family prac. Anyway, we were talking so much, he ended up giving us like 5 or 6 wine tastings when we paid for 3. Also, he gave us a full glass of almond champagne. It was soooo yummy! He also gave us 2 bottles of wine for the price of 1. It was really nice of him and we spent probably an hour and a half in there. (Don't worry it was just a tasting so we were fine!) Anyway, I had never done anything like that before and it was a lot more fun than I thought it would be. We then went on home, cooked dinner, watched The Secret Life of Bees, talked some more and went to bed around 3. That was the latest I had stayed up in a loooong time. The next day, all the husbands came over and we ate breakfast. So much fun!

Book Blog

I decided that when I read a book I'm going to post it here. My mom used to (I don't know if she still does) write in a notebook the title of a book when she read it. I remember being amazed at how many books filled that notebook. I thought it was a pretty good idea and have tried to do that in the past. Since this forum is more permanent and convenient maybe I will keep up with it better here.


I just finished "The Prison Angel" by Mary Jordan and Kevin Sullivan. It is about a woman who grew up in Beverly Hills and later in life decided to give it up to go live in a small, cold cell in La Mesa, a prison in Mexico near Tijuana. She grew up Catholic but never liked the many strict rules it imposed. She decided to pave her own path. After 2 divorces the Catholic church would not let her become a nun, so one day, she made her own habit and went to live in the prison. Later on, after many years and hearing of all the amazing things she had done, a bishop let her become a nun. Her main goals were to love and care for the prisoners no matter what they had done. She fought to improve conditions for them and the guards within the prison. She met with everyone from the pope to some of the top men in the drug cartel world. I would definitely recommend the book to anyone. It really shows how pure Love can and should be, free of judgement and misconceptions.

El Paso Trip 2

I'm still new to this blogging thing so I was unable to post all the pics under one post. Anyway, we went to El Paso for Jennee's ( my mother in law) birthday. (Okay, grammatically I know I messed that up, I'm feeling a lot of pressure knowing that an editor, Kayla, reads my blogs.) Anyway, we flew up there Friday afternoon and returned Monday evening. We had a great visit and enjoyed getting to talk and catch up with everyone. Clint and Nick went to shoot guns Saturday morning so I would say that was one of the highlights for him. He also got to play soccer with Connor. Rumor has it Connor whooped up on Uncle Clint...


We went on a walk one day. Lillie and Papa Bill went to go look at a dog that was barking.

Grams showing Lillie the first signs of spring...flowers on the tree.Connor showing Papa Bill the hopscotch he made. I think only Nick, Clint and Connor attempted the hopscotch... It looked pretty hard for us short legged folk.

4 generations

Lillie playing with Grandpa.

The view from Trans- Mountain Road. From up here, you could see into Mexico and New Mexico. We went by the border fence one day. El Paso is right next to Juarez. Nick was saying that the population is like 3 million people. Pretty crazy. It was really great there because there is hardly any humidity. So when it was 75 it really felt like 75!

El Paso Trip

Blowing out Grams' birthday candles. Yea for birthday cake! (Beth told us that Lillie was really excited about cake because Elmo had birthday cake.) Before this, Nick had grilled steaks, asparagus and corn. It was very yummy!

Getting a ride in the Radio Flyer. Lillie loved for Papa Bill to give her rides around the backyard. It was such nice weather we spent many hours sitting outside playing and talking.

Connor and Clint playing a little soccer. Friday night when we got in, we immediately went to watch Connor play his soccer game. His team won! Afterward, we celebrated and went to a local Mexican restaraunt. Lillie taking a look at her shadow. Grams would run a little ways and then Lillie would run to catch Grams' shadow. It was so precious. Don't you wish part of your day was to find your shadow and look for other people's shadows? What an easy life!

Connor and Lillie in the Radio Flyer.