WE ARE BACK!!!!

WE ARE BACK!!!

Yesterday, Jason was texting me while at work and suggested that I start up my blog again. I told him that I thought that was an excellent idea even if it was just for me to use as a journaling/scrapbooking sort of outlet. So...WE ARE BACK!!! We have been going on tons of 'adventures' lately and have tons of new and exciting things going on that I am sure y'all have all seen on Facebook, but here is where you can get more details! 

I recently made a photo book on shutterfly.com and love it! I figure this is a good way to catch y'all up on what has been happening since a little before the hurricane-until now. I will keep back posting a little bit on the major things, but mainly start posting our daily stuff-starting now lol. SO, here is our album...check it out.... http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0SaMXLNq2buZA.

Hope you missed seeing us!!

House Take 2: Sneak Peak

Hey Y'all!
It's been sooo long since I have blogged and life has been somewhat normal. I am so glad to finally be at that point! Here is the scoop!

1. We moved back into our house Wednesday night Dec. 5th. We unpacked a little bit the next morning before we headed to our Anniversary Va-Ca...with Keaton of course who had "hand foot and mouth" and was soooo much fun ;)....then when we came back Friday evening unpacked a little more, and have been making progress slowly but surely. Here is a sneak peak of our "new" house! (oh and Keaton is doing much better!)

Here is the Kitchen and dining area. Sorry the pics are kinda yellow..it's night time and I took these on my phone. 

Living room with our tiled fireplace wall and new furniture, bathroom sneak peak, Keaton room sneak peak, and master closet sneak peak. 

MORE PICTURES TO COME!

2. We had lots of fun as a family making memories this fall even though we were basically homeless for 3 1/2 months. We are truly blessed that we still have each other! That is all I could ever ask for! I LOVE MY FAMILY!

 Here is Nottoway Plantation where we spent our 4 year Anniversary (a little belated celebration lol). It was so beautiful and so great!! I can't wait to go back and learn more about this historic plantation. It is the Oldest remaining plantation in the South and like 2nd in the nation. And it is all original...even most of the furniture. I LOVED IT!

We had lots of fun in the leaves at mom and dad's and at the Rich's, and we loved hitting up all the playgrounds! :) Plus the zoo. :) 

That is really about it in a nutshell. We are so excited, grateful, and blessed to be home; especially for Christmas! It is the best present I could hope for. I have had lots of time to reflect on what this life is really about and what is important. I have always known my answer, but I believe in it even more firmly now. I am so happy grateful for all of my friends, family, and temporal belongings we have. I have learned so much from this experience and have truly received more out of it than I have lost. I thank my Heavenly Father for giving us this trial. I hope we have passed it well. I am so happy to know that we have a strong family and that together we can get through anything. There have been so many people, prayers, scriptures, and quotes that have gotten us through this challenging time. One of my favorites I would like to share is...

FAITH

 in God 

Includes

FAITH

in His Timing. 

-Neal A Maxwell 

Thank you everyone for your thoughts and prayers! I am so eternally grateful for them and for you! THANK YOU!

More scoop coming soon!

Halloween, House sneak preview, and Parties!

Our Rich Life continues! :) So it looks like the Rich family will be moving back home before Thanksgiving! We have come such a long ways! We now have floor, primer on the walls, baseboards and doors should be here next week, cabinets the following week, then countertops and hardware, and then our furniture, and then us!! So excited!

We have lots of new and exciting things to show also!

1. Furniture- We ordered furniture today! (we had a crazy day of running around ( I really don't enjoy leaving the house before 9 a.m. and not getting home until almost 8 p.m., but we have accomplished so much!)

2. We decided to do a glass tile accent wall on the space around the fireplace! It is going to look amazing! It will look like this house on st. charles ave. in downtown NO!! :) The house appraised for $500, 000!! (picture in top left of above collage)

3. Play-group Halloween Party! Robyn Loader did a fantastic job, all the kids looked great, and it was so good to see all my mommy-wifey friends!!

4. We went to a work Halloween party this week which was so awesome! Courtney had the house decorated so amazingly, and the food was incredible looking (pictures below!), and it was really enjoyable! (these pics were on jason's phone and it was dark outside, but I hope you can still tell how cool everything was!) So PINTREST!

5. Church  Halloween Party tonight! We showed up just in time for Trunk or Treat! Everyone looked sooooo great!! I will post some pictures to my Facebook. Our little Rubble family had a blast though despite the cold (that i was not expecting to last, nor prepared for this morning when we left the house for the day). lol

6. This week is Halloween of course! And Jason's birthday!!! We are going out trick-or- treating together for Keaton's first official trick-or-treat experience! I am so excited! We also need to carve pumpkins this week!

7. Life isn't all hunky-dory all the time, but I definitely choose to focus on the happy and the good, so I won't vent about the crazy stuff that has been happening with insurance, being scammed online trying to order Jason's bday present, Keaton's big accident, etc. lol That is enough said. Everything will work out! :)


Hopefully I will have some more fun stuff to share next week!

This next week, we will officially have lived with friends longer than we have lived in our new house. Wow! It is crazy how time flies, how many emotions that sentence brings on, and how far we have to go. All the things I thought would be done by now, haven't even been started. It is frustrating, yet I know we are so blessed and have truly come quite a ways. I know it will all have gone by fast in the grand scheme of things, but right now...it couldn't be going any slower.

In the mean time, I have had lots of things to keep me busy!:

 1. CRAFTS! :Y'all thought my last blog post contained a lot of crafts....guess what...I have even more to show now lol We have re-decorated Marie's whole room. We made a rug (it took like a week lol), wall hangings, blanket. pillow, and curtain valence. We even took the pink curtains that were hanging in my house when we bought it (no..Jason wouldn't let me keep them for Keaton's room ;) ) and we put them in Marie's room. They work great!!!

2. KIDS: Of course these little munchkins provide constant entertainment in my life and I love them! They are so cute together and play so well....even though sometimes they do stress me out and are, as Mary calls them, "stage 5 clingers'. They are so cute in their big kid carseats, clothes, shoes, and even walking home from the bus stop! (glimpse into the future!!!.... ) We walked with Mary's sister's kids home from the bus stop.... our kids were so cute walking with the big kids. They got a little left behind though...short legs.

3. WEDDING: Mary's sister wedding is in like 16 days! We have been going to bridal showers, bridal photo sessions, thinking about rehearsal dinners, bachelorette party, and of course the bid day itself! It is so fun! I even got to practice my photography at Amy's bridal session. I am not very good, but I was quite impressed with the shots I did get (as I tried not to be in the way  and lay low lol) It was so fun getting to help put the blanket out for her to stand on, move props around, fix her hair and dress, the whole experience was fun to me! I never did bridals so I definitely think I lived a little vicariously through Amy that day hahaha ( I hope she didn't mind!) Her pictures at the Houma Plantation are beautiful and I can't wait to post them. They are finished, but I want to wait for her permission :) Here is the plantation though.

4. ACTIVITIES: We have been playing volleyball, ping pong, running errands, and going to community events such as "Battle for the Paddle" Gumbo and Jambalaya Cook-Off in St. Charles Parish. This kid won't eat jambalaya or gumbo at home.. but when all these people are eating it...why not right lol. Crazy kid! He definitely got to vote for his favorite :) We loved going with the Guilfou's and seeing the Davis and Hall families. :) We miss them!

5. HOSPITAL and SICK:  Sweet little Marie had to go to the hospital due to a scary episode she had at the house we believe to be a result of her 15 month old shots, and "fists disease". She is doing much better now. It was a crazy day/weekend for her parents, but she is much better now. However, now, Mary is sick, and Keaton is sick. Hopefully it will all pass in time for their big trip tomorrow.


6. CANADA: No...I'm not going to Canada, but Mary and Russell are! I am so excited for them! It is work related, but they will be able to visit friends, go on tours, etc. It is going to be such a great experience for them I hope. I really am going to miss them, but am very excited for them and have enjoyed hearing about all of their plans.

7. CELEBRITY STALKING:   My obsession with Swamp People has lead to stalking. I was elated seeing Troy and Jacob Landry at Mardi Gras in the Napoleon Parade. I was like a 12 year old who just saw Justin Beiber! Now... I have moved on to stalking since I can't wait for more swamp people (season 4!!), so when we were in Houma...I had to stalk J. Paul and R.J. We happened to drive passed the gym where J.Paul trains for boxing... I freaked and Mary I know thought I was crazy....little does she know! Then, she told me she and J.Paul went to the same high school. He graduated the year after her. So of course when we were in Houma we just happened to drive by J. Paul's...I mean... Mary's high school ;)

I know I know...I'm a creeper! I will try to back off lol ;) ....

Well that's the scoop! I don't know what I will do without the Guilfou's for 10 days!! Hopefully life isn't completely boring without them. I may go crazy though! And, I hope things start progressing with the house. 

Holla at me Y'all! 

Crafts, Kids, House Stuff, and Fun

Our "Rich Life" has definitely had some bumps in the road recently, but I am happy to say that our spirits are still high, we are keeping busy, and things are progressing!  We don't know a definite finish date for our house, but we are hoping before Thanksgiving!! It will definitely be bitter/sweet since we are having so much fun at the Guilfou's!!! We pretty much do everything together, and I can't really imagine life without them!!

Here is what we have been up to:

1. Crafts:
We have had a couple of birthdays that we have crafted for
1. Mary (we made her a painting for her kitchen wall.... it's behind the present parade in the picture )  :)
2. Braelyn who just turned one (we made her a bow hanger for her hair bows).

 And a wedding:
3. Amy LeBlanc (Mary's sister) who is getting married on the 27th and her bridal shower was this weekend. We made her a collage.

And...
4. I made a collage for Keaton's Dr. Seuss room :)
5. And a fabulous door hanger for outside my dad's classroom :)

I learned that Mary is so crafty and didn't even know it! I think we have created some monsters!! We already have our next projects lined up!@ :)


2. Kids:
These kids are so cute! They crack me up! They are so happy to see each other first thing in the morning and when they wake up from naps....they hug, kiss, and hold hands. They love riding in the truck together and tickle each other, share snacks, and just have a blast! They definitely love to be mischievous together-taking mud baths, eating grass, eating dirt, eating mulch....lots of eating haha! They are lost without each other.

Here are some pics from this week....

"Just the two of us"

Chillin, eating, and sweet Marie! Keaton does what ever she does, and what every she wants him to do ;)

 Botany Class 101: 

they love picking grass, clovers, and dirt. They have discovered lots in their botany research lol

Rainbow Rice: 

The kids love this rainbow rice (even though all we had was green). The rice didn't stay in the bucket long by itself as you can see. But they loved spreading it around, scooping it, and of course sharing ;) ;) 

3: House Stuff: 

We are so lucky to be one of the first in the community to receive our insurance money. We were ahead of the game and it is definitely a blessing and paying off. Hopefully we will have enough and everything goes smoothly. Things are really starting to progress! It has been a long 6 weeks, but we are finally seeing the light. We signed a contract with our contractor, there is sheet rock in our house ready to be installed, we ordered flooring that should be here by Friday and unloaded at our house so it will be ready when the contractor is ready, we should have our quote today from 'the cabinet guy' (as we call him) and from the countertop company, and we are starting to plan out paint colors and things. Here is what we are looking at :)

1. There is the dumpster outside our house! Good sign! Work is about to begin!

2. There is the sheetrock in the bottom picture; ready to be installed

 NOT THE BEST PICS, BUT...

3. The granite on the left, and the one in the middle are options for the kitchen countertops. (There will also be a better pic of the left one in my next blurb about "fun") It isn't really yellow like that. We are trying to decide which one we like best. It will go with The "Cordovan" color cabinet on the far right. It will most likely be the recessed cabinet like that too.

4. The bathroom will be: expresso cabinets like in the top left pic, framed mirror, square sinks (but set in the countertop), and white granite kind-of like the pic in the bottom right. (the little sample I have like the other two isn't photographing that well)

We are very excited to receive the quotes today, and our floors should be in by Friday which are beautiful Mahogany Porcelain Wood. 

4. FUN: 

We had cupcakes for Mary's birthday, bridal shower, Braelyn birthday party, football party, eating Mexican at La Carretta's (owned by our neighbor), volleyball games (and home practice every night), ping pong tournaments, company, cooking lots of good food and desserts, shopping, playing with babies, FHE at the Hall's, Avengers movie night, etc.! It has been GREAT!!! 

Even though we are going through the biggest trial we have in our married life thus far, I couldn't ask for more, I couldn't be happier, we couldn't be luckier, we couldn't have better friends and family....

We are truly blessed and have a wonderful "Rich Life"!!

Food, Friends, Football, and Fun

These past couple weeks haven't really been too hard, but they haven't been too easy either. This was the first week where I felt more at ease! Here is what we have been up to.

 #1 ) Food: We have been cooking lots of food! We are staying at Mary and Russell Guilfou's house and have had tons of REAL cajun food! Homemade!! It has been fantastic!! Monday we had red beans and rice, Thursday we had jambalaya from Jason and Russell's work jambalaya cooking contest, and this weekend we had the most AMAZING gumbo!! Here are some pics!

#2) Friends: We have the most AMAZING friends!! Our Jefferson Ward friends came out to help us gut our house and worked so hard! Our amazing friends the Davis family evacuated with us and then still aren't tired of us! (that is amazing!!) And, we have stayed with our amazing friends the Loaders all last week. And now, we are staying with our amazing friends Russell and Mary! They are so great! Mary and I have now become sister wives...in the sense of cooking, cleaning, working, shopping, and taking care of the kids...no husband sharing though lol We have played volleyball, games, xbox, etc. and have had a blast. Keaton even loves his little friend Marie. She is only a week older than him and they get along so well....well Keaton follows her around all day...but I think they will be lost without each other when we leave. :) They are just so cute! Yall check it out...

You can see what a great influence Keaton is on Marie too ;) 

#3) Football:  The house is filled with football talk on the weekend! I have been thinking of making a canvas art piece for the house that says "we interrupt this marriage to bring you...FOOTBALL"! Thankfully I have a sister wife to keep me company! :) and the kids. 

We recently ran the Saints Season Kickoff 5k. It was great! My first 5k ever...and it went pretty well...despite: 

1. me never running more than 2 miles at one time in my life 

2. never have run in the morning 

3. leaving the house at 6:30 a.m. and not going to bed the night before until after midnight haha 

4. not eating breakfast before we left because we thought there would be some 

5. wearing black while running in the Louisiana heat and the sun beating down

6. me not having a set pace yet...since I didn't get to finish my training program before the race due to Hurricane Isaac.

We did finish in a decent time...Keaton slept the whole race...and Jason got #1 in the 40 yd. dash out of 4,080 people!!! Here are some pics.

#4) Fun:  We have just been having lots of fun here! Between crazy running errand trips, games, sports, cooking, mud baths, regular baths, rain baths, football, and just playing...we have had a blast! Keaton has for sure! Check out the little ham.

I need to think of a good way to sign off every time I finish a blog...it's gotta be cajun/southern/fun!... I got it!

Holla Back Y'all!

Lately

So much has gone on these past 3-4 weeks! I can't believe we have been basically homeless for that long lol Lots of good, bad, ugly,happy, sad, fun, etc. has been happening.

I will fill you in!:

1) News of hurricane Isaac hitting Louisiana came and we decided to evacuate. This definitely proved to be a good idea. So, we packed our things and our friends Aly and Michael Davis and evacuated to Hattiesburg Mississippi. We thought at the longest we thought we would be in Hattiesburg for 2 or 3 days. We were there for a whole week.  This was fun, but as Aly said in her blog, there wasn't much going on haha we just kind of relaxed.

 Saturday September 1st, we came home to discover that our new home (we bought 9 weeks ago) had been flooded. The neighborhood and whole town was affected and looked so sad. It was a long, hard weekend of work getting our house taken care of. We couldn't have done it without our friends, the elders, and members of our church. We thankfully and luckily got the whole house gutted in about 3 days!! We definitely lost a lot of temporal/personal belongings...most would say we lost everything. I feel that way, but at the same time...I am not sad. I am so happy that I made it out with my family, and that is what is most important to me. Things will all work out! We are so lucky that we have flood insurance, good friends to stay with, and lots of love and support!!!

We have been fortunate to have our contractor already come and look at our place and we hope to sit down with him to make a plan and start work on Monday or Tuesday this upcoming week!!! Our advance from insurance has come in, we have a wonderful place to stay with friends, and things are going great!  I feel like it's going on forever and it is, but at the same time it is all going so well! Being patient is hard, but I know it will be worth it and all work out in the end :)

2) I got to spend some time with my sister Amanda and my mom last weekend which was much needed! I definitely needed their emotional love and support. They drove all the way down just to see me! I am so lucky to have the best family ever! They have done so much for us in demolishing our house, taking and helping salvage some of our clothes and things, coming down whenever we need them, and just coming down to make sure we are ok. I love them sooooooo much!! I am eternally grateful for them :)

3) Staying with Russell and Mary Guilfou is so wonderful! We have so much in common and our kids are only one week apart! They are loving being each other's playmate and having someone to share snacks and toys with lol. They are such a wonderful family! I have no idea how we will repay them (or anyone who has helped us)! Mary and I call each other "sister wife" and I am definitely going to miss her when we go back to our own homes. There home is set up pretty much just like ours, so we feel right at home. They even have the exact same bed that we had at home in their spare room!! I am so eternally grateful that Heavenly Father has placed them in our lives!!

4) We are making so many great memories this summer...and now fall....I don't know what else to say. All the little things going on are going well...these were the big things. I haven't blogged in so long! I don't know where to start, and where to end. haha

Later! ;)