How long has it been?

I know it has been quite a while since I have posted. A lot has happened. After our fun adventure in my last post, Joe got the job and we packed up and moved from our home in Duncan to St. Johns. It was kind of hard for me. Even though our house was still in the middle of remodel stage, I loved it and the little town of Duncan but I am very, very happy to be back in St. Johns with my family. It's nice to have my sisters around to go and hang out with when I get bored. We haven't got the internet at our house yet so that is my excuse for not posting sooner. I have a lot to post about, and I will. I am still alive, I promise!!!

Just a silly story

Today Joe and I went to Tucson for Joe to get a physical done for his new job. It seemed to take forever so I was relieved when we finally made it out of the office and back to the car. As I was setting my word cross book in the back seat I noticed Tad's car seat was missing. Darrells was still there but Tad's was gone and we were missing two maple long johns out of our donut box! So we did a quick assessment of the car and nothing else was missing. I had my wallet in there under the seat and nothing was taken out of it. Joe had a trunk full of tools and none of them were gone, but we had an envelope with all of the paper work from Joes drug screen in it and it was moved so I thought they went through it and it had Joes social security # on it. So we decided to call the police so we had a claim # just in case anything came up missing later that we hadn't noticed.

So this sweet cop lady gets there and she asks what is missing and we tell her our little boys car seat and two donuts. She asked if that was all and we told her yes and she got the description of the carseat. You could tell it took all she had not to bust up laughing, but she asked, " Ummm, what kind of donuts were they?" hahaha! I felt like such a dork! We reported missing donuts!!! Anyway there wasn't anything else to do so we went and ate then headed home.

We were almost out of Tucson when Joe gets a call on his cell phone. It was a lady from the clinic we were at. She asked if she was talking to Joe Sanders and he said yes and she told him please listen to my story so I can explain. She was going to have to work late and she needed her dad to pick her little boy up from the baby sitters. She told him to come and pick up the carseat at the clinic so he had it to for the little boy. (I watched the nurse carry the seat into the clinic while I was waiting for Joe.) She had waited about two hours and her dad still hadn't picked up the carseat so she called him and asked if everything was o.k. because he hadn't picked up the seat. He told her everything was fine, he HAD gotten the seat out of her car and was at home with her son. She too has a Silver Honda Civic! He had gotten into our car and taken our carseat thinking it was his grandsons and helped himself to our maple donuts!!!! Oh we had a pretty good laugh all day. She offered to mail it to us but we just told her we need to buy a booster seat for Darrell anyway and to give it to someone or throw it away! hahaha! WHAT ARE THE CHANCES?

Driving Miss Daisy

Well, more like get it FIXED, so I can drive Miss Daisy! We went to my parents for a few days and Joe and my dad were outside walking around the yard and this is what they found!


My dad hurried and snapped these with his cell phone so the quality isn't the greatest but they are so stinkin cute! Darrell drug the little car onto the ramps and while he was "fixing it", Tad jumped in and waited patiently for his car to run again! They are so funny. Darrell has been in the FIX IT kind of mood for the past month. The other day he came up to me with his tool bag and said, " Mom, I have work to do!" and proceeded to climb in the cupboard under the sink and "fix it!"

MUD FIGHT!!!!!

I know, I know, all of the pictures I post of my kids are of them doing something to get dirty. I have come to the conclusion they are just "NATURALLY DIRTY!" I bathe them at least 3 times a day (Not exaggerating) but they always seem to find a way to get dirty again. I think I will have to nick-name both of them PIG-PEN like off of Peanuts. (Was that the dirty kids name?)

This time was fun to watch. We have a well in our front yard that isn't working very well so we let it run as long as it will on our pecan trees to try to clean it out. Darrell and Tad started out by just driving their trucks through the mud and then it turned into a full blown MUD WAR! They had so much fun, I couldn't stop them. Why should I? I figure dirt can't hurt them and it washes off!

He's to sweet!

Darrell has been saying some cute things lately. He has quite the imagination. This morning though has been my favorite so far. I am always telling him how much I really Love him and he usually says "No!" and he won't say it back. This morning I was laying on the couch and he came over and rolled up on the couch with me and looked at me and smiled and said " Mom I really Lub you!" It was so cute. He is funny. He is a Sunbeam now so while he was waiting for primary to start, he got bored so he went over to our secretary that had just gotten her binder out of the closet and he said, " Hey whad ja find!" It probably isn't as cute to everyone else but his little personality is so sweet. He is going to be our class clown. He does everything he can to get you to laugh.

Darrell, I really Lub you too!

By the way, we know FOR SURE Joe will keep his job. WHEW! Thanks for the prayers!

Mondays the day...

I haven't posted in so long I figured I had better post something even if it is just ramblings. Things have been a little tense around our little town this past month and I need to vent or I am going to have a serious meltdown.
Freeport-McMoran (the mine in Morenci that Joe works for) announced a month ago that there was going to be a mass layoff. The price of copper is below production cost and I guess they figure laying off a ton of people is going to solve the problem. They didn't give anyone a clue as to who was going to get layed off. They offered an early retirement package and this past week Joe brought home a paper offering a deal for anyone who would leave voluntarily. Pretty much the only thing keeping our little town alive is the mine. It is the main source of employment. The air in the town is heavy. You can feel the stress and tention anywhere you go and the only thing anyone talks about is this layoff. Well Monday is the day they will start to let people go. My heart is heavy when I think of all of the families I know that could be effected. It makes me sad to think the future for these families our little town could be grim. They are going to layoff 1550 people so who knows what the outcome will be. That is about half of the mine.
I don't like posting negative things on my blog because I hate to dwell on the negative. The only reason I am posting this is to ask for your prayers for the people that are going to be effected by this. Not us imparticular but for the whole group. I know there is going to be a lot of anger and contention all next week and I am hoping nothing to serious happens. If you are a reader of this blog and you or any of your family members work for Freeport, know that our prayers are with you. Thank you all for everything you do.

ALL ABOARD!!!

We have this great family that lives in Duncan that adopted us. Joe used to work for this family when he has a lot younger and they adopted him then and the kids and I were adopted as we came along. They got us tickets to ride the Polar Express Train for Christmas this year because they knew how fascinated the boys are with trains. It was such a sweet gift and we can't thank them enough.
I don't know who was more excited to ride a train, Darrell and Tad or ME! They had so much fun. We boarded at 6:30 p.m. and they gave all of us hot chocolate and chocolate chip cookies. They read the Polar Express book to us on the way to the North Pole. After about 30 minutes we got to the North Pole and we saw SANTA! Who knew he would still be around. He got on the train and visited all of the train cars. He gave each of the kids their very own bell. Darrell and Tad LOVE them! The ride back was for 30 more minutes and we sang Christmas Carols and had a ton of fun. It was to stinkin' cold to put them in their pajamas so we looked like hum-bugs in regular street clothes. Oh well. We are going to go back but I think next time we are going to go all the way to the grand canyon and stay the night then come back the next day. These aren't all of the pictures I wanted to post some are on another camera so I will post them as soon as I can get them.

Joe, Darrell, and Tad

Our Conductor

Darrell, so excited to finally be on the train

Joe and Tad on the train

They had so much FUN!

Darrell with his Hot Chocolate, Tad didn't want to drink his.

Darrell getting his bell from Santa

Darrell with his bell

Tad with his bell.

Outside the Train Depot they had tons of amazing lights

Their Bells