Ugh! Vanessa dear someone once told me you have to be smarter than the object you are operating-Well Blogger is kicking my but! I'm a blog tard...it's official.
So I did what you told me and it's not showing on this page? It shows up on my dashboard under the layout page but then doesn't show up on my page??? Any ideas?

our summer in review so far

Yea Darrick!! He's 18 and getting the taste of Freedom upon Graduation!! Yea!!
that's right! Bubba graduated this year!! Class of '09! We are so proud of him!! He worked very hare for this and he conquered!! Great Job Bubba!! You will go far in life with the determination, talent, character, personality and drive that you posses! I love you so much!!!! xoxoxoxoxoxo

....awwww....summer...sigh....
The fresh smell of plastic toys, sunscreen and coconut oil. The feel of chlorine dried skin, and the look of golden brown skin!!!! I Love summer!! I had diligently been working on fixing the pool up for our summer fun-We have such hot days here that you can't pass up the pool.

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~random question for the collard girls~
Do you two remember the time Daesha and I would take to set up a "Water Park" in our front yard?!?!?! I was telling Josh about this and how much fun we use to have as kids!! Ha Ha just a fun memory!!
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Our pool is such a blessing! We love having pool parties. We've been lucky enough to have our College Bible study group ( the one we are helping run) at our house a few times this month, so one of the times we had a big pool party and BBQ. It was a Blast!! Our home is set up to entertain-we think the people who added on to it were definitely fun people-and we'd love to meet them. :) ha ha. We had people playing karaoke, Wii games, and lots of pool fun. And no. ...no one jumped off of our roof into the pool. that would be to stressful for Josh and I. NOT! Unfortunately I have not brought my trembling body to actually jump. The ladder shakes as I come down it backwards an hour later.... :( One day! One day my friends. ha ha. That's one of my goals this summer-Look the fear in the face and leap right at it!!

The Boys!




This June we've had two friends leave to missions!! I know this next part sounds all snooty, but to protect the innocent the names cannot be mentioned ? ha ha. They are going to countries who have underground missions basically. So just a shout out to them and a prayer request for each of the on their journeys. Hopefully they are able to plant seeds....God Bless Friends :) We Love them!!
The hopeless feeling some have had thrown upon them in this economy is so harsh. I have started volunteering at a shelter here in Tucson called The Giving Tree Outreach. I was cutting an older man's hair as he tells me his story...Homeless, and without a vehicle any more, he woke up around 4 am to ride his bike many hours, in our heat, just to get his free hair cut. He was one of the nicest men. He was so grateful to receive a hair cut that He kept telling me to do as I wanted because "He was just grateful...not choosy". He was telling me how he had to get his hair cut to look nice for his passport photo he would be taking the next day. He had lost it and was headed by bus to Mexico. Homeless himself, He goes to Mexico to (volunteer) work building ranches for others to come together and live in. OH! that's when I started sobbing inside.... He builds houses for others when HE doesn't even have one. This man he has it figured out. .....Unconditional Love. I hope I get the privilege to speak with him again.
Right now me helping at the shelter is a little sketchy without employment because of state board. So please Pray nothing would happen to prevent me from helping there. Plus communication between The director and me has been stopped for right now. so I guess if I am suppose to be there I will be and if not then another opportunity like this I will just have to search for.
Our friends baby, Levi, is doing so much better. he was in the NICU at the hospital with his little respiratory distress going on. That was a time of many positive thoughts being sent his way, and the community getting together to help the rest of the family that couldn't go to the hospital. Thank goodness God isn't done with him here. :) Way to pull through our mighty soldier!!

The Breakfast Club

Josh and I just celebrated a friends wedding and got to celebrate our anniversary as well. Congrats Rachel and Alex!! That night as we watched you two we were thinking back to our special night and how you two will be in our spot in a little over a year. We stayed up there that night and celebrated our one year and two month anniversary :) The place we stayed at was amazing!! The whole exterior of the hotel/resort was lined in triangular cone like shapes with flat tops.

Of course the first thing out of my mouth, knowing my husband, was "look honey! they under estimated your sneakiness!" an inside kind of joke from a movie. He says "I could scale these walls-I want to climb these walls!!" the challenge in his eye was very intriguing and curious for me. I love my little ninja....Boys never grow to be men....they will always be little boys. So I got a picture of Joshy climbing the wall :) Ha Ha and who had to follow...? Me!! I did it to. It was a fun little dream of us being secret agents....oh the imagination we have together is something different. ha ha!! anyways, we had an absolute blast with each other ending our time there in sappy happiness and pure bliss....

Danarae: Danarae gazes up to Josh's eyes in adornment and hugs tightly to his arm as they walk away. "I'm so blessed to have you...." Taking her cheek and pressing to his bicep as she looks into the sun of the mid day.... (ha ha)

Joshua: Josh following quickly with "I know I am...." He looks down at her and kisses her head adoring her.

Awwwww....I know we're sappy. But were still newlyweds!!

Well June is now coming up to it's last week. Those are most of the highlights I can think to share with you all....June has been another great adventure for us. We hope it has been for all of our friends and family as well.
Love you all! Take Good Care!!
xoxo

Our Babies....

Oh how I yearn to have children....But until then, these are my babies! I love them to pieces!! Shadow and Shaeda.
They are the runts of the bunch and that's how I chose them :) They are brendal boxers w/ a little lab in them. You can't tell their siblings at all? ;) awww...they had such flattering figures back then. Now they are much more comfortable in their own skin :) We're working on a dog run for them in the back, until then....exercise? what? maybe we can turn them into swimmers?!
REMISSION!!! YEA!!!! Shadow has had Valley Fever which is a very common thing in the desert. Many animals get this as well as us humans. So far only shadow has had it. He's strong and resilient though. His v.f. is now in remission!! He is a different dog. He has so much more energy. He has the strength to not limp on his back leg anymore also!! He is using his leg alot more :) basically with every step he takes now. :)

Teaching Shaeda to swim! Getting shadow in too!

Ok the pics of the kiddos aren't uploading so we'll try other pics of the pool. This is us working on the Pergola. What a wonderful gift from Josh's parents that he had never used. The pergola has gone through many changes. One storm came crashing it into the pool even. So this is us putting it back up. It's now secured to the brick wall. Can you see grandpa in the background? Gotta give him something to do on a trip-he has to stay busy or he gets into trouble.
I wish you girls could plan a trip together to come visit us for the weekend one time your down with Bethany!! That would be such a fun reunion!! Or maybe we could have a family reunion for all of us including our parents and all!! What a hoot that would be!! You guys won't believe what a wonderful person Darrick has grown up to be. He is SO funny!! and So caring!!

finished grass, lots of kiddo's and a pool

So Darrick, I call him Bubba, was in one of his Mohawk phases during these pictures. Can you believe how big he is?!?!?! He just graduated from High School! I can't believe my little brother is all grown up?!

Our House

One of the first suprises....shouldn't suprise anyone really. :) A dirt patch and a girl longing for green...Grass! My brother, my family and his friends really helped me here!! Tucson...brown...desert? what? I thought I could lay the sod and prepare the ground all by myself but appearantly it was taking me all day as you can see by the dark photo. ha ha! The boys came in to save the night and then decided themselves it was better off done in the morning :) ha ha!

The next day I had alot of kiddo's coming to play in our pool. I'll show some of these photos cause you can see the pool and the grass finished in them both :) I wish you girls could bring your kids here to learn to swim!!! Just thought I'd plant an idea for a trip!! :)

Pictures! Pictures! Pictures!!!! Here they come!!

Oh How I love the people who devote their lives to making camera's more special and technically advanced!! I don't always put my camera's (or the computer at that) full abilities to use, so...now I am. Here are random pictures for you gals. I'll try and put little updates on each of them :)
In the beginning...ha ha. So I'm not sure how I'm going to do this in chronological order but I do want to share some more photos with you guys-so bear with me. :)
Back to in the beginning...Josh moved down here to Tucson from Sierra Vista and this is the house we bought. :) We thought this was a funny touch when we ran off to get married :) One day I'll have to put our story on here, It's really amazing. I'm just time rushed right now. So since we have the trip to Vegas on here and some wedding photos I'll start adding house pics now.
When your momma is the Realtor-she fights to get you into the house early and hard. We moved in that night everything was a go! We couldn't wait!! Now we weren't married yet so we saved our master bedroom for when we did get married and we slept in the two other bedrooms of the house! So hard but so worth the wait!! I highly recommend saving your self until marriage even in those circumstances. anyways, the whole decorating OUR bedroom once we got hitched was so fun!! Josh was gone on a work trip to Germany and I was at home decorating and having a blast doing surprises for him at the house. We had thought it out and planned what colors and where we wanted things but other than that he was so lenient and let me do what I favored. (I guess I can only add two pics so i'll just keep making new posts?)

Without a roadmap.

Things come along in life that are unexpected and, we will find ourselves at a crossroad. Afraid. Confused. Without a roadmap. The choices we make in those moments can define the rest of our days. Of course, when faced with the unknown, most of us would rather turn around and go back. . But once in awhile people push on to something better-something found just beyond the pain of going at it alone and just beyond the bravery and courage it takes to let someone in. Or to give someone a second chance. Something beyond the quiet persistence of a dream. Because it's only when you're tested that you discover who you truly are. And it's only when you're tested that you discover who you can be. The person you want to be does exist, somewhere on the other side of hard work, faith and belief, and beyond heartache and fear of what lies ahead. -One Tree Hill