Mexico Trip

It has been a while since I have posted, but I wanted to share some of the pictures that we got while we were in Mexico. Quite interesting on some of the facts that we learned about.

The Mayan Ruins that we went to were very interesting. You can see some of the carvings that they did in the rock to preserve their heritage. In the tallest pyramid there is a smaller pyramid inside along with a red statue that we were not able to see, but were told that those two things were still intact. The geologists state that some of these statues date back before Christ. Very interesting!

Friedel, Mark and myself went to Mexico on a cruise to go and see this Mayan Ruin. Friedel and I were there this past spring and we went to a different Mayan Ruin, but to get the information regarding both of these sites it was great.

The sun sets on the cruise was beautiful as well.

2nd stage of yard work

Mark has successfully removed the bushes from the side of the house. Now he will remove the stumps and then we are going to transplant a couple of other items to this area, so that we are not losing all of the vegetation around our home. A lot of work by Mark and NOPE I did not help with cutting, but I did move some smaller branches of these bushes.

With Land comes WORK!!

We have had our home now for a year. With this almost one acre comes work. Mark wanted to have some land so that he could do what he wanted to accomplish. WELL, with this land comes work. Mark loves being outside and working. The work will be on going all the time, but as we go, we try to see what it might look like in the future. Mark is cutting down the bushes on the Stoker side of our home. We will pull out the bushes and their roots and then we are thinking we will French Drain around the house and then we will replant plants in this area that will not grow as quickly as they have. The first set of pictures is when we first moved in. We trimmed the bushes back straight across and with the second set of pictures you can see that the bushes have grown quite a bit. Should be fun and it will look nicer when we have fully accomplished what we want to do.

Round 2 for Mark's POND

As you can see, Mark is putting together another option for his pond idea. He really does DO A GREAT JOB on the projects that he does. You can see in the previous postings what he was thinking about, BUT, this one has more thought and a bit more easier to keep up. This is Mark's reward for still having to cut the grass with a push lawn mower. The pond will about 3 feet deep and Mark is going to place some heavy duty black plastic in the bottom of the pond and then make a ledge around the entire pond, so if I want plants in the pond, then we can do that. The paving stones going across is going to be able to support a riding lawn mower that Mark will get eventually. The project will be completed by sometime in the spring of 09.

Joe's Wedding

On September 20, 2008, Joesph Kent Jackson got married. It was a BEAUTIFUL Wedding and Kelly made a most Beautiful bride, but all of the family looked wonderful and happy. They had beautiful weather and everyone appeared to be having a good time. It was fun talking with people that I had not seen in years and then to see all of the Jackson young adults and catch up on their lives and what they have been doing. Over all, it was a wonderful time to be had by all.

Hott family update

Mark and I went to HI with two other couples that we knew and took a cruise. If you want to see HI and several different islands of HI, that is the way to go. It was beautiful. On our last day on the islands, 2 of the couples decided to rent scooters and go and scoot around and out to a couple of water falls. We did not make it out of the parking lot. I told mark that I did not get a good feeling about doing this activity, but Mark wanted me to at least try. I have never been on a scooter, motor cycle, moped or anything of that sort. I crashed their scooter, tore myself up really good and told myself that I will never again try something like that. I will walk, or rent a car before I do that again. I had a big GOOSE EGG on my chin and bruised myself up something awful. I cannot remember how i got back to the ship, or to my cabin. I can remember telling mark to make sure that I took 3 aspirin when we got back to the cabin and 2 every 4 hours until we landed back in Alabama. Hence forth, I did not have any blot clots any where, but I did break my right hand and had surgery on it last week and I am off for a while until it heals like the dr wants. You can see the BIG GOOSE EGG on the face. I have to say it is not that cute, and I still have a rather nice size lump under the skin. Oh well, what do you do when you are out having fun!! The other pictures are just a few of all the pictures that we took between all three couples. Yes the water is that blue. It was a GREAT trip.

More construction for Family Room

Here are some additional pictures of our family room. Mark has begun to lay the floor in the family room and it looks nice. Mark is not happy with the way it turned out, but it is concrete under the wood flooring, so it does not want to lay like what Mark wants it to, but it really does look a lot better than the blue carpet that was there and my nose is liking it WHOLE lot better. We are undecided about what we are going to do with our bedroom about the flooring, but most likely it will have the wood flooring as well.

Family Room Refurbishing

Mark has decided that we are going to complete the one end of the house, the one that we mainly live in. SOOOOOO Mark has begun the family room. A total refurbish job is going on. From ceiling to floor. We have several pictures of the wild animals that we saw in South Africa and that is what we are basing our family room on. Walls are two toned. Yes you are seeing orange!! NOT a bright orange, but a Burnt Sienna color of orange. The other color is like a earthy tone of Taupe. The floors are going to be wood with a rug on the floor, when we get that far. The brick wall that you see in the pictures is no longer there. That is where Mark is putting the stucco on them. It looks so nice, in my opinion only. We will keep you updated as we proceed with our projects. Mark does good work and he enjoys seeing the vision come together.

MY RESPONSE TO BEING TAGGED = : )

10 years ago: I was in Europe with my closest friend and traveling buddy, Friedel and Justin and Christian.

5 non-work things on my list today to complete: A) Water all plants in the green house, B) make some additional meals for Mark for his lunches. C) Plenty of food for all the cats that are going to the shelter here in the next couple of days, hopefully. D) Put birthday card in the mail for John III
E) Hang more pictures up in the dining room

5 snacks that I like: A) Silk light, B) sugar free jello C) Almonds D) all kinds of SOUPS E) Hot chocolate with French Vanilla seasoning, sugar free of course.

If I were a Billionaire what would I do? Set up trust funds for our grand-children, purchase a place, HUGE place, and set it up for our entire family to come and visit as they would like, along with suppling some of the animals for them to enjoy. I would also make sure that our children are OK financially and leave enough for Mark and I to live comfortably. After that, I would share with my family and take care of their needs as well. I would also set enough aside for Mark and I to be able to serve a couple of missions for the church.

Places I have lived: Too many to name. Purchased a home in AL, have lived in CO, AZ, UT, KY, OH, IN, CA, AK, KS, MO, ND, ID, OK, and LA, I will have to think about that one. Like I stated, too many to remember.

Jobs I have had: My best job that I have had is BEING A MOM!!! I also love being a wife too. I would n ever trade any of my time being a mom. I still love being a mom. I loved sharing with my children and continue to be there for them if they need me to be. I have worked in the paper business, the business work, worked with juveniles and adults in the legal system, I have and currently working in the medical field.

I am not sure who I will tag for this information, but I will follow up with it on a later date.

Have fun reading.

Family Time

Mark and I had the pleasure of going and visiting my parents up in Frankfort, KY. We also go to see Cindy and her family and Trystan. We were not there very long, but we sure enjoyed seeing everyone and being able to spend some good quality time with the family. We went to Frankfort Ward on Sunday for church and it was just as nice to see some folks that I knew when we were members of that ward. A short note to that was there was a family there to support a young missionary that is going to Rome, Italy for his mission. The family that was there was from Prescott, AZ. They knew several of the same families that Mark and I knew when we were living in Bagdad, AZ. Small world for sure.

OK, you garden buff's. Take a look at Mark's garden. Yes, we know it is rather on the small side, but, for this year, it will do. Mark is trying his hand at gardening again. He loves to play in the dirt. He does not mind at all getting in the dirt and playing and digging and watering and of course the EVER, NEVER, ENDING Weeding project. It is not as nice as some of the pictures I have seen on your gardens, but maybe next year.

The four legged cats that we have had for a few weeks now are growing up quickly. We will be calling the animal shelter to come and retrieve these little critters so that they can find homes, hopefully. Mark was able to get one of the babies and so I am holding the one that I name Tinkerbell. She is all over the place. Our planters on the porch are more than for plants. See the two kittens in there. They are fun to watch, but boy they are quicker than lightening.

You can take me out of Arizona, but you cannot take Arizona from me. Notice the license plate on the flat bed trailer. This is where Mark has begun to unload some of the NASTY wood that is in the basement from where he began taking down some very old shelves that were built in the basement from how long ago, we are not sure. We will have a nice size bon-fire one day soon.

Salvage or not?

Let me tell you when things happen they happen for a reason. Getting a salvage title to your vehicle has been very interesting on our part. Tried to go and tag our tracker and there was a hit put on the title. When I crashed with the camper attached to it, we decided to retain our tracker and not sell it to the insurance company. WELL, low and behold, there are several HOOPs that have to be jumped thru to get a legal tag for this vehicle. We thought it would take about 30 days to get things finished on this situation. Mark drives 25 miles one way to work, and I drive 6 miles to work. Not in the same direction and since we are not on the same hours currently, we were not able to go to one car. We checked into renting a car. OH MY!!! What an expense that was. SO, to make a long story short, we decided it was time to check into purchasing a different set of wheels. OK, now it really shocked me when I found out how much wheels cost these days. But you can see our pictures of our new wheels and I am driving it back and forth with Mark driving my baby back and forth to work. New wheels do not get the same mileage the Jetta. What does one do?