Missourable Moles

When we first moved in, I asked adam why our grass was so lumpy...I kept stepping and sinking - it was crazy! Well, come to find out, we have moles!! And in the almost 2 months we've been here, they or it (we've heard there's usually just one; however, we are not convinced), have done quite a bit of damage, and have even moved into the backyard!! After reading up on the best way to rid your yard of moles, it seemed the consensus online was to have cats. Well, CHECK! We have 2!! So, I thought the moles would be gone in no time. WEll....it took them 2 MONTHS, but sure enough - Adam came home to find a little present from the kitties this week! Hercules is living up to his name : )
HOWEVER, we're pretty sure, we are home to the mole motel becuase since then, we have found more tunnels pop up. It's so bad now, you can see their maze of dead grass in the yard. Adam attempted to stomp all of the tunnels in, then shove the hose into a hole to see if another one would surface - lol. It was a vain attempt. So, hopefully between the traps we buy and the cats, the mole motel will be closing soon!

Adam had his 1st official week of classes as a Mizzou Tiger this week. He enjoys riding the bus, and sometimes I can even pick him up from the bus stop after school -(so sweet, right?)

We also got a dartboard this week!! Adam wanted to hang it up in the living room so we'd actually use it, amdist my hints of how bad I am (so as to imply it may not be good for the walls). Well after hitting the wall twice within our first game, we decided to put some moving boxes to good use:

Last but not least - may I wish my dear old Dad a HAPPY HAPPY Birthday this week!!! We love you, Daddy!!

Spiritual Thought for the week:

Be Followers of Christ!! ~ Adam and I spoke on this last week in church, and this week it was the sunday school lesson...so we're going to work extra hard on it : )

Belated Post : Busy Bees

Such is my style -- this post was ready to go - just needed pics last week...and it never made it -- so sorry about that!

• We celebrated our 2nd ANNIVERSARY last week!!! Adam bought me a beautiful necklace...and I got him a funny book about farting. (I have some making up to do - haha) He wanted to take me to this yummy ice cream place downtown I've been talking about for weeks now, but after dinner, he started feeling kind of sick. So...I settled for McDonald's drive-thru sundae : ) We will be going to Chicago in a few weeks to celebrate for REAL!

• We made FRIENDS!!! We had a church picnic last week --- it was GORGEOUS outside --- we could never have done this back home. It was a really good time for us to get to know alot of the people in our ward, and we finally feel like we're fitting in : ) I also work with some FANTASTIC people at McIntire Elementary. Everyone has been really nice and HELPFUL so far...I definitely think I made the right choice accepting this job : )

FUNNY STORY of the week:

We got Adam all set up with a bus pass last weekend (he's going to be taking the bus to school since we're a 1 car family now). He had his first opportunity to use it on Monday for orientation at Mizzou, which was also the night of my school's Open House - requiring me to stay at school until 7pm. So we woke up early, and I drove him to school at 7 in the morning, so he wouldn't be late, and he would catch the bus home later and figure out the route then. Well, at about 10, I got a message from him saying he'd misplaced his bus pass and house key..YIKES! But there was hope because our garage door is coded, so he was going to call the previous owners to get the code. In the meantime, he found out that his paperwork had gotten looked over and he wasn't even registered in the Mizzou system, so he had to run around and talk to different people, and he "didn't even get to win any cool orientation prizes" (his recount of the experience : )). Well, after missing the 1st bus stop because he didn't know to pull the cord...he finally made it home...and the garage door code...

DIDN'T work!

So he went to visit some neighbors for a while, took a nap in our kick-butt backyard, and was attempting to drown the moles out of our front yard when I pulled up :) We looked everywhere in the house for his keys/pass to no avail. However, a few days later - they turned up!!! in his camera bad of all places...we're thinking an angel found them and slipped them in there : )

• I GOT TO WATCH THE SAINTS GAME THIS WEEKEND....(for 2 minutes)....
• I knew my boys were playing this weekend, so even though I couldn't watch the game (because we have no cable), I sported my WHO DAT?! shirt. Around 8 o'clock yesterday evening, I found a piece of our neighbor's mail in our mail stack, and decided to run it over to them. And low and behold...what did they have on, but the GAME?! It was funny -- I'm hoping they're Saints fans, so I can bring some cookies over "to be a good neighbor" for the next game - lol.
• 8 LEGGED FREAKS:
• When walking back into the house from feeding the cats the other day, I noticed the HUGEST spider I've ever seen in the wild about 4 inches from the door to the house. I screamed, then ran like a crazy woman inside and told Adam for the 100th time since we've lived here, "HONEY! You've got to see this spider - it's HUGE!!! I'm Serious this time!" He rolled his eyes and reluctantly came outside, but unlike the other times...his eyes got big and he took a step back and said, "WOW. That is a big spider." and went and got his camera. SCARY!!!

Laid Back Week

This week started out with a BANG as our kitchen floors were finally installed!! HOORAY!! We’re down to only about 50sqft of concrete floor left in our house (in the living room)…we’re waiting on the insurance company STILL to get back to us, but who cares!! We can cook without standing on concrete and that makes me one happy chef!

Additional excitement for the week was that I was able to visit the school I will be working at this year and meet some of the staff and check out my cool room!! The best part of all was that I even got my own nameplate on the first day – you could have sworn they handed me the publisher’s clearing house my smile was so big. However, upon admiring my sign when walking back into my room from lunch, I noticed it read “Mrs. Shehaden” – so CLOSE!!! The good news is I should get a correct one before school starts.

The rest of our week was pretty laid back…it FINALLY rained a morning or two…and we took the time to sleep in to the sound of pitter-pattering on the roof.
I was able to find a new route to Fulton that is absolutely gorgeous, full of rolling hills, old barns, prairies full of livestock and horses (even a few colts). So as long as I can avoid getting stuck behind a school bus or slow poke driver, I will be able to enjoy a nice country drive to and from work. AND we got some new sofa pillows too!! Wahoo!
Today, we went to church where we were able to meet some more new people…our ward is quite the place to be this summer it seems. Next week we’ll have a potluck and really get to know of folks. I got to sing with the primary children again – I just adore them!! The first song we sang was “Do as I’m Doing” (a simon-says like song)…so I chose a little boy who was being REALLY reverent to lead it. When I asked him what he wanted us to do he said, “Well, it’s kind of silly. It’s going to be like the motion you make when you make a pit fart noise, etc.” Even the leaders couldn’t help but laugh!!
Well – here’s to another week full of fun with the Shehadehs and hopefully some cooler weather : )

Southern Comfort

Well...Within a month of living in our new home and sadly still without kitchen floors, we had visitors!! Mom, Papa and Eli came to CoMo for a weekend visit : )
Friday, we met them in St. Louis for some yummy BBQ at Pappy's Smokehouse - yumola! We had ribs, and pulled pork and deep fried corn on the cob...and Adam found him some good ole sausage too!

On Saturday, we did some sightseeing in downtown Fulton (itty bitty town nearby where i'll be working this year) at a little treasure Winston Churchill museum there. It is in the basement of a GORGEOUS church building, and is well worth seeing. Mr. Churchill was not only a great hero, but quite a humorous one!

After that, we decided to go check out Adam's new stomping grounds, Mizzou, where we wanted to show the family these really cool, old columns they have there. When we talked about going earlier in the day, Adam informed us that they were actual artifacts from the parthenon, so we were ready to take on the 100+ heat to score some sweet pictures. On the way from the museum to the campus, Adam had fallen asleep, and we circled the campus 3 times looking for those darn columns with no luck. Adam awoke on the 3rd round and told us he knew right where they were..so pulled over and began the what was supposed to be a 5 minute walk to the columns. Well, they weren't exactly at the first place we went, so we tried point 2 and 3 before the group became weary and irritated from the wild goose chase in the heat. So, as we began our 4th try to find the historical monuments, Adam said, "Well, I guess it's okay if we don't find them...they're not really from the Parthenon." ..... I think all of our glares would have furned him if we were part of a Looney Toon show - haha So, we headed back to the car, sweaty and hot. However, on our way out of campus to home, we did catch a glimpse of the columns through a clearing between 2 buildings. Fun Fact: they are from the original campus which completely burned down some 150 years ago : )

Later that night, after we had showered and forgiven Adam, we headed to Shakespeare's Pizza - "The best pizza in Columbia" so say the locals. While the pizza was good, I think the Spiderman pin ball machine took the prize for the night! We all had a blast playing on it -- turns out Papa is a pinball playin' fool! He bragged of the glory days in his youth when he could play a whole day on 2 quarters...and ladies and gents he did not disappoint! On his only turn, he took on 3 balls at once, played for like 10 minutes, well surpassed the rest of our measely scores and won a free game! IMPRESSIVE!
On Sunday, I got to lead the primary children for songtime -- that was fun! They are very funny and love singing. I decided to teach them a song that talks about how children all over the world say "Thank You" to Heavenly Father at night. They thought the German phrase "Wir Danken Dir" was histerical!! So much fun!!
After church, we returned home, to see Mom and Papa hard at work putting our new grill together for us...we love Adam's grilled chicken and they couldn't stand to visit without eating any!! But before the chicken, we decided to catch a movie for Papa's birthday. When we got home, we ate some yummy chicken and BIRTHDAY cake! YAY! Then we said our goodbyes : (
It was a great visit!!

Shehadeh big adventure in the Midwest thus far : )

Well we made it to the Heartland of the USA : ) While we feel like we’re starting to get a grip on living way up here in the hills – you know we no longer need a GPS to get most places – we still miss having our friends over for dinner and hanging out with our awesome family. I can’t believe we’ve been in Missouri for 2 weeks now! Although all the furniture’s in the house and all the boxes are unpacked, it doesn’t feel like we’ve been here that long. In an attempt to feel like we’ve been productive with our time and not lazy (watching 40+ episodes of Ugly Betty all day long) - Who said that?!, I asked Adam on our walk last night to help me recall what all we’ve done thus far...

1.BOUGHT A FRIDGE

So we needed a refrigerator, but it seems all of the stainless-steel-look fridges (I love magnests too much to get a stainless steel) in Columbia were not in stock and at least a 5 day wait. BOO!! Eating out is fun when you don’t HAVE to do it, but when you can’t get a cold drink without visiting the curb store – life is no fun. So, after visiting home depot, sears, best buy, and lowes (and actually purchasing a fridge from them), we stopped off at another locally owned place around the corner just to check out their stock…everything was WAY overpriced, and just as Adam told the salesman they were out of our league he pulled up a “hidden treasure” stored in the back…that could be delivered in 2 days and was way cheaper! Here’s the BEST part – he was from Monroe, LA!!

2.LICENSE & REGISTRATION
Check out Adam’s picture…the lady asked him to slide his glasses down a bit, which led him to give that divinere smile : )

Actually, the lady who helped us told us all about her wild times in Monroe, LA where her daddy sent her to college to get away from her no good boyfriend at the time...haha I wonder if she knows the refrigerator salesman : )

3.SETTLING IN & GOING WITH THE FLOW
So I got the house looking all cute...

… and Adam got the TV and computer set up. We even got some new furniture! Adam found this AWESOME deal on a nice computer desk on craigslist…and the guy offered to deliver it – thank goodness. It was quite a heavy bugger…but Adam got it all set up and in perfect position with the help of my new favorite invention: SLIDERS!

Next, it was time to go look for some bedroom furniture…so I threw in a load of laundry we headed off to the local flea market. After 20 minutes, Adam’s shopping energy ran low and we headed back to the house. When I got out of the car, I noticed a lot of water on the garage floor (here comes the “going with the flow” part). As soon as we opened the door to the house…we walked into a 1/2 inch of water on the laundry floor and a soaked kitchen and ¼ of our living room (right where the new HEAVY desk was set up –lol). Thank you draining hose on the washing machine! Oops!! I feel like the cute little couple on the LOWES commercials : ) (i've also had a few painting mishaps -- go figure!)

(click on the pic to go to the video)

The good news is that house insurance covers accidents! So we’ve become accustomed to concrete in the kitchen and are going to have new floors in our new house!

We were also welcomed to town by the Columbia welcoming people who gave us all kinds of fun gift certificates and “go green” shopping bags; were extremely late to the church the first Sunday because we couldn’t find the building : ) ; checked out the local farmer’s market; got a sofa and loveseat!; have probably made it to LOWES banned list for returning so many things : ) ; went to see the final Harry Potter; and we even enjoyed a fun few games of bowling!

So, I guess we have gotten a lot done!
Missing y'all from Missouri