Big changes....

Also in November, Tim and I made a very hard decision. We have made the decision to move back to Pennsylvania. Its a tough one... We have met such wonderful, amazing people here and have had such a spiritual awakening! I'm especially happy for Tim that he has come to know Christ. He's learning everyday and its  been wonderful! We can't wait to continue to learn and grow in a new church back in PA. While we are leaving simply wonderful family and friends here, we are also excited to be back "home" and enjoy time with friends back there. Its a very bittersweet time for us, especially since the big move will happen right before Christmas. We'll definitely have a Christmas tree (when you're dad is in the "biz" you really have no excuse), but other than that and some presents underneath, I believe that will be the only decoration adorning our house this year. I will be heading back this week on my own for a few days to begin a new job. I am very excited to begin my new position and feel that it will be a great fit for me.

We are basically starting over again and have been given a second chance. Not many people get the chance to do it all over and we are blessed to be able to do so.

We will forever be grateful for the time we have been able to spend with my Mom, Larry, and Kyle. We had some awesome family time together! There were tough times, but overall it was a truly wonderful experience. We are SO blessed to have such an amazing family!

Stay tuned to see what's in store for the Klinger Family next!

Where did the time go?!

In November we had the official opening of the Ritzy Roost, my mom's new upscale furniture consignment and merchant marketplace. I couldn't be more proud of my mom! She has wanted to be able to do this for a long time and finally realized her dream. The place looks absolutely amazing! I'm told that my pictures do not do it justice, so I'll just direct you to the Ritzy Roost website (www.theritzyroost.com) to check out the pictures there. Our friend Linda designed the website and has added the wonderful pictures. She's done such a great job!

Also in November we celebrated Tim's and my birthdays. For Tim's birthday, Larry scored us some fantastic tickets to the NASCAR race in Talladega. I am so happy that we got to go experience this racetrack. Especially for Tim, who has always wanted to go there! Below is me at the race. Its really the only picture we took. The cars were going MUCH to fast at this track to get any suitable pictures.

For MY birthday, my husband decided he would give me the gift that keeps on giving... a higher insurance premium! LOL! Unfortunately on my birthday morning, Tim was involved in a car accident downtown that resulted in thousands of dollars of damage and almost totaled my car. Eeek!

Needless to say, I will never forget this particular birthday!

Ghosts, and gobblins, and witches, Oh my!

In early October the boys were able to make a nice visit back to PA with my dad. Tim, Kyle and I drove the boys to Atlanta and met my dad who them took them back to PA for a long weekend. It was a whirlwind trip for them, but they loved riding their 4-wheelers and seeing their cousins Reese and Hank, as well as their buddy James. Not enough time to fit everyone in during this visit, but they had a great time!

Above is Chase and Kyle passed out in the car on the way to Atlanta. Only an hour drive for us, so I knew my dad was in for a long night of driving with 2 anxious boys in the car!

Here are the boys with Hames on their 4-wheelers during their trip. They just love the great outdoors!
It snowed while the boys were in Pennsylvania also. This was the first official snow fall of the year and it came in early October!  Somewhere I have a very sweet picture of the boys outside in the snow in their underwear. If I could find it in the depths of my hard drive I would post it. Alas it is not meant to be. Ian and Chase would probably harm me in my sleep if I did post it anyway!

On October 3rd Tim, the boys, and I visited the Cotton Pickin Festival in Gay, Georiga. What an adorable town it is and such a scenic drive from LaGrange! We had a very nice time. It was very family oriented with a lot of activities for the kids to do and some great food as well!

Here is Chase tackling the rock climbing wall.

Really though, the only difference between a festival in Georgia and one back home is the food and the music.  Here they serve a lot of biscuits and gravy and fried chicken, and back home they serve a lot of peirogies and monkey bread!

This is a picture of one of the many bands that played for the crowds.

And of course in October there was Halloween! Down here in the south Halloween is not such a big deal. The schools don't have Halloween parades or parties. There is trick or treating in various neighborhoods. But the trick or treating we attended was the one put on by the local businesses on the square downtown LaGrange. Our church, FLF, also participated. I honestly did not get any good pictures of the boys in their costumes. Ian was "Jason" and Chase was a pirate again this year. This year was the first time since the kiddos were born that we were able to do costumes on the cheap!  Below is a picture of the girls from church, Deena, Tracie, and Judy handing out candy downtown.

We also had a lot of fun carving pumpkins before Halloween. This year I enlisted Tim to help with some non-traditional, "designer" pumpkins. He's so good at that kind of stuff and they turned out AWESOME! Just how I pictured them (or copied them from Country Living magazine, lol!)

 

 

 

 

Izzy was a big fan of the pumpkins as well!

Throughout October we continued work on the Ritzy Roost. Getting it ready for the big opening on November 1st!  It is now up and running full steam ahead! It looks amazing! Check it out at www.theritzyroost.com

Long time comin

Well this post surely has been a long time comin! I have two entire months of catching up to do! I guess we should go back to September....Chase, my dad, and Larry all had birthdays in September. My dad and Larry share the same birthday, September 4th. On "Pop's" birthday we celebrated with dinner, ice cream cake, and some very special presents.

Here are Larry and Kyle posing with "Tiki Guy." Tiki Guy will move into his new home in the Tiki Hut out back by the pool this spring.

Ian and Chase also crafted Pop some special gifts out of clay. They had some much fun doing this! Here is Larry, Kyle, Ian and Chase posing with the "Pop" clay design. 

My dad and Connie were able to come down for a visit right before his birthday. The boys had such a good time staying at the hotel with them for a few days and swimming in the pool and hot tub.

Chase's birthday was September 23rd and he woke up to find that the "birthday fairy" had arrived.

What a neat tradition we have started! Chase thought it was awesome of course and wanted to keep his birthday fairy balloons for weeks!  That evening we had Chase's favorite dinner, Spaghetti, and mommy baked him his favorite cake, funfetti! Our friend and neighbor, Miss Sue, joined us for dinner that evening. Chase and Ian both just adore Miss Sue and she does them as well. The boys love to ride their bikes at her house because she has a nice slopping brick path leading from the bottom of her driveway across the back of her house and to the big pavilion in the backyard. So they start on their bikes or scooters at the top of the road and zoom down the driveway to the backyard. Such fun!

Time off

I've been saying for weeks now that I'm going to update my blog "tomorrow." Well that obviously hasn't happened. Even now that my blog has officially  been "pimped," (many, many thanks to my friend Linda for doing that!) I still haven't gotten around to it. Now especially with the kiddos in Pennsylvania for fall break, Tim and I have been spending a lot of time cleaning and organizing, and just enjoying being together sans kids. So I thought I'd pop on here real quick before Tim and I head out for the day. We are planning on going to brunch and then maybe the Hummingbird Festival in Hogansville. Its actually a pretty chilly day here in LaGrange. Nowhere near as cold as back home with it being somewhere in the 50s here today. Still chillier than I was hoping for the festival. Maybe we'll just run to Angel's Antiques in Opelika. You never know what treasures you'll find there. And there is also this fantastic little store that opened recently nextdoor to Angel's call "Resurect." Its wonderful and has all these perfectly worn and rusted pieces, any one of which I'd love to have in my home!

So continue to stay tuned. I will have pictures of the boys football season and some more of the Ritzy Roost as well. Also some new and exciting things happening over there.

Have a wonderful fall day all!!

Blog

My blog is about to get pimped! Expect some new, exciting changes to the blogs as well!

I am so not good at this

• but I'm an excellent procrastinator! We have been incredibly busy around here with school, homework, football practice, Tim's new job and house hunting. I'm exhausted. I long for those lazy fall days back in Pennsylvania where we came home from work, at dinner on the couch and then just collapsed there the rest of the evening, lol.
  
• The boys are doing really well in football. Chase has been playing quarterback in flag football and Ian is an offensive and defensive lineman on his tackle football team. I never realized just how cute little boys look in football uniforms with pads and helmets. I also never realized how much "stuff" they need just to wear that uniform and all the work that goes into getting into said uniform! First there are all those pads! My word, there are pads for every part of the body (which is good I guess), there is the mouth piece that has to be boiled and formed to your kids mouth (who knew?) and all the extra stuff like special socks so the cleets fit properly, the special "silky" shirts (as Ian calls them) to wear under the shoulder pads. Then we have to round up a shirt that is big enough to fit over all of that for practice. Whew!
  
• Of course Chase is quite the cutie out there running the field with his flags strapped to his sides.

• Its exhausting, especially when we have two kiddos going to two different fields on the oposite ends of town on the same night. But its also a lot of fun. I've met some really great and helpful people while sitting on the sidelines and it sure does tire the boys out, which makes for a much easier bedtime.
  
• We have also started work on my mom's new store, The Ritzy Roost (www.theritzyroost.com), an upscale furniture consignment and merchant marketplace. Its a very exciting time for all of us, Mom especially. I will be opening up a booth there and plan to sell mostly coastal/cottage chic items. So I have been trying to get items together for that (believe me I have plenty of stock already sitting in my Mom's basement just waiting for its spotlight). I also have some other things in mind to carry in the store, its just a matter of getting my Tax ID and really exploring the wholesale market out there. Mom and the guys spent a lot of time at the store this past weekend ripping out carpet and getting walls ready to paint. Of course Chase was about the hardest worker of all! He loved it!
  

• Over labor day Tim and I headed to Atlanta Motor Speedway for the race on Sunday night. We've been to many races at this point, but our seats for this race were the best! Gotta love the smell of gas and burnt rubber, not to mention the insane noise from the roaring engines! I just love it! Many thanks to Coca Cola for that!
  

• Well that's a little update for now. Tim is about to walk in the door and we are headed to look at yet another house and then off to football practice as long as the thunderstorms hold out.