What?! No pictures of the house flip you may be asking yourself! Well, it was time to take break because we celebrated Timmy's birthday! We had family time with cake etc and it was nice to take a break from house remodeling. For his real birthday on Tuesday, I am taking him, his brother and a couple of friends to great America. My neice Hannah will be joining us and spending the night. I have some one on one Aunt time lined up with both my neices and nephew so can't wait for that!!
Silly cousins Luke and Tyler! This is Tyler's new trick and he will do it at any opportunity he can. He can even move them in different directions. That kid's got talent!
Timmy loves board games now so we all played Apples to Apples as a family. It was a blast!
My cute as a buttom nephew Zacheriah. I think he thought the party was for him!

Movie Review Time!

I just realized last night as were we walking into the movie theater that we have seen a lot of movies this summer. It's probably not the best thing to be doing since I have the summer "off" (big joke here if you call working on the house flip being "off) and movies cost so much these days. My husband tried to use that "off" statement once but he stopped mid sentence when he realized how ridiculous that sounded because I have been free labor at the house this summer. Anyway I digress...here are the movies we have seen and my reviews.



The boys wanted to see this and I thought it would be boring but it was cute and original. We had fun watching it and it is a good family film.


We were so looking forward to this movie and if I had seen it with just Matt I probably would have liked it better. I made a bad parent move and brought the boys before we parents saw it first. First of all the previews made me cringe. Really hoping Timmy does not remember some of those images from the teen movie previews they had. The movie overall I thought was great and I want to see it again. I thought the main character was funny. Not sure what was up with the girl character but I liked the army aspect of it. The special effects were great and they really did do the toys and cartoon justice. I was wondering how they would pull it off without being hoky. Matt and I looked at each other after the opening scene and said "this is NOT like the cartoon!" Unfortunately they had to thrown in some adult humor and more violence then I thought was necessary but I should have been more responsible as a parent.



Ok I am going public - I am a HUGE Harry Potter geek. I have read, reread all the books. This one was my favorite one of them all so I was super excited to see it (sorry Shannon M. I couldn't wait). There are so many good parts in it that unfortunately did not make it to the big screen. My fellow HP geek son, Timmy, that I happily created so we could discuss at length all the ins and outs of the books, was also disappointed and after the movie we listed all the things we wanted to see that were left out. I could list them all here but I am have already admitted I am a geek and don't want to scare anyone anymore. The movie was so serious that if they had thrown in some of the more creative stuff it would have been better. Anyway, it was a weird to see Harry all grown up and they did have some good scenes. Sadly the last book is coming out next week but I can't wait to read it.



This is the one we saw last night. I LOVED it!! Wow so nice to see Hollywood do something "biblical" with respect. It was great. I thought they pulled the concept off great and we laughed A LOT!! So nice to see something together as a family like this. I also even shed a few tears. I think Morgan Freeman as God explaining how the God thing works was done so well. I loved the part how he explains that we pray to have more courage, more patience etc but we think He will just give it to us but he doesn't work that way. He give us opportunities to learn that ourselves. That little part hit me. I know I am supposed to be learning stuff from the Harding house - patience, endurance etc but I don't think I am doing it with a lot of grace. Anyway - I would recommend this to EVERYONE to go see!

Harding then

Harding now
Family room thenFamily room now
New floors Master bedroom then
Master bedroom now
2nd bedroom now

kitchen then Kitchen now

So here are some of the latest pictures from the Harding house flip. A lot has happened these late two weeks! We got ready for the outside to be painted which happened on Thursday thanks to Julie's brother and father. I have been painting like a mad man on the inside trying to stay ahead of our floor guy. Floors started this last Monday and Matt got a good deal on real hardwood call Kempus. If you ever need flooring come see our Cousin Josh and Uncle Ken who run Off Price Carpet in San Jose! Aren't they pretty?!

It is hard to see clearly but I picked the colors for the rooms. I went with a darker color for the kictchen since the cabinets are dark and the counter tops will be black granite. We have a good contact for kitchens too if you are interested. Don't the cherry cabinets look great?!

So it is all coming together but there is still so much to do and it doesn't help that my husband is the project manager. He doesn't give me any days off!!

So crazy these last two weeks have been. The house flip is flipping me out!!! I have to post pictures soon. It is finally looking like a house. We finally past the last inspection so we could put up the drywall and now they are getting textured and the hardwood floors are being put in. Which means I am rushing to paint the rooms as soon as they are being textured. I'll post pics of the rooms soon. The outside is getting painted this Thursday - yeah!!

Here is some latest layouts for this month at Picture Me Perfect. Here are my layouts:

Lady Luck was kind to me on my trip to Vegas!



We are back from Vegas but there is no time to relax or clean the house. I put in about 7 hours at the flip house today. Vegas always has a way of taking it out of me. I get so tired when we come back. But we had a good time and here is a recap (oh and sorry for all the poker lingo).



Friday - Got in around 11pm and headed straight to the Rio after checking in at Harrah's (which was awful this time and I don't think we are going to stay there again). We each signed up for a satellite tournament where the winner gets chips to enter into the WSOP events. Matt did well and ended up chopping the chips three ways (there were 3 for the winner and he came in third but they had made a deal). On my tournament my first hand was Ace's, I couldn't believe it. So of course when it is my turn I raise. Everyone fold except for another guy who reraises me so I push all in and he calls. This is all in the first hand! He turns over Ace King so I think great I am doubling up the first hand. The flop comes and there is a straight draw. We end up chopping when the straight hits. Bad luck for me! I end up getting knocked out later.



Saturday- We wake up around 11:30 and are starving so we quick and get ready and go get something to eat. We play some at the Mirage and then we decide to head over to what we thought was the Alladin but now it is the Planet Hollywood casino. Last year we were laughing because their tournaments were only 60 bucks but there poker room was really a roped off area near the bathrooms. Fancy huh? Now they had a legitimate poker room. We play one tournament there and we both get knocked out.


Sunday - After we wake up, we head back over to PH to play in the Noon tournament and decide to sit down at the cash table to play until the tournament starts. It's scary at cash tables because the bets can get really high so I am playing really tight. At one point I got King's and there is a real obnoxious guy at the other end who is British or something but has such an attitude and I think really does not like to see women at the table. So he reraises my raise and I call. The flop comes and I bet. He reraises and I go all in. He calls. He has two pair so my pocket king's are no good until the board pairs on the river and my two pairs are better than his - ha ha mean guy. So I come away from that table with about 180.00 in profit. Then the tournament starts and 3 hours later I am the winner! Out of 90 people I end up at the final table with guess who sitting at the opposite end - mean guy. Now two things seem to happen every time I sit at a table. I either have guys that treat me like their sister. They don't want to give me a bad beat and they will usually fold to me if I raise. Then you have guys that automatically think you can't play because you are a girl and they only way you win a hand is by dumb luck. So mean guy has it out for me and I announce to the table that he is just mad because I took his money at the cash table and the rest of the guys laugh. He then makes fun of my glasses. So now the guys at my end of the table are gunning for the mean guy and I think it is so funny. Mean guy eventually gets knocked out and the rest of us can really play. It was a good final table but the poor chip leader got knocked out third and me and the last remaining player chop for first. So I am excited - my 2nd tournament win!

I treat Matt to a lobster dinner for Father's Day. He was bummed that Bobby Flay's restaurant Mesa Grill was booked but we will have to try it next time.



Then we head back over to the Mirage because they have a great poker room with cash tables and single table tournaments. Matt I sign up for two for of the table tournaments. I win 2nd in mine! This table was rough because the majority were jerks and I ended up heads up with one of them. He happens to be Irish but leads tours and guess where his next stop was - Monterey! It is just so irritating when they don't give you respect for playing well. But oh well. I was just happy with another win.



We decide to go to O'Sheas for their midnight tournament because someone at PH said they have cheap tournaments. Now I know why - the casino is tiny and you feel like someone has opened up their garage and turned it into a casino. The atmosphere is great and there is a band and it is packed. We play in the tournament but both get knocked out. We go to bed at 2am.

Monday- I am wiped out and we had switched hotels and checked into Caesar's palace which I liked a whole lot better and wish we could have stayed their longer. We decide to go back to O'Sheas. They have cash tables that are facing outside so you can people watch and play at the same time plus it is cheap. I have lost all cognitive function and definitely not playing like I did the day before. Matt and I play in another tournament and both get knocked out. I had Queen's which were against King's and a set of 8s so no way I was winning that one. I decide I am done with poker and can't wait to head back to San Jose! We got home safe after a bumping flight (hate those pockets of air when the plane drops and people scream).

What a CRAZY week!!! First of all it was my last day at Harman's!! Happy and sad. I had been there 11 years - that was a long time and they were like my 2nd family. On Tuesday we had one of our inspections (the one that was holding up us putting up drywall and moving forward on the inside of the house flip). We failed! We got a grump, know-it-all inspector who said we had to undo what the first inspector told us to do. This is setting us back until another week with the drywall. So we are now trying to get the outside ready for paint which will be next Tuesday. I have been painting the last 4 days putting primer on the house. Thursday is the boys last day of school and then the fun begins. Matt and I are going to Vegas Friday night through Monday. The WSOP of poker is at the Rio and we are going there to play and people watch. We are celebrating my birthday which is on Friday, father's day and my last day with Harman's. See I said it was a crazy week!!

I've been scrappin'

I actually scrapped for a reason other than getting my monthly assigments done at Picture Me Perfect. Here are some layouts from Easter. Can you tell I think my nephew is really cute?!