The Official Deely Blog

W.O.W. Results...

2009-04-29T21:01:00.000-07:00

WOW I had a great time getting my project done! Moving back into our house with less furniture sure did create a problem - but I came up with some solutions thanks to those who were cheering me on!

Because of this challenge I was able to take 6 large bags of clothes to Other Mothers and get a nice check in return and then I drifted across the street to the Youth Ranch and got a good write off for next years taxes! Thank you Becky for helping me get this done!!!

I decided to up my challenge and do two rooms and I'm very happy with my results. I'm wishing I had a bed frame and dresser but I made it all work!

Here is the before picture of my bedroom... What a mess!!!!

Here is the after picture of my room! So pretty! The red fabric is hiding a white 3 drawer plastic container. I sold my side tables in a garage sale (mistake) and this was suggested to me. I choose red to add a little color since I haven't painted yet. Painting will come on the next W.O.W.

I actually love that the room looks bare and you can see the carpet!

The formal dining room turned office... Oh my!!! Before Picture...

After Picture! I bought some baskets to put things in and I brought my Great Grandmothers desk down for extra storage. All the files got moved to the closet under the stairs.

School has started!

2007-09-05T17:16:00.000-07:00

School started for Caitlin last week and I am happy to report that she loves it! This is the first time she has been so excited about going to school every day and she loves how nice everyone is. She is now in 1st grade at Calvary Elementary. I love that it is a Christian school and she has Bible study and Chapel time during the week. She comes with all these wonderful new stories about Jesus. My eyes tear up every time.

Mikayla started on Tuesday and is also enjoying school. She is attending Calvary Pre-school and has a great teacher. She got to take her favorite stuffed animal to school on her first day - what a smart plan! We didn't have any tears the first day but today my little one broke down when I was leaving - it made me want to cry too. But once her teacher walked in Kaylie went to her and dried her tears. She told me tonight she had a good day and is making new friends. So I'm not too worried.

I had a big week too - I started my new job at HP this week. So far it's been going well - no tears from me but I do wish I could bring a stuffed animal. :) Training is always a pain but I think the job will be good. I work for Pat Walker in the High End Laser Printer Department. Basically it's the R&D lab. The hardest part is getting used to seeing computer and printer parts everywhere! It's a bit overwhelming since I don't know much about what these people are doing. Mike would love it, I'm sure.

Since the girls started school and I started working full time our schedules are crazy. I do have a great boss who doesn't need his team in until 9am so I can take the girls to school and Mike picks them up at 3. But with all the after school activities...Music class, cheer leading, soccer and dance - I pray we find the time to smell the roses.

At home in Boise

2007-08-28T08:27:00.001-07:00

It's been awhile since we've posted any updates, so let me see if I can summarize what we've been up to since we've moved back to Idaho in February.

Life has changed so much since we got back. I have to learn to slow down a little, yet I thrive being busy. I think we've been trying to make up for the time away so we packed our summer schedule.
Caitlin started soccer this Spring and has actually
already started fall soccer too. She did great her first season. It was fun to watch her grow and get into it - she was scoring goals almost every game toward the end and in the final game she scored two goals!

She also celebrated her 6th birthday in June as
well as her graduation from Kindergarten.
She wanted a luau party so we invited some of her friends to our new house and had a wonderful day. We live next door to the neighborhood park so the kids were able to go back and forth between our house and the playground.

Mikayla has been doing great as well. She decided she wanted to take tennis lessons this Spring so I signed her up. She loves playing tennis! She will be better then us by the time she is 6! She will be starting Pre-K next week at Calvary Pre-school.

We went on a wonderful Vacation with my parents to Disneyland in July. It was so much fun - we were all completely worn out by the end of the trip. We spent 3 days at Disneyland and one day at Sea World. The girls were amazing - they kept up with us all day and then would crash at dinner. I don't think they ever did make it through dinner without falling asleep. I don't know how Disney does it but they do a great job with making us all feel like kids!

We also took the girls camping for the first time. They had a great time but Mike and I didn't get much sleep. A storm came through and the winds gusts were about 35 miles an hour off and on during the night. We could hear trees falling in the distance and something was walking around outside our tent! We made it through the night and when I opened one of the tent windows in the morning I got a close up look at what was keeping us up - a cow! All night I thought it was a bear, since they have been seen in the area but no it was a big cow. After breakfast we took the girls on a mile hike around part of the lake and I just felt so blessed. We would stop and look at the trees, which now seem bigger then they were before we moved to Texas and look at footprints in the dirt and talk about what animal left them. It was a wonderful peaceful moment and I realized how lucky I am to live in this beautiful state and have such a great family.

On top of all of this we've had visits from our families that live out of state, swimming lessons, lots of BBQ's and Mike and I went to my Up With People reunion in Arizona in August. It was a great weekend and I am so glad that my hubby was able to meet some of my UWP friends. We also added to our family this summer. We got a dog in July - he's a Golden Lab named Cowboy. He is a great dog and can be trained quickly. Mike works with him daily and we are already to a point of being able to take him on a walk without a leash. He is a great addition and the girls love playing with him.

I think that is a pretty good update from us for now. I will try to stay more current.
Take care,

Andi Deely

I'm a lumberjack and thats ok.

2006-12-03T16:09:00.000-08:00

I had some fun cutting down a few trees this last weekend. We had a couple of trees hit by lightning and one was dead and the other one was dieing. So I decided that they needed to come down and Andi wanted a few more to come down so that we had some more room to play in the backyard. So the following pics are me taking down one of those trees. I got to buy a chainsaw.. oh yeah!

October Fun!

2006-10-08T12:30:00.000-07:00

We had Carol Warren over this weekend and had a great time going to a place called the Oil Ranch and the next day we went to The Old Time Christmas Tree Farm. I didn't realize how slobbery and long cow tounges were until one was on my hand and leg. Good Times. It was lots of fun, check out the pics:

October 2006

Sep 28, 2006 - 31 Photos

Click on the picture for the album.

Texas Weather

2006-07-29T17:39:00.000-07:00

Here are some pics of some lightning I have taken. Lightning is hard to capture well, at least in my limited experience, but these aren't too bad. The last pic is one of my trees that was hit by lightning while I was standing outside in the rain, not cool. The line of no bark is the path of the lightning as it travelled. I was standing outside watching the downpour and I turned around to go into our door. The next thing I know I ear is ringing and my feet are tingling. I was about 30 feet away from the strike, scary stuff. Enjoy the pics.

Happy Father's Day 2006

2006-06-18T12:02:00.000-07:00

We celebrated Fathers Day at the Woodlands Resort for a wonderful brunch. I don't think I have ever seen so much wonderful food at a buffet. They had oysters and sushi and lamb and so many things I had never seen before. I think it was the best buffet I have ever been to.

We spent the afternoon with Bob and Carol Warren and that was a lot of fun. We will defnitely have to go back and spend more time at that resort, it looks like a lot of fun. With the waterslides and pool Caitlin and Mikayla were both ready to jump in and swim.

Hope to see you all soon.

Caitlin is five!

2006-06-17T18:50:00.000-07:00

Caitlin had a great birthday party, she celebrated her fifth birthday at the childrens museum with a few of her friends. She has informed us that we have to listen to her now that she is five. Everything is now "You do this" or "You do that" because "I am five". Oh Boy! What happens when she is a teenager? I shudder at the thought. She thinks everything in the world now changes to her needs now that she is five, she will learn soon enough that even though she may be different daddy is not! :)

Any way it was a good time. Enjoy the pics.

Swim Class June 2006.

2006-06-06T10:08:00.001-07:00

Sorry I haven't had a blog entry in a while. Here is the latest. The girls are in swim class and are having lots of fun. Caitlin is becoming a great swimmer and she is more confident every day. Mikayla is getting more and more comfortable but still doesn't enjoy getting her face wet. They will both be regular fish in the water by the end of the summer. Caitlin is even jumping into about 3 feet of water by herself and going all the way under water and coming back up, so that is fun. I can't wait to show them what Dad used to do to us, throw us way up in the air and then land in the water. Anyway, enjoy the pics!

Swim Class June 2006.

2006-06-06T10:08:00.000-07:00

Everthing's big in Texas

2005-11-07T11:32:00.000-08:00

Well we had another spider attack. Now these spiders are not normal spiders, these suckers are huge. I think they almost classify as tarantula size, if only small tarantulas. So last night Andi decides to turn the light on outside and low and behold a massive wolf spider, Lycosa Furcillata, is laying in wait beyond the back door. Andi gasps and starts to go hysterical I immediately go and try and find something to contain it in. I grab the nearest tupperware container run outside and slap it over the spiders body.

You can hear its legs, or maybe fangs, tapping the the plastic container in a tempest rhythm. I go back inside and ask Andi to get a glass container, I aquire an old pickle jar and head back outside. With some careful maneuvering and a piece of paper, which felt awfully thin between my hand and the spider, I slip the spider into the glass container. I poke some holes in the lid and presto; pet spider. I let it sit outside overnight and go in to calm the shrieking cries from inside the house.

So the next day I decide I need to feed it. I wrustle up some breakfast, a smaller spider I find in the garage, and throw it into the container. The girls and I then head off to the gym. When I get back I go check out what happened to the small spider and find just some spider dust left over. No small spider to be found anywhere. I decide that the beast needs a bigger meal. So I go wrangle some inch long bettle, not sure what kind... someone told me once they are tree roaches but I think they are wrong.

I throw the beetle into the jar and the spider starts to freak. I am thinking "You are 3 times the size what is your problem". The beetle or spider, I can't tell which, sprays out some white poo looking stuff. I figure the spider was scared and crapped his pants, since he was running around frantically. I put the jar down and wait for things to calm down.

Meanwhile Catilin has been watching from the window and when I come back inside she says "they are fighting." I look out and sure enough the spider is running around the jar and the roach seems to be climbing up the glass. I go out and see venom sprayed on the inside of the glass, all over, and the spider is starting to go belly up. I let the roach out and he flys off. Meanwhile I am thinking how do I save my spider and by this time his legs are curling up. I look closely and see venom on his fangs and I think that maybe he has bit himself.

I open the jar again and an acrid smell greets me. I am thinking "what is this?", smells like some sort of brake cleaner, very toxic smell. My eyes start burning so I put the lid back on and go inside and wash my hands. A minute later the spider is dead and I know Andi couldn't be happier. I didn't even get to name him.

Enjoy the pics! Click to enlarge.

The Spider, lets call him Wolfy, next to my thumb. Now hold your thumb up and then imagine the size.
Here he is partially curled on my hand. Fully extended his legs reached out to almost the size of my palm.
Took a while to get the legs to stay out but finally did and here he is next to my hand.
Thought about eating him but then thought about the toxic junk that killed him and decided to snap a pic. Damn.. now that I think of it I should have put him on my cheek.. Wait let me go get a pic...

Ok now that was bad.. I never had spider legs on my face before... had to wash it a couple times. Ok well enjoy the pics and just be thankful that Wofly is not in your backyard.

Fall with the Fam

2005-11-04T04:59:00.000-08:00

Well we just had a great visit from Bob and Carol Warren. The weather was wonderful, aside from a brief Texas sized thunderstorm just when we wanted to start trick or treating. The girls had a great time running up to doors and ringing the bell and having people hand them candy. We now have a large bowl full of candy that sits on top of the fridge so the girls cannot get to it.

I had my camera on manual focus for some of the pictures I took so since I already posted halloween pics I will just go ahead and post the pics that we took at our outing to the zoo. The weather was perfect and I didn't drip an ounce of sweat the whole day, a miracle in Houston.

Here is Grandma and Mikayla outside the elephant barn at the Houston Zoo. If you can't tell Mikayla is looking older and I still can't believe she is only two. It seems she is a lot more mature, if a little more headstrong, than Caitlin was at this age. She can be so sweet one second and the next she gives me the death glare; I think "What did I do?". She is a great girl and her personality will serve her well when she grows up.

Grandpa and Grandma with Caitlin and Mikayla at a new section of the Zoo. People who meet us on the street keep asking if Mikayla and Caitlin are twins. They look like sisters, but twins? Twin cuties maybe!
Here the girls are playing with a 'spitting' frog. They thought that if they hit the frogs head he would spit water, so they were slapping away on the frog until it would spit. There were some other water features in this new section of the zoo and I kept shooing the girls away from the bigger ones so they wouldn't get wet. Then I started thinking it would be great to snap a pic of them getting soaked, but it never came to fruition. That would have been great.

Here we have both Grandma and Grandpa 'mooing' with the girls, who are sitting on top of a cow. We had a great time at the zoo and both Caitlin and Mikayla have since expressed how much they miss Grandma and Grandpa.

We had a great time and can't wait to see more family around Christmas time.

Halloween 2005

2005-10-30T03:48:00.000-08:00

Just wanted to post the latest pictures from Halloween.
Here is Andi posing with our beautiful girls. Caitlin decided that she wanted to go as a Kitty Cat, and Mikayla wanted to be a dragon. Needless to say we went with the second pick of 'Cowboy Girl'.

Mikayla the Cowboy Girl! We had her practicing yehaw and she loves to run around with her horsey.

Mikayla didn't want to wear her hat for some reason or another and boy I tell you what when she doesn't want to do something good luck in changing her mind! She is very strong willed and I think that will come in handy later in life.

Here is a closeup of Caitlin the Cat meowing. Andi did a good job of turning her into a Kitty. Note her black nose. Later on in the day they were sharing a drink and Mikyala ended up with that black nose!

This picture is of the Halloween day the kids had at school. Caitlin is giving the pumpkin pinata a good whack.

Andi went to school with them for the day and really enjoyed being around all the kids and helping out, I think she is a teacher at heart and we shall see where that leads.

Bob and Carol Warren are on their way here today and we look forward to spending some good trick or treating time with them. I will post some pics of that when I have some.

Pumpkin Patch Oct 2005.

2005-10-25T15:37:00.000-07:00

This time of year men set aside their masculinity to romp with their children in the hay and pumpkins. I did just this this morning and it actually turned out to be pretty fun.

Caitlin and Mikayla were a little worried about getting on the tractor for the hay ride but after we got moving they had lots of fun.

Our beautiful girl waiting for the ride to start.

Caitlin striking a pose.

The Girls got to pick out their own pumpkins and here they are with them! Caitlin just 2 seconds before this picture was bawling for some reason or another and then she said 'My turn!' and gave a big goofy smile. Girls!

The girls loved the scare crows.

It was a lot of fun and I hope we get a chance to see all of you during the Holidays.

San Antonio is Deely Country.

2005-10-12T06:09:00.000-07:00

We just got back from our trip to San Antonio and it was a great time. I can't tell you how fun it is to see Nathan and my two girls playing together. They are doing pretty well together and there wasn't to much of Nathan getting pushed around and I can tell that he will soon be stronger and faster then they are since all he pretty much does is run around and climb on things. I feel for Andrea, girls are easier to deal with I think and don't do as much climbing and rough housing.

My dad and I were the most recent golf scramble champions, as seen by the winning 'you won!' cake presented to us on the night of win. I think I shot like 4 or 5 birdies and dad may have helped some too. Brian and Kevin didn't stand a chance against a powerhouse like myself.

Here is a picture of the extended Texas family in Tarpley, Texas. This was a great get together and we had fun seeing everyone and letting everyone see our girls and get to know them a little better.

Here is Caitlin and Mikayla with their great Grandmother Margaret, Monnie. Caitlin said when we were driving to the hotel in the car a day or two later 'They are all my family.' Both girls just loved being around the family and getting to play and have fun 24x7.

We had a day at Sea World and that was a lot of fun. The highlight of the day had to be seeing Shamu. They are so large and powerful and I can only hope that they love performing as much as people like to see them.

This pic was one of several good shots I took out of the 20 or 30 I snapped. Its hard to believe an orca that weighs ten thousand pounds or more can jump all the way out of the water, amazing.

This picture tells a funny story, Grandma was reading a story to the kids in our hotel room. After finishing the story Andrea wanted to get Nathan to bed but Nathan didn't want to go with mommy. All the kids kind of laid down and I knew that Andrea was tired and wanted to go to bed so I picked up Nathan and gave him to Andrea. Nathan promptly gave mommy a kiss goodnight and then motioned for me to take him and we all knew that he wanted to go back to bed with the girls. I put him back into bed with the girls and he did not want to leave. He was having fun with the other kids and I guess he wanted to sleep with them that night. He put up a fight when Andrea finally took him away. I wonder if he would have gone to sleep.

The highlights of the trip though were seeing the kids interacting with everyone. Caitlin is getting old enough that she is starting to feel real emotions, not that Mikayla or Nathan can't but they are still in 'baby' mode. So one sad thing that happened was on the final day of the trip we had just gone to the Children's Museum and then to the Hall of Horns. We were at my van saying our goodbyes and Caitlin realized that we were leaving and weren't going to see Grandma for a while and I look back and her little lip is quivering and there are tears in her eyes and she sees me looking at her and says 'I miss grandma.' It was heartbreaking.

The memories she is making now will stay with her for a lifetime and I am so thankful that we were able to have the whole family together and share in the memories with the kids. Thanks Mom and Dad for a great time!

2005-10-04T06:21:00.000-07:00

This is the only picture I currently have at work of family. I didn't have any digital prints of myself as a baby and we were having a deal at work where everyone was supposed to bring in a baby pic. So I took this picture in from home of my nephew Nathan Patton, son of my sister Andrea and husband Kevin.

The competition at work was to see if you could put the adult with the baby picture. What was funny is that everyone at work right away said 'Oh that one is Mike Deely'. I told them afterwards that it wasn't me and they said that the nerdy classes were a give away...

Now I am thinking why are nerdy glasses a dead give away for me? Do I exude nerdiness? I like to think that people see me as highly intelligent and nerd's are usually intelligent. So the give away was that I am just insanely smart. Or is it because I am also very cute?

Anyway, the pic is a cute pic I took while in Boise on a trip this year or last? I can't remember.

Let me know what you think of my new blog!

The New Official Deely Blog

2005-10-04T06:17:00.000-07:00

Well so here is the first official Blog for the Deely family. I am hoping to make this a spot for everyone Deely and Deely related to come here and find the latest updates and pictures for the Michael J Deely family. This will probably mainly be setup to host pictures of our girls. So hopefully you will find this fun and exciting and maybe I will get the chance to update this on a regular basis.