My darling Chica

Here are some of my favorite pictures of Chica and then Chica with Gabs riding a horse. (Chica is starting horseriding lessons soon!) Chica , now in 2nd grade, busy doing piano and soccer and enjoying life. I totally enjoy watching her personality blossom. She is into snails and frogs and all things outdoors. Yesterday she said that she decided not to become a scientist anymore (and I worried what she decided to choose..) and she said she wants to be a gemologist, palentologist and something else, but it was still all science. It was cute! She likes digging for gems in Webkinz World and so that is where the gemologist came from.

She is also such a great helper with Gabi. I have to keep remembering she is 7. I get all irritated if there is something that happens (she chases Gabs and Gabs wrecks or something) and I know that Rach always has her best interest. Like, everyday she will tell me, Oh Gabs wants this or that, if Gabs is whining about something. I'm like, you don't have to translate, I know what she wants, I'm just not giving it to her. Funny! But yeah, it's great to see the love blossom between them. Gabs RUNS to see Rach after school. We love picking up Sis from school. Gabs will walk around the house and say "where's dachel" (Gabs calls her Dachel). I have to say, remember, we took her to school? I hope they always remain close.

Chica is a very good girl. We butt heads, but we're still very blessed with her. She's so smart! It's great because I know the Lord has great things in store for her!!

One more week until I have my Hubby!

It's the last stretch of this summer. I can't believe it. I remember the day Kev left for the summer, and I moped while I organized the garage. I thought of how our summer seemed so long, stretched before me. How was I going to get through it? And then, amazingly, I was very busy, had a great time with friends and the kids, and now, school is back in and Kev is done on Saturday. Yippee!

I am flying to Orlando and he is flying in from Houston and we will go to Disneyworld together to ride the rides together instead of just with Rachael. We will also go to the Orlando Temple and then also see how the rest of Orlando is since it's been raining a ton from Fay. I can't wait!

I miss him, miss him, miss him!

Idaho here we come?

Funny how things go...
Really.
Kev and I have been wanting to buy a home and we were dead set to stay here in Rocklin. We LOVE it. Love the ward, community, etc. We kept saying that we would grow old here. I'm even running for City Council!
But alas, (between the little snipets of raising our family in a smaller town somewhere over the years), things started heating up lately as we see how much Kev loves APX (he's found his calling!) and wants to continue for awhile. So we have been thinking how he is the main breadwinner (despite Leonidas, etc.) and that if he needs to work on recruiting in the off season, he needs to be where the type of people he is looking for is strong. We started thinking AZ, but that only lasted a few days. We couldn't wrap our heads around it. Why do people love AZ? Why do people move there? Not our cup of tea. :)

Anyway, so like a couple weeks go by and we started up again. This time, with drama of Leonidas in the forefront, it was even stronger. The drama with Leonidas is that besides us throwing our money into it in the off season, (which we knew we would do), Corp Leonidas wants us to open in the Galleria... and be a coffee shop (the NEW LCC). And we don't want to be a chocolate cafe (a $350k buildout). And the whole time we've been open, they've been saying how really, they wanted us or SOMEONE in the Galleria. And we never went there first because, hey, cheap rent to get started then move on, but also, Corp really wants the coffee thing, so we felt like we were pigeonholed doing what we were doing in our current spot. We would never be able to open another "just chocolate" shop again. No room for growth/expansion for us. That's no fun because that was where we were planning on going with it. And we didnt' realize how much Corp would be involved, because it only just started in this last year. Before it was, sell our chocolate any way you want, be what you want. Now they are streamlining and braning themselves hard! Anyway, we were worrying that someone would come into our territory, and we'd be out of biz, etc. We had stopped worrying about it because we were like, no one wants Sacramento but us. Well, that is true, but since we had expressed interest about having a kiosk in the mall at the holidays, Corp went crazy! And as of yesterday emailed me plans to the mall... and I'm like, wait, wait!! So, since Corp wants us in the mall, and not in our current location, we can't sign a new lease with where we are at. Especially because if we don't open in the mall, Corp will find someone that will and won't care that we get squeezed out. Why do we want to commit business suicide? Why ride a sinking ship? So...

With the drama of possibly shutting our doors. Well, okay, we will be, just after the holidays, but I do hope that someone wants to open in the mall because it is Fab chocolate and now we got people all excited. I don't want to let the fans down. :)

So that opens the door for us to be able to leave. (without a mess.) How wonderful is that? Kev and I started thinking that if he makes great money for APX, maybe we SHOULD start considering what people always talk about, the whole "cost of living thing". So we started comparing different cities and costs, and discovered Rexburg, and how we could get a huge home and get everything we want and more and it is the price of a cheap, nothing home here. The comparison was like, 43% lower cost for a home and 27% cost of living lower. That's a ton. Besides that, the cost of running the home is low as well (Utilities are like $120 in the summer a month for all and then up to $300 in winter, again for ALL the bills. Not here, and I'm a RENTER!) Also, we found a home we are in LOVE with. And then it started to come together. Kev and I were like, this sits well with us, where AZ didn't. We keep talking as if we already own this home and live in Id. Kev has tried to look at other homes online and send me links, and I'm like forget it! I'm sold, this is the one! And he agrees. We both just keep staring at the pics online...

Last night, Kev's regional, Cameron and wife, Brooke, went to the home, knocked on the door and got a tour of it. The owner is the builder, he's a contractor! They put it on the market on Tuesday and Cameron said it was a great home. They said there are four girls who live next door for our girls to play with! The wives hang out and drive to the lake! I'm so excited and I'm not even there yet. But it FEELS right. Well, the sick thing is so did the modest clothing shop... but we won't go there. (I'll get back to that in a min).

So yeah, we love Rocklin, swore we would be here forever, or around this area (loomis or somethin) and here we are, moving to the SNOW. (notice how I just said "moving", like it's a done deal!). Oh, and on the whole snow thing, we didn't want snow when we were thinking of where to go and kept talking about how perfect CA is, but then since I've lived in Rexburg before for a couple of winters, it wasn't a big deal. I don't look back and think, Rexburg was nice, but man I hated the snow. Now I could change my mind. But at the same time, we both agree that there are more benefits to living there than the snow can dampen.

Okay the mod clothing shop, I still am going to do it. I will come back and get that started and then when I come back to visit my family, the trips will be tax write offs for the biz! But yeah, since my intention wasn't to be hands-on with the shop anyway, just the dream of bringing modest clothing to our area, I still want to do that, and still like the idea of it being mine. But all the day-to-day stuff, I know Morg can handle and I can't wait to turn it over to her. So yeah, once we get settled in Id, we will come back in the spring and get things going for the Simply Modest Clothing. If I can even use that name...

And as for the home, we are already working with a local realtor (Cameron and Brooke's) and then we have our friend Gary here, who is working on the financing. It's all rolling... Maybe my next update will say we got it?!

Tidbits

Summertime is almost over for us. I'm SO glad. Today we find out who Rach's 2nd grade teacher is, Monday is meet the teacher, and Tuesday school begins. I love her to pieces but we are getting at each other's throats lately! Rach also had her physical last week and we found out her height is in the 95th percentile and that she is 4'3". I asked what a normal height for a 7/8 is, and he said about 6 inches shorter! holy cow! Here are some pictures of some new school clothes!

On another note, I've been scanning pics and uploading them to Heritage Makers and having fun with that. It's so fun! I started throwing out old, bulky photo albums. Rach was asking me why, and I held up a thin HM book and said, because we now have these! :)

Has anyone read divinecaroline.com? That has the most hilarious blog about brazilian waxes. I was cracking up! I always wondered why women would do those things, and it made me still think, no thanks, but yeah, if you want a good laugh, check it out.

patience is a virtue...

So I had no idea about the blog world until my neighbor emailed me about some. Has anyone read thepioneerwoman one or captainhambone? They are funny.

It is almost 3:30am and amazingly I can't fall asleep. First I just had a great meeting with a restaurant about our chocolates and it went well. We are trying to get my chocolates in their dessert mix, and then some big events coming up in the fall that they will want our chocolates at, also, they have a little shop to sell their wines and olive oils in and I could put some of our chocolate in their case (the prepacks). This would be great! So we will see. The manager was also very excited about me running for City Council. It made me feel good. I was feeling like I could conquer the world.

The other news is that I'm trying to get this modest clothing shop off the ground, with a shoe-string budget and I thought Kev would be all for it. He was an advocate, and then, as soon as I came back from FL, the option just blossomed before me that I had to go for it. We have an awesome site in our current center to put our clothing shop and I just got the okay today that I can lease it. Now Kev is saying that he wants to wait. This is KILLIN me. Of course, him as well. He said he feels so bad, like he's crushing my dream, and well, it is. I feel like, is there anyway I can convince him otherwise? He wants to wait at least a couple more months and then figure it out, or even wait until next year. (our goal was to pay down/off debts this year and starting a new biz doesn't go in that direction). Next year? Our perfect little spot won't be there by then. Unless the Lord knows otherwise... which He does, so why do I whine?

I get it, I get it. I'm changing things up. Not going according to our plans. I get that we should wait, but I'm so passionate. I feel like a starving artist. I feel like I'm going to jump out of my skin from excitement! I have so many people that can't wait for this shop to get open! And then, I have my Love... my everything. And I do not want to make him stressed out and my passion for this is. And that hurts. And I would never do this without his blessing. I need him to be excited about this as well. That's the part that hurts, is that he isn't with me. I thought he would be excited and just think like me about taking it slow and put the shop together slowly. But obviously, someone has to have their feet on the ground, and I know it's a good thing that he does, I just don't like it at this moment.

EDIT: So I decided that we won't open it until next year. I let the landlord know that we WON"T be taking the lease and I'm sad, but I know that Kev never leads us in a wrong direction and so... I just have to have patience. Which is good, it will give me more time to plan and get things organized and not try and get it open in two months. but still... sigh....

Disneyworld!

We had a great time at Disneyworld Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom!

FINALLY AUGUST!

I am so excited for August, because it means Fall is just around the corner! My favorite time of year!

Rach starts soccer this week, we got her new cleats today. She finds out who her teacher is next week and then starts the following week. We will restart up on our piano lessons and then she will begin horseback riding soon as well. We just went ice skating last week and it was so fun, I didn't bring my camera though.

Still haven't signed our new lease for the shop. I'm not worried about it though. I'm really looking forward to the holidays! We got ANOTHER write up in the Sierra Style magazine, so that was nice (a surprise as well), so hopefully it is keeping chocolate on people's minds! Tomorrow I have a meeting with a big restaurant in our area and so hopefully they buy again from me this holiday season.

I've also decided to run for City Council. I think it will be interesting, especially with owning a business and with the way the economy is going, I want to make sure the City is doing what it can to keep businesses staying and hep bring new business.

Kev is doing great with APX. It's been a rough summer.

Okay, so I feel like this blog today is generic. I'm tired, but wanted to get a new post up since it has been forever. I promise a better post later!