Baby boy turned 3! What???

I know I am late, but last month Jack turned 3!  We celebrated his b-day that sat before.  We took the kids to the safari drive through.  We never went before now cause we know more than one person who has gotten bit by one of the animals there, but we figured it would be a fun thing to do.  And it was awesome.  

Jack feeding the animals.  They were so funny they would all crowd around your car and Ryan would honk and they just look at you and don't move.  Jack would just drop a piece of feed out as we drove a a little goat followed our car for a good 15 minutes.

 Ryan let Jack drive.  He was a super happy boy!

The zebra. 

This bird was cracking me up.  Ryan kept throwing a piece of feed out the window and this bird would eat it and then pop its head back up in the window.  He was making me laugh.

This camel was crazy.  He would make a mean noise at the other animals and then take their food.  He followed us forever, but he was really slow cause he was so fat.  Ryan said he didn't see any camels as big as him in Kuwait. 

The ostrich who was pecking at our car.  I can't believe how big they are.

Baby bison nursing on his mommy.  So cute.

                                         Peacock in the middle of the road.

 After the safari fun, we went to the mall and gave Jack a bunch of quarters and let him go crazy on all the mechanical toy things.  They had lots of fun. 

They also rode the train and there was a bunger cord trampoline thing they got to jump on too.  They were so over stimulated by the end of the day and Caroline lost her balloon animal.  So traumatic.  On his real b-day we celebrated with a few friends and I made all Jack's favorite food.  Corn dogs and Mac and Cheese.  And I made him a monkey cake and cup cakes.  But sadly those pictures are still on the camera which I cannot locate at the moment.  I was so proud of my cake too.

Merry Christmas from the Durrs!

We probably won't be sending out Christmas cards this year so this will have to do for our Christmas card. This has been the hardest year for our family ever. Ryan was deployed last Dec right before Christmas to Kuwait for a year. It was one of the most challenging things I have ever had to go through. It wasn't all bad though. We got to talk to Daddy a lot on skype on the phone. He sent the kids books with DVD's of him reading the story. We had some fun too while Daddy was away. We took two big roads trips, one west, one east. And we traveled all over Texas. (Pictures will follow) We had lots of visitors too! Thanks to my sister Heidi, my mom and Dad, my in-laws and my good friend Maggie for coming to keep us company. There were so many wonderful people around here that were always there for us whether it be holidays or babysitting or just keeping me company. I have to say we were taken care of. I actually didn't have to take either of my kids to the ER once during the deployment. Deployment does seem to be the time that everything goes wrong. I did have to call poison control for Jack twice though. Crazy stuff did happen. While Daddy was away Jack weaned and potty trained. He's such a big boy now. Caroline started kindergarten and started reading! It is always adventurous with two little ones around. But I know I we only made it through this because of the strength we received from the Lord. I am so grateful for the blessings bestowed upon us this year. While all this craziness was going on at home, it seemed Ryan was relaxing in the desert. He was promoted to SGT while he was in Kuwait. I was sad I missed it but still happy for him. But I really do think it was harder for him, because he was away from us and had less to do. R&R was in Sept. and it was so wonderful. I did have to pick up Ryan from DFW airport which is always an adventure and I was lost and so anxious, I just knew something was going to go wrong. I had no idea where I was even going. All I was given was a time, no flight number or where to meet him. Luckily the ladies in the parking toll booth knew. I arrived maybe 5 minutes before Ryan walked off the plane. It was one of the most wonderful moments in my life. We spent the next 4 days in fort worth and we had so much fun just the two of us. The kids were so happy to see him. Jack had been wondering what happened to Daddy and was so excited to finally find him. We had a great time. It was hard to see him leave but I was still happy and excited because we found out right before he left that we were expecting!! We will have a new member of the family in May of next year. Of course the last three months of deployment were filled with morning sickness and tiredness and not as much fun as the first 9 months of the deployment. But I had awesome visiting teachers and home teachers who helped me out so much. And a great neighbor who would take Caroline to school for me if I needed. Anyway it is finally over and we are looking forward to what this year brings. We will have a new baby and will be getting out of the army and leaving the hood. But we are excited for all the changes to come our way! Merry Christmas and I hope everyone has a wonderful year to come!

 Ryan doin ghis job in Kuwait

 This is what they spent their time doing.

 Ryan at his promotion

 First speech as Sgt. Durr.

 Ryan and his weapon.  He was given the biggest one for some reason.

Just another day in the desert.

 Ryan's homecoming.  Happy Wife!

 The Kids were happy to see Daddy too!

No one cared about Mommy anymore now that Daddy was home!!!

More of our house.

 Here are a few more pics of our house that I could find.  I can't wait to decorate everything for Christmas and take pictures!

This room is suppose to be a dinning room but it isn't even by the kitchen and we only have table so we stuck some other stuff in there.

Our house.

Whenever we move I always say I am gonna take pictures and show everyone our knew home. Yeah well we have lived here a year now so I decided to just post a few pics of our house of rooms that I can get clean enough to show people. Nothing too exciting. It is on post housing and my decorating skills arn't that good. But I said I would post pictures a year ago.

Jack's room if you can't tell.

The Princess's room.

I picked these flowers one day and thought they looked so well there I took a picture.

Yeah my fridge is always a disaster inside, out and on top of.

My Rooster Kitchen.

I know i have pictures of my living room somewhere I will just have to find them and post them in another post.

Cheese Face!!

It is so hard to get good pictures of the kids these days because everytime I get the camera out

This happens...


They look so cute playing and then they do what I call the the cheese face whenever I want to take a picture. I try to tell Caroline open your eyes more or close them or just smile normal. It only makes it worse. How could such a cute little girls school photos turn out so horribly wrong. I will spare you those. I was like really photographer you charge 40 bucks and this is what we get really. It's like they don't even make an effort to take a good picture. They are still cute though and I love taking pictures of them! I am hoping his is just a phase and his years school pictures will be better.

Celebrating Caroline's Birthday at Ft. Meade!

On Caroline's real birthday we celebrated with family and friends at the Ft. Meade bowling ally. They have dollor thursdays. It's a dollor to bowl, a dollor for shoes, and a dollor for pizza. It was a good deal and the kids had so much fun. They were super cute bowling and did well. I am the worst boweler ever, but the kids are great!




Caroline and Maggie

Caroline bowling. The kids kept wanting to slide down that alligator thing.

Jack Cheesing for the camera.

He had to do it all by himself.

He had his own specialway of bowling.

He liked to back into the ball to make it go down.

He was so cute.

Celebrating Caroline's Birthday in Texas!

Before we left for our summer adventure we celebrated Caroline's birthday at Ft. Hood. We met a few of her good friends at the pool and then did cake and presents with just family. It was very laid back and very enjoyable. Jack took a nap during the whole thing so it got to be all about Caroline which is a rarity with Jack around. She got a little mermaid barbie and a prince charming and a few outfits for them, a movie (barie and the magic pegasus, I hate those barbie movies.) and she got a big barbie doll house, which I somehow got for free from Amazon. She loves it and it took forever to get it together and I thought I took pictures of it but I guess not. She loves it and was so surprised. It is always easy shopping for Caroline. She is really into Barbies but we mostly only do the Princess ones cause they usually come with more clothing. And it was difficult finding a normal looking Ken doll. I don't know what is going through the head of people who make these things, so we went with Prince Charming. She loves the pool and has become a very good swimmer and has even gotten to practice her swimming skills at the six flags wave pool this summer and then later in the ocean. She loves it and wasn't scared of the waves at all but she was scaring me. Oh to be 5 again...

Caroline in the pool with her friends.

Jack having fun in the "poo" too.

My second attempt at a castle cake. Hey the pan cost like 30 bucks so I am gonna use it as long as I can. It turned out a lot better this year, we'll see if I can do better in years to come.


Caroline holding her Ariel Doll and cheesing for the camera.