Florida!

Lately I cannot seem to keep up with this blog. Granted life has continued to be quite busy but somehow the weeks just keep slipping by. Last night I officially unpacked our last box! That was an exciting moment. I pretty much have the house set up and organized now, except for some remodeling to the kitchen we hope to have done this fall. And let me tell ya, that project makes me super excited!! (more on that in the months to come)
One reason for my long blogging absence is because we went on another vacation. And as you can tell from the title, we went to Florida! Kreg's parents took us and all his siblings and their families to St. George Island for a week. It was wonderful! We truly just relaxed. We all stayed together in a beautiful house right on the beach. And not only were we on the beach, but we had our own private pool as well! I could have stayed there for much longer than a week, that's for sure.
Take a peek at the house:



Aiden and Makayla both loved the beach. Aiden improved quite a bit on his swimming while we were there. And Makayla loved the waves! She is a true beach babe. It was quite windy for several of the days so one day the waves were probably at least 4 feet tall, but that didn't phase her. I got in the ocean but not for long. I love the beach but I am not the biggest ocean person (not a big surprise to some of you).
I could tell you more but I think pictures say a thousand words so maybe I shall just inundate you with pictures. I realized after looking through all the pics that I didn't have too many of Aiden. And then I realized why. He was off playing with his cousins for most of the week! Hard to believe my son is old enough to just go off and play with his cousins. Anyway, I present to you our Florida trip:














And that was Florida! Well atleast some of it. We had a wonderful time and are so thankful to Kreg's parents for letting all of us spend the week together. What a blessing it is that we both have such wonderful Christian families!

Home Sweet Home

What a busy summer it has been! I can hardly believe its August already. Moving really made the weeks go by fast. But we are in our new home and loving it. And last night my father-in-law and my husband got our Internet going so I feel reconnected with the world once again! (awww what a great feeling) We've been in our house since the first of July and are feeling fairly settled now. Kreg's "honey-do" list is getting shorter with each week. I've already painted 3 rooms and just have the kids room and a bathroom to go. This may sound weird but the house is starting to smell like us now too. When we moved in it just smelled like other people. I would walk in the door and it didn't "smell" like home. Now I walk in the door and I don't notice anything so it must smell like us now! haha.
We moved in on a Friday night and by mid-morning Saturday I had my dad put to work on a little remodeling project. Our house is very open concept but it wasn't that way to begin with. There was this very odd wall that separated the kitchen from everything else but the wall was serving absolutely no purpose (it wasn't even touching the ceiling). So we took it down! And we LOVE IT now. Here is a before and after pic:
Before

After!

So I was thinking the other day how life has changed this summer:
-I now use the words "goin into town" when I need to run errands or get groceries.
-I go by corn fields, bean fields, grain bins, and hog barns when I'm jogging.
-I have a great view of the grain bins from my kitchen window (no longer is my view the side of the neighbor's house)
-Kreg can just pop in to say hi now when driving between barns. Love that part!
-We live just around the corner from my in-laws who have a pool so we've been doing lots of swimming.
-The kids have a huge yard to run around in now and I don't really have to worry about cars driving by while they're playing.
-Aiden and Makayla's future school is also just around the corner. I'm hoping to get Aiden signed up for preschool there next year.
-The kids also share a room now. Its going really well too. The only down side is they tend to wake up a little earlier than they use to and stay up a bit later talking (although sometimes thats really cute to listen to).

Those are just a few things I love about our new location. I think we are really going to enjoy living here.
And because I can't resist here is a recent pics of the kiddos:

They were dressed in my shirts.

We also took a big trip to Washington State to visit my extended family a few weeks ago. I'll post some pics from our trip soon.