Thursday, July 30, 2009

Our New House

We are moving tomorrow! We are very excited about our new home. Although we're a little sad about leaving our current home--it's where Jay and I lived after we got married and brought our babies home---we are looking forward to the opportunities and space in our new home. Come and visit us soon!

Front view:

Back view: Great screen porch!
The back yard: 1.5 acres of trees and woods!
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Friday, July 24, 2009

Milwaukee and more

We just got back from our trip to Milwaukee for Northwestern's annual company meeting. We had a great trip and even enjoyed some cooler weather (only in the 70's there)! They do such a good job of making the meetings a family event. We look forward to going every year and truly making Jay's work something our whole family does, not just somewhere Daddy goes during the day. I am so proud of Jay!

On Sunday morning, they have a 5k/10k and a 1 mile kids run. This year, Catherine and PopPop did the 1 mile run together. She was excited (even though it doesn't look like it this picture). She apparently was doing great until she tripped and fell down about half way through. I was waiting for her at the finish line and was so excited for her, but when she saw me she just burst into tears. I'm proud of her for trying it and look forward to running runs with her in the future.

Will's favorite thing all week was seeing the buses in the city. We rode a big bus to go to the zoo on Sunday night. All Will kept saying was "big bus"--very emphatically and loudly. He kept doing it all week any time we saw a big bus. We love that he's trying more words and word combinations now, especially when he's excited about something.
Their favorite part of the trip is usually the zoo night. Northwestern has the entire Milwaukee zoo and provides food and entertainment, and you can walk around to see the animals too. Catherine was very excited to see the hippopotamus. They also really liked the bears.
On Tuesday morning, Jay's mom and I took the kids to a children's musuem while Jay and Steve were at meetings. We went last year and were excited to go back. They had one entire exhibit that had golf balls and all kinds of different tracks set up to roll the golf balls down. Golf balls are Will's favorite, favorite things so he was a very happy boy! It's a really cool musuem and makes me excited for the opening of the Greenville children's museum next week.
One funny Will story from Milwaukee: One night we were getting ready to put the kids in the bathtub in the hotel. We had gotten them undressed when they decided they wanted to play a little hide-and-seek. So off the ran, naked, to hide. A couple of minutes later, Catherine came running in to tell me that Will was going potty. I went into the bedroom and he was hiding in the armoire and had peed and pooped in there! It was disgusting! Yet very funny. No more naked hide-and-seek!

In other updates, we are getting ready to move! We closed on our house today and will close on the house we're buying next week. We'll be moving into our new home next Friday. This has been a long and trying process, but I am very excited about where God is leading us. We'll have pics of the new house soon.

Catherine gets her cast off on Monday. It's hard to believe it's already been 6 weeks. She is very excited to go swimming and to wash her arm in the bathtub. Poor child, she tried to lick her fingers tonight at dinner and can't reach them. I know that has to be annoying.

We'll keep you updated. Thanks for checking in!
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Monday, July 13, 2009

Family Time at the Greenbrier

We were in WV this past weekend for a family reunion with the Heckman's (Marcy's brother and his family). They live in Vermont and Texas, so we rarely see them. I think the last time we were all together was for Jay's grandfather's funeral in May 2005. We really had a great time and enjoyed the chance to be away for a few days, especially to take a break from all of this house stuff.

There was a great playground in front of the cottages we stayed in. Catherine thought this 4-person see-saw was really cool. They also liked to swing and watch the people who were going horseback riding.

One night we had a "fancy" dinner at the hotel there. Jay had the bright idea that the 4 of us should wear seersucker. So we all did. Catherine was pretty excited about getting all dressed up.
Catherine also had lots of fun playing with Aunt Wissa's (Melissa's) jewelry. She brought her grandmother's jewelry box of costume jewelry and Catherine kept getting "all fancied up". This was how dressed up she got one night to go bowling. That's the fanciest bowler I've ever seen--yes, she's wearing earrings too. I think she even added a bracelet or two before we got there.
One of the highlights was spending some time with their cousin (i think he's technically their 3rd cousin), Augie. He's 3 and such a fun little boy. Will really liked have another little guy around. And even though Will doesn't say too many words still, he learned to say "Augie" very quickly. This picture was after some fun bowling! You should see these 2 throw some bowling balls.
It was great weekend! Now we're getting ready to head to Milwaukee on Saturday....
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