Moving...

It's pretty much the worst thing ever.  Ugh.  I just want to be unpacked and have everything in it's place.  Our garage is full of stuff and my van is sitting out in the driveway while I pray that with this crazy storm, there is no hail!

We are so thrilled with so much about our new home!  We love love love the neighborhood and actually like the yard a lot even though it's much smaller than our previous lot.  We are having fun exploring the restaurants in our neighborhood since right now our oven is sitting in the middle of the kitchen waiting to be installed.  We got our new fridge and love it...it's a monster.  We figured with 3 growing boys, we need the biggest fridge we can get...so we got a giganto one.  We even had to trim a bit of the wood off of the cabinets above the fridge so it would fit!  Ha.  Soooo worth it!  Can't wait to get our dishwasher installed TONIGHT as our dishwasher in the house was not draining right and I am FINALLY getting the double gas oven (that's the one sitting in my kitchen waiting to be installed!) that I have been wanting since moving into our PREVIOUS house 2 years ago!  Woot!  So needless to say, we are excited about the new appliances. :)  We definitely have less square footage here which is a bit of a struggle as we don't want our house to look cluttered, but it turns out that I kinda like (and want to keep) most of my things.  Ha.  We'll figure it out, I'm sure!

I am excited to paint and will be making an IKEA trip in the very near future for the boys' new beds and some storage solutions.  Otherwise, things are coming together pretty well.  Tate and Wesley have had a blast meeting and playing with the neighbor boy who is a year older than Tate and we are really doing our best to make this house our home.

I cannot wait for the school year to end so I no longer have to drive Tate 25 minutes to school each morning and also drive that 25 minutes in the afternoon to pick him up several times a week as well!  That is no fun!

So there's good and bad, but we are super happy that at least the moving part is over!  :)

Spring Break 2014

Here is an overview of our spring break via my phone pictures.

We sold our house!!!!

We took an awesome 2 day mini vacation to Grizzly Jack's Grand Bear Resort with the DeCooks. We had so much fun with the kids and laughed so hard the whole time.

Then just the big boys and I went to Des Moines for the night. We went to find restaurants, the boys played with friends, and we went to Skyzone. It was a super quick, but fun trip to end our spring break. :-)

In addition to the fun that we had, Jamie and I actually got some work done for our photography business too!

It was a great week and a half break. It always goes by way too quickly.

Phi Phi is TWO!

(a belated birthday post for Sophia...I've had this drafted for almost a week and just got around to finishing it!)

Phi Phi turned 2 last week!  I can't believe it!

It seems like just yesterday that I walked into that delivery room and got to see her sweet face only moments old.  It seems like yesterday that I got to hold that sweet baby for the first time!

I love her and her sisters so much and love the amazing bond they have with my boys.  What a special relationship we have with the DeCook family...and how God orchestrated everything with our children being so close in age and them being such amazing friends and genuinely loving each other so much.  Tate and Wesley still don't "get" that they aren't their cousins!  lol

Lora, Sophia and I got to spend some time together just before Sophia's birthday doing her 2 year pictures.

Seriously...you don't get much cuter than this!

And I know I say it all the time, but this is my blog and my personal journal and outlet where I can say anything that is on my mind so I will say it again...I am so blessed to have Lora in my life.

I love that Lora and I are doing this thing called motherhood together.  It's so nice to be able to learn and grow as mothers together.  I need her and what we have is beyond friendship and it is so precious to me.  And her girls...I love them each so much that it hurts.  God brought our family together with the DeCooks at the perfect time in our lives.  We just "work".  Sean and James' friendship, the kids friendship, Lora and my friendship...it just works.  We have built so many incredible memories with this family...through our many evenings and weekends spent together, our trips away without kids, our family vacations, being there for each other in the hard times and the happy, big times in our lives, picking each other up when we are down, laughing harder than we've ever laughed in our lives together.  What a blessing to call these amazing people more than just friends...they are family to us.  And we look forward to the many more special vacations we will take, memories we will make and times we will spend together!

Phi Phi was not super excited about getting sung to.

It may have been a bit too much for her to take! lol.  I remember Tate doing this at his FOURTH birthday!  Ha!

 Aside from the fact that she obviously hated our singing, she was happy as can be!

We love you so much, Sweet Girl!

Happy Birthday!

I haven't started packing...

I am sad.  I really don't want to leave this house.  And the thing is...I LOVE our new home.  I am excited for what's to come.  I really am.  I let myself fall in love with this home though.  I had never done that before.  I have always lived in places that I knew were temporary.  This was the one home that I knew we would be raising our family in...the home that we would love and make our own over the years.  Ugh.  It's just a house...I know.  I just can't shake that icky feeling.  And honestly, our new home has a little bit less square footage than our current home and a smaller yard.  Because of those things, I honestly don't know if it is the home that we will be in for years to come.  It might be, but we know that in 5 years or so, we may want to get a larger place.  I hate the thought of moving into a home that might not be where we are for the long haul.  It's the reality for us right now though.  Sean is in school, my photography businesses are still growing and we didn't want to be house poor, so we purchased a home that we knew we would be able to afford comfortably right now.  Unfortunately, homes in the area we wanted to be in (for the schools and such) are just more pricey, so what we could afford comfortably wasn't going to provide us with as much square footage and yard space.  Once Sean completes school and starts his new career as a Nurse Practitioner and my photography businesses continue to grow, we may end up making ONE MORE move.  Although, the house isn't small...it's just that we've been spoiled with LOTS of square footage in our current home...so maybe this will be our forever house.  We've learned over the last few years...and continue to learn...that things never seem to go as planned.  Well, I believe they do go according to His master plan, but that plan is often not in line with my own plans!  Ha.

All of that to say that I haven't started packing...at all.  I probably should start working on that.  We are moving closing 2 weeks from Thursday.  I think I will cry when I walk out of this house for the last time. :(