Even after 5.5 years of life on the road is finally done, the excitement continues while raising our six children...all while relying on God's grace.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Changes!!
We were in St Cloud waiting in between jobs from Oct 7th until yesterday! We FINALLY got a call (After thinking we'd might need to change careers!) on Thursday and we were able to move back to LUVERNE last night!! We are in the same apt building as we were before, just a different apt. The apt that we are in now is the same set up as our other one though, so coming from our apt in garner, we fell as though we are living like KINGS! :) So we are settling back in here and trying to get everything unpacked and put away. We went from st cloud to garner (packed, cleaned and moved out) and then from garner to luverne (unloaded everything) all within about 13 hours! It was a packed day and we couldn't have done it without the help of my dad and his truck!! THANKS DAD!!
Oh, the other thing that is exciting in our lives is that we are adding another little blessing to our family!!! We are expecting baby #4 in March and are very excited! Even though I'm almost half way done with the pregnancy, I'm still waiting for my belly to 'pop' out! I have a tiny little bump but no one would even be able to tell I'm pregnant :) I do feel the baby move though and have heard it's heartbeat a couple times, so I know it's in there! :) (And don't feel bad if this is the first time you've heard anything...we didn't tell anyone until I was 15 weeks along (now 18)...that was a LONG wait for me! :)
Hope all is well with everyone and, again, I'm sorry this is so short, but once we get the internet in our apt, I'll be able to update the blog more and post a bunch of pics, etc! Until next time...!
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Welcome to October!!
So we thought Nathan working 293 hours in August was a lot....WRONG! In September he put in a WHOPPIN' 347.5 hours!!!! Wowzers!! Keeping in mind that most "normal" people worked around 168. But, then again, if you haven't caught on yet, WE'RE NOT NORMAL!! :) But that's okay cause 'normal' is boring...hehe :)
ONE MORE WEEK!!!! The deadline for the job is Oct 8th, a week from today!!! They are going to be trying as hard as they can to be done by the 6th though because if they get done then, they get a bonus. Nathan thinks that they will actually make it!! As long as we don't get any rain that slows them down, it should be alright! A few nights ago it rained the whole night and we got about an inch. Nathan said the next day was just spent getting unstuck so they didn't progress much. Now that it's dried up, they are back at it! He still starts at 7am and gets off at 8pm. I'm glad that its started to get dark earlier and earlier so the foreman is tempted to keep them their any longer than 8...it's too dark!! We are looking forward to having Nathan off work for a little while (maybe a week or two??) until the next job starts....we ALL need a break!!
We are very anxious to get out of this place as well. I have 12 boxes already packed and sitting by the door and continue to get a couple boxes packed per day. We won't have much time to move when we find out where we are going since they usually call him for a job on a friday and they want him to start the next monday, so I'm trying to get as much ready as I can now.
I'm SO ready to have FOUR WHOLE BURNERS to cook on! :) instead of just 2! That's one thing I'm looking forward to. There's not too much about this place that we will miss....although the two things that have been nice are 1)my clothes line right outside my door...i LOVE that!!! and 2) Donna!! She's been such a sweetheart and loves us so much. I know we will be missed by her.
Some things I won't miss? Hearing the marching band start practice a block away at 7:00 AM EVERY weekday!! Hearing the music/walking/digging in cupboards/coughing of our neighbor. Smelling the constant smoke of our new neighbors that moved in downstairs. actually, there were two apts (one next to donna and one in the basement) that were moved in to a few days ago and they all smoke so it tends to just float right up here when we have our windows open. Having our landlord not fix ANYTHING that he said he was going to or that we've asked him to. The CREEKY-NESS of our floor!! It's so horrible! The stove not working, the cupboards in the bathroom falling off, the bathtub being tilted so all the water by the faucet runs down onto the floor, no light in our fridge, having to push the fridge with our legs in order to shut it, no roller thingys in our drawers just wood on wood, NO light in our living room!! Our living room is seperated from the other rooms so light from the kitchen or something doesn't just flow into the living room and the other day the kids broke our lamp that was in there so now we have NO light in our living room....So, after like 7:15, no going into the living room if you need something...good thing Brayan sleeps in there, at least it's dark! :)
But despite all that stuff that, I know we've been blessed. We have a wonderful lady who lives below us, neighbors behind us that gave us cucumbers from her garden, and another neighbor who let us pick apples off their tree. A safe town to live in where I could walk the kids everyday. A huge park a block away. And we actually found an apt in Garner (which is where we wanted to move based on where Nathan was going to show up for work) that let us pay month to month so we didn't get caught up in a lease when it was just going to be short-term. Oh, AND we were 10 minutes from our milk farmer! THAT has been SUPER nice!! So I try to focus on those things and not the other stuff :)
Now I'm just excited to see where the Lord leads us next! Where do you think we'll end up??
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Caedmon
The two things that DEFINE Caedmon: a book and his red tupperware "hat"!! (which he wears ALL the time!! :)
Caedmon turned 2 on Sept 4th.
He weighs 24.6 lbs and is 2 ft. 9-7/8 inches tall. (I know, skinny little guy! :)
His favorite thing to do is read books. Next favorites would be to line up his matchbox cars in a row, and the same with his farm animals.
He's obsessed with hats and will put anything on his head and call it a hat!
He goes to bed around 8pm, sleeps through the night and will get up around 8am.
He'll (usually) nap for a couple hours during the late morning/early afternoon.
He doesn't have that big of vocabulary yet but he does say 'mom, dad, grandma, grandpa, baby, hat, up, bee, me, cup, go, ball, please, hi, all done (which sounds like 'ah dah', so cute!)....and i'm probably forgetting a bunch but that is what I can think of now!
He uses signs for milk, please, more, book, open and whatever else I show him the sign for, he will copy.
He LOVES to play in the tub, which is quite a difference from a few months ago! If you remember, it was Caedmon who was DEATHLY afraid of water, even the SIGHT of water! Now, I can't keep him out of it!
Breakfast is probably his best eating time of the day. He'll easily put down 2-3 eggs, a couple bananas, and a piece of toast; or 5-6 pancakes.
He's in size 4 diapers and wears size 18-24 mo clothes (mostly). We sit him on the potty (which he likes!) but does nothing and just wants to play in the toilet, so we are not too actively pursuing potty training at this time!
His middle name is Graham, named after my paternal Grandma's maiden name.
He still doesn't have much hair! :) Although in the places where he does have it, it's super fine and gets long.
He's just starting to climb up onto the kitchen counters, looking for something he can get into!
He's still our 'squeeler' which we are constantly trying to stop!
He plays very well independently. Tiernan and Brayan will play together while Caedmon sits on our bed by himself and reads books or sits at the table and lines up his cars.
He loves to strum his 'air guitar' and flex his muscles :) (what a boy!)
He LOVES animals of all shapes and sizes!
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Another New Niece!!
Monday, September 22, 2008
Haircut Time!!
Hopefully this following picture makes you laugh because it sure made me laugh!! It was time to give Brayan a haircut!! After being mistaken for a girl a few times in the last couple weeks, I said enough is enough! (The last time it was at the grocery store and he was even in a BLUE shirt!) I tell ya.....so anyway, here are the before pictures!
Here is the after picture! His hair sure couldn't stand up as high as before! He looks like a handsome little boy now!
As if working 12 hour days wasn't enough, Nathan now works 13 hour days, 7 days a week, including Sunday! They are really trying to push to get the job done on schedule (Oct 8th) so they are workin' the guys to the bones! A lot of guys left this job to go work on storm work with the hurricanes so they lost about 30-40 guys. They just brought in about 15 from MN and NE so hopefully they'll get it done on time. We are ready for Nathan to be done working on this job!!! We don't know where we will be moving but pray that it will be in MN. They say there's is 'plenty' of work in MN so that would be nice! Nathan gets home about 8:30pm, says good night to the boys and reads them a story (to who ever is still awake!) then he showers, eats, and does this....
.............poor guy! Just a couple more weeks!!
A week ago Friday, Tiernan was looking out the window and then came up to me and asked "Mom, can we go to the parade?" I said "parade? what parade?" So I looked outside and much to my surprise, there were people lined up in their lawn chairs out by the road! The two little ones were sleeping, so I took Tiernan outside to see what was going on. There were obviously people waiting for a parade to start, but I had no idea why! It was any other Friday afternoon! So I asked the lady that lives in a house behind us and she said it was homecoming! So I came back in to get a blanket and Tiernan and I sat on the curb right in front of our place and watched the parade, full with police cars, firetrucks, bands and CANDY! It was a fun time, especially since we've never lived on a parade route before!
OH! By the way....Go see the movie FIREPROOF this weekend, opening in theaters Sept 26th (Friday). From what I hear it is an AMAZING movie and you can learn more about it, see trailers, etc at www.fireproofthemovie.com Support this film (ESPECIALLY on opening weekend when all the 'numbers' count!) We need more like it!!
Monday, September 8, 2008
There's a First For Everything!
Caedmon turned 2 last week as well (on the 4th!) We celebrated with ice cream cones when Nathan got home. Now my kids are back to being all different ages :) 3, 2 and 1 :)
Nathan's been keeping busy with work. He still works 7 days a week, 12 hours m-sat and then 10 hours on sunday. Even with a couple rain days and taking a day off in August, he still worked 293 hours in August!! (Most 'normal' people work around 160). We are thinking we will be here until the end of this job, which will probably be in october sometime.
He got off early yesterday because of the rain so it was super nice having him home longer on sunday! We went to Mason city to do some quick shopping and during our trip, we were asked a question that I haven't heard yet....."Are they triplets?" HAHAHA!! :) I was busy picking out some grapes and all I heard was Nathan say "Nope, they are all seperate." I turned around to find an older lady smiling at all my kids and then she said "Oh, they sure look like it." We smiled and she continued on her way. After she was gone, I asked Nathan "Did she ask if they were twins?" (Everywhere we go, we usually get at least 2 people ask if Caedmon and Brayan are twins, so I was assuming this was the same) But then Nathan says "Nope, she asked if they were triplets" Hehe...this made me laugh! It was a first!! Tiernan and Caedmon were riding in the cart and Nathan was holding Brayan so I guess she couldn't really see that Tiernan is a little bigger than Brayan :) It was funny though....
Me and Caedmon (the other boys weren't paying attention to the camera :)
Caedmon with his birthday cone!
Monday, September 1, 2008
What a Weekend!!!
Friday: We spent time at my parents house just relaxing, going on the boat, and playing outside. Friday evening we went to our friends house for supper and had a blast just fellowshipping and chatting.
Saturday: Nathan and I got to have a DATE DAY!!!! We left the kids with my parents and started the day out with massages!! After those we went shopping for a few minutes and then went to eat. Next we went out to St Johns to walk around. We did about half of the chapel walk and decided it was time to turn around....it's a long way out there!! :) After St Johns we drove through some houses in St Joe and actually found where one of my friends from high school lives and stopped in for a bit to say hi to him and his wife. Next, we went to a movie, then dinner, and ended the evening with some bowling!! It was so much fun! I won both games :) But I am STILL sore!! Maybe we should have got our massages after we went bowling! We slept over at Nathan's parents house who were gone for the weekend and after we grabbed lunch on Sunday, we made it back to my parents house! It was such a nice time with just the two of us!! We haven't been away from the kids for that long since we've had kids so after over 3-1/2 years, we thought it was time!!
Sunday: Relaxed for a couple hours at my parents house while the kids napped and then headed to our other friends house for the evening. Again, it was a great time of fellowship and food and football and just hanging out!
Monday: Went to Nathan's parents house for lunch and then headed back home! We thought the traffic would be bad so we left early. When we were stopped on the interstate in Albertville, we thought that we would have a long drive through the cities but it actually only took us 13 more minutes to get home than it did to get there, so it wasn't that bad!!
Grandpa and Grandma with Brayan and Caedmon
On the chapel walk
Relaxing at St Johns
Tiernan with Grandpa on the little four wheeler
Will it be a strike??? (probably not...hehe :)
Can I get the spare??
Proof that I won! :) (Notice we both got 2 strikes and both got the last one in the 10th frame!!)
On our way to bowling
This is Tiernan with the sweet Ms Donna that lives below us. Last week she said that she wanted to get a professional photographer over because she wants a picture of "her other family" and then she said "I love you guys like you were my own" Awww...she's so sweet! Caedmon calls her Grandma Donna :)