hot cocoa

What a nice relaxing weekend! I thought I was going to be at my parents place through the weekend since the Ymca was having a 'free day' including a free zumba class that I wanted to go to but since the weather decided to get icky and snow, I figured I better make it back here before the snow. So Friday afternoon I left and came back...and I'm super glad I did because that night it started to snow here and the wind was a-blowin'! We ended up getting about 6 inches over night and the next day. Enough to make a mess and enough to keep Nathan from working on Saturday! He left for work at 5:30 and was back in bed by 6! He didn't even get a few miles down the road before he figured that he wasn't going to be making it any further. He called in and the foreman said that they'd be calling it off for the day anyway. So he had Saturday with us and today as well since they aren't working Sundays for the time being.

The kids had fun in the snow, spending as much time outside as their little soaked mittins would let them! They even got to build a snowman.


It was also a wonderful weekend to drink some hot chocolate! Here is the recipe I used for my hot chocolate!

1/3 cup water
1/4 cup cocoa
1/2 cup sugar (you can use rapadura or sucanut to make it even more healthy!)
5 cups whole milk
1 t vanilla

Stir together water, cocoa, and sugar in saucepan and heat until boiling. Add milk and heat again til very hot. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Enjoy!!


While I was at my parents house, I spent most of the time making selections with our builder! The first day I was in town was the same day Nathan had class in the cities. He ended up leaving class by 1:00 and coming up to do the electrical walk-thru with us! It was such a help having him their for some decisions because I had no idea about some stuff but I knew Nathan would have an opinion. He spent the rest of the evening with us (checking out lighting, tile, stone) and then drove back down here that night.

The next day I met with the builder again for most of the day and went to lots of places and had LOTS of choices to make!! We checked out cultured marble, visited our builders house for ideas (for those of you who don't know, our builder just happens to be Nathan's first cousin...so it's nice getting to know him better! And he builds beautiful homes!! :) Then we checked out granite (wow, lotsa choices!), picked up our flooring samples, went home to pick up the kids and to take them to my brother's house so my sister in law could take over childcare for awhile, met back up with Steve (builder), checked out laminate counter tops, lighting, and tile.

The next day I was able to run some errands (like to pick up my Dyson and Shark vacuums!!) and then to met with Steve again for stain and paint colors, lighting and more countertops! Whew!

It was actually really fun being able to visualize some stuff that is going in our house. As of now, the shingling is done, framing and plumbing are almost done, and the electrical and heating is part way put in. This week they should be install the septic, hooking up the electric, digging the well, siding, and continuing to work on the inside! They should also be fixing the front window situations, getting those to be the right size.

We cannot wait until we can move in!!

We will be back there next week over Thanksgiving so I will be able to update more then. We will be going to my parents next Tuesday and Wednesday is my birthday so Nathan and I are going on an all-day date to the Mall of America! We are both super excited to spend some time together!!