Have a Happy Fourth!!

Just a quick post here..... Nathan's last day of work for the week is today (and hopefully he'll get off early!) and then he'll have the weekend to relax!! Nathan's parents are coming to visit later in the day and are staying until Saturday. They have to bring their own bed, blankets, chairs to sit on for the parade, etc b/c we only have the bare essentials here, but they wanted to come anyway!! There will be a parade in Clear Lake tomorrow and then the carinval (rides, etc) is going on along with a craft show. It should be a good time! We will also probably go back to the beach since the first time was so much fun! Then Saturday morning, Nathan and Mary are planning to go strawberry picking so I'm excited to get more strawberries!!

Yesterday we went into Clear Lake to meet my sister, husband and family at the Dairy Queen. They are on their way to MN from Arkansas and go right thru Clear Lake, so they planned it so they could eat lunch there and meet with us! I have not seen my sister and her kids since last a year ago June and I haven't seen John since a year ago March, so they both got to meet Brayan for the first time!! They plan on staying in MN for about 3 weeks! (John has to go back to Arkansas to run his business during that time, but then is coming back again next weekend for a family reunion! The reunion will be at my parents house and almost ALL of my family BOTH SIDES will be there camping out in my parents yard!! (aunts, uncles, cousins..the whole works!...although i do only have FIVE cousins total on both sides put together!! :)

Meeting at the DQ was a good time!! It was funny because my sister's kids are 6, 4, and 2 and then I had my 3 kids of course, along with 4 adults (Me, Leah, John, and John's brother Darren). We all walked into the Dairy Queen and while standing in line, this old man kinda got caught up in all the kids and ended up tripping Tiernan (by accident). So while he made his way out of the DQ, Darren was just coming in and laughing. He said as that man was leaving, he was grumbling to himself saying "6 kids...who would bring 6 kids to the dairy queen...6 kids...grumble grumble" :) We thought it was funny. At least the man could count!!

Well, here is the only pic I took at the DQ (I should have taken more!) but it is of Abi (6) and Tiernan. (Leah with their dog Bella and Caedmon in the background.)

Have a Happy Independence Day!!

A Day at the Beach!!

On Sunday we went to Clear Lake (about 12 minutes from Garner) to go to the beach and have a picnic and go swimming!! It was SUCH a perfect day out too! I thought it would be a little cool since it was pretty windy out but the wind turned warm and the sun was shinning most of the day! It was so much fun to go as a family and just hang out, the kids had a blast!! We had our picnic and then walked around the beach for a little while looking at the neat houses along the water and looking at the ducks, etc and then we came back to the beach and went swimming and then walked around the cute town of Clear Lake. It was a perfect day!!

We started off the day with a picnic!! It was the perfect picnic meal with pb&j sandwiches, grapes, bananas, potato salad, & chips! The weather was perfect (a little windy but it felt good when the sun was out!!)

Caedmon eating his sandwich. Brayan had fallen asleep in the car so we just moved his car seat to the stroller and he slept for quite a while!

The cruise boat they take out every few hours for paying riders. It was actually closed for this day because of the wind out on the lake.

I think he's a little too short yet....

Tiernan getting ready to go swimming!

Yes, that is Caedmon in the water!!! This is funny....as we pulled up into our parking space right when we got to the beach, Caedmon started bawling b/c he saw the water! We were like 'ok Caedmon...you've been in the bathtub, you can be in here!...plus, you're obsessed with playing in the toilet whenever we aren't looking, so just pretend it's a big toilet!" He still didn't like it until I got him down by the water and asked him 'do you want to get down?' and to my surprise, he nodded his head yes!!! So I set him down and he started throwing sand right away...yay!!

Here he is getting a bit more brave....

Beach Bums :)

Where's Bray Bray??

Smiley

Mmmm...that ice cream was good!!

There was this fountain thing that randomly sprayed water really high up so some kids had a good time doing that. It was fun to watch.

The picture below is of a ampi-theater thing that they have in the park where a band was performing. There were tons of people sitting in lawn chairs, etc watching their performance.

Norman and Gill

Sorry it's been a while since I've posted on here!! Not too much exciting has been happening. We got a couple goldfish from Walmart when we were there. We figured at 28 cents a piece, if they just last a couple days, it was still worth it!! The kids have been enjoying them and Tiernan would feed them all day long if I'd let him! I did have to put them on top of the frig for a while, out of Caedmon's reach because a couple days ago, he was sitting up on the table watching them and then when I looked again, he was playing with one....in his hand!! Then I looked at the bowl and it had a bobby pin laying on the bottom, a kleenex floating around, and 2 toothpicks and a starburst wrapper floating on the top :) Needless to say, I had to clean their bowl....

Tiernan looking very closely at the fish. We named them Norman and Gill :)

Nathan has been working alot, 12-14 hour days. He got home at 7:30 a couple nights ago and after he showered, he sat down to eat and says "Man, this is nice! I'm home and it's only 8:00pm!!" I said 'anyone else would think that's nuts but you think it's early still!' That just gives you an idea of how much and how late he can be working sometimes!! Although he did get off an hour early the night before last because it was absolutely pouring here. It started to rain and thunder and lighting so the kids and I were standing by the door watching it. Then it started to get REALLY windy and the rain was blowing right into my house so we quickly shut the windows and then next thing I know, it's hailing! When I looked out our door (we just had the storm door closed) I could BARELY see the house that is like a few feet away from our front deck because it was rain and hailing and BLOWING that hard! It was actually quite scary and I was contimplating going downstairs, but then I thought let's just shut the door and get away from the window for now!! Plus, there'd be no way I could have gotten the kids outside and down 2 flights of stairs in that weather. I called our landlord to see what radio station to listen to to hear the weather, but that hailing and blowing only lasted a few minutes. Then it just rained and rained for awhile. Nathan got home about an hour than usual and he stood outside in the rain for awhile soaking it up, washing himself off and LOVING the coolness of it for a change! Then he got home yesterday at about 11am because it was raining in the morning again. It's rained most of the night last night and was thundering and lightning this morning but there's no sign of him yet!

The road right outside, it was flooded again and only that tiny line down the middle was the road peeking through.

Nathan washing himself off in the pouring rain!

Nathan says "It's so nice out here!!"

Nothing too new with the kids....Tiernan loves his train set and that keeps him busy for quite some time. Oh, there is one kinda new thing with Caedmon, he sat in the tub WITHOUT screaming for ONCE!! YAY!! He still bawled as we put him in there, but then once we let him throw a few toys in and make some splashes, he decided it wasn't SO bad in there. That is the first time EVER that he hasn't been absolutely screaming when being by water. If you remember from previous posts, Caedmon usually cries just when he SEES water, so this was quite a milestone! and Brayan is standing more and more on his own (he thinks he's pretty cool) and is now walking behind his push toy.

Caedmon's enjoying the water!!!

When we say "Praise the Lord!", Brayan does this.... :)

The dreaded laundry room....This is what you see right when you open the door to the laundry area...

...and when you turn to your right, there you see the washer and dryer...

I have actually had time during naps a couple days this week to do some scrapbooking!! I'm trying to get caught up on Brayan's so any time that I can squeeze it a page or two is so nice!!

Oh, by the way, I clocked the drive from here to 'downtown' Garner and it's 1.1 miles one way. So I figure we probably walk about 2.5-3 miles each time we go out since we most of the time don't take the shortest distance there, etc. So that's why it took so long last week to walk to the dollar store, cuz it's 1.5 miles away!


Well, that should be all for now. Things might get a little more interesting here in the next couple-few weeks, but you'll just have to stay posted!!! :)

Happy Summer!!

What a beautiful summer day in Garner IA! It's sunny and 80 degrees as I write this at 6:40pm. The kids and I have been trying to get into a routine this week since it seems like it's been an eternity since we've had 'a normal day'. It's actually been going very well. I thought the days would just drag on forever with Nathan working so many hours, but to my surprise, they've been going by fairly quickly.

We've been getting out in the afternoon for a couple hours to walk around the town, so that breaks up the day nice. We usually do this in the afternoon so we can come home and start making supper right away, but today we did our walk in the morning because I had to hit a garage sale :) I actually went to two of them and the second one wasn't even planned! I found an awesome book (5o cents!) there that I know Nathan will really like so I'm pumped about that find! But then by the time we got home, it was time to make lunch, so it worked out nice!

Yesterday we started our walk at 3:45 to go to the dollar store, it took 40 minutes to walk there! You'd think in a little town like this, everything would be very close by, but since we live on the very south-western part of Garner and all the stores are on the north-eastern side, it takes a while!! So by the time we went to that store and then walked across the lawn to the other store (ALCO...reminds me of Warroad, since that's the only other ALCO store I've ever seen... :) and walked home, it was 2 hours later!! And since I'm by myself I don't have the luxury of Nathan pushing the stroller when I'm tired....so needless to say, I'm really hot and sweaty and exhausted from pushing the stroller with usually 3 kids in it!!...but at least I get in a good work out with each walk!! I'll be shedding the last of my baby pounds in no time!!...yippee!!

(Just a quick note...I was just interuppted by Tiernan who came to me and said "Caedmon splashed me!" so I look over and Tiernan is soaked, head to toe. It looked like he just got out of the bath tub with his clothes on. I said "He splashed you with what??" and he said "the toilet!" HE WHAT?!? Ugh....So when I made it to the bathroom I found Caedmon just as wet as Tiernan standing in front of the toilet in a lake on the floor giggling. I tell ya..... )

THANK YOU to those of you who have signed my guest book! There must be only 5 of you that check my blog ;) Ok, so I know there's more than that, so SIGN IT if you haven't, PLEASE?? So thanks again Mom (the kids hug you back), Carol (we look forward to seeing you and your family soon!), Diane (no I haven't found a source for eggs), Jen (we miss you too!) and Amy (yes we remember you and great to hear from you! just curious as to how you heard about our blog??) Anyone is free to email me at anytime as well! dawnlegatt@msn.com

Here are some pics of Brayan standing by himself...He will be taking his first steps soon I'm sure. And to think he's only 9 months old....although I guess in a couple days he'll be 10 months, but still, he's my baby.. :( Maybe it should be time for another?? :)

A little blurry, sorry....

Not sure if he was trying to do the splits or what??

The "are they twins?!?" duo :)

GUEST BOOK....PLEASE SIGN!!!

Ok, I know I already did a post this morning, but I had to let you all know that I just added a guest book to my blog and I would like EVERYONE to SIGN IT!! It is located on the top right of the blog site. All you need to do is click on it and it will let you send a message, etc. I have been finding out about more and more people that check our blog that I had no idea that they did!! I think it would be VERY neat if everyone could at least put their name in the guest book (you don't even have to write a message if you don't want to...although that'd be fine if you did :) ...but just a name would be fine with me so I can get an idea of everyone that reads this!! It just tickles me to hear that people really actually read my blog...so I guess it would be cool to find out who you all are! Thanks and I look forward to seeing A LOT of names in the guest book very shortly!! hehe :)

Let the Summer begin!!

Nathan had his first full day of 'regular' work yesterday! He worked 13 hours, from 7am to 8pm, so he left around 6:30am and got home at about 8:30pm. He said that once the project gets underway that they will be working from sun-up to sun-down. That makes a long day, for him and I! But we knew that going into this and that is the reason why we are here...get us that much closer to building our house! Speaking of that, we are getting bids from sub-contractors to get an idea of the cost of building, so if you know of anyone who is skilled in a certain area and wants a chance at a bid, let me know and I will email them our blue prints! Here are a few pictures taken this week.....

This is where Biggie rides when he gets tired of walking (he REALLY likes it under there!) and this time, he fell asleep....

The playground that is a block away...there's more to it but I couldn't get it all in one picture :)

This is by where Nathan is working, just to give you an idea of how wet it still is. When everything is so saturated...there's no where for the water to receed to! They are just doing stuff that they can do without going into the ditches (hauling poles, etc)

The new waterpark in town that is 1 block from our place. They are open every day of the week and have music blaring, so we can hear it from where we are at. There's kids ALL the time riding bike around here in their swimsuits and we know exactly where they are headed :)

This thing is cool....its this bucket that fills with water and then tips over and obviously splashes alot. The little cones things behind it whip around with water in there to, getting whoever wet that is nearby.

We don't see too many kids on this slide, actually I've only seen one girl go down it for all the times that we've walked passed it already. The water coming out of it is super fast and it's almost straight down, so I think it's too much for the younger kids and pushes them too far underwater when they go down it....but it sure looks like fun to me!

This pic was taken the first couple days we were here, that is why it is so wet...but here is an overall pic of the park, although it looks much more impressive in person...you'll just have to come and visit!!!

Lots of people in there...it was 82 degrees and sunny!

Happy Father's Day!

Well, here they are....my 4 favorite guys on this planet!! They all matched with their white shirts and army green shorts, it was SO cute! And to my surprise, I was able to snap a wonderful picture of all of them!! Aren't they HANDSOME?!?! :)

We spent Father's Day in the following way:

In the morning we made a trip out to the farm to get milk! This is the closest we have been to a farm to get milk so far! It is about 10 miles away. They have a great set-up, milking about 150 cows. They have mostly holsteins and jersey with some other breads that I can't remember :) One thing interesting that I learned was that since they have been certified organic (since 2005) they haven't had to have the vet out at all!! Their cows stay really healthy and if one happens to get sick, they give it garlic and other natural stuff!! Maybe more people should learn something from the cows...think about it....they EAT ORGANIC hay and food (not sprayed with pesticides and junk) and they DON'T take any antibotics, and THEY ARE NOT SICK!!! Hmmm...go figure! Only if HUMANS could learn more from the cows...!

After the farm, we got a surprise visit from Nathan's parents! (They called before they came but it was when they were already on their way!) They got to our house around 2 and left about 7:30. It was a nice afternoon, we played cards and had supper and then went for a walk and made a quick stop at the park before coming home.

Hope all you father's out there had a great, relaxing day!