The Lake

We have a beautiful lake near our house and the kids and I have gone over there the last couple mornings. I take Jett and Savannah in the stroller and Dylan and Skyler walk. Well, yesterday Skyler tried to ride his bike and he almost didn't make it back to the car. He was whining saying it was the desert and he was going to die if he didn't get a drink (he's my drama queen). Today we didn't take the bike and it went much better. We figured that from where we parked to the gardens and back was a little over 2 1/2 miles. We were definately tired and ready for a nap when we got home so that was a plus! The garden area is very pretty and Dylan had the camera so we got a picture of every flower in there. The geese and ducks were quite plentiful as well and today we came prepared with bread so they were swarming us. It is slow going with 4 kids and the walk takes us 2-3 hours by the time we stop and play and swing and feed the birds and smell the flowers. We're taking the walk around the other side of the lake tomorrow...wish us luck that we make it back to the car! There are 7 miles of trail around the lake and someday I'll make it all the way around. I don't know if it would be any easier pulling them on a bike? There are lots of flowers pics and it may take a few minutes to load!

Lions and Tigers and Bears!

Not really.... but I did happen to find a nest of baby bunnies in the back yard. Lucky for them the lawn mower did no damage. I knew the kids (especially Skyler) would be so excited to see some wild life at our new house. So we had to show them off to the neighbor kids and all were impressed, even some parents. I'm sure that helps the boys win brownie points with the kids... whatever helps. (This is now 2 days after I found the bunnies) and they are still doing good and we moved them to a box in the garage. We have a noisey bunny. We named him Stripe from Gremlins. He is very active and makes this very load EEEEP EEEEEP sound when he doesn't want to be touched. It scares us everytime. I think we'll just keep them till daddy gets home and then we'll call the animal rescue center to come get them. So this is taking the place of the dog the kids have been begging for... for now.

Getting settled

Well, we're finaly here (I guess we've been here a few days). It will take a while to get unpacked of course. I was really amazed at how fast the kids adjusted. They all slept in their own beds the first night. Savannah may have ended up in our floor at some point during the night, but Dylan did good staying in his room... didn't seem to mind at all (his room's in the basement... all by himself now.)

So let's go back to July 1st. Thank you to all the guys that volunteered to come over and get all sweaty loading a U-Haul for me. It was loaded to the door... I don't think we could have possibly stuck anything else in there! And we couldn't... that's why I had to go rent another truck the next day. I severely underestimated the amount of stuff we have. Dad and I filled the second 26 foot truck on wednesday (taking longer than I wanted... because we have so much junk) and we didn't get pulled out of the drive until 7pm. We got about half way and Jerr called to say he had landed (8:45pm). Unfortunately I had to tell him I wasn't in town yet so he had one of the guys take him to the hotel. By the time we got to the house to drop off the two mongo trucks and unload the car (we had to pull Jerr's car behind a truck) and my mom was following in my car with the kids... it was about 11:30 before I got to the hotel. I was so tired and stinky. Not the conditions I had in mind seeing my hubby for the first time in 35 days. I was soooo tired because I had less than 4 hours sleep with all this. I couldn't sleep so I was over at the house at 3am cleaning and packing up a few last things. Anyway... we got here in one piece. My parents had my car so they took the kids to KC and Jerr and I had the 3rd without kids. We closed on our new house and ran some errands (picked up the cable box, because I think life would stop if there were no tv in the house). The kids were delivered the 4th and the help came to unload all this great stuff into the house. Jerr I got started early and unloaded one of the trucks before the help came. If that wasn't enough we had another enclosed car trailer of stuff delivered sunday that was from my parents house. I'm sure the neighbors think we're nuts or something. We had a couple days to unpack about 6 boxes (yeah me!) then we went to KC wed. night. We left Vannah and Jett with Jerr's mom and took Dylan and Sky to Dylans grandma down by Springfield and Jerr and I enjoyed a couple days (with no kids!) in Branson. We got back last night and we sadly had to go take daddy to the base so he could leave for Alaska this morning. He's only gone for a week this time, so I'm hoping to get a few boxes unpacked and a little decorating done.

Thank you again to all that helped during the moving process whether it was manual labor or prayers and good thoughts to get it all done. We really appreciate it and I couldn't have gotten it all done without you! The pics are of the old house... we'll really miss it and the last two are Skyler and his snake he caught on our last day in Independence. You can imagine my surprise when I saw him walking towards me holding that thing. It was no little pencil thin snake. Savannah had her nose stuck right in there. She's not afraid of all the critters either. It's name... Snakey McSnakester.... we also had that day Froggy McFrogster, Toady McToadster and Granny the turtle (from Franklin on Noggin if you're familiar). It was hard for him to leave them all behind, but I assured him there would be critters in Topeka. I'll stop there for tonight, because if you've gotten this far you're probably tired of reading! I've got a couple funny stories, but I'll save them for another day. Thanks for checking on us!

Finally!

I got on the blog to check it and my song had changed. Jerr said he would change it when he left Guam so I'd know he's on his way to Hawaii...finally! This will be 5 weeks gone, but it seems like it's been so much longer. We're very ready to have our family back together again. He will be in late wednesday night then we close on our house thurs. morning. We've been awaiting this time so long and it's hard to believe it's finally here. It seems to sneak up fast at the end. I will miss all my friends here, but luckily were're not too far to come visit. We may be back for the Halloween festival here... the kids had so much fun last year. The kids are excited to have a fenced back yard (so are we) and Dylan feels pretty big to finally have his own room. And among all my busy time packing and everything... I still made time to make a couple baby blankets. One is for a baby here at church and the other is for a girl I used to work with in KC. I was glad to get them done because I don't know when I'll get settled enough to start sewing again. So I think that's all for today. I'll try to post tomorrow with a picture of Dylan's baseball team before the internet gets shut off. I guess I could probably go sit in the hotel parking lot and borrow their service? We'll see how energetic I'm feeling!

We're Expecting!!

... to move next Wednesday (hehe... did I scare anyone?) We should be closing next wed. on this house and thurs. on our new house. I'm excited about getting there and finally getting to see Jerr. It's been A LOT of packing. I'll have packed well over 200 boxes. Definately a big garage sale in store for us in Topeka!

So here are the pictures from the wedding, a friends birthday party the next day, a couple pics at home and Skylers last t-ball game tonight. At the wedding I didn't get any of Dylan (jr. usher) because he was playing with kids most of the time. I didn't get better ones of Sky (ring bear... I think that's what most kids say) and Vannah (flowergirl) because I was busy making sure I didn't miss my que to go sing. Skyler was one of two ring barers. He was upset he wasn't the one carrying the rings. He said, "I wasn't a ring bear... I was just a stupid bear!" I had a little laugh at that :) Tonight was Skyler's last t-ball game. The little guys did quite well. It's so much fun watching them. They can do some silly stuff. Dylans last game is Monday so I should have a picture of him then. My internet gets shut off that night so I'll have to post as soon as I get home! That's all for now I think. Thanks for checking in on us! (The movie works much better the second time through)

Our New House

These are a couple shots of the new house. I'll get better ones on here once we get moved. The outside view is cut off a little. It's a 3 car garage and has a nice white fence in front that you can't see. The kitchen will be decorated in, of course, purple... I know that's hard to believe. We should be moving somewhere between the 1st and 5th of July...still need to work on those little details.

Our new address:
3519 SE 25th Street
Topeka, KS 66605

You can always look on here for the address and I'm sure I'll be sending out postcards you can refer to. So wish me luck on getting the house packed in time. I've gotten quite a bit done in the last couple days, but we have so much stuff! We definately have to have a huge sale when we get moved!

The kids and I are in a wedding on Friday so check back this weekend for pictures!

You butter not!

As a rule... if you don't see or hear Savannah... you better find her and see what she's into. So today, like every other day, she was quiet and I had to go investigate. I have recently put a lock on the refrigerator because she can get it open and helps herself to the fruit drawer. She ate 3 peaches the other night before I knew what was going on. I had left it unlocked because I was going to fix myself a sandwich and then got side tracked doing laundry or something. So, today she didn't pick the healthiest thing in the frig. As you can see she loves butter. I quickly stuck the tub in the frig, but by the time I turned around she had already eaten the big glob on her hand. (yuck!) This is just a normal day with this girl. She definately keeps me hopping!