Thanksgiving

Wednesday, November 26th didn't exactly go as planned.

The day started out fantastic with the news that we could FINALLY close on our house....it's officially ours now! (the story of the house will come later...I wanted to wait until it was actually OURS!)

After the closing, we packed our bags as fast as possible to head to my in-laws for Thanksgiving. My husband has not had much time off lately and we were so looking forward to having a holiday off and being together as a family.

We arrived just in time to get the kids in bed and get in the car with Aaron's sister and her husband to catch a movie. A double date night away from kids....ahhhhh, it was wonderful.....until about an hour later.

What started out as a little back pain turned into the most awful pain I've experienced on my right side. Doubled over in pain, I tried to make it through the whole movie. With 20 minutes of the movie left, I just couldn't do it anymore and we left for the hospital.

Kidney stones are no fun. I've never had one before and hope I don't have to go through that pain again...it.is.horrible. So, that was our Thanksgiving  :( Bummer, right?

 Onto happier things though:

I did get to enjoy a bit of Thanksgiving the weekend before with my family...

And, this kiddo was 4 months on Nov. 24th (on my husband's bday! Fun fact: Aaron, Connor, and I all have birthdays on the 24th!) and I discovered TWO teeth in his mouth! Crazy!!

My husband's 32nd bday

We went to a fun Indian place to eat and my husband said it was one of his best birthdays. He went to India when he was younger and has been craving Indian food as of late...his craving was met at his new favorite restaurant :) 

I feel like I can finally breathe a sigh of relief because the buying and selling of our house is FINALLY done. What an adventure...I don't want to sell a house for a very long time! But, the extra space both inside and out is SO worth it....stay tuned for pictures!! 



Catch Up

Ahhh, so much to catch up on. It's been 2 weeks since we officially sold our house and moved into our new one. We are actually STILL waiting to close on this house (something came up a few hours before closing and needs to be fixed....LONG story but at least we're moved in!) but I'm SOOO thankful that the sellers let us move in early or else we would be homeless at the moment! We are slowly but surely putting away boxes...it is a slow process but I have all winter to get things put away :) (speaking of....we have a good deal of snow already! Ahhh! That came way too soon!)

We are loving the country! It's definitely a lot of work but it brings us back to our childhood. We inherited a litter of kittens so I'm playing surrogate mother to them....fun stuff even though it adds another chore to do :)

Sooo....Halloween was a few weeks ago! We trick or treated with friends and had a blast!! Some pics of the night:

Introducing:

Batman!

Robin!

and, Batgirl!

I felt a little safer with these 3 superheroes running around :)

Dinner with friends-"The Kids Table"

Two cute baby boys :)

Trick or treating!!

 Our kids had SO much fun!!

The next morning, the kiddos and I hopped in the car with my parents and we roadtripped with my parents and brother to see my grandparents! I'm finally feeling 100% since my surgery and I wanted to jump on this opportunity before it gets too cold and snowy.

It's been pretty busy the last 3 weeks since we moved in but this snowy weather has made me slow down and stay inside with the kids for the past 2 days. I guess winter in Minnesota has its perks after all :)

Moving Day

We close on both our houses tomorrow!!! YAY!!!! The sellers of the house we bought graciously let us move in 4 days early so we moved the majority of our things on Saturday. It was SO great seeing our things again and letting the kids play with their long lost toys they haven't seen for at least a few weeks (and many they hadn't seen since we put our house on the market!) I think we can just skip Christmas this year since everything is new to them again ;)

A "first glimpse" of our new home in the country!

Getting the U-Haul all packed up

Some of our help on Saturday!! THANK YOU to everyone who helped us on Saturday and Sunday!

Aaron worked an overnight on Friday night and went straight to packing up the truck on Saturday morning instead of sleeping. He was EXHAUSTED by 6:00pm on Saturday night so he crashed with the kids (who didn't have naps and were pretty tired!)

 

My parents and I took Connor and grabbed a few more things from our old house and as I drove up to our new house, I looked out and saw this sunset and savored the moment! We had just come from a very loud, downtown house and when I pulled up, all I could hear was a gentle breeze outside. After everyone had left, all I did was sit in silence and soak up the quietness....some people are just made to live in the country and my husband and I are those people :)

 

More to come later! I'm trying to decide what needs to be unpacked next!

Meeting Family

Because the last 3 months of life have been just a LITTLE crazy, we haven't been able to travel to see some members of the family! Aaron's brother and his wife had a beautiful baby boy in September and we were SOOO excited when we formed a plan to meet them in Iowa to see him! We stopped by my grandma's house on the way there...she got to meet Connor for the first time! It was a busy day but well worth it!

 

Connor just slept all afternoon and liked meeting his great-grandma

Our newest nephew, Drake! What a cute little guy!!

Eating a meal with 4 kids under 4=total success! Seriously, they all did great and it was so fun catching up with family!

 

Tomorrow consists of getting the rest of our house packed up! We start moving in on Saturday!! YAY!!!!

Things I'll Miss....and Things I Won't Miss

All 3 kids are in bed (the 2 older ones are not sleeping but at least they're slightly quiet giving me a little breather) and I was reminiscing about when we moved into our current house. I've learned so much through this house-it's kind of hard to put it into words but I'll give it a shot.

Some things I'll miss about this house:
*The way that it made me appreciate the small things. It led to a simpler life for us and I'm grateful for that. We didn't NEED all that we had before....a small space was enough.

*The way it made me contemplate hospitality. Soon after we had Tristen, my husband wanted to be intentional about hospitality. My excuse was always, "We don't have enough room" and my thoughts were very "me-centered" (is my house good enough? Will people judge our current situation? Will I appear poor?) My husband and a sermon from John Piper(I think it was him but it's been so long ago I could be wrong!) made me reevaluate hospitality. The sermon told about a sweet older lady who lived in an apartment and felt the Lord's leading to invite new couples to her home for Sunday dinner. She could have used all the excuses that I had but instead, she obeyed and after a few weeks, she had SO many people in her small apartment....she didn't shy away from inviting people because of the space she had. It was huge in my life when I finally came to this realization. Just the other day, we crammed 9 high school guys into our small dining room to play games. And you know what? I heard laughter and good talks going on.....I pray our house has been used for God's kingdom and I'm so grateful for the way it has challenged me to be more hospitable.

*The coziness of having all 3 bedrooms close together.

*The late night feedings with each one of my kids. Connor is already sleeping through the night so the days of multiple night feedings are gone and I slightly miss it :)

*The amount of time it took to clean my house top to bottom! It could be done in less than an hour which is SO great when we had children!

*The way it made me deal with conflict. It's a small space so you kind of HAVE to deal with things out in the open since there's nowhere to run to :) I think I needed that in life.

*Having to be REALLY creative with space. It challenged me and I think (hope!) I'm a better organizer because of it.

Some things I won't miss:
*Days like today where I'm trying to keep my kids quiet while my husband sleeps. Something I didn't mention before is that the full time job he took is actually the overnight shift. My husband tries to sleep during the day in a house that is loud....needless to say my husband is pretty sleep deprived at the moment.

*Not having any personal space. We were planning out our new home and I was dreaming about how much I'm going to enjoy having space that I can actually breathe in again! We have such tight quarters at the moment that we don't have any place just to have to ourselves.

*Giving my kids a bath in the shower :) HA! Bet you didn't know that about us....my kids have had maybe 5 baths in an actual bathtub (when they would visit grandparents). We only have a shower in our house so we have had to makeshift bathtime for 3 years. I will definitely not miss that!

*Having my clothes closet under my bed :) We don't have a real closet in our house so I've had my clothes under the bed for the last 4 years that we've lived here. So very excited to have not one but many closets in our new home.

*Living on a busy street. I know I won't always be able to protect them and I need to entrust my kids to the Lord but living on a busy street has stolen a bit of joy from our household. We can't let our kids run and play outside because we fear they will run into the street...again, something I won't miss :)

But, this has been such a good house to us. There were so many uncertain times in our life in the last 4 years and this house offered us stability. There were lots of tears shed here but many MANY happy and joyful times too. I'll look back fondly on it and remember our first few years with the kids and the coziness that it brought to our lives. It was a blessing and we will miss this place.

Boxes, Boxes!

I'm doing so much better since I last wrote! I can lift Connor but can't lift the other 2 for a few more weeks still. This has forced us to transition Aubrey to a toddler bed (well, more like her mattress is on the floor since we're in the middle of moving!!). That girl LOVES her newfound freedom! Ahh! :) I guess we needed to transition her sometime soon anyway but I was hoping to make all the big changes once we got to the new home (getting rid of the paci that she's obsessed with, potty training, and transitioning into a toddler bed) Today is the first day she's actually sleeping during naptime so that's improvement!

The kids have been awesome about being independent though. Tristen is not even 4 yet and has really "grown up" in the last 2 weeks and I so needed that! He can use the bathroom all by himself (which helped a ton since our bathroom is on the 2nd floor and the stairs were the hardest for me), get ready for the day, and he even got breakfast ready for his sister and himself one morning :) Now I know what he's capable of!

Something else that has been SO fun to see him do is start Awana Cubbies at our church! He learned his first Bible verse which was pretty stinkin' cute! (even when he started shouting it and saying it over and over and over and over! Ha!) :) I'm so proud of him!

 

This weekend we put the majority of our possessions in boxes and moved them to the front of our house. Even though I'm so excited about moving into our new home in 2 weeks, there's still a bit of sadness about this place we've called home for 4 1/2 years. There are so many memories from this house and I want to cherish the last 2 weeks here...and not get too stressed about all the details that need to be worked out in the next 2 weeks :)

 

Thanks for reading, all!

Post Surgery

Well, I'm home and recovering! Yesterday I had my surgery and all went well. They did a test to make sure a gallstone hadn't gone into my bile duct and thankfully it hadn't so recovery should be a little easier.

The thing I was most nervous about was being put under. I have a hard time going to sleep at night so I was wondering if I'd be that person who couldn't be put under. Ummm, yeah, don't remember a thing! They must have drugged me before I knew what was happening :)

Funny story-When I was waking up, I was apparently "comforting a baby" by patting my shoulder and saying, "It's OK, it's OK" You can tell I have an infant at home :)

I definitely feel like I've been through surgery though. I'm pretty sore and tired but all in all, I'm doing good. Hopefully I'll update again soon but a nap is calling my name :)

This Week

Ahh, the month of October. Probably my favorite month of the year. The colors of the trees are just stunning, the weather is perfect for bonfires, bugs are at a minimal, I get to live in jeans and sweatshirts/sweaters and pull out fall jackets. *sigh*

This October is going to look a little different, though. On Wednesday I'm having gallbladder surgery so I'll be in recovery for 2 weeks after that. I'm expecting to feel better a few days after the surgery but the "not-lifting my older 2 kids part" will be hard! :) I have lots of help including a husband who knows what he's doing so I know I'll be fine though.

Then, we have a closing date for our house and it's the last week of October (which is plain AWESOME!! Don't get me wrong!) but packing up and moving is a lot of work! But, the light at the end of the tunnel is SO close for feeling better and getting moved into a slightly bigger house that accommodates our family....so I'll take the crazy October!

So, October, I'll try to enjoy you this year....but I absolutely cannot wait for November :)

Finally!!!

WE SOLD OUR HOUSE!!!!

 Yesterday we received an offer on our house and although they lowballed us (and I doubted that we would ever reach an agreement), after an entire day of negotiations, they finally accepted our final counter offer!! They're happy, we're happy and it's DONE!

We're so happy about it but I think until we have the keys to our new place in our hands, it won't be real to us. If everything goes as planned, we'll be moved into our new house in a month :) Right in time for the cold winter months ahead....Thank you, Lord!

Family PIctures

It was time to update the family pictures now that we have an addition in our family! I wanted to get these done before my surgery just in case the recovery takes a while.

 

It took us a full HOUR to get out of the house to even start these....and since we do them ourselves, we were wondering how the kids would hold up. BUT, they did pretty good once we started bribing them with suckers :) Go ahead, judge away :)

I'll share just a few of our favorites!

Random photo tip I learned from Pinterest: With active children, have them hold hands to give them something to do. It worked like a charm!!

All 3 of them

 

Pictures with our kids individually

 



 

So, there are a few of our day. I can't WAIT to hang them up someday....maybe in our next home whenever and wherever that is. Thanks to my little family for bearing through these...as much as I like the finished result of family pictures, they sure are hard work and frustrating at times :) But, glad that they are done and we have a few memories of this time in our life.

Such a gift

Today I fell sick yet again so I made a decision to take the earliest possible surgery date to remove my gallbladder. Less than ideal (we were hoping to wait until our house sold) but I feel relieved about getting it out of the way and finally feeling somewhat normal again. *sigh* I think we've figured out a plan for my recovery and our house selling can wait! (or maybe it will sell before then?? Hmm...) So, next week it is.

In 2 days, this guy will be 2 months old. Wow! That went SO fast! His little life has been such a gift and has been a source of comfort to me. I don't have any wise words or deep thoughts today...just that I'm so thankful for the last 2 months with him :)

In the Next Few Weeks

Remember when I mentioned how brutal the recovery from Connor's birth has been? I've been sick off and on since then and was starting to wonder what was up. Well, in the last week I got some answers as to why I've been so sick.

I need to have gallbladder surgery.

Not that I want to have surgery but it's nice to actually have an answer for my constant sickness.

As you can imagine, it's a bit overwhelming. Trying to take care of 3 kids and keep our house spotless while recovering from surgery would be just too much. So, we're putting off the surgery as long as we can and hoping our house sells in the meantime. It would make everything just a little easier!

My friends and family have been so amazing throughout the last 8 weeks since Connor's birth. I think I've cooked only 1-2 times in the last 8 weeks because of all the meals people have dropped off and the freezer meals that have been made for us. Friends have taken our older 2 kids for a few hours and have been a listening ear for us....I'm so grateful for all the support.

We were able to squeeze in a bonfire on Sunday evening. SO perfect. There is something so therapeutic about bonfires! It may have been the first time we've actually relaxed since putting our house on the market :)

Cuddles with this little guy! He liked his first bonfire :)

Conversation with my Firstborn

Tristen: Mom, can I read to Connor?

Me: Sure, bud.

Tristen: Okay. Once upon a time there were lots and lots and lots of animals. There were sharks and tigers and llamas and (on and on and on....flipping through every page in an animal sticker book)

Tristen: See, Connor? See? (as he took a sticker off the page and put it in front of his eye and then proceeded to stick it on his cheek)

5'ish minutes later.....

 

Tristen: Do you like that, Connor? Mom, does Connor like sharks?

Me: He probably does, Tristen.

Tristen: Connor's so cute. He's such a cute baby, Mom. (to Connor) You're so cute.

Tristen: Mom?

Me: Yes, Tristen.

Tristen: I like my brother Connor. Can I hug him? Can I give him a kiss?

This was yesterday's conversation before naptime. It was pretty precious and I got some of it on video as well. Tristen was so little when Aubrey was born so doting upon a younger sibling just didn't happen. So, Tristen has especially surprised me with his gentle and caring ways with Connor. He loves his younger brother and it's amazing to see his firstborn qualities coming out. He's a leader and it's starting to show in our family.

 

Anyway, you may have noticed a significant increase in the number of posts recently (writing more than once a month! What!?!). With my husband's new schedule and half my house packed in my garage at the moment, I've been trying to figure out what to do late at night while waiting up for my husband. I packed away all my hobbies except my camera and computer....so here I am, on my computer posting pictures :)

 

On that note, it's time to go back to being a mom and putting my newborn to bed. Thanks for reading!

6 Week Smiles

I've been getting smiles from this guy today! LOVE!!

I like the newborn stage but I must say that I love LOVE the 2-4 month stage and I have been eagerly awaiting his first smiles!

 

Preschool

On Tuesday we started preschool!!! I did a loose preschool schedule last year (a trial run!) but this year Tristen is ready for an actual schedule. One thing I learned last year is teaching preschool to 20 students is WAY different than teaching your own child! I held myself to a crazy high standard....this year I'm following a basic curriculum and getting as many things from Pinterest as I can (as opposed to trying to make everything from scratch last year!)

I'm excited for the fresh start!

This little one LOVES to learn at the young age of 2. She's into letters and wants to do everything that Tristen does. I decided to just include her as well and already she's loving it!

Our attempt at a first day of school picture :) Maybe I'll try again next week! Ha!

 

The first day we filled out an "All About Me" booklet. It was so fun to hear the kids tell me what their favorite things were and Tristen decided he wanted to work at a Zoo when he's older. Speaking of the Zoo, we went to 2 Zoos in the last week. My kids LOVE the Zoo!

 

At the Zoo on Labor Day

 

We still have house showings and are still patiently waiting for our house to sell. Having preschool and fall activities starting up again has helped but it would be SO great if it sells before the winter months! I'll keep ya'll posted. Happy Friday!

The Name Story

Mr. Connor. You look like a Connor....which is part of the reason why we named you that. I wanted to have a "reason" for naming you what we did but having a story about the many times we changed your name will have to do :)

 Connor has always been a name that I like. We like names that sound like they've been around for a while (old English royalty sounding) so Connor was always on our top 10 list. However, I think the reality of this perhaps being the last child we name made a difference in our fickleness.

 

For 2-3 months, his name was either Edmund or Owen-both great names but we just couldn't settle on either one. One week it would be Edmund and then the next it would be Owen. Both had fantastic meanings and reasons behind why we would name him one or the other. We just couldn't pick between the 2.

 

3 weeks before Connor was born, we went back to the drawing board with names. I took out my top 10 list and ran them by my husband one more time. Our eyes landed on Connor. It became our top name in a matter of hours for no reason whatsoever!

 

We decided we were too fickle to fully commit though so we waited until he was born to make it final.

Connor means "strong-willed" and "wise" and he has already fit the strong willed part by being so late! :) And, seriously, he just plain looked like a Connor to us so we were glad to finally have a name for our 3rd child! So, Connor, that is how we came up with your name

Tristen's middle name was after Aaron so we wanted Connor's middle name to be after his grandpa. Joel is my dad's name.

 

That's the story behind his name! Yesterday he gave us his first half smile...I can't wait for smiles to come full force! He also has been blessing us with 6 hours of sleep the last 2 nights! Sleep had been hard to come by lately with 3 different schedules going on (Aaron works until midnight, Connor has been up 2 times during the night, and the other 2 wake up at 6:30 for the day) but the past few days Connor has decided to sleep 6 hours straight, eliminating one night feeding. I will take the extra sleep!

 

Tomorrow we're off to the Zoo while another house showing takes place. Looks like I better make some cookies tonight....come on potential buyers, someone buy our house! I'm actually looking forward to a messy house again someday :) 

Connor's Story

This little one is already 5 weeks old! Here's a little recap of his birth story...it's short and sweet (very unlike the pregnancy with him- I felt like I was pregnant for an entire year!)

 

I was due July 19th and really believed that THIS baby was finally going to be my early bird-or at least a few days early. Little did I know he would be my latest!! I had a Dr appointment on Wednesday, July 23rd-4 days after my due date. My doctor gave me the option of waiting a whole other week or getting induced the next day. My response was "I want this baby out! Tomorrow sounds great!"

 

So, bright and early on July 24th, I headed into the hospital for a scheduled induction....the only difference from the other 2 kids was that this time I was in the early stages of labor when I headed in (I was grateful my mom had come the night before just in case I went into labor on my own!)

 

I LOVE epidurals (how did I ever think I would go without an epidural!) but have always waited to get one until a few hours into labor. This time, at 9:30 am I thought, "I might as well just get it earlier than later since I know I want it." And oh am I glad I did! Got the epidural at 10, fell asleep watching TV and then woke up to strong contractions at noon. I woke up and the nurse said, "Oh my. I need to call the doctor because you're ready to have this baby!" The doctor got there a bit later and Connor entered the world at 12:31!

 

A few hours later, the kids came to visit! It is SOOO fun to see Tristen especially with this baby. Just today he said, "Mom, I REALLY like my brother. He's so cute." Since he's older, he actually gets it this time....it's been fun :)

 

Aubrey has been adorable as well but we have to constantly watch every movement she makes around the baby. She likes to mother and kiss him constantly-and sometimes those kisses are a bit much for Connor :)

 

We loved the first few hours with this little guy! He looks JUST like Aaron! I had forgotten how small babies come...the first day I was so in awe of how tiny his feet were :)

Getting ready to head home!!

 

So, that's his birth story. Everything went great and I was so glad he finally got here!

 

The recovery for me has been pretty brutal though. I have not taken it easy this time and have been sick with flu symptoms quite a few times over the course of 5 weeks. *sigh* So, my advice to new moms-take it easy like the doctor says-especially the part about not lifting! I think I overdid it by moving way too many boxes...Ouch. Hoping I feel completely better soon.

 

Next up: How we came up with his name! We've never been so back and forth with a name before and because of that, I'm still getting used to calling him Connor because we went through so many names before deciding!