Update

The days have been flying by and I've been just too exhausted to update the blog.  Ava has been busy starting her days with her new wake-up time...6:20.  Oh yes, I'm very excited about this!  It used to be 7 or 7:30 which was great.  I'm not sure if she wakes up when she hears Mema up and getting ready for work, or if she just wakes up on her own and wants to make sure she doesn't miss out on anything.  Either way, I'm REALLY hoping that it stops once we get in to our new place.  I doubt that this will be the case though, seeming as though it will have been her new routine for 4 months.  I have to say that I'm at least grateful that for the past week she's stayed in her bed all night long.  Last week we (ok, I, because Nate could sleep through a train coming through the house) would hear the pitter patter of her little feet coming across the floor, down the stairs, and into our bedroom.  It's 12:30 am and I hear "I'm awake".  When asked why she just smiles and says, "I'm awake".  Back to bed we go and 15 minutes later the pitter patter is back.  We do this 4 times.  At 2:00 she comes down and says, "Mommy, I can't find my shoes".  Back to bed we go and up goes the baby gate in front of her room so that she definitely can't find her shoes by the front door and escape into the garage.  We are now locking the garage door so that she doesn't find her way out there in the middle of the night and get stuck out there.  I can't imagine!!!  Like I said, this week is much better. 

Ava finally got a comforter for her big girl bed and she's super excited about it.  We'll get a picture for you as soon as I finally go and get her some sheets that match as well as some pillows for the shams.  She loves it and so do I (it was a gift from Mema because Mommy was to cheap to buy this particular one).  I was shocked at how difficult it was to try to find a cute comforter for her bed. 

The potty training continues.  Some days are definitely better than others.  Some days she gets super excited to go and other times she doesn't even want to sit on the potty.  I was home on Monday after my long weekend of work.  Ava had just pooped on the potty and we went directly to the kitchen to get her stickers to put on her potty chart.  She's standing their looking at the stickers and I hear a toot.  I look over at her and there is a pile of poop on the floor!!!  I asked what happened as she and I both looked at the floor in horror and she says, "I pooped".  Dear God!  It was down her leg, on her dress, and of course on the floor.  Thank God it was on the hardwood floor!!!  If I'm not at work cleaning up poop then I'm at home doing it.  So, let the potty training continue!

We are still in the process of looking for a new daycare for the kids once we move to Apple Valley.  We met with a lady last evening and are hoping to hear back from her by tomorrow.  This search has been more stressful than building a new house.  Trying to find somebody to trust your most precious gifts with has to be the worst job.  You can only go with your gut and pray that you're making the right decision.  After meeting with her we stopped by and took a peek at the progress that's being made on our house.  Slowly but surely it's on its way up.  I can't wait for them to frame it in so that I can get a better sense of the size of it and exactly how it will look on the land. 

I'm off to work this evening and then we'll be home all weekend.  I am SO looking forward to a low key and hopefully relaxing weekend at home with my family.  We're hoping for a trip to the park, a picnic, maybe the pool, and just hanging out.  It will be nice to be able to stay home and not have to pack up for another road trip.

Wishing you and your family a fun and safe Labor Day weekend!
 

Ava loves playing with her Dora kitchen

This was Ava at 8:30 the other morning.  She just laid down on the hardwood floor and fell asleep.  I think that this is a good indication that 6:20 is far to early for a little girl like her to be waking up. 

On our way to the park yesterday.  Thanks Aunt Darlene for the Dora sunglasses...Ava loves them!

Time flies

The past two weeks have flown by.  We have managed to find a place for most of our things here at Mema & Boppa's.  There are still a few stray items that I should probably get to, but haven't quite found the ambition to do so yet.  They haven't threatened to kick us out yet so I'm assuming that it's not bothering them to much.

The calendar has been packed full of things and I keep thinking that things will slow down here soon.  However, it appears that every weekend is booked (and sometimes double booked) up until the baby comes.  The one free weekend we have is Labor Day weekend and I have forbidden Nate to schedule anything that weekend.  I picture us having a low key weekend of going to a park, having a picnic, etc...we'll see.  :) 

A couple of weekends ago we went to the cabin for a "family weekend" with Mema, Boppa, Uncle Wes, and Janna.  The weather was fairly cool so we didn't spend a lot of time out on the boat.  Uncle Wes & Daddy went golfing on Uncle Wes's birthday and we had a big dinner with neighbors that night to celebrate birthdays (it was Grandpa Dick's birthday on Sunday).  We left late Sunday mornings, as we had lots of things to do to get ready for the upcoming week.

We met with our building contractor last Monday morning at 7:00 am in Apple Valley, which meant a very early morning for Ava.  She had breakfast at our meeting and then played with the ipad.  Thank God for that ipad.  She loves it, it keeps her quiet and entertained, and I like to tell myself that it's educational so that it makes me feel better about having it babysit her during times like this meeting and my Dr. appointments (if it's not the ipad then it's food).  We got a timeline that they will be following as closely as possible, so it's nice to be able to see what progress should be taking place and when; especially since we're so far from the building site.  They broke ground last Tuesday, the 14th.  Moving a little dirt may not sound like a big deal, but I had been looking forward to that date forever since it meant that we should at least start seeing progress.  We stopped at the site on Sunday on our way back from IA.  There was indeed a hole with some concrete in it.  They are hoping that we will be able to close around Nov. 28th.  I hope that they are right because I'm already making arrangements for my family to come help us move in the first weekend of Dec...yes Lisa & Brent that's you!  :)

Friday morning I had another Dr's appt. with my OB.  Ava came with again and couldn't wait to hear the baby's heartbeat.  It was thankfully once again strong and 152 beats per minute.  I asked my Dr. if my stomach is measuring okay since I feel as though I'm so much bigger this time around.  She said that it's perfect and that the baby is just long...hopefully he's more coordinated than Ava and we'll have a basketball player.  I now start my every two week appointments.  When I think about how I'm only 31 weeks pregnant I feel like I still have so long to go.  However, I know that time will fly with how busy we are.  I'm enjoying my time with Miss Ava and praying every day that she adapts well to having to share her time with us when the little guy arrives. 

Ava has adapted to living with Mema & Boppa much better than I would have ever anticipated.  She still wakes up earlier than she ever did at home, but overall she's done very well.  She sleeps well in her big girl bed at night, and we've been doing fairly well with potty training.  Unfortunately we had an accident Friday morning.  I was of course getting ready, trying to finish packing for our trip to IA, and then get out the door in time for my Dr's appt.  She comes running into our bedroom and told me she peed.  She definitely had!  So, I picked up all of her play food out of the puddle of pee to disinfect them, soaked up the pee puddles, scrubbed the floor, threw her in the tub for a quick scrub down, scrubbed the floor again (carpet of course, she couldn't have peed on the hard wood floors), got her dressed, scrubbed the floor again, and ran out the door.  Luckily everybody drives 12 mph over the speed limit so I blended right into traffic and still made it to my appointment only 2 minutes late after a bathroom break.

Ava and I had lunch downtown and then headed over to pick Daddy up so that we could head back to IA for my annual girls get together with my high school friends.  That night we got to see Grandma & Grandpa for a short time before they left town on Saturday morning.  Grandma Great was nice enough to come down and see us for a bit.  Then on Saturday, the 6 of us girls and our families gathered for lunch.  It was so great to see this group of girls again, and all the spouses and kids.  After lunch we all went our separate ways so that we could drop our kids (and spouses) off so that just us girls could get together to catch up over dinner.  Nate and Uncle Craig got to spend the afternoon golfing while Aunt Darlene took Ava.  A HUGE thanks to Aunt Darlene for taking her.  From what she told me at 6 am on Sunday, she had a great time.  :)  It was so nice to get to spend some quiet time catching up with these amazing woman over dinner.  These friendships go back to our freshmen year of high school.  I am so grateful to have these women in my life.  Thanks for a great day ladies!!!

Sunday morning we left to head back home to the cities.  By the time that we stopped for lunch, stopped at our building site, and made a few stops in Maple Grove it was getting late by the time that we got home.  I was hoping to go shopping for some clothes since I have two outfits that fit me.  Unfortunately that will have to wait for another day.  Good thing that I wear scrubs to work every day. 

So those are the highlights of our past two weeks.  Hope that you're enjoying this beautiful weather!

Lyndsey, Steph, Jenny, Lisa, Nikki, and me after enjoying a great dinner together

It's not much now, but it will eventually be home sweet home!

What a month!!!

Yes, I'm very well aware that it's been a month since the last update. Let me tell you, it's been an action packed month!

After getting back from a weekend at the cabin with my sister and her family we headed up for another weekend with Nate's family.  We had such beautiful weather and really enjoyed our time together.  Unfortunately, that's the only weekend in July that I was at the cabin.  Nate and Ava spent the following weekend up there for fireworks while I was back home working. 

The Wednesday after that the three of us packed up the car (I mean fully packed) for a "long road trip" to Door County for a Becker family vacation.  We stayed in a condo with Grandma & Grandpa, while Uncle Marc & Aunt Sara stayed in a hotel next door, and Aunt Lisa and her large bunch stayed at a nearby campground.  We spent a lot of time swimming in our pool, going to the beach, and Ava and I watched everybody do go carts after we all played mini golf.  Daddy got to spend a day out on the lake salmon fishing with Grandpa and Uncle Brent.  They had a great time, didn't get sick, and brought home A LOT of fish!!!  It was great to spend that time with everybody.  Unfortunately we knew that when we got home we had a lot of work to do to get out of our house.
This past weekend, with the help of Mema, Boppa, and our dear friends Brian and Jason, we moved out of our town home.  We honestly couldn't have done it without Brian and Jason, and are so very grateful for their time and help.  We lucked out and had good weather.  Most of our things are in a 16 foot "pod" that is being stored.  We have a few things scattered at Uncle Wes's house, and a lot of things here at Mema & Boppa's.  Unfortunately we had to bring all the new baby things, plus winter things since we'll be here until the end of Nov.  That's a lot of stuff!!!  Ava is adjusting fairly well, except for that her wake-up time is now 6:15 am...not cool!  She is still going to the same daycare in Mounds View which means a lot of commuting for Nate and me on the days that I work.  I picked her up the other day and she said that she wanted to go home.  I told her that we had to go to Mema & Boppa's and she said, "we stay there until our new house is built".  So, hopefully she gets it.  However, the next day she asked me if the house was done so she doesn't quite understand the timeline that we're working with. 

Saturday night was our first night at Mema & Boppa's, and Ava's first night in her big girl bed.  I had been talking this bed up for the past month.  It paid off...she loves it.  I was up all night Saturday worried that she was going to roll off the bottom or wake up scared or not sleep...she slept all night.  We have a large rail on one side and the other side is along with wall since she is such a crazy sleeper. 

Sunday Nate and I finished cleaning the town home after church and then rushed home to shower so that we could take Ava back over to our neighbor girl's birthday party.  It was a bit stressful getting everything done, but a great way to spend our last day.  It was very odd to say good-bye to our neighbors of the past 5 years.  We took one last trip through the house.  Ava played peek-a-boo in her closet and then made the request for a family sing-a-long of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star in her room one last time.  I will admit, I shed a few tears during that time.  I'm so very excited for our new house, but Ava's bedroom holds so many wonderful memories.  There were so many giggles shared, stories read, and songs sang in that room.  It really was a great house for us to start our family.  Tuesday evening Nate and I made things final and we closed on the house.

We've been busy this month making final decisions for our new house, as well as packing and wrapping things up with our "old house". The cabinets, flooring, etc are all picked out...now they just have to start digging. I think that they are breaking ground on August 14th. It's been almost two months since we signed for the house so I'm very anxious to actually see some sort of progress being made on the actual structure of our new home. They tell us a closing date of Nov. 21st...we'll see.

Well this has gotten quite wordy so I'll wrap it up with some pictures.  If you don't hear from me for a while it means that we're still digging out and trying to find all of our stuff here.  Thanks for not giving up on me and checking in.  :)


Mema & Ava hanging out on the beach at the cabin

A nice shot of all of the "kids".  (why is it that the large pregnant lady decided to stand next to the two skinniest people on Lower Hay Lake?...think next time Steph!)

We found time to squeeze in a fun night out with our friends Bill, Riley, Miles, Mike, Kristi, & Cora while Miles was visiting from WI.

Ava just chill'n by the campfire

Daddy & Ava in the arcade

Who knew that it would be cold and we would need sweaters on day 1 of vacation?

Aunt Lisa & Ava

Go-Karts...Daddy would like to point out that he won!

One of the fish that Nate caught.

Daddy, Grandpa, & Uncle Brent on their fishing excursion

An afternoon at the beach

Love this picture!