Four Months

weighing in at 15 lbs and 7 oz.

Father's Day

We had such a fun day celebrating the Daddy that we love. We left encouraging notes throughout the house for him to find and then grilled steak and made homemade stuffed mushrooms for dinner, followed by a fun outing to Maquoketa.

Sundays always throw our nap schedule off, so we let the girls sleep as late as possible and then drove to Maquoketa to the drive-in theater to see Kung Fu Panda 2. Georgia LOVED it. As soon as the previews started she began clapping her hands and yelling, "Yay!!! Woohoo!" Some of the fighting scenes scared her a little and she kept asking, "What happened?" I did my best to explain what was going on. At one point there was a scene involving a sad baby panda and she started to cry; huge tears rolling down her face. "It's a baby, Daddy, it's a baby!" She has such a sensitive heart.

Here are some pictures of our little adventure:

Out With the Old...In With the New

Good-bye to this (old, icky and couldn't clean dishes properly) :


And this (which I looked at for over two weeks) :


And most definitely this (which I let pile up cuz I HATE doing dishes) :


Hello to this (which is totally awesome, works well and matches my other appliances) :


And this (purchased used from a dear friend who moved away) :


And of course, this (can't go without the matching love-seat) :

Sister Tea

A new event at Grandview: the Sister Tea. We decorated some tables with our finest dishes (which I had to borrow because I didn't have any) and enjoyed some tea and goodies with all of our church sisters. I wanted to blog about this because I love how creative the other ladies were in setting up their tables.

This is the table I decorated. The china isn't mine, but everything else is; they were all gifts from my wedding. After this event I was sad that I didn't have any china of my own to pass down to my girls. Many of the dish sets were old and had been passed on from mothers and grandmothers.

Below are the sisters at my table.

Then over Memorial Day weekend, I acquired the dishes that were given to Andy's grandma by her parents on her wedding day - June 22, 1944; 67 years ago this month! I'll be delighted to give these to Georgia some day.

(written on the back of one of the dishes)

Timberrrrrr!!

So we have decided to take on a few home improvement projects for this summer. One of which is having a very large tree removed from our back yard in order to provide more play space and sun for our little vegetable garden. A family from church kindly volunteered to remove it for us. Thank the Lord for them; this would have cost a bundle. I wish I would have taken a before picture, but I was feeding Georgia breakfast when they got started.



When they got done removing the last large section (and it fell so hard!) Georgia was cheering them on, "Yeah! You did it!"


Notice the coats, hats, and gloves? Even though it was late April, it was only 39 degrees when they cut this tree down. When they finished it a week to 10 days later, it was in the 80s.

When it was down to just a very large stump, Andy decided to burn it down. After attempting it once or twice he realized it would take a very long time.


So we decided just to hire someone to grind it down for us. It left us with a lot of mulch which we kindly shared with our neighbors.


Andy's got it all spread out in various place and has planted grass seed. I need to take a finalized picture, but haven't had a chance yet. There's so much more room in our yard now. We're planning to set up a little pool for Georgia to enjoy all this space!

The Longest Birthday Ever

Ok...what kind of mom would I be if I didn't post at least a few pics of Georgia's super late 2nd birthday party on my blog?

Georgia's birthday was March 5. We had some gifts and cupcakes on her birthday with the anticipation of a family gathering party on the 12th. However, we ended up in the hospital with Lola on March 7 and weren't released until the 14th. So...Georgia got birthday gifts all thru March and April as people were able to come see us and we finally had a party in May. So now anytime someone gives her a gift, she thinks it's her birthday. She even sings, "Happy birthday to me!" I have no idea how to explain this one to her.

Anyway, here are some pics from her little party at my mom's a few weeks ago. It was a fun day with lots of her cousins, cake and presents.


And here is a short video clip of Georgia dictating to me which present she would like to open next.

Pain in the Grill

I understand lots of people have this issue. It's so annoying. Every time we try to grill Andy has to clean out a bird nest. And they just don't learn! Andy cleans it out and they just keep building over and over again. I'm sure there is a nice nest in our grill right now since Andy has been out of town. I'm really worried that one day we'll have grilled baby birds for supper.