Last Days of Summer

Summer is very rapidly drawing to a close.  Merrick starts school on Tuesday and Carrigan and I start a week from Tuesday.  I knew going in that it was going to be a short summer, but it truly felt like a blink of an eye. The last few days we have tried to make the most of these final moments with lots of family fun.

Two weeks ago my parents moved. For the next year and a half they will be house sitting for a family we know who is serving a medical mission in Japan.  Their house sits on a very large piece of land with swings, slides, forts, and a pumpkin patch.  To say that the kids are enjoying Nana and Papa's new house is the understatement of the century.  We have spent quite a bit of time over there recently.

Speaking of Nana and Papa's new house, we all enjoyed it this past Monday as the perfect viewing spot for this week's solar eclipse.  We live just outside the totality plane, but got to enjoy pretty spectacular views with 97-98% of totality.  We also got to see "shadow bands" or "shadow snakes" for about 30 seconds.  They say this was a once in a lifetime opportunity and it felt like it.  It was awe-inspiring.

The other big highlight of the week was a trip to our local amusement park, Oak's Park.  We went with Becca's family and played hard the whole day until they shut the park down.  This has become somewhat of a family tradition in the last week of summer and one that the kids really enjoy.

And now it is time to get back at it.  This coming year is going to bring exciting changes for our family and hopefully some learning and growth too.   Here is to all that is to come.

Tie Breaker

We have some exciting news to share this week!  We are expecting baby number three!  We have been dying to let the cat out of the bag on this one and finally decided it was time.  Right now I am a little over 12 weeks along (that puts my due date at Feb 23rd) and I am really looking forward to wrapping up my first trimester and hopefully starting to feel a little better.

We don't yet know what we are having, though with new genetic testing options we could find out at any time, but we are definitely a house divided on what we are hoping for.  Merrick really wants a brother.  Carrigan really wants a sister.  Jeremy and I are just relieved that it isn't the twins that the kids were really hoping for.  I have been trying to decide if I have been less sick (like with Merrick) or more sick (like with Carrigan) and it seems to be somewhere in between.  Only time will tell...

Boy or Girl, we are so happy to have this little one join our family!  We feel so blessed!

12 Years, But Who's Counting?

This week's highlight was Jeremy and I celebrating our 12th anniversary.  On Friday, my parents were babysitting Ben and Becca's kids, because they are out town, so they volunteered to take our kids for a slumber party as well.

Since we were suddenly kid free, Jeremy and I decided to go out for a nice long, relaxing dinner and then come home to a very quiet house for a peaceful night in.  The icing on the cake was a full night's sleep with no kids waking us up in the middle night.

The next day we rounded out the celebration with some errands and going to see the Broadway rendition of Newsies (they filmed it live and where playing it at our local theater).

It was the perfect 24 or so hours to rest, recharge, and to enjoy some time together.  I can't believe we have been married 12 years, I tell you it happened in the blink of an eye.  Of course I neglected to get any pictures taken of us on our end so here a a could of picture of Carrigan and Isabel hanging out in the hammock at the sleep over.  It looks like they had as much fun as we did.