our wisconsin vacation

I'm finally getting these vacation pictures up - only a week late!  At the bottom of this post is a Smilebox scrapbook of our week at the house we got with our friends on the Fox River in Wisconsin.  However, I've been waiting and waiting for ONE of our friends' pictures... (I won't say who, but her name rhymes with Lawn Beagle) *eh hem*, but I've decided to go ahead and post this with the pictures we have.  So if there aren't as many pics of one of the families, hopefully you'll understand.   And below are a few pictures of us visiting Chad's brother Mark in Madison the night before we met our friends.  Enjoy!

The girls love their Uncle Mark!

On Saturday morning we went to the Madison Farmer's Market and  had some slushies to cool us off.

Eating some gooood Wisconsin cheese- and it squeaks!

Visiting the capitol building

And here is our vacation scrapbook:

my little grievances

I have run into several things that really annoyed me this week.  I don't think it's just the pregnancy.  Who knows... maybe it is, or maybe it's a combination of my hormonal self and coming back to the "real world" after a great week away with friends (which I promise to post pictures of as soon as I make the effort to edit them).  Anyways, here are a few things that have set me off this week.  I hope you don't get annoyed with me for griping, but I see this as my therapy. And let me tell you, it's much better than the other option (which may or may not include carrying lethal weapons in my purse... actually I've thought about carrying a water gun in my purse and giving those who annoy me a good squirt in the face).

Let me spell this first one out for you... W.A.L.M.A.R.T.  Hate it.  You make think "hate" is a strong word, but that's also why it's a perfect word for how I feel about this store.  I had to endure this atrocity twice this week, when usually I manage to avoid it for a month or two at a time. What's so bad about it?  Let me count the ways...

1. Crappy carts.  Not a great way to start a trip to a store you dread anyways.  I had the girls with me and tried to put them into one of those big carts with the 2 kid seats.  There were 3 carts lined up, so started with the first one.  Get Addie all situated and realize Millie's strap is broken.  No problem, I go on to the second cart.  Once again, Addie gets in just fine and when I'm almost done buckling in Millie, I realize that once again, the strap is broken.  I'm starting to get a little irritated, but am thankful that there's one last cart.  This time, I get Millie all strapped in and breathe a sigh of relief, when Addie lets me know that her strap is broken.  ARGH!  But with no carts left, Addie just had to hang on for dear life and try to keep her little bottom up in that high seat.  I think her gluts are all the better for it.
   
2. Bad placement of items.  Seriously bad.  So bad that the associate couldn't even help me.  When I first asked her where to find the alarm clocks, she gave me this look like I was an idiot.  "Uh, they're by the clocks," she said like she was talking to a half-wit.  "Well, that is where one would THINK they should be, isn't it," I replied, "but of course I've checked there, and I've checked by the alarm radios and pretty much every other home furnishings aisle and trust me, they're not there."  So we journeyed around the store together until we finally found them in some random aisle that was completely unrelated to clocks or housewares.  Seriously stupid.  I mean, do you WANT anyone to by your alarm clocks, because they're certainly never going to be able to find them.
3. The people.  And I'm not talking about the associates (although some of them could use a squirt in the face), but the other shoppers there.  Yes, shoppers can be annoying anywhere, but somehow the majority seem to migrate to Walmart.  Especially the ones with bad, dirty kids.  Like a lady I ran into today whose son and daughter were hysterically screaming for who knows what, so to console them, she says, "Hey, look at that huge BRATZ doll!  If you stop screaming, I'll buy you that one to add to your collection."  Great parenting.  Which leads me to my next annoyance of the week...

BRATZ dolls.  I mean, have you seen these things?  If not, check out the above picture of a very typical Bratz doll.  Great idea.  I mean, who doesn't think it's a great idea to give your daughter a doll that shows her how to dress like a prostitute and have a bad attitude before she's even out of diapers?  It's not like they don't get enough of that from the media, let's go ahead and give them dolls that promote it too.  Super.

And my last annoyance of the week, and you've heard this one before from me... BAD GARAGE SALES!!!  I won't rehash all my pet peeves about garage sales, but I'll just tell you that the one I went to today was actually more expensive than buying brand new at a store.  Not kidding.  For example, they had a plastic kids shopping cart there for $10, and I actually bought the same one several years ago on sale at Target for $8!  Then, they had clothes marked like they were brand new too - like Gymboree sweaters for $14!  CRAZY!  Just wait until they go on clearance and get them for cheaper.   Then when I left the sale, they asked, "Didn't you find anything for your baby?"  There were sooo many things I wanted to say, but instead I just smiled politely and said, "Oh, they just weren't the right size."  That took a lot of self control.  Especially from this pregnant mama.

So, now that I've grieved you all with my annoyances, I actually do feel much better.  Thank you.  Maybe I can leave the water gun at home the next time I venture out.  I promise my next blog will be much happier and have some fun pics of our vacation.

diary of a sleepless night

I really wanted to write this post on Thursday, but I was much too busy (and tired) getting ready for our vacation, going to a doctor's appointment, and driving down to Oskaloosa to see my grandpa in the hospital. We are now in Wisconsin visiting Chad's brother, Mark (who spoils the girls rotten!), and leave tomorrow for a house on the Fox River that we're sharing with some old friends from Michigan for a week. Well, our friends aren't old... we've just been friends for a long time!

Anyways, Wednesday night was insane. Here is what my diary might have looked like if I had the energy to actually write one in the night:

12:30 a.m. - Finally get to bed after packing and getting stuff ready for our trip.

1:50 a.m. - Wake up to a heavy thunderstorm. As minutes pass, I realize this might not be just a thunderstorm... is that a train I hear...? Okay, so maybe it doesn't sound just like a train, but it's loud and very scary now that I can't see a thing out of the windows due to how heavy the rain is blowing around. I love a good thunderstorm, but this doesn't seem like a normal thunderstorm... Gotta wake up Chad so he can share in my concerns.

2:15 a.m. - The power goes out. We decide we should get the girls and bring them to the basement, although we haven't heard any sirens... but would we be able to hear them over the noise of the wind? Probably not. However, as we're about to wake them up, the wind starts to die down.

(All times from here on are complete guesses... couldn't see what time it was since the clocks weren't working.)

2:30 a.m. - The water alarm in the basement goes off, signaling that our sump pit is filling up with water and since the power is off, the pump isn't working. Chad goes to the basement and starts hauling buckets full of water upstairs and outside.

2:45 a.m. - I have to pee.

3:15 a.m. - Water alarm. Chad heads back to the basement to haul out more water.

4:00 a.m. - Millie wakes up and begins screaming when she realizes it's pitch black and their night light and noise maker are off. This wakes up Addie who also commences screaming. They come to bed with me. Chad goes to sleep in their bed, since he's been kicked out of ours.

4:05 a.m. - I have to pee again.

4:15 a.m. - Water alarm. Chad hauls more water.

5:00 a.m. - Millie has been awake this whole time twirling my hair (which is what she does when she's tired). Very sweet, but it has kept me awake (at this point I've been awake since 1:50). She gets bored and starts calling for daddy, which is waking Addie up, so I bring her to sleep with daddy.

5:15 a.m. - Water alarm. Chad hauls more water.

6:00 a.m. - Power is back on! No more hauling water! Although I do have to pee again.

7:30 a.m. - Addie is up and ready for the day. Mommy is still trying to fall asleep.

• 1 1/2 hours of sleep - $0.
• 40 gallons of water hauled out of the basement - $0.
• Backup sump pump (which we ordered last week) and delivered Thursday (a day late) - $140.
• A night full of memories that we can hopefully laugh at someday once we finally catch up on our sleep... - Priceless.

twinsies!

I've resigned myself to the idea that I'll never have twins.  (Although a few weeks ago a lady asked me when my due date was and then after a huge gasp said, "Are you sure there's not two in there?!"  Thanks, lady.)  Not that it's been a huge desire, but it did always seem like fun.   However, I guess the idea was fun mostly for purely shallow reasons - like dressing them alike because it's so cute.  Is that a bad reason to have twins?  I guess that's why God never blessed me with them.  So, I've had fun lately dressing my girls alike.  This week was VBS at our church, so I tried to dress them the same every day.  Enjoy the pics of my "twins!"

My poor boy won't have anyone to dress like twins with!  How sad.  Maybe I'll have to put him in a few of these dresses sometime... (don't tell daddy...)

catching up with the hols

Okay, yes, when I start blogging, I really start blogging.  I'll go for weeks without time to post anything and then, BAM, you're hit with 3 posts full of pictures all in 2 days time.  Sorry to bombard you all of a sudden, I just finally had time to upload my pictures last night and thought I should get them on here.  These are some of my family from Memorial Day and this past weekend.  Enjoy! 

My dad and my niece, Ruby.

Look at that sheepish grin.  That's my brother Trent with little Ruby.

Sure loves her "Baba Cornie!"

Adeline LOVES holding her baby cousin, Taryn.  And surprisingly, Taryn doesn't seem to mind.

Here are the 3 cousins that were all born within 2 weeks time.  They love playing dress up.  Yes, even Kaiden got into it with dress-up shoes.  (Don't tell his Daddy I put these pictures on here...)

The men enjoying some good conversation around burgers.

Trent and Lydia just celebrated their 9th anniversary, so mom made them a giant cookie cake this weekend.

Millie loves Ruby!

Mom and Dad came back from Branson with rag dolls to make with the girls.  They loved making them with Nana Lois!

So, that's all the pictures for now.  I'll try to space these out better in the future...

sharing a room!

Three more things checked off my list before the baby comes: 

• Millie is in her "big girl" bed.  It actually is a really big bed for her - full size!  But Addie also started out in a full size bed and did just fine.
• The girls are now sharing a room without too many problems.
• The girls' room is now all decorated!  Enjoy the pics!

Here's the awesome new bed daddy made.  I'm so proud of him!  The only problem was that the only wall we could put the bed on covered up the beautiful tree my friend, peter marie, painted.  But it still seems to work - it just looks like the tree is growing up behind the bed... kinda like they're in a tree house.

My "artsy" wall - I made the painting on the left, and my crafty mother-in-law made the letters and the painting on the right.  The "paintings" are actually made of scraps of scrapbook paper.  We stole the idea from Pottery Barn Kids catalog.  My mother-in-law also made the cute aprons hanging from the hooks.  I painted frames around the paintings hoping to make them stand out more... also a stolen idea from PBK.

"A" is for Addie.  "M" is for Millie.

This part's still the same.  For those who don't know, my handy-man husband also built these shelves for the girls' toys.

This is the vanity my grandma gave me when I was little so I repainted it for the girls.

These are their growth charts.  Their names are above them formed out of wire - bought at a craft show.

Here's the nursery that is now empty...  *sob*  Now my next project is to paint all the purple on this wall blue.  But my super wonderful artist friend who painted the aforementioned tree offered to help out.  She must be a saint.  This wall took me about 25-30 hours to complete!

my handy man

It's so nice being married to a handy man.  School has only been out one week and he's already finished three projects:  swingset, sandbox and bunkbeds!  He actually had the swingset and sandbox done before school was out and worked on the beds last week.  He did such a great job, I think he needs to open up a woodshop and make a little cash off of his skills.

Here my dad and Chad are putting the swingset together.  We got an amazing deal... the neighbors up the street got a new swingset and put their old slide, double swing, ladder and climbing wall out with the trash.  So Chad used our previous "east-side" skills (my Des Moines friends will understand) and raided their garbage.  

Just a side note that I've noticed since we moved to the "burbs" - in the city, we could put ANYTHING on the curb and it was guaranteed to be gone in 10 minutes or less.  In Ankeny, we put stuff on the curb and it sits there forever until our neighbors put in a complaint to the city.  (Hasn't actually happened yet...)

Trying out the "new" slide!

Just a swingin'!

So glad to see this smile... just last week she HATED swings!  Now she seems to love it!

Here's the slick sandbox Chad put together in just a few hours one morning.  We saw one very similar online for $250!  Do people really spend that much money on a few pieces of lumber?  Crazy!

Here's Chad with part of the bed he built.

I helped with the painting.

Millie and Addie were super excited!  They have so much fun playing in their bunk beds!  Not to worry - there are better pics of the bed in my next post with pictures of the girls' new "shared" room.