Busy weekend

We had a busy, but fun weekend! On Friday morning, Hans flew back to Omaha from Dallas from being gone at his friends mom's funeral in Louisiana. He then drove over to Des Moines IA. Jacob and I loaded up the van on Friday morning to head down to Des Moines to meet up with Hans for my scrapbooking stuff. Jacob did very well on the 7 hour drive (thanks to our DVD player!) and I am very thankful for that!

We have a friend who lives in Des Moines, so we were able to meet up with her and her family for dinner before my festivities started. As we were leaving our hotel, Jacob was running down the hall and ran right into the door jam and hit his eye. :( He now has quite the nice shiner on his right eye.

Friday night, the first part of my scrapbooking festivities was a meet & greet with the owner and designer of Pink By Design stamps Sarah. She also had 3 of her design team present and they were some awesome women!! I actually ran into them at Michaels craft store a few hours before the event started, and then at Starbucks! Each month, Sarah hosts a live Ustream event where she shows off the new stamps that are coming out, and she always has her starbucks in hand! Since we don't have starbucks in Huron, I had to get my fill while I was down in IA! After the first hour of getting to talk with Sarah and her designers, it was time for the live Ustream. It was so much fun to be sitting across and watching it all live. She did some giveaways for the people that were there live, as well as to the people watching. She also showed off the 6 stamp sets that were being released that night.

On Saturday, Hans, Jacob and I got up and went to Sam's club. After that, Hans and Jacob headed back home and I stayed to attend day 2 of the scrapbooking activities. Sarah's 3 designers all had a "make and take" project, and they were really cute and fun to make. I also was able to do a little shopping with some birthday money that I received early and got some goodies at the craft stores! I then made the 7 hour drive home, getting me home late last night!

Today we had a family day, we went to church and then came home to do some things around the house. I have some pictures from this weekend, I however don't have them uploaded yet, so will try and do that tomorrow and get them added.

I promise we are alive!

We have been busy! After closing we jumped into some home projects and are still trying to finish some up. Hans' parents came to visit on Friday the 15th and stayed until the following Thursday! They helped us complete so many projects, and we are forever grateful for that!

The projects started with a work bench for Hans' in the 3rd garage space. They were able to complete that in an afternoon and Hans enjoys having an area to keep all his tools.

The next project was to put together Jacob's new playset for the back yard that my mom bought for him when she was here. The directions said that it should take 2 people 4 to 6 hours.....but they lied. With no real issues it took Hans and his dad 16ish hours over 2 days to get it all done! And to make matters worse, they were working outside when we were having record high temps of 100+! But thankfully they got it all together and Jacob LOVES it!

The next project that we tackled was painting the upstairs of the house. When we had made out large trek to Menards to get the wood for Hans' work bench, I checked out the paint they had and we found colors that we liked better than the other stores we had already been checking out. So we decided to go ahead and pick up the paint and supplies so that I could get started with the help of Diane. So over the course of 2 days while Jacob was at daycare, we painted the formal living room, dining room and kitchen! It looks so good, and I am loving the color! I will get some pictures sometime next week once we have all the new curtain rods hung up and maybe even some art! Diane also tackled hemming some of the curtains for the bedrooms that I had bought at Kohls when I was in Colorado.

This week has been a little hectic because Hans' best friend Richard mom passed away last week Friday. He drove down to Omaha, NE on Monday night and then flew down to Dallas, TX and then drove over to West Monroe, LA for the funeral that was today. He was also one of the pallbearers as a request of Richard. He will be flying back on Friday, but this weekend is when we were going to head to Iowa so that I can go to a scrapbooking mini convention. So when he lands in Omaha, he will be driving over to Des Moines, IA and Jacob and I will drive down to meet up with him. We are going to be able to meet up with a friend that Hans' used to work with as she lives in Des Moines now! Then on Saturday, Jacob and Hans will hang out for a bit and then head back towards home while I finish up at the scrapbooking event.

We did it!

We closed on the house yesterday!!!! ::insert happy dance::: :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) 

There were a few hiccups before closing with an issue with some of the credits that were to be applied, but we got that all straightened out and were able to close on time. I have heard people say that closing on a house is a long drawn out process, but I am not sure why. We were in and out within 30 minutes!

After closing, I went and picked Jacob up from daycare and took him to day one of swim lessons. He did great at first, but then freaked out when it was time to try and show him how to float. We had to get out of the pool for a while to get him to calm down. Once they moved onto something else, I was able to get him back in the pool and to play the game they were playing. Here is to hoping that today goes better! Tonight, Hans is going to come with us, so maybe it will help with both of us there.

Family Fun Weekend!

We had a great weekend! On Saturday, we got up and packed up the van to head to Brookings (about 1hr 40 min drive) to go and check out the Brooking's Art Festival! It was AWESOME! I had been told about it by one of the moms in my Mops group, and then read about it online. Over the 2 days that it is set up for, they expect 75 to 80 THOUSAND people! Let me tell you, with the amount of people that were there on Saturday, I am sure they hit that estimated number and maybe even went over it! We had a good time walking around checking out all the booths and only bought a few things. We also ate some really yummy food! At one point Jacob was pretty tired as it was past his nap time, so I put him in the Ergo and he fell right to sleep on my back. That made for a very hot walk as it was in the mid 90's, but when a toddler needs to sleep, I will do what it takes!

One thing that we have started to wonder is come Christmas, where would we hang our stocking from since our new house doesn't have a mantle or fireplace. Well while we were at the arts festival I found a booth that sold Christmas related decor and stumbled upon this...

This sign usually is mounted to a really cute snowman, but it wasn't very tall and Hans was worried that Jacob would just take everything out of the stockings before it was time to do so. So I asked the booth owners if they possibly had any of the signs by themselves and they did!! They even added some hooks to the back so it can be hung on the wall! I am so excited for Christmas now!

Another one of our finds was this sign.....

I just loved it since it is just so true! Even with only one kid for now, he can sure make quite a mess of the house pretty quickly! 

After the Arts festival, we made a trip to Home Depot as it is in Brookings and I bought a couple of sample cans of paint to see if I really like the colors for some of the house!

On Sunday, we went to Church and then came home to do house stuff. :) Hans installed a curtain rod in the laundry room so that clothes that need hung up can be right out of the dryer. He also took down the cabinet above our fridge to trim the edge of it so that our new fridge that comes this week will fit! I painted some sample squares on poster board to take around the house to different area to see if we liked the samples that we picked up at Lowe's on Saturday. We decided that the tan color we picked out will be good for the upstairs, but is to dark for the downstairs walls. I picked out a dark red to use as as a focus wall and we are still trying to decide if we like it or not.

Today is going to be a very busy day! We close on the house starting at 3:30! Then at 5:05pm, Jacob starts his swim lessons that are every night this week. :) Each lesson lasts until 5:55pm. It is a tot and parent class, so I get to go with him and be in the water as well. Then after swim lessons we have a newcomer orientation class at our church! So needless to say, today is going to be very busy! On Friday, Hans parents arrive and we are really excited about that!

I will leave you with a picture of Jacob.....I gave him some fruit snacks to try and get him to not walk on the kitchen floor as I was trying to mop it.

Holiday Fun!

We had a great time this past weekend with all our visitors! Megan and Mike arrived very late Thursday night last week and stayed until early Monday morning. They had to head back for Mike to work the night shift (he is a cop.) We enjoyed seeing them again as it had been a while. They are getting very excited as they are also closing on their house next week!

On Friday night, my mom and sister Kim arrived. On Saturday, Megan, Kim and I went to the city pool (where I got nice and sun burn!), while Mike and Hans made a trip to Mitchell to go to Menard's and Cabellas (boy stuff!). Mom stayed here at the house with Jacob so that he could take his much needed nap! After the pool, we stopped and looked at a local store that was advertising their patio furniture at 50% off. I was able to find a really good deal on a table with 6 chairs. This was a house warming gift to us from my mom. She also bought Jacob a play set (swing, slide) for his late birthday / early Christmas gift! That was one of the items that Hans and Mike picked up at Menard's. It will be built once Hans' parents come the weekend of the 15th and Hans has his dad's help.

We really enjoyed having the patio table, and ate a few meals outside since having it. We also enjoy it in the evenings when the sun is going down and it isn't so hot outside. :) On Saturday night, Mom, Megan, Mike, Hans and I all went to watch the fireworks! Kim wasn't feeling well, so she stayed home with Jacob as he was already in bed. We enjoyed the show and did our best to not be eaten alive by all the mosquitoes!

Sunday we just had a lazy day after Church playing games and visiting. Then we had to say goodby to M&M early Monday morning. After they left, we were able to get a few more hours sleep before Jacob was insistent on us being awake (Grandma wasn't keeping him entertained enough I guess). We hung out and then went down to check out the 4th of July celebration festivities going on. Most of the stuff had already ended, but we were able to walk around some booths that were set up in the park down town. We then came home and Jacob had a blast playing with Grandma and Aunt Kim in his play room!

Then after dinner on Monday, Mom got a couple good family pictures for us!

Next week we have some exciting things going on!! On Monday 7/11 we will be signing the papers to officially own our house!!!!! I am so excited! Then on Friday 7/15 Hans parents are coming for a visit!!!

I am also happy to report that Jacob is doing very good with sleeping in his own bed and for most of every night! I was worried that he would regress with the full house, but he did great!