Erin and Jonathan's Wedding

This past weekend we were in Eau Claire for Erin and Jonathan's wedding.  They got married at the Stone Barn in Urne, which was very beautiful.  Fortunately the rain held out and it was nice to spend some time with my family.

The cousins had a great time playing together, especially Ian and Nolan.  They ran and wrestled and played lawn games for most of the afternoon.  It was really fun to see how much fun they had!

Cousins! (Ian, Kate, Olivia, Maddex, Romen, and Nolan)

Kate and Olivia are only about 6 weeks apart in age.  Cute to see these little girls together!

Sunday School

Nolan began Sunday School last week at Trinity with Ali as his teacher.  He was pretty nervous beforehand, but once he got there and saw Ali and his friends, Elsa and Ryder, he was pretty excited.  I'm excited for him to learn and grow in his faith, as well as develop some confidence about going to school away from Mom and Dad.  I think it will be great practice for him for next fall when he heads off to 4K.

My girl

At 13 months, we're really seeing Olivia's personality blossom. Our little lady is confident, independent, and just a little bit sassy. :)  She is fiesty and opinionated and oh so very funny.  She's saying more and more words - Night-Night, Mama, Dada, Nolan, My-My, shoes - shakes her head yes and no, barks like a puppy, and has the best laugh.  

She still loves to snuggle with her pink birdie blanket and sucks her thumb when she goes to sleep. She loves to give sloppy open mouthed kisses and blow raspberries.  Also, if Daddy doesn't pick her up immediately when he gets home from work, she stomps her fit and throws a fit in protest.   

One of the cutest things about Livi is her absolute love for shoes and purses.  She loves to sit by the front door and try on Mommy, Daddy, and Nolan's shoes and wear them around the house.  She also loves to drag around purses and bags, often squealing because she's so excited.  

Lately, she's been getting more mischievous and has been getting into all the kitchen cabinets and emptying the book shelves.  She is a climber and is really brave about standing on stools or chairs, even though it gives her mommy a heart attack.

Olivia is an outdoor girl and loves to dig in the sandbox with or without big brother.  She can climb up our jungle gym slide and can really cover some ground when she gets to running across the yard.

We sure love our Livi LuBear and all the many charming and wonderful facets to her personality!

World Record Watermelon

We had a lot of success with our garden this year, with the exception of our watermelon plants.  To be fair, I basically forgot about them and didn't water them all summer.  Despite all odds, one lone watermelon grew and we noticed it was about the size of a softball.  We waited and waited for it to grow, but it never did.  So finally I let Nolan pick it.  It was the tastiest three bites of watermelon I've ever had.. ;)

Buddies

Nolan's good buddy, Isaac started 4K this week, but before he did we made sure to have a great sendoff with library storytime together and lunch at Casa Mexicana.  These two crazies are too cute and Nolan's day is made anytime he gets to spend it with Isaac. :)

My boy

These pictures are just soooo Nolan..... :)

Squirrel!!!!!

The other night Eric was giving the kids a bath when I noticed Miles was acting weird.  He was panting and darting back and forth from the gate to the blanket chest, trying to get my attention.  Honestly, with how peculiar our particular dog is, I didn't think too much of it until I heard a squeak.  

It was like that scene with Aunt Bethany from the Griswold's Family Christmas..."What's that sound?  It's a funny squeaky sound."

I nervously gathered my courage and made my way into the family to check things out.  Sure enough, I heard another squeak and I high-tailed into the bathroom for reinforcements.  

Usually of the two of us, I am calm and collected and know just what to do in a crisis.  However, I was acting like an irrational basketcase and took over bathtime while my hero of a husband headed in to discover what was hiding in our house.

Eric and Miles cornered it and discovered that our rodent nemesis was a rolly polly thirteen striped ground squirrel....probably the same one that's been shredding everything in our garage...but that's another story...

It was not long before my knight in shining armor called for my assistance, so I quickly finished the kids' baths and began the process of "suiting up" for this disgusting task.  There were two things I was certain of: 1. It was NOT going to touch me.  2. I didn't want to kill or maime it.  So, obviously I needed to wear socks, boots, long pants, a coat, hat, and scarf in order to make sure it couldn't possibly touch my skin in a wild frenzy as we chased him back to the great outdoors. 

Basically my "help" consisted of me standing on the landing, watching Eric flip over the furniture and shrieking every time I spotted Chippy.  Once all the hiding places were gone, our demonic little friend found the open door and booked it out of here...hopefully never to return again!  It certainly added a little excitement to our boring Sunday night!

Good boy, My-My.

Privacy

Today, after running around like a crazy person all morning, I finally took a brief potty break and as soon as my cheeks hit the seat, my son burst threw the closed door because he needed to throw his banana peel away...in the bathroom garbage...  Thanks, son.

Sunset

Gosh, we live in a beautiful part of the world.