Saturday with the cousins

As soon as we pull into my parent's driveway, Christian unbuckles and jumps out of the car so he can run up the driveway. He can hardly stand to sit in the car for one more second he's so excited!

When we arrived on Saturday my brother, Tim, and his family were already there. Elizabeth loved following McKenna around.

And this just melted my heart. It took McKenna a little while to warm up, but when she did I think she had everyone wrapped around her little finger!

Isn't this the best?? I love seeing everyone playing together. It's so sweet how they just love playing together and get along so well, even though they haven't seen each other for quite some time.

(Christian & Adam)
Seriously...just the best day!

Oh Christmas Tree!

This was the scene Friday night right after we all shook our jingle bells and the town square was lit up by the warm glow of the lights on the Christmas tree!

McKenna wasn't entirely sure what to think of her first tree lighting!

McKenna loved her jingle bell!

We missed Daddy but had a wonderful time with our friends.

McKenna and Gwen always spend most of their time staring at each other.

Gwen and her mommy, Mandy.

My kiddos with their jingle bells.

Reanne, Kevin, Carter & Anessa

Mandy, Jason, Gwen, Kate & Ellie

Brian & Angie

Christian was having so much FUN!!!

Miss Gwen

Carter & Chrish are becoming such buddies at preschool & church and pretty soon we'll live within walking distance of Carter's house!

Kate & her daddy.

Grace & Taryn

Bethany with Caleb & Grace

The window displays in all the stores were so much fun to see!
It was such a fantastic night! A wonderful way to start the holiday season! I felt so blessed that even though Ryan was gone I was surrounded by friends who seem more like family :) It's going to be a great Thanksgiving and Christmas this year!

We Got the House!!!

So much to tell you, but I'm also so tired! A full day and I'm teaching Sunday School in the morning, so all the details will just have to wait!! Talk to ya tomorrow!

Just wanted you to know...

1. We had the best time at our town's annual tree lighting last night! The Christmas season has officially started for us! More to come on that later!
2. I'm heading to my parents today so that Christian & McKenna can get together with all 8 of their cousins on my side of the family! It should be a good time, if Christian ever wakes up. He had a late night last night.
3. We are still waiting to hear about the house. This house buying business is quite a roller coaster ride. I can't wait to get off and be done with it. Maybe we'll hear something today!
   
   

So close!!!!

We are so close to calling this place "home." We got a very reasonable counter offer. We know it's a good deal! They know that it's saving them a ton of hassle to not even have to officially list their house. We are weighing the different options of countering. Ryan's out of town, thus complicating everything. But aren't cell phones grand? How on earth did we live without them??
We would love to come to an agreement today and that's what we're praying will happen.
The sellers seem very willing to work with us. They wanted to give us the swing set (yay!!) and I think they're going to give us their trampoline too (fun, fun!). Now if only they would give us a riding mower. Can you tell...we're going to need one and we don't have one!
It took me FOREVER to fall asleep last night. I think it was 2am when sleep finally came. And Christian is so excited about the tree lighting in our town square tonight that he was up just after 6am. Ugh! So he laid in bed with me and talked and talked and talked about Christmas. He can hardly wait for it to come.
Oh, I almost forgot to mention....guess when the sellers what to close on the house??
Did you guess yet??
--
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December 21st!
As in the week of Christmas!
Yikes!
But we're thrilled and ready to go for it even if Ryan and I have to move every box ourselves!

So that's the latest! I'll keep you posted!
Just keep praying.
So close!
We're so close.

Stuff Happens....

and that's why we're not going to find out anything today about the house we made an offer on. Our realtor had to take her mother to the hospital and therefore she will not be able to meet with the sellers. We're disappointed, but completely understand. Sometimes stuff just happens. So we will be waiting for at least another 24 hours. That just gives me more time to think about paint colors (hopefully Ryan's not reading this because he said we're not going to do anything or fix anything for at least a few months after we move in...but you know, it's not like I'm going to let Christian have a pink room, so I think we'll be painting).

We fell in love!

Look at that yard! Ohhh...I love it! So we officially love the house!! Not the sparkles in the ceiling - who has ever heard of such a thing??? And not the appliances from the 90's - the fridge might even be from the 80's! But we adore the yard. We could see ourselves calling this place home. So we made an offer. We're nervous. Trying not to get our hopes up, but I think it's too late for that.
Our realtor will present the offer to the sellers tomorrow. Please pray that they accept it or make a reasonable counter offer!!!
We're ready to call this place HOME and that is officially the first time I've felt that way in the last 6 months!!!
Look at that pantry!!! Oh the organizing I could do!

Hopefully I'll have some good news by tomorrow night :)

Plans

We finally have our Thanksgiving plans squared away. For those of you who care to know here's the plan:
Ryan will leave after work tomorrow to drive out to Notre Dame for a football game this weekend. His best friend from college is a baseball coach there and he's also going to be meeting up with Zac, so it's guaranteed to be a good time.
The kids and I will then fly to Chicago on Monday afternoon. Ryan will pick us put there and we will all drive (for several more hours) out to the family farm!
That all doesn't sound that complicated, but actually it is. I have to have all of our stuff packet for our trip by tomorrow morning. Ha! I just started. And I've got to think through all these little details like what to do with McKenna's humidifier. Do I send it with Ryan and just do without it here for four days or do I keep it here and just do without it there for five days? It really is a big deal because I honestly believe it is helping to keep her healthy. All she's had so far this fall is a little sniffle and that is a MIRACLE of the Lord! Oh geez...I should probably stop thinking about it and just buy another one. We're getting the kids pictures taken with their cousins while we're in town, so I'm trying to plan out their outfits with my sister-in-law. And then there's the Christmas presents I've been wrapping for the last hour because we always take Christmas with us when we go out for Thanksgiving. I love doing it that way because it spreads things out a bit and usually gives Christian something new to play with on the way home.
So that's the plan!
A lot going on this weekend...we'll be seeing all the cousins on my side of the family for a few hours on Saturday. HipHipHooray!! We haven't all been together since last Christmas! Oh my word I can hardly wait to squeeze everyone! Look out kiddos...Auntie Judy's coming and she's kissing everyone and she just might cry when she sees you too! We also have our annual tree lighting ceremony which is the offical start of the Christmas season for us!
Oh yeah...
in about 30 minutes we are going to look at a house.
I know..yada yada...you've heard this before. But seriously this could be it! It's actually not on the market yet. Our realtor was going to list it and asked the sellers if we could see it first before she lists it. It's in a neighborhood, but on three acres! Oh my word we love it and we haven't even been inside. The price is at the top of our budget and that makes me nervous. So we could really use some prayer...remember Ryan leaves tomorrow, so if we're going to make an offer it's got to be tonight. Yikes! So nervous, but excited because it appears to me (from my own human stand point which could be totally off) that this just might have been orchestrated by the Lord. I'll keep you posted on that one. I promise I'll post something tonight if we do make an offer!

Well, I've got to go wake up McKenna so she can go visit her new house! Ha! We'll see about that one! Ohh...I hope it's her new house!