Random Photos

Here are just a few photos from the past couple months. I could have put lots more up but didn't want to bore you. These are some highlights.

Sophia and her cousins, Bronte and Renae in Canal Park.

A bear outside the chocolate store in Canal Park. Caleb really loved that bear!

Sophia and Ben's first kayak ride in Lake Superior.

Caleb and I at the end of our first kayak ride in the lake. As you can see, he really enjoyed it. It took him five minutes to fall sound asleep in the kayak.

Sophia at Enger Tower. Some friends got married there last weekend and Sophia and I had a little photo shoot after. It was a beautiful outdoor wedding!

The house

I finally had a few minutes to download the last two months worth of photos onto my computer and thought I better update the blog. Sorry it's been forever. I have some photos of the house for those of you who have been wondering how it's coming along. With lots of help from family and friends we were able to get a bunch of projects started and/or completed before we ever moved in. It was a huge blessing because since we moved in it has gone much more slowly... Here's some of the work. I'll post more as we continue to do work...especially whenever we finally make it into our bedroom!! Please, don't ever paint the trim in your bedroom pink, especially without cleaning it first!

The new fence. They did a great job. I think it's the straightest fence in Duluth!

My lovely husband!

Sophia's room. The canopy lasted about 3 days before being ripped out of the freshly sheet rocked ceiling during a temper tantrum. It sure was cute for three days though!

The safer way to let them help!

Caleb's room...we still need a carpet remnant and the green doesn't look quite so neon in person!

Our house

Here's a photo of the front of our new house. We close on it this Thursday and then will start digging in on the work that needs to be done. We are excited. The grass/dandelions were a foot long at least but Ben and a friend spent the morning working on it and it is getting better already!

You got it.

So it wasn't that difficult...but our hair does look really similar from the back doesn't it??

Pop Quiz!

My brother Don and his kids are visiting this weekend for Bronte's soccer tournament. We went down to Canal Park today and got this picture of me and my nephew Aaron. Your job is to guess which head of hair is mine and which is Aaron's. He does have quite a nice head of hair for a 14 year-old boy!

One more thing...

I had to save this for a different post. A couple days before we left for California we made an offer on a house and it was accepted so we had the inspection the day before we left. During our whole trip Ben was on and off the phone with our realtor, the banker, plumbers, etc...negotiating and finding out info on the house. After dealing with a whole bunch of stuff we decided today we are for sure getting the house. They have accepted our counter-offers and we sign the papers tomorrow. The closing will be June 8th! We will stay in this apartment until the end of June so we have a few weeks to do some work on the house and get packed up and move.

We are really excited! The house needs work but it's going to be a great house for us. The funny thing is, it's only three blocks away. Since we have been married we have only lived within a 6 block radius. We used to live at 7th and 7th, now we are at 10th and 10th and we will soon be at 7th and 10th - right in the middle! It makes moving trucks very affordable since they charge by the mile!

California!

We got back from California on Tuesday night. We spent about 9 days there and we had a blast! The first four days were spent near Anaheim (home of Disneyland) at a National Vineyard pastors and leaders conference. The conference was really good and they planned some free time into it so we could hang out with people and see some sights. This was good since we had Sophia and Caleb with us. They had childcare and fun stuff planned for the kids during the conference so they really liked it too.

When the conference finished the rest of our staff went back to Duluth and we stayed for some much needed vacation. We went to Disneyland on Friday and then to San Diego from Saturday until Tuesday. We got to see some great beaches, SeaWorld and the San Diego Zoo. We all had a great time!

When I downloaded my photos off the camera we had 541! Don't worry, I've only put a few highlights on here.


Notice Caleb's finger in this picture. Contrary to what the picture shows, he really loved Mickey Mouse. All day he would see him on stuff and scream, "Me Mouse, Me Mouse!!"

This was the "Shamu Rocks" show at SeaWorld! It was probably my favorite thing we saw on the whole trip. This guy surfed across the whole pool on the whale's back.

A day at the beach. Of course the water was never actually warm enough to swim in!

At the zoo!

Sophia has been working on this sucker all week long. I think it was the highlight of the trip for her!