July! Part 1

July started with us listing our house for sale.  It was a crazy, stressful time.  We stayed at a hotel for a couple days, hoping we would get lots of showings and sell it quickly. We didn't end up selling it quickly, but it turned out well in the end.

Grace and BethAnne stayed with Nana and Papa for awhile while we showed the house, that turned out to be very useful and they had a wonderful time.  Mark and I took the three little kids out to dinner the first night our house was listed.  It was a celebration of months of work getting the house ready.

The first morning at the hotel, Mark took Andy and Joy to Nana and Papa's while Daniel and I slept in.  I took a quick shower and came out to Daniel helping himself to a breakfast of cookies he found in my bag.  So funny.

 More cute Daniel pictures from July- 

We had a special birthday this July.  Andy turned 8 years old!  Where does the time go?  We had a fun birthday party with lots of family and a very cool baby Yoda cake!

Our lovely Rose of Sharon tree started blooming not long after we listed the house.  It's been beautiful this year.  We'll probably get a few of these in our new yard.

Stay tuned for another July post...

June!

I took this picture after a big day of cleaning and dejunking as we get ready to sell our house. It wore me out for sure, but that day we also had fun taking the kids out to eat at Red Robin.  It's been a very long time since we went out to eat as a family.  It was expensive, but it was a blast.

Mark took these great pictures of the boys.  These boys are the sweetest boys a mom could ask for.  I always hoped that if we had boys that they would be sweet like Mark and I definitely got my wish.  They are wonderful!

Mark took this great picture of Grace too.  We are so proud of her for doing a great job (all A's) in online school this year.  Online school was chaotic and difficult but she managed everything almost entirely on her own.  She's 14 going on 20 and I'm so proud.  She's excited to go to the Fine Arts Academy in the Fall and I know she'll do great.

I took this candid picture the other day while Mark was teaching Andy about the Periodic Table of Elements.  Andy is so interested in science, he watches science videos for fun, that's almost all he watches.  He's so smart like his dad.

I arranged these flowers for when we had pictures taken of our house on Thursday.  The pictures went well and I hope the hardest part is behind us.  We'll get things cleaned and staged again on Wednesday and Thursday morning and then our house will go on sale on Thursday.  We're going to a hotel for a couple days and hopefully it will sell quickly.

Here's a professional picture of our house.  It's been a great place to live for the last 11 years, it will be hard to leave.  You can also see a 3D walkthrough and some cool aerial photos at these links- https://my.matterport.com/show/?m=HS5ZvdjL6WJ&brand=0

 http://www.homesbyepic.com/skyview/2487%20N%20Wallingford%20Ave%20Unbranded/index.htm

Here's a recent picture of our new house. It's coming along.  The framing and plumbing are done.  Next week is electrical. It's exciting to see the progress!

 We have lots of cousins coming in the next couple weeks and Andy will be baptized in 3 weeks, it's very exciting, so stay tuned!

May and Daniel's 4th Birthday

Our house framing started a couple weeks ago and it's great to see the progress every day!

The framing is supposed to take another couple weeks. Time is going by so quickly, we're planning to sell our house in a couple months and then hopefully move in to our new house at the end of September.

The temple is now open for youth baptisms and Joy got to go for the first time (Grace was able to go too).  They say it was a lovely day.

Daniel turned 4 on May 12th.  He's been asking to go to Chuck E Cheese for many months and we finally got to go!

Daniel loved to ride the rides and play the games.  It was a lot of fun.

I love this picture of me and Daniel!

A few days before his actual birthday, we had a family birthday party.  Daniel wanted Shadow Sonic on his cake and Tena came and drew that on there in less than 1/2 hour.  She is amazing!

We are so grateful to have this sweet, sensitive, smart boy in our family!  We love you Daniel!

April!

Something happened to my captions, so I'll write them again.  The wood arrived for our new house.  Daniel said houses weren't made out of wood, they were made out of "colorful wood".  Very silly

We have loved our dates out to see our house.  It gave us a place to go since last August, which has been so nice in the pandemic because it wasn't really safe to go on "normal" dates.  For months and months we were visiting bear dirt, but it was still fun.  It's great to see the house go up.

                                            

I love BethAnne's new haircut.  Her health has been slowly improving since her major surgery early in March, but it's been a difficult road.

                                                

I love my little buddy!  He will always be my "Dan-baby!"

February Part 2 (And March too)

My 1st baby turned 18 in February!  It's gone by so fast.  We sure love our sweet BethAnne!

We decorated the house with hearts and a sign (see above) and we got her 18 birthday balloons!

And we made a yummy cake

Happy Birthday BethAnne!

BethAnne and I got a great present a few days after her birthday.  A pharmacist in the ward had extra vaccine that was about to expire, and he thought of me, and he let BethAnne get hers too.  We got our 2nd shot about a week ago and so we're now fully vaccinated.  Mark got his first shot this last Monday and we definitely can see the light at the end of the tunnel. 

About a week later, BethAnne was admitted to the hospital for major surgery.  My family put together a great care package for her which included this llama which was a great comfort for her week in the hospital.

Before surgery

The surgery had some unexpected complications and so she had to have another surgery a few days later.  It was a really rough week.  My mom saved the day by staying two nights at the hospital and helping the doctors figure out how to control BethAnne's pain.  We were so grateful when BethAnne was able to come home after a week at the hospital. Her dogs were so grateful too.

In better news, while BethAnne was at the hospital Mark got a great job offer from Amazon (working remotely). (He hadn't been laid off from his old job, but his company had gone downhill in several ways). Mark started his new job this last Monday (3/29/21) and we're very grateful.

Then even more good news happened last week.  They started digging on our house.  After waiting more than 6 months, it was finally our turn!

We also got to have our first in-person party with the Rogers since last fall because Nana and Papa are now fully vaccinated.  It was so good to be together!

                                             

And finally, Daniel got to go to the dentist for the first time last week and he did amazing.  Last time we couldn't get him in the door, so I thought we would just go in and say "Hi", but he let them do a full kid cleaning! He loved the batman protective eyewear! He's getting so big and grown-up!

So spring has come and life is great.  There are still challenges, but we feel very blessed and we go forward with faith.

 

February 2021 Part 1

We have missed the temple this last year during the pandemic, though we have felt strengthened throughout the year by faith and the Spirit.  Sometimes on our dates, Mark and I get takeout and sit and eat in the temple parking lot.  It's a very special place.

Daniel made this "transformer" out of duplos.  He's so creative!

Mark got me these beautiful roses for Valentines Day.  They bloomed beautifully for a week.  I'm so grateful for him and for our marriage.  

We got a fun surprise Valentine's weekend.  We had almost no snow all winter, but then on Valentines weekend we got a lot.  It didn't stay long (which is kind of good), but it was beautiful and fun while it lasted!

Sweet Andy!

Beautiful Snow!

Snowball fight!

Adorable Daniel!

Mark took the kids sledding, the hill was quite crowded and the place we found wasn't very steep, but it was good for Daniel!

I bought some daffodils and one day the sun came out and shone through them.  It was so pretty and a great reminder that after the dark winters of our lives, spring comes again.  (And you can see my valentines roses blooming in the background, so pretty).