September 26, 2011

Keith is still busily working at the old house trying to get it all finished so we can put it up for sale. I think I can safely say that when everything is finished, that might rank as one of the happiest days of his life. Well, maybe not quite, but I think he is ready to go back to working on only one house, preferably the one we are actually living in.

Weather continues to be cool, and wet, but we did have a welcome visitor today....the SUN!

From 2011-09-24

We have had our share of rain this fall, and our rain garden has looked like a pond on more than one occasion. However, we have lots of sand on our lot, so nothing looks like a pond for very long.

From 2011-09-24

Outside, we are starting to see some changes in the leaves. I am sure the cold weather that is coming in this weekend will help that process speed up even further. My only hope this fall is that we might get some great colors in the trees with all this rain!

From 2011-09-24

We also celebrated the only fall birthday in our immediate family this weekend. Good Ole Molly turned TEN this weekend. We celebrated by making pizza, which she didn't get to taste.

From 2011-09-24

From 2011-09-24

However, I did let her have her own piece of strawberry shortcake that night. She has earned it after many years of eating dog treats for her birthday. It appeared that she enjoyed it a lot, although if you blinked, you would have missed the whole thing!

From 2011-09-24

The kids also enjoyed their weekend visit to the library. Now that Julia is starting to read some simple stuff herself, she is getting a whole new enjoyment out of picking out books. Although she is still at the point where she likes picking out the books based on their covers!

From 2011-09-24

From 2011-09-24

Andrew enjoys his books too, as long as they are about tractors, tools, heavy equipment, robots or dinosaurs. Here he is reading up on one of those subjects.

From 2011-09-24

Lastly, when he is not reading, he enjoys being Captain of the Library!

From 2011-09-24

September 19, 2011

For many, Labor Day marks the "end of summer". However, around here, we still often get summer like temperatures well into September. In fact, last year when my parents came in November, it was still in the mid 70's most days. This summer has been unbearably hot (and humid), but I was still surprised to see it go away so quickly. Two weeks ago, we had lots of rain and cool weather. This was followed by a fairly sticky and hot Labor Day. Last week you could feel a definite change in the air. Gone was the thickness in the air and it was replaced by a feeling of fall. Then the temperatures shifted too, and this weekend we were dressed in long-sleeves and light sweaters to deal with the 60 degree days. The kids noticed the difference and started remembering all their favorite things that start happening when the jeans and sweaters come back out-i.e. Halloween, pumpkin patches, and eventually Christmas. I decided I would commemorate these changes by taking a weekly photo from our great room window. This is what it looked like this week.



Of course, this is also the time of the year when things get darker earlier, and brighter earlier as well. So it was time to put up the custom roman shades in the kids bedrooms. We have them for the other windows as well, but we will hold off hanging them until the windows are painted. That should be by Julia's high school graduation, I hope.





Alas, Julia, my early riser, enjoys getting up before the sun so she can see her friends to like to come and visit in the morning


To wrap up this week, I have some pictures of Andrew at the breakfast table showing us his many faces








And a final picture, I call this "ode to Liam", since he was copying a pose from his cousin that was taken a couple weeks ago by my brother

September 12, 2011

Well, we finally seem to be settling into a routine after our move, hurricane, and power outage. The kids continue to love their new schools, and the house. I am amazed how easy the transition has been for them. Keith and I have enjoyed the changes too, but we still have a long list of things on our to-do lists. We have been very thankful that Keith's mom and Bob continue to help us shorten those lists! The kids enjoy helping out with some of our chore too, so you can see in the pictures how we often mix work and pleasure. Besides the screened-in porch, the kids favorite space seems to be the great room. Largely, because much of that furniture is currently at our old house to "stage" it for selling which gives them lots of room to play. Andrew even created a new game called basketbasebowing ball. I am sure it will be an Olympic sport soon.

I also included some pictures of the rooms with our furniture since I had not posted any of those yet. As well as, the guest bedroom showing the small amount of boxes that still remain unpacked. In the final shot, you can see our grass coming in. We also have had beautiful weather now for several days. A very welcome change after all the rain last week!


Click on the link below to view other pictures from this week:
https://picasaweb.google.com/semerranko/September122011?authuser=0&feat=directlink