Hello again.

Hey there! Once again, I took a bit of a blogging break. I was pretty surprised when I picked up this old thing and dusted it off to see that the last time I had written was in MARCH. When there were still mounds of SNOW on the ground.

Thankfully we're not in March anymore because obviously, March is the worst. Or one of the worst. July on the other hand is awesome. Warm, sunny, a baby kicking in my belly. Right at 19 weeks! The morning sickness is gone but the back pain is already here and rearing it's ugly head, settling in until December when the little sprout is out.

Although I would pick back pain over morning sickness/feeling like my life is over at any time.

Here are a few of my favorite photos from the last few months!

 

Trip number two.

So! I'm working on preparing a post with photos of the new place but don't have all my ducks quite in a row yet. They just keep wandering all around and I just can't get them to stand still. C'MON, ducks. So in the meantime, here are some pictures from our recent 1 1/2 week trip out to North Dakota!

The first few days we were out visiting Brian's sister Beth in Hettinger, ND. She had a garage to build and lots of delicious vegetables to be eaten from her garden. Paisley loved picking all the veggies and eating them fresh out of the dirt, but had to be coerced and bribed into eating the same veggies as soon as they were cleaned and cut up on her plate at the kitchen table. Typical, child.

Brian's parents were out there with us, and we had a grand ol' time exploring Hettinger and the nearby towns and the nearby playgrounds and the blow up pool in Beth's yard. We ate lots of tasty fresh veggies and salads and Paisley supervised all the garage building with a heavy hand.

Other destinations on our adventure were Cavalier, ND where the hubs was standing in a dear friend's wedding and Detroit Lakes, MN to stop at Castaway Club, a camp that we will be frequently involved with through Brian's work. It was all a blast and so fun and simply marvelous, except for the very darkly looming fact that I developed some horrible case of the stomach flu amidst it all.

And that's why there are tons of pictures in Hettinger, two pictures from the wedding, and only one picture from Castaway which features Paisley rolling in the grass. Something about having to spend most of your time in the bathroom makes trying to take lots of beautiful and lasting pictures seem super unimportant.

So now we're back! My stomach no longer hates my guts (pun INtended, heh heh heh), our bags are unpacked, and the cats did indeed survive our longer than usual absence. Hallelujah, praise be.

Thanks for reading folks! Tune in next time, and all that.

Even though the mayflies were bad

Well, so here I am! Attempting to get back on the blogging train. Choo choo, chugga chugga. Let's start with a few quick updates.

We moved! The hubs got a job as a Young Life area director in Cloquet, MN. While it was hard to leave our beloved Minneapolis and all our special people there, Cloquet is a super fun and beautiful town surrounded by tall gorgeous trees and just minutes away from Lake Superior, Duluth, and the super awesome Jay Cooke State Park. Plus, to say we are excited about Brian's new career path would be a pretty large understatement.

We have moved to a home that is over one hundred years old, so we are now officially "old house people." It's big, it's beautiful, and it's going to be a lot of work. We love it. Anybody know how to work a radiator?

I'll show pics of the new place soon! But first I have to take some. So for now I'll play a little bit of catch-up, and show some photos from our family vacation in June. Because that was a long time ago.

We went and stayed at a lakeside cabin resort with my mom, brother and sister in a town called Hackensack in northern MN. Yes, Hackensack is the actual name of an actual town, it's really quite endearing.

Boats! Lakes! Beaches! Fishing! Swimming! Water slides! Excellent food! Delicious drinks! Games! Laughter! Great discussion! Mayflies as far as the eye can see and the foot can crunch! Need I go on?

No I think that's good.

Alright, pictures coming at you right now!

And now we have a short series of "surprised face." As I mentioned in my last post, "surprised face" is a big deal these days.


And with that, I bid you adieu.

hi elephant

Well, I guess I haven't blogged since April? We'll just address that elephant immediately. Hi elephant. Nice to see you. You're looking good, have you been working out?

People would nicely say hey, you haven't blogged for awhile. And I'd be like, well, I guess you're right. And then later someone would more bluntly say, you need to blog again. And I'd be like, well, I guess I do. And then my hubs would say BLOG. YOU SHOULD BLOG. BLOG ABOUT THAT! BLOG ABOUT ANYTHING, DO IT, DO IT RIGHT NOW.

And now it's July? Well, I guess you're right about that too. But now we're in one of these situations where too much time has passed, too many pictures have been unshared, and I'm so completely behind that I need to start over. You know, one of those kinds of things?

The past few months have been a whirlwind of crazy. We had some trips, some sicknesses, some parties, some haircuts. For everyone, haircuts!! And we were rained out of a picnic, but we had a blast. And we saw kittens at a mini farm, but Paisley tried to sit on them. And we rode on a pontoon, and Paisley kissed the fish we caught. And then there was the time I forgot to order decaf at Starbucks and I nearly leapt out of my skin that night while trying to fall asleep. Because caffeine is not my friend. It's not even my frenemy.

Oh, and we're moving. So there's also that? Selling a house while also attempting to buy a new one in a city that is two hours away has been slowly sucking the life out of me. Inch by inch. Centimeter by centimeter. All friends and frenemies and extremely caffeinated iced lattes aside.

But we're making it, we are! Moving next week, and then the fun of arranging a new house starts. I'm thinking my blog inspiration will come rolling right back right around then. Because new house! And because honestly I shouldn't let this happen again. When I signed onto blogger today I could barely remember what to do in order to start a new blog post. I was all, "Wait, HOW DO I BLOG POST???"

The two loves of my life, right there. Doing "surprised face." It's a big hit around here.

I'll be back dudes. Don't even worry about it.

I heart chocolate stuffed croissants

I had brilliant, brilliant plans this summer/autumn of going to the farmer's market every single Saturday to buy my produce, and perhaps more importantly to buy a flaky, delicious, dark chocolate stuffed fresh croissant for breakfast. But life happened in it's usual bustling way and in all reality I only went a pitiful THREE times, although I still have a few more weeks before it closes for the season. Here are some pictures I snapped from the few times that I did go.

The Mill City farmer's market - my favorite of favorites.

After we shop we like to head to the park on the other side of the Guthrie and release baby girl to run free in the long fields of grass. Except instead of running free she usually chooses to inspect the buckles of her stroller for long periods of time. Because, you know. Buckles. We have much to learn from them.