Dance Party!

Last week we finally found a keyboard, we've had a piano for Evie, but it doesn't work so well when the other band members are downstairs and you're upstairs. A thrift store posted a piano on craigslist, so we headed out the next morning after a saw it and were able to get it. The keys on the piano light up, so tonight the kids decided they were going to do a dance party with the only light being the piano. I gave them some glow sticks as well and they had so much fun!

Here are a couple pictures (without the flash) the red lights are the keyboard (which also will play songs on it's own).

Here's a short video of some dancing.

Today was a good day, which was much needed as we have been struggling this past week. Nathan started second shift last week and will be on it until some time in February most likely. So it's been another adjustment on top of the many adjustments we've already been going through. I'm so thankful for a good day like today! 

Bonus picture: the rockin' Crustaceans from a few weeks ago. 

Fort Wayne - Take 2

Shortly after returning from our first trip to Fort Wayne, Nathan officially accepted an the offer for an engineering position there. He accepted the position Tuesday evening June 18th, we told the kids Wednesday morning, Nathan called a realtor office and spoke with a realtor who said he could take us house hunting the next two days, so we packed up and headed down to Fort Wayne again. We looked at 15 houses in two days with the kids in tow. The realtor was great about it, he is a retired postal worker and did a wonderful job with the kids. He even cleaned up the blood at the last house we saw on Thursday, as Kaleb had cut his hand on Tuesday (right before his soccer game, debatably needing stitches, but we were in Alpena and there's no easy way to get stitches....) and reopened it running around the driveway at the house and then dripped blood on the porch as he came to tell us what he had done. Again, we were tempted to take him to an urgent care to get stitches, but it seemed to be healing some and figured he'd be okay, so we just headed back to the hotel. That was day number one of house hunting, day number two went much more smoothly and we found a house we liked! We came home early Saturday morning (I think we got in around 1 am? this was the theme of our travel getting in super late/early depending how you look at it) praising God we again did not hit any of the wild life we saw, and thankful for the opportunity to see it! We processed through the houses that weekend and put an offer on the one we liked on Monday the 24th. Fort Wayne is currently a pretty hot market, but the house we liked had been on the market all last summer and for over a month with no offers this year, so we offered below asking price by a bit. We worked back and forth for a few days with the offer and closed and had it accepted June 28th. We closed on the house July 19th. From the time Nathan accepted the position until the day we moved we were in Alpena for 18 days. Between the house hunting trip and a trip to Rochester, NY for vacation it was slightly crazy. If you take out the days the movers were packing us up you can subtract another three days. Our friends were disappointed how fast we left, and our realtor found it crazy how fast we could close on a house and move (we closed 21 days after having our offer accepted). Here's a link to a video walk I did through of our new house!

Beach Day!

Last week there were some pretty warm days. We made it into the 80s, so I took the kids to the beach and they went swimming in lake Huron. Just to clarify, as when people around here hear that you actually swam in the "big lake" in May they think you're crazy. Remember it only really thawed in April :-)

Here are the girls running in

Kaleb had fun building a sand castle

And yes, all the kids went in the water, I put my feet in, but that was it. 

Having a fun time!

Capture the Crustacean

The kids formed a new band this week. Capture the Crustacean. Here is their first song.

New Years Eve Sermon

Nathan got to start and end 2017 preaching! Everyone was excited because he finished super early, that was because started early because the rest of the service elements were short. But hey, that's okay :-) It makes the week between Christmas and New Years a bit crazy when he is prepping for a sermon since that isn't his normal weekly affair, there was also a death in the congregation on Christmas Eve so he was helping out with care for the family, funeral planning and the funeral that week as well. He made it through and last week was much lower key.
Here's the sermon if you're interested in watching:

Away in a Manger

The kids wanted me to post this for everyone to enjoy!

The 4th of July

On the 4th we rode our bikes into town for the parade and met up with some people from church.

The girls decided watching the parade was way better than being in it because you get candy. Everyone had fun, but were pretty tired by the time we rode home. 

The kids had fun with some pop-its and then everyone had some down time before heading to some friends for dinner.

After dinner all the kids had some fun with sparklers before heading off to see fireworks.

We headed to the mall parking lot to set up chairs and watch the fireworks

Waiting for the show to begin

We had a nice view of the show, plus the addition of several people in the parking lot setting off their own fireworks :-)

It was also close enough to our house that Nathan was able to walk Damen home when he wasn't behaving and had had enough. A long but fun day!

Sledding!!!!!!!

Wednesday night to Thursday morning we got about 6 or 7 inches of snow. After we finished school on Thursday (because co-op was cancelled because public school had a snow day) we took the kids sledding! Nathan had the day off, so we headed to church to sled.

It was a beautiful day, blue sky, snow on the trees!

Evie heading down the hill

Kaleb getting a push from Daddy!

And I didn't get any more pictures of them sledding there because I shoveled the steps instead......

But, they also enjoyed playing on the huge plow mounds

Evie and Kaleb built some forts in them

I made a snow angel :-) 

And then Hannah found a slightly more fun (dangerous) place to sled :-) 

Here's Kaleb trying it. 

And since I didn't get any other pictures of Damen, here he is trying it....but Hannah had to show him how first......

And here's Evie getting up the nerve to go, although she wouldn't do the double drop that Hannah was doing. 

State Meet

Yesterday Evie and I drove down to Saginaw for the state swim meet. Warm ups this morning were at 7:30 am. Evie had fun and did okay. She dropped a second in her backstroke and had a great swim in that. Her breaststroke you could tell she was trying too hard and went almost a second slower than her best time and her freestyle was just a little slower than her best time. She placed 5th in her breaststroke and backstroke. They handed out awards through out the meet giving the swimmers the opportunity to stand on a podium if they were top eight.

Her first race, the 25 free, she's third from the top, black cap, pink goggles

This is the backstroke, she totally nailed this race. She has the white back on her suit.

And here's the breaststroke, she didn't have the best start on this one as you can see...

Hanging out before her race

At the blocks ready to go (black cap with white writing)

Receiving her medal! She's in the pink bathrobe, at least she made it easy to spot her!

You think you could be a little happier Evie? Maybe smile?

That's better!

Evie's swim meet

This past Saturday, the 4th Evie had her second swim meet. She won every race she swam and dropped lots of time. She was disqualified in her backstroke, but she didn't actually do anything wrong.....the officials did not like our team after the coach let one of the swimmers ask his girlfriend to a dance by putting a sign in the water at the end of the 500. Anyway, I got some videos of Evie's races, so you can see her swim!

Swimming the backstroke

Here's the breaststroke....I started a touch late on this one.....

Evie hanging out with her friend Evie (not short for Evelyn). I think there were at least three Evelyns (my Evie said she thought there were five!) at the meet and one other eight year old one, it was crazy

Seated and waiting for her event

Behind the blocks, getting ready

Focused and ready to go! 

Hannah's Birthday!

Hannah is 10!! She enjoyed going down about 20 minutes south of here to a diner for breakfast with Nathan. She got a huge cinnamon roll that she couldn't even eat all of!

Hannah happy to have a giant cinnamon roll and some time with Dad!

Hannah ready to blow out her candles! 

Hannah was very excited about her rip stick from Nana and Grandad. 

Here's one of her first attempts at using it. 

What Engineering Books Are Good For

Nathan insisted on keeping a number of his engineering books when we moved to Michigan. Why? I have no idea, but we still have a number of them. About a month ago we had the hot wheels out and Nathan found a good use for his books :-)

See the books propping up the track? 

The video shows just how useful they are! 

Frog catching and dog sitting

Some friends from church had a wedding to go to down state and asked it we could let their dogs out since they'd be gone for over 12 hours. They live pretty close to us and the girls were excited to go to their house, Evie was excited to play with their dogs and Hannah was excited because they have a pond with LOTS of frogs. 

Evie had fun playing fetch until the dogs lost interested and started going after the frogs instead...

Do you want to see how fast Hannah is when she catches a frog? Her speed amazes me! The girls had fun until the dogs killed a frog chasing it down....

Soap Bottle Ball

The kids were out in our front yard playing a game that was a combination of soccer and football with a soap bottle refill container they had gotten out of the recycle bin. Who needs toys? I totally love the fact that my kids create games and toys out of things they find laying around.

Here's a short video I took of them playing from inside, Nathan and I joined them shortly after this. 

VBS Take 1

The last week of June the kids participated in VBS at First Baptist in town. They had fun and we got a break for a couple hours each night :-) I went to the parents night and got some pictures and video. Nathan wasn't feeling well, so he didn't make it.

Here's a short clip of the kids singing and doing the motions....well, three out of four doing the motions.....Kaleb is the only one who wasn't. 

Every night started with a craft

They decorated picture frames with them in it that said "Child of the One True King"

They did a little quiz show the last night

The week was about God being the King of Kings and it was a whole castle/king theme.

Riding a two wheeler take four

Damen sort of figured out the two wheeler last week.....at least how to stay up on it. He has not figured out how to stop or turn yet. Which is a wee bit of a problem when trying to ride a bike. Today he attempted to turn and ended up in the drainage ditch. But here is a video of him riding.

Slight better video, as I've started following the boys on my rollerblades :-) 

Three Down....One to Go

Kaleb decided he was done with training wheels yesterday. We took them off and he's good. He can do all the basics, go, stop and turn :-) Damen is not so eager to go without the training wheels. But we are not giving him a choice, yesterday he was sharing a bike with Kaleb because the bearings on his had gone, so he didn't have a choice. Today, our neighbors found us a fourth bike by asking around and gave it to us! It's bigger than what the boys had, but Kaleb is working with it and figuring it out, it's a little big for him, but he'll grow into it soon enough. Anyway, here is a video of Kaleb riding yesterday. He is excited about his bigger bike, as it's the same size the girls have right now (they need bigger bikes soon too) so he can keep up with them.

Here's a short clip of him riding! 

Really COLD!

The 14th was really cold here, like throw boiling water up and freeze cold. What? You don't believe me, or you'd like to see that? Sure, no problem.

Here Nathan is doing it after church.

The kids and I did it before church and I also blew some bubbles and watched them freeze in the air, it's super cool! It's fun to play in COLD! I was telling people at church about all the fun we had had before coming and they all looked at me a little strange, but thought it was pretty cool. Some were going to go home and try it themselves. :-)

Hot Wheels Fun!

My sister got the boys some hot wheels for Christmas. I helped them set up a track and all the kids had fun playing with it and taking some videos. :-)

They enjoyed throwing the people off

And maybe they were learning something too :-)

Hill Rolling

We went to the park last week on a beautiful fall day. The kids found some hills and had a great time rolling down them!

 Here are various kids rolling down the hill, and Evie doing somersaults....

And here I am rolling down the hill :-) And then various kids....

The boys also enjoyed some tree climbing!

And then started jumping off. :-) The boys will now jump from heights taller than I am and love it!