Back to August...

During the Hickman's visit we all went out to dinner at Roaring Rapids Pizza. I believe it was the hottest day of the summer, but we still sat outside and enjoyed the sound & view of the river in the background. The kids (and adults) had fun on the indoor carousel and running around on the outside lawn. It was a great evening...and kinda started cooling off by the time we were leaving.

Katrina and Finn

Sweet Sadie on the carousel

Ronan--looking like such a big boy!

Cohen, Becca, Natasha, and Aunt Carol

Josh & Tash
Sisters
(Mom & Aunt Carol)

The Chase Fam

Our Family

The Henrys

Natasha, Wyatt, Aunt Carol, and Uncle Keith

Josh making Griffin fly SO high!

pretty sunset on the river...

Quick Update

I have so much to catch up on...so many fun August moments and now we're already into September, but it will have to wait! We have been busier than ever these last two weeks...continuing to work on our new house while also finishing up several projects to get our current house ready to sell. I'm happy to report that our house is officially on the market!! If you want to check out our listing, click here. Feel free to spread to word to any locals looking to buy a house. (:

As you can see from the pictures, we have completely moved out of our house. Most everything is in storage in the attic of our new house, and my parents have graciously opened their upstairs "apartment" for us to live in until we get occupancy in the new house (by the end of the month, lord willing!). It has been working out really well! The kids especially are having fun living at Memaw & Papa's house, and I have enjoyed having the extra help while Josh is working overtime on the house.

I'll try to post pictures soon!

Garden Tea

While the Hickmans were here, we got to have some girl time with Aunt Carol and Natasha. Becca and I brought them with us to our friend, Jincy's, annual tea in her beautiful little backyard. We were able to leave our kids (minus Sadie) with Papa, Uncle Keith, and my cousin Wyatt. It was so cool that the guys were willing to do that for us! (Mom was working, so she wasn't able to come.) It was such a nice & peaceful little break for me from our 'construction zone' at home! We all had fun looking around and getting ideas for our own yards. (:

Cousin Natasha, Aunt Carol, Becca, me, and Sadie at Jincy's tea.

We were so impressed with all of Jincy's creative ways of using small spaces to create such pretty floral scenes. There was so much to look at~it was amazing!
Sadie and Aunt Carol exploring together.

Sadie loved Ellie's playhouse.

Bubbles with Papa

Wednesday, August 13th

While we were waiting for the Hickmans (relatives from CA) to arrive, Papa kept all the kids entertained with bubbles in the field across the street. It was a great way to get everyone out of the house so that Memaw could finish getting the house ready for company. The kids loved it! They've had so much fun having Papa home all summer!

So many little helpers...

Cohen, Finley, and Sadie decided to sit in the grass to wait for the bubbles to come to them.

The boys heard some guys working on the baseball field, so they gathered to watch.
(Finn, Ronan, Griffin, Cohen, and Tyler)

Ronan and Tyler hanging out on the fence.

Happy Birthday, Mom!

Later in the day on August 10th we celebrated Josh's mom's (Grammie's) birthday at the park near their house. As always it was fun hanging out with the family and getting all of the cousins together to play.

Josh and his mom swinging together.
Dylan, Ethan, and Ronan playing in the sand.
Ronan and Lydia
Josh and Griffin sliding together.
Josh thought it would be fun to drag Griffin around the sand in this box. He loved it (:
Ronan wanted to join in, too.

What a fun Daddy!

Griffin kept rubbing his eyes with his sandy hands, so we had to clean him up at the drinking fountain.
All better now.

Amy made cupcakes for dessert.

We gave Grammie a garden stake with a frog on it (:
(Ethan and Macey watching Grammie)

Grammie with all seven grandkids!

Happy Birthday, Becca!! (& Kenton, again)

Sunday, August 10th
We celebrated Becca's birthday along with Kenton's since my parents were out of town on Kenton's actual birthday. We had a nice afternoon with yummy food and nice company. Kenton's parents and grandparents were there, and my Uncle Tom and Aunt Kathy joined us too. (They were visiting from the Bay Area for the birth of their twin granddaughters in Portland!)

Cohen and Finn looking on as Kenton opened his musical birthday card.
Becca holding up one of the shirts that Katrina and I gave her.
Ronan and Queen Sadie
Griffin napped during most of the party and when he woke up he was glued to Daddy. They have such a sweet relationship (:
Josh feeding bites to Griffin.
Katrina, Outi, Kevin, Lew, Mary Lee, and Aunt Kathy

For dessert we had brownie sundaes~~yummm!

Griffin is a natural at playing the trumpet (:

Aaron and the Birthday Girl!

Katrina and the Birthday Boy~ it was also their 6th Anniversary!

Tractor Time

On Saturday Josh rented a John Deere tractor to level out the ground around our house. He is going to be building the fence between our two houses and also preparing for landscaping, so this was the first step in getting ready for all of that. I let some of our family know that we were going to have a tractor at our house, because I thought it would be fun for the kids to see. The Henrys and Greens came by for quick visits and all the kids got turns driving the tractor!

Finn and Griffin sitting on the tractor before Josh got started.

They were very excited!

Ronan driving with Daddy

Finley driving with Kenton

Working on the side yard

Clearing out our little backyard

Macey and Ethan driving with Jon

Ethan, Griffin, and Macey checking out the inside of the house.

Griffin, Ronan, and Ethan on the front porch, and Amy sitting down watching Jon and Macey on the tractor.