New Digs! 6/13

Hey Graham Fans!  We are up to June of last year!  June 1 was the day we moved into our new house.  The moving actually started on May 31 when Dad and Mom signed all the papers.  Grandma came up and helped unpack the boxes dad was moving.  The 1st is when the real moving really happened.  Two guys in a big truck pulled up around 8:30 (there was supposed to be a third, but Mommy doesn't know why only two came).  Uncle Greg was helping.  Uncle Tim and Aunt Deb helped.  Kayla helped to entertain Caroline and me.  Mommy's friend Sara helped too.  Somehow it all got done with a lot of hard work.  God Bless those that helped!

 

After move in day, there was still lots of work to do.  Daddy worked to get the garage organized so we could get the cars into the garage.  Soon the storage room had shelving too.  Uncle Greg got the washer and dryer going.  Grandma was helping (and passing out some of her cookies) and Grammy made her potato salad to feed the helpers.  Love her potato salad! 

 

The getting settled continued, but we started getting to know neighbors.  Gosh on move in day a family that was building their house across the street and they even came over.  Other neighbors across the street have two boys - 4 and 2,  brought us dinner that first weekend.  During the week, their daddy and our daddy were gone so they invited us to walk around the neighborhood.  I road my bike - mind you on two wheels- all the way around the neighborhood.  Mommy had to push once we got towards the end and it was uphill.  The next two weekends they had what are called Pink Flamingo parties.  Someone puts a pink flamingo in their yard and then people in the neighborhood bring their coolers in the evening and everyone socializes.  The first one was a lot of fun because they had a bounce house out!!  The next one was fun too, but not as many kids.  It took me a bit to warm up but it was a good time!  People are pretty friendly and will stop and talk. 

 

Finally in June Dad was able to participate in a bbq contest.  The bbq trailer was still at Grandma's so on a Saturday morning, Dad and I headed to Sigourney to get the trailer.  We left a little early and frankly I was tired from the previous night's Flamingo Party.  I took a snooze on the way down.  

 

This trip was my first time visiting Grandpa Dennis' grave.  Usually Mommy just gets out on her own.  I felt like a pretty big kid that Daddy took me there.  You know my middle name is Dennis so it is  important for me to make a visit myself.  Then we headed on to Grandma's.  I did some gardening while there.  Grandma has an old push garden tiller.  I had to help her out and do some tilling.  She appreciated it. 

 

The bbq contest was the following weekend.  I was so excited.  My plan was to go up with Dad and Grampa to Marshalltown, help set up, help cook, and EVEN spend the night.  We didn't leave until after gymnastics.  Grampa wanted to see what we do at gymnastics.  The picture is of Caroline climbing the rope ladder.  She hasn't been doing gymnastics that long but you couldn't tell from how she made it to the top.  Once we had gymnastics out of the way, we were off to Marshalltown.  We stopped for bbq on the way out of town.  I managed to doze off on the way to M-town so the trip went fast.  I worked so hard trying to help unload the trailer.  During the downtime, I climbed the trees by our spot.  As the day wore on, I became more tired.  As much I wanted to stay with dad the idea of Caroline getting to watch a movie on the way back home was too much.  I had to go home too.  I did get some good sleep!  We went back the next day and I was ready to help!  Daddy won 5th place in chicken and .  How cool is that!?  I rode back with Dad and Grampa.  Mom and Caroline headed to Sigourney to go to the Peiffer family reunion.  

I really missed Caroline.  Daddy and I did some projects around the house.  We went to Bass Pro.  I insisted on getting pop guns for Caroline and me.  I was very happy to give it to her and of course happy to see Mom too. 

In the past, I am pretty sure I have talked about learning to golf.  Dad takes me out with him sometimes.  We had talked about asking my friend Michael and his dad to golf with us.  It finally happened.  We had so much fun.  Once I went to retrieve a ball from the weeds and Michael shouted there was a snake in there!  I hustled back out!

 

That is all for now.  Hopefully Caroline will be on here soon writing the July '13 entry. 

I turned 3!

Happy Birthday to me!  Happy Birthday to me!  I am 3!  Woot Woot!  If you haven't figured it out, it is Caroline at the keyboard.  Given that May is my birthday month, it should be my turn!  My birthday was awesome!  We started out the day with Pillsbury rolls.  Because I am three, I am now old enough to go to gymnastics!!  I got to try out a class and of course I needed to get a leotard.  We go there early so I could try a few on before deciding.  We found a pink one that we liked.  Then out I went to gymnastics!  I liked it - lots of fun stuff to do!  For dinner we went to the Chicken Coop for pizza. 

 

My birthday party was actually on the 4th.  Grandma came.  Nanny, Grampa  were there from Kansas City.  Aunt Deb, Uncle Tim, Sam, and Kayla were there and of course Uncle Greg.  It was a Dora themed party!  Grampa gave me a tea set that his sister had used, as well as a family friend of Grampa's family.  Mommy took some pictures with it, then it went back in the box and placed out of reach.  :/  Daddy made some yummy bbq and Mommy made some stuff to go with it.  I got some really fun things including my scooter from Mommy, Daddy, and Graham.  The cake was great.  I felt so special!

 

 

The next day we were playing outside, though it was chilly.  I wanted to ride my scooter of course.  Graham wanted to ride his bike but he wanted Dad to raise his training wheels.  Well tha wentt ok so then Dad took the wheels completely off!!  At first he could balance, then he could get stopped, and ultimately he figured out how to get himself started.  All in ONE day!  Can you believe it!  I sure was proud of Graham!

 

Our spring was pretty raining, but we were hopeful that the morel mushrooms were out, around the second weekend of May.  We all went down to the hunting camp to try to find them.  We didn't see one mushroom!  It was fun nonetheless tromping through the woods.  Below we are sitting on one of the tractors on the neighboring farms.  We love farm equipment!

That same weekend was mother's day.  We went to Victor where we met Mom, Grammy, Greg, Uncle Tim, Aunt Deb, Sam and Kayla.  I had a pretty good time - even sat on Grammy's lap for awhile.  She turned 93 the day before, that is a lot of years!  She still lives in her house and makes the best noodles! 

Our family had planned to go to KC to visit Daddy's family the next weekend.  Mommy's Uncle Clarence passed away so Mommy went to Grandma's for the services.  Dad, Graham and I headed to KC.  Obviously the weather was nice - shorts all weekend and outside play!  We even got some golf in!

 
Graham's preschool year concluded in May and of course there was lots of house related stuff and packing.  

Sold!

Hey Graham Fans!  We are talking April, 2013.  Way behind, but if we keep the pace we could be caught up by Spring Break!  Woot Woot!

 

April was a lot about selling the house.  The action picked up and we got an offer!  It was a family with seven kids!!  That was going to be a packed house.  To make a long story short, they were kind of hard to work with and ultimately couldn't afford the house and backed out.  Their realtor had shown the house to another couple that had liked it but the other family had made an offer before this couple was ready to decide on a house.  They were going to come back to see it.  We relisted it too to ensure we the traffic started again.  We had three showings and fortunately the couple made an offer.  Relief!

 

Beyond the house, we had plenty of other activities.  Nanny came to visit.  The weather was nice so we got to enjoy the weather.  Mommy and Daddy went out for dinner which put Nanny in charge.  We had a good time.  

We did some packing.  Every spring there is an anything goes garbage day.  It was timely given that we would be moving.  The crazy thing about it is that people drive around and pick up your stuff.  We put our stuff out on Sunday, and the majority of it was gone by Monday morning.  We watched for awhile as people rummaged through the stuff on the curb.  I talked Mom into going out 'pickin' with me.  We didn't find anything we wanted however. 

Hopefully the video below shows up for all my readers/viewers.  I really worked on my hula hooping.  Believe I have the moves.....

 

We celebrated Mommy's birthday.  Daddy helped us bake a cake for her.  We also went out for pizza.  Her birthday was the day that things started to go south with Buyer #1 so it wasn't as fun as she would have liked.  Dad and Mom also had conferences with my teachers on Mom's birthday.  They seemed happy with what they heard!  Whew!

 

Thanks to Uncle Greg we found a new park in our part of town.  It has a differ which I love and these cool trees you could climb.  If you know me and Caroline, you know how much we climb!  The perfect playground for us!  We made another trip there and packed a lunch.  

Most of you know about the Drake Relays.  We hadn't gone to any of the events before. We went to parade for the first time.  There were not many people there.  It was really windy but we got PLENTY of candy!  For the first time, Mom took us to the Beautiful Bulldog Contest.  They had all these bulldogs dressed up. Lucky for us there were some others there that we got to pet. Well they hold the pole vault event inside the mall.  Can you believe that?  Mommy took us to see it.  It was pretty cool, plus Porterhouse, the real bulldog, was there.  We love to pet him.  Hope we get to see some of the same events next year!

On the road again! 03/13

Project catch up the blog continues!  Caroline on assignment!  I am so excited to share with you what our escapades from March!  We had normal activities - Graham had school, I went to Brighter Beginnings, an occasional play date, plus our house was on the market!  Mom was always cleaning and picking up.  Every few days, sometimes less, sometimes more, someone was looking at our house to determine if they wanted to buy it.  Then we would drive around, run an errand, sometimes drive by the houses Mom and Dad liked to see if there was a sale pending sign.  Sometimes we would get to eat out.  Mostly it was a hassle!

 

The highlight of our month was going to Minneapolis.  Daddy had a meeting up there so we went up after his meetings were over and spent a couple of days.  It was a bit of a drive, but with the DVD player in the car, we survived.  Plus we had just been to Chicago in February - that was a DRIVE!!  First on the agenda was Mall of America!!!  We rode rides that were based on some of our favorite Nick Jr. characters!  Some rides I couldn't ride because I wasn't tall enough. Fortunately there were plenty of rides that were fun and perfect for Graham and me!  I really liked the Blues Clues ride!  The Wonder Pets ride was NOT fun!  It went up in the air and gradually jolted down, then went back up.  The little boy next to me tried to make me feel better because he noticed I was freaking out!   Graham rode it twice.  We rode a bunch of rides.  Graham even rode a roller coaster with Daddy.  We found a Peeps store, visited the Lego store, ate dinner and headed back to the hotel.  Swimming time!!  

 

 

 

The next day we visited the Children's Museum.  It was awesome!  Graham loved the city bus he could pretend to drive.  I liked the pretend store.  We both loved the restaurant and the doctor's office.  They had a nature area that we played in, but also we came across some reading buddies - dogs! I loved petting the dogs!  Mom and I found story time.  It was the best story time I had ever been to - that guy was an excellent narrator, plus it was a book about a cat!!!

 We found a place for lunch and ultimately headed back to the hotel to swim!  For dinner we met up with some friends of Daddy's from college.  Their kids are about the same age as us!  I slept through part of our meeting.  Nap time just didn't happen earlier so I had fallen asleep.  We still had fun.  Sunday we were headed home but went to Edinborough Park to burn some energy.  The pic below shows the climbing structure we played inside.  Graham was a little more adventurous than me.  They also had an open area with balls and ride on toys.  Mommy's friend Karen met us with her baby.  We had a great time. 

 

The other highlight of the month was Easter!  We went to an Easter hunt in Waukee.  There was candy everywhere!  After that we headed to Grandma's!  On Easter we dressed up for Easter Mass.  Graham and I like to dress up for holidays!  After church we got to help make dinner.  Of course, we had an Easter Egg hunt.  Graham was trying to get more than me as usual. 

 

  After all the excitement at Grandma's we headed home.  Graham and I were hoping that the Easter Bunny had visited our house!  Sure enough he did!  We both got swimming suits, which we promptly tried on!  The bunny also brought books and candy. 

 

February's Winter Wonderland!

Hey Graham Fans!!  Here goes my effort to getting caught up!  We have lots of pictures to share from February '13!  We had lots of fun!  We went sledding on a hill near our house some.  Unfortunately due to the cold and the potential to ruin the camera in the snow, Mom and Dad didn't take the big camera out.  I love to go sledding!  I try to snowboard on my sled.  We would go over a little ramp in the snow.  SOOO much fun!

 

Unfortunately, some of our fun was the result of a loss.  One of Daddy's good friends lost his mother.  We made the trip to Chicago so Daddy wouldn't have to go on his own.  Daddy was glad he got to be there for his friend and still got to spend time with us.  Mommy took us to the Children's Museum in Naperville.  It was a LOT of fun!  They had a water play area, bubble area, wind tunnel, music and a bunch of other fun things to do.  After we picked up Dad we went all the way downtown to go to the Shedd Aquarium.  We didn't go to any shows but saw lots of cool fish and water creatures (see the snake below, which gave Mom the creeps!).  It was cold and  we saw a big lake and lots of big buildings.  In the car, we just really wanted to watch the movie. Dad and Mom were the ones that liked the looking at the buildings, but NOT the traffic!  We had pizza at Lou Malnati's in Naperville.  Caroline, being the cheese lover that she is, started licking the plate while we were waiting for the pizza.  She could use some etiquette lessons!  As with any trip to a hotel, we had to check out the pool!

 

 

For the first time, we went to a Drake basketball game!  It was the Drake/UNI game so particularly fun for Mom and Dad.  As you could expect, we looked for Spike, had some snacks, found Uncle Greg, watched a little of the game, and we were ready to go!

Every school, I get to bring Mom to school for a day and another time, Dad.  In February, it was Dad's turn.  It just happened to be Dad's birthday and they sang the birthday song to him!  I thought that was pretty cool!  We even went out to lunch with a couple of my classmates and their dads.  This is me at school that day. 

Grandma came to visit in February.  Right before she arrived, Mom heard an unusual water sound right after I fell asleep for a nap.  She went to the basement to investigate and found a pipe had burst.  What a mess that was.  Fortunately, we got some help from the man that finished the basement and Uncle Greg came over.  We were lucky Mommy caught it fast enough so there wasn't more damage. 

 



We went to Kansas City in February too.  They had lots of snow so we went sledding while there.  Benjamin and Joe also came along.  I was so thankful we could play in the snow!!  We also went to Fritz's, the restaurant with the train that delivers your food.  I love that place!  We had a fun trip!

Lastly, Mom had a sinus infection and she was seeking some relief when Daddy took this picture.  Shame on Daddy, but Mommy is a good sport to let us post it!