Grace in Heaven - part 2

Grace practically lived in Mom's pool while we were there visiting. The only day she didn't get in was when it rained all day. Other than that she was swimming her little heart out. I thought I took more pictures of her swimming, but this is about it. She had a blast jumping off the deck and she practiced her "diving" skills. Like the video shows she does more of a belly flop, but she's learning! We may get one of these pools when we move to Illinois. Our duplex has a patio big enough for this size of pool. Grace loves swimming so much, I hope we can get a big pool for her some day. So far her obessions right now are kitties and pools. It will be interesting to see if these will be lifelong loves.

Diving

Scottie and Penny took Grace swimming at their neighbors house in Hagerstown. It was the perfect size for her to dive in and swim to the other side. She does more of a belly flop than a dive, but she isn't afraid to go in head first. I was impressed with her swimming skills.

Our New Place

View from the street - Just in case you didn't know, we haven't moved yet. Scottie still has three more weeks of classes and then we will move to Illinois!

Front Entrance - We forgot to take pictures of the backyard, but it's pretty nice. It has a little deck off of the kitchen and a small patio below. There is also a shed in the back that the landlords use to store their lawnmower. You should have seen Scottie's eyes light up when she said that her husband does all of the yard work. So he is looking forward to two years without mowing!!!

Garage

Living Room (This is a weird picture. The insert is the view from inside the room, the rest is just to give you an idea of the size - and the walls are all the same color, it just looks strange because they are merged pictures)

KitchenBasement- This picture doesn't make the basement look like much, but it's pretty nice. The landlord said that the last tenants used it as a toy room for their child. I think we will buy a couple of rugs and put Gracie's activity table and toys down here. Actually we don't have much of a choice. Since her and the baby will be sharing a room there won't be any room for her toys. Plus if she makes a mess nobody has to see it. That's the real bonus for me! :) I almost forgot the biggest blessing of this place... it's only $50 more than what we pay now! We couldn't believe we found something nice for this price. Everything else we saw was a lot more expensive and to be honest a bunch of trash holes. I was in the process of crying when we pulled up to this place. I thought for sure we had gotten the address wrong, because this couldn't be the right place. (Oh yea of little faith.) God really provided for us with this place and we are so thankful!

Gracie's Quote of the Day

On our way back from church today Grace said the funniest thing. We drove past our Taco Bell and the parking lot was full. Out of the blue she said "Taco Bell! Lot's of people are going to have diarrhea." What would we do without her in our lives? :)

Grace in Cat Heaven

Grace was in heaven while we were at my dads farm. There were cats everywhere! The three huddled together are momma cats babies, but they didn't like people so we just took pictures of them. The kittens that Grace played with were from the milk can (the last picture) The day before we got there Carol discovered them in an old milk can on the front porch. They didn't know they existed until the kittens were weeks old. Grace and I set them free the next day. Their momma ended up moving them to the old smokehouse. Grace would take a handful of food, put it inside the door and wait for the kittens to come out. She always had to have two at a time. She tried to talk us into three at a time, but we always said two were enough. We constantly heard her say, "Ummm... I'm going to go get some kittens to bring inside." She did a pretty good job socializing the kittens. They started out fairly friendly, I guess spending your first few weeks of life in a milk can keeps you from fearing humans. I knew Grace would get attached to them, and of course she broke down and cried every time we had to leave. I wish we could let her have a kitten, but our landlord said we could only have one pet. Hopefully we will be buying a house when Scottie does his residency so she can have one then. I'm sure she will still be obsessed with them in two years. Until then she will just have to go visit other people to get her cat fix.

From the Beginning

I guess I should just starting posting pictures from the beginning of our trip and go from there. I posted more pictures below and one video. The first Saturday we were in Indiana we went to a little reunion for our college friends. We love these people and it was so good to see them. I always remember my high school teachers telling us that the friends we make in college will be our lifetime friends. It is so true. No matter how many people I have met after college it's just not on the same level. Probably because when your in college you sit around for hours at a time talking and getting to know each other. I really miss that!! These lovely ladies are two of my most favorite people in the world! Teresa is holding Grace and next to her is Nancy. I met both of them through Student Christian Fellowship at USI. Teresa is a beautiful person who is the ultimate organizer, and she has a wonderful heart for others. Even though we are pretty opposite in a lot of ways (she's organized, I'm not; she is efficient, I'm a tad bit lazy, etc...) I always have the best time with her and there is always lots of laughter. Miss Nancy Pants was my roommate during my last year of college (notice I didn't say senior year? I had two and half of them:) All I can say is good times my friend. She makes me laugh so hard! Who else will stay up half the night with me making up answering machine messages about our bug infestation?! I could go on and on about her beautiful qualities, her compassion for others, her love for the Lord, her loyalty to her friends. I have been blessed to have these two as my sisters in Christ. I just wish we could see each other more often. Friends like these don't come around often. (The other girl is my friend Jared's fiancee Casey. This was the first time we had met her, and we LOVED, LOVED, LOVED, her. I am so happy for them. Jared is another friend I could go on and on about, but I'm running out of room. I'll try again some other time.)

This is little miss Grace instructing Teresa to throw the exercise ball into her stomach. The clip below shows a little bit of the game Grace wanted to play. She said she was a gladiator. Scottie and I swelled with pride as Grace rattled off all the names of the gladiators on the tv show. Ha! Ha! Just kidding, we were actually a little embarrassed that our 4 year old knew their names and said them with such excitement. For some reason she thinks that show is awesome. She's a bit strange, but she gets it honestly.

This is little Micheal. He belongs to our friends Kerri and Kenny. Something happened to upset Micheal and he instantly grabbed on to Scottie's shorts. His dad had to work that day, so Kerri said that he probably just saw a pair of khaki cargo shorts and thought it was his dad. I tried to get a picture of his face, but the bottle is in the way. He made the cutest face when he cried. Well, he still has the cutest face even when he's not crying! :)

Alpacas and a Trampoline

Teresa took us to her in-laws house (Chad's parents) to see their alpacas. The babies were so cute. The little brown one that Gracie is petting walked up to me and bit the bottom of my shorts. Of course I screamed and it ran away. They kick their heels up like lambs when the run, too cute!

Here's Grace and Teresa with the brown baby again. Chad's parents raise the alpacas for their wool. (I guess you call it wool) Their wool gets quite a bit of money per ounce, so they are a good investment if you have the time and space. Somehow I can't see Scottie wanting to move out to the country to raise alpacas. So hopefully his salary as a doctor will be enough! :)

Gracie jumped on a trampoline for the first time. For some reason I thought she had been on one before. No wonder she always screams "TRAMPOLINE!" every time we pass one in the car. Sorry Grace, I didn't realize I had been depriving you all this time of the joys of trampolines.


Daddy got on with her and bounced her around for awhile. Then Teresa and Nancy got on with her. But after a few minutes she asked all the adults to get off because she couldn't jump very high with two adults on it. Actually she didn't really ask, she just said I need you to get off the trampoline. Teresa was trying to model for her the polite way of asking by saying "Can you get off the trampoline please?" Grace thought she was talking to her, so she got a sad look on her face and said "why?" It was funny, and I don't think she liked us laughing at her. Overall Grace is a pretty polite little girl, she just has to be reminded from time to time.
**Thanks Chad and Teresa for having us over to your house and showing us a great time. We miss all of you more than you know. I just wish we got to see each other more than once a year. Someday we will get to have that group vacation!!

My Child's Idea of Fun

Sorry... we're on vacation!

If you are reading this, then you are a very devoted friend. It's been several weeks since I've posted anything. My brother Curt told me last night that if I didn't post something soon people we're going to take my blog off their bookmarks. I'm pretty sure that was a threat from him. The truth is I didn't know how to transfer photos on to Scottie's computer, plus the fact that he has been studying with his computer for the most part of every day and night. (Just two more days until he takes his boards exam --- prayers needed please!!!!) After Thursday I'll start posting away. I'll write about the good times we've had here and pictures of our new place in Bloomington. So please stayed tuned!