It's almost Holiday Season!

It's almost the holiday season!! And by holiday I mean Halloween, Thanksgiving, and then the best thing ever...Christmas!! I love once it gets to Fall because there are SO many things to look forward to like decorating and spending more time with family and having the holidays off! I love buying presents and putting them under the tree and everything. I am super excited...this weekend I'm going to get out all of my Halloween stuff and put it all out. I literally cannot wait!

We're still working on finishing the downstairs bathroom, which really takes up all of our free time I feel like. We're on the verge of sanding, putting on texture and then painting! After that it's just tile and then putting everything in! I'm hoping to be completely done by the end of October; if not before. Josh is thinking maybe in a few weeks...after this bathroom project is done, hopefully we'll have a life again!

So aside from the bathroom we haven't done much. We went and helped Andy and Laura move into their new house in North English last weekend, and the weekend before they came to Baxter and we took Kayden to Monkey Joe's. It's amazing how big she's getting!
Us at Monkey Joe's

KK going down the slide!


I went to the craft show this past weekend and got some neat Halloween decorations...I'm still looking for some battery operated orange lights for my Halloween tree, so if anyone knows of a place to get some, please point me in that direction. Other than that, nothing exciting has happened - hopefully once the bathrooms get done we can get back to having a life and I'll have something exciting to blog about! :)

Remembering

I can't believe it's the 10th anniversary of 9/11 today. It seems like it was just a few years ago I was in 8th grade history class when our teacher turned on the tv and we watched the second tower be hit. It seemed so surreal. I remember coming home that afternoon and just watching the news coverage over and over and over again. It seemed like when you stepped outside there was this eerie feeling that washed over you. It's still something I have a hard time watching and hearing about, I always start crying. My heart just hurts from the pain not only the heroes who perished on 9/11, but also their loved ones still feel today. I also though have an immense pride in my country and will always get teary eyed when "I'm Proud to be an American" plays. Always remembering those whose lives were taken too soon, and, as one of my favorite quotes tells us, "If we learned nothing else from this tragedy, at least we learned that life is too short to hate" - Susan Dahl, wife of Jason Dahl, pilot of United Flight 93. I'm proud to live in the greatest country on earth. <3

We had a nice weekend of remembering, remodeling, and cheering on the Cyclones! Tyson wore his lucky jersey and ISU pulled out the win on Saturday! Josh has been finishing up the walls in the bathroom and hopefully in 3 weeks we'll have a finished bathroom!

I downloaded an app on my phone that lets me update so maybe I'll be able to update more often, but for now excuse the typos since I'm on my phone. :)

Updatin

Once school starts...my life is consumed. I've noticed that when I come home at night, I seem a little more tired, and I don't have much energy to do much besides clean up, cook dinner, and then maybe take the dogs for a quick walk (since the weather has been so nice). We haven't done much in the last month...I went back to work and Josh has been slaving away on the final bathroom project (we have a tub and some walls up right now! Getting there!). We have a new 7th grade Language Arts teacher and her and I have been working together to really update the 7th grade curriculum and really work together. So far so good! But it seems like one night a week we plan and it usually takes us from 3-5p.m. to plan out one week's worth of lesson plans, which is consuming when I still have to do my own for 8th grade as well. But I've liked it so far and we both have some great ideas - it's nice to bounce ideas of someone else at work. :)


I guess though I'll catch up from the last post. Josh's birthday was great; I always love birthday's, no matter whose they are! From me he got a new ipod, a signed Def Leppard poster, some work out shorts/pants, and an ISU shirt. He got lots of great things from everyone, he's a pretty lucky guy. We also went to the fair again and this time Josh and I rode this ride called "The Sky Scraper". The sign says you go 70mph like 165 feet in the air. We had both ridden it before (years before), and didn't think anything of it. Boy were we WRONG! My heart was beating so hard I thought it was going to jump out of my chest!! I feel like in my "old age" I can't handle heights as well, they're jumping up on my list of fears. This was NO difference. Even Josh got off the ride a little shaky and I think his exact words were, "I don't remember it being as intense when I was tweleve." Hahaha. Jane got some pictures of us on it though:
Us waiting in line (I'm excited!)

Getting strapped in:

Away we go!! At this point in time was when I started getting sweaty and my heart started beating super fast:

Swinging down!


Glad to make it off alive! I am a thrill seeker though, so anytime I can drag Josh on a rollercoaster or something, I'll do it, no matter what the height!

Other than that nothing too much to post...we had a low-key Labor Day. Some of our friends from Omaha came down and we were suppose to go boating, but of course, it rained ALL DAY. So instead they came over, we all hung out for a while, and then Alex and I went out in Des Moines with them. All-in-all it ended up being a nice night for just hanging out with friends.

Coming up we have a couple of weddings, and hopefully a finished bathroom project by the end of the month! Andy and Laura will be moving soon; only an hour away (and close to the outlet mall!). So I'm excited to see KK a little more often and definitely taking her and babysitting! :) Will post when something exciting happens and as always will keep you all updated on the bathroom project! xoxo

End of Summer

I can't believe how FAST summer went! Seems like just yesterday we were packing up the classroom and heading out to end the school year. Last week I went in and UNPACKED my classroom and got it all set up again - it really seems quite crazy! I always LOVE the fair, but it seems like once the fair starts, summer is over. It's kind of the signal of the end. But, we did a lot this summer and as always, I'm looking forward to snow and Christmas! :)

I was lucky enough to get to go to THREE concerts this past weekend! Friday night, we scored some late Jason Aldean standing room tickets for his Friday night concert at the fair. I went with some of my girlfriends and we had a BLAST! It was a lot of fun and we danced and sang at the top of our lungs! SUPER FUN!



Then Saturday night we took the boys and went to Def Leppard. They're one of Josh's favorite bands, and he'd already seen them once at the fair but he humored me and went again. I had a lot of fun and they played all of their old hits so it was a great time!



Then Sunday night Alex and I went to Glee Concert Movie in 3D! Basically it's just a 3D movie of their US tour, but it felt like we were at the concert! Plus we were the only people in the theatre so we got to sing and dance and cheer all we wanted, it was a lot of fun - ALMOST as good as watching them live.


Josh's birthday is also on Sunday the 21st so we've been trying to figure out what to do for that (and he says Thank you! to Grandma & Grandpa Medders for the card...it was the first card he got for his birthday! :)). Here's his pile of presents from me, and we went and got some good presents for him from his mom and Grandma Koppin so he'll be spoiled on his birthday! Plus I'm going to try and make his favorite breakfast for him on his birthday - biscuits and sausage gravy! I'll let you know how it turns out (if it turns out edible) haha!


Oh! And I've been meaning to post pictures of our COMPLETED upstairs bathroom! The only thing left is to decorate it, but I love the way it turned out! It's not a very big bathroom so we had to utilize the space we had, but I just LOVE using it and I feel like there's so much more room in it already!
Before:

Before:

After:




Josh did all this himself! Bathroom #2 is in the process now! :)

RAGBRAI

Yesterday we had RAGBRAI come through and it was so much fun! RAGBRAI is Register's Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa and it's basically one big bicycle ride across Iowa! They start on the west side of the state and over the course of 6 days they ride across Iowa. It's a LOT of fun, especially at the over-night stops because everyone just parties all night long and the over night cities usually have a band and some entertainment. While Baxter wasn't an overnight stop, it was the only stop along the way serving alcohol, so it was a BIG attraction! I woke up at about 7:30 and there were already people coming through. Our house had a bike repair shop set up right next to it and a thing of free water so it was basically the first stop and everyone dropped their bikes and hung out in our front yard. I went out & saw Alex's family's set-up out on the highway then we all got together and went up to the bar. It was INSANE! So many great people and fun times - we loved it! Here are some pictures from the day:





They had a shot taker ice sculpture.


Once Josh got off work we went to Grinnell to the overnight stop and listened to the band for a while - SO much fun! I wish RAGBRAI came through Baxter every year! :)

Summer is coming to an end soon...August 16th I go back to work. But before that the State Fair is coming up and we're going to the Def Leppard concert...CAN'T wait!!

Mid-Summer Update

Even though some days it feels like I'm not busy and I'm not doing much, I've realized that in reality we've been doing so much lately that I haven't had time to update! Since it's about 100 degrees all week, I've been spending time either inside or poolside so that's been nice. Since the last update we've been busy doing plenty of things:

-Andy's birthday
-Lake of the Ozarks vacation
-Baxter Fun Days
-Storm clean-up
-Kayden's first birthday
-Finishing up bathroom upstairs renovation
-With a wedding or two mixed in there

Needless to say, we haven't had much time to do much on our own on the weekends. We finally went boating this past weekend and had a lot of fun. But I'll post pictures and recap those events to keep you up to speed. :)

For Andy's birthday we went to Davenport to celebrate (it's his 30th) and we took the boat. It was towards the beginning of June, which we thought would be a nice time. It turned out it was rainy, cloudy, and cold the entire time we were there. We still went boating down the river, but I kept myself wrapped up in a towel and long sleeve t-shirt, not much fun. They had some sort of fair/celebration downtown Davenport though that night so we went there and it was really neat.

Then over the 4th we went to the Ozarks for vacation. The Petermeier's are nice enough to give us their hospitality and let 8 of us crash there, and we always have a BLAST! It's seriously my favorite vacation of the year, so leisurely and nice. We hang out by the pool all day, head out on the boats, drink down at the docks, and just have fun with our friends. I absolutely love it, and we tried a shrimp broil this year. I've never seen one and we thought it was just amazing! You basically broil a pot of shrimp, sausage, corn on the cob (cut in half), and potatoes. Then instead of fishing it all out and things, you just put down some paper on a table and dump it all out on the table and people just pick what they want off the table and eat! It was so neat and different and delicious! I wish I had pictures, I'll have to wait for Virg to post some - it was one of the coolest things we've done.

Baxter Fun Days came around the next weekend and was another weekend of good friends and fun. Alex has friends from ISU that come to the Fun Days events and they are always so much fun. We all played games at Bryce & Jill's Friday night, then went up to the bar to listen to Loose Neutral all night. The next day we get up for the parade, eat some good lunch, go down to the car show, and just kind of hang out until we head back up for the band that night. I didn't really like the band Saturday night, but again, good friends makes that worthwhile. I do have a few pictures of Fun Days:
(My hair isn't actually THAT long, those are extensions :))

All the girls @ Bryce & Jill's

And this past weekend we made the trip to Davenport again for Kayden's first birthday. She is one of the cutest, sweetest, happiest babies ever. (Well, she's technically a toddler now!). Andy & Laura had a rainbow themed birthday so it was really fun to see all of that and she LOVED Uncle Josh & Aunt Rachel's tunnel gift. :)

Loved her rainbow dress

Rainbow cake!

In the tunnel!


The upstairs bathroom is thisclose to being done! I am finishing up the painting today, and then Josh and I are doing the tile tonight then we just need to fill it up! Our vanity is in and stained, now we just need the counter top, toilet, and things to decorate with! CAN'T WAIT! <3 I'll post pictures when it's done, no use just posting a few pictures. I've been so thankful that Josh has been able to do it all himself - I admire a lot about him and being so handy is one of them.

Well that was a quick update! Soon the fair is coming, and then school starts again. I can't believe I'm starting my 3rd year at Collins-Maxwell. Hopefully I'll be able to update a little sooner than last time, keep checking and I hope everyone has had a great summer so far! xoxo

Summer = Busy

This summer has started out with a busy bang! We've been go, go, go lately and when we aren't on the move, we've been doing a home renovation project. I'll start at the beginning (or at least try to!).

Rachel & I headed West for Memorial weekend and went to the Taylor Swift concert in Omaha. To say we had fun would be an understatement. Rach & I had a BLAST! The concert was amazing, and thanks to my Uncle Denny & Aunt Sharon, we got the VIP seats, free food & drinks, and shuttled back to our hotel! We met some friends out in downtown CB afterwards, and just had a lot of fun. Here's a picture of us at the concert:

We've also been working on a bathroom renovation project. To say "a" bathroom renovation project would be an understatement. We are actually doing BOTH bathrooms at the same time! Josh took apart both of the bathrooms completely. We only have a bath & and a half, so the upstairs wasn't too bad since there was basically just a sink and a toilet up there. The downstairs though was a project since it had the bathtub, shower, sink, and toilet. We took apart everything except the toilet in the downstairs bathroom and Josh set up a shower in the basement. So we're still able to go to the bathroom and shower, but that's about it! I've been doing my hair in the spare bedroom (which I've done for the past 6 months anyway), and ALL of our supplies are in there. It is kind of a hassle and definitely not convenient when you're looking for something, but it works until we're finished. And it'll all be worth it in the end, so I'm told. Josh has been doing all of the plumbing and wiring himself, he's one of the handiest people I know and for that I am forever thankful, appreciative, and I admire that about him the most. We're now in the process of picking out paint, vanities, and lighting at the moment. Right now though our bathrooms look completely like this:

So on top of a bathroom project, our summer is still busy. It seems like we keep running to Menards and then the weekends come and we have other things to do. It is a nice break though. We saw our friend Aaron get married to Jess and that was fun last weekend. Josh's brother Andy turns 30 this month so we're heading to his place in Davenport Saturday morning to go boating and have a birthday party of sorts. Always fun to see the family and baby K! The rest of our month should be pretty low-key; which allows me to hang out more with Alex, which is always a great time. Then we're going to the Ozarks again for the 4th, CAN'T WAIT!, then Fundays, Kayden's birthday, and before we know it the Fair will be here! Now worries though...even though I've been super busy lately, I still make some time to lay out and spend time with the puppies:

Tyson enjoys getting some rays with me too! :)

I hope everyone has enjoyed their summer so far! xoxo