Home Sweet Home

So, we are in our new house now. Well, we've been here for 2 months now but let's just pretend we've only been here for a few weeks.

We are mostly settled here and getting used to a new city. We are LOVING our new house!!!! It is SO fun to have our own place. I keep starting to tell the kids to not be so loud and not jump, but then I remember that they can if they want to, no neighbors to bug (at least not with little things like jumping in our own house.) I feel so spoiled with my GARAGE and a real size KITCHEN. We have definitely been blessed and feel very privileged to be in this wonderful new house. And we can't wait to add our own personal touches to make it into our very own home.

Our WARD seems really nice and we are getting to meet many new neighbors also. Our current bishop (the former bishop of the University Ward in Columbus) has just announced that he accepted a job in Arizona so will be leaving us. It is kind of sad to have our only connection to Columbus now leaving, but I think we've been here long enough now to pull through.

Nate is liking his job and is adjusting to being referred to as Dr. Noakes. He is also getting used to telling others what to do and how he wants things rather than someone telling him how to do something down to the tiniest detail.

The kids are loving the house and the space and I am LOVING the backyard. Our upstairs is all unpacked and live able now. I'll explain the basement later. It was fun to open all the boxes and find all our new/old treasures and try to figure out what place they have in our new house. Every once in a while we'd find an extra special treasure in one of the boxes. Now if I could just find my keys that seemed to disappear during our move.................

Flooding Fun

We are just now getting started unpacking our basement. About 5 days before we left Columbus our basement there started having flooding issues. Luckily Nate had put everything up off the ground so our stuff didn't get wet. We did spend a couple late nights trying to keep up with the water as it flowed in from our window. Almost 3 years at that apartment and no issues until a week before we move??? Maybe preparing us for our next house....

Here is the basement of our apartment the first time it flooded. Not too bad, but certainly not fun.
The arrow shows where the water level is inside the window well. I guess that explains why the water was literally flowing into our basement.
And here is our NEW HOUSE's basement.

This is in the crawl space inside a closet downstairs. Notice how the water has a nice well cut path to flow down.
This is in the closet right under that nice river through the crawlspace. The crawlspace door is right out of this picture on the top.
This is actually the third time our basement flooded in the first three weeks we lived here. And this one by far was the worst. The water once again flowed in from our window (just above the picture where you see the water lines on the wall.) All the dark is water.
And here is a bigger picture of the basement. And this is once the water stopped coming in from the window. A large part of that dark area actually had standing water there. Nate had started squeegying up the water and putting it into that bucket in the middle of the floor. We probably emptied that bucket at least 1/2 full 6-8 times. Let's just say we found ourselves a really, really good dehydrator.
Swimming Pool

One of our favorite things about our new neighborhood is the community swimming pool. This pool is LITERALLY right across the street from our house. The kids (and us) have thoroughly enjoyed this pool. It is amazing how much the kids' swimming skills can be improved when they get to go swimming in a pool where they can't touch several times a week.

Luke wears a life jacket and swims around the whole pool. Ethan also has a life jacket to swim around with but can swim anywhere in the pool without it also. After a few jumps off the diving board with his life jacket on, he tried without it and has done great ever since. He swims to the edge after jumping in and is our good little swimmer. Linz is also quite the little fish. She absolutely LOVES to be in the water. If we aren't careful, she'll jump right in without us ready to catch her. In fact, she did this once; Nate had turned away in the water to watch Ethan jump off the diving board and Linz jumped in. Luckily she landed right on Nate's head, so he was able to get her up fast. We let her go all the way under the water when she jumps in and it doens't phase her at all.


Here is Nate showing the boys how to dive.

Luke diving in off the diving board. Not too bad. Most of their dives are belly flops, but I guess with the life jacket on they don't feel too much. And here is our brave little Ethan going without his life vest. I'm not quite sure we can call that a dive, but he's having fun.

So, we let the boys watch some of the diving during the Olympics and Ethan started getting brave and wanting to do flips off the diving board. He did a couple until I put a stop to the flips when his head came WAY too close to the board one time.
Our cute little water fish. She had to try on the boys' swim goggles too.

Her favorite thing to do at the pool. She's a brave one.

We are learning to appreciate not having a house while in school - there is a lot of work that goes into taking care of a house, especially in the summer time. It is a darn good thing we have such a wonderful helper to accomplish such tasks as mowing the lawn a little quicker. (Notice she even has her gloves on so she doesn't get her nails dirty.)
Illinois State Fair

We decided to head to opening night of the Illinois State Fair. They have a parade that opens up the fair so admission is free and you get to enjoy a fun parade. We have a fun time, although I think I'd rather pay the $3 (yes only $3 for admission) next year and go when it isn't quite so crowded. The parade lasted forever so we couldn't walk on the streets. But other than the crowds, we had fun. We got to try all sorts of great fried foods and we even got to see some fireworks (since we missed those on the Fourth of July.)



Many at the fair were amazed we could fit all three kids in our stroller. It is not too uncommon for our stroller to carry all three of our kids, now if we can figure out a way to make our double stroller into a quadruple stroller - we'll really have it made.



Life is returning to Nomal...
Linz has made herself at home here in our new house, getting into all sorts of trouble - as usual. Don't you think it sounds fun to smear diaper rash cream all over your legs???

We finally cracked down on getting Linz to fall asleep on her own. Linz was an angel going to bed when she was in her crib but the moment we switched her over to a big girl bed, she hardly ever went to bed on her own. Well, that era of her life is now over and she goes to bed so well in her new bigger bed all by herself.



This episode happened a few weeks after she had been going down for her naps perfectly. I had put her down for a nap and about 5 minutes later I see her come walking out of her room without her blankie even (which she never does.) I asked her what she was doing and she said, "baby going night night." I walked into her room to find this. She had put her baby down for a nap in her bed with her blankie. And even a bottle near by just in case she needs a drink.

Potty Training Time

I finally decided to tackle potty training again once we got mostly settled here. Linz has done GREAT!!!! The first day was dedicated to just her. We played all day and did everything together so I could be with her and watch to see when she needed to go. It was actually really fun. We played with playdoh, did puzzles and read books, etc.

Since my kids all love sugar, I have potty trained them all with treats. So, every time Linz went to the bathroom, she got to pick out a treat. She got as much juice as she could possibly want and treats all day long. The first picture is her with the prize she got for going to the bathroom for the very FIRST time in the toilet. And then posing with her favorite treat, sour gummy worms (also one of mommy's favorites.)

This was her final prize that she received the first time she had a bowel movement in the toilet. This was hard for her to figure out for a while.

This is doing great now. Really no accidents anymore, except once in a great while. I was just thinking today while I was out shopping with her that none of my children have ever had an accident while shopping.

She really is doing well and has been dry every night since the first time I started training her. She stays dry for naps and bedtime every time!!!! She has only had one accident at night and that was at 6:15 in the morning, so it almost doens't even count as an acccident at night. She gave up her pull-ups on her own. She simply refused to wear them for nap time one day and then again that night. She didn't even go through one package of pull-ups!!! What a big girl!!

New School Shoes

This is the first time I've let the boys come with me to pick out new shoes (ok, this is really the first time they've gotten new shoes.) They found these shoes at the first store we went to and I for the life of me could not convince them of any other (cheaper) choice at any other store. They were so excited about these shoes and that they are matching too. They were so cute; when we got home from the store, they would not take them off. They kept running laps through the house having me time them - convinced that these shoes made them run faster and jump higher. That has been their criteria for shoes for a few years now, if the shoes help them run faster, then they are a good choice.