We Have a Crib!

So I know Julie is 11 months old, but we finally have a crib for her to sleep in! We are so excited. Before we had Julie Arek's brother, Jared, told us that he wanted to make a crib for us as a wedding/baby present. So after countless hours, we have our very own custom made crib. Jared designed it himself and it is beautiful! See for yourself:Julie helping us set up her cribIsn't it lovely? :) Makes me SO happyThe front folds down for easy access to babyFinal Verdict: Julie sleeps great in it! Thank you once again, Jared! We love it

Oh, and a big thank you to Arek's mom, who has loaned us Julie's "temporary" beds: the cradle (with and without the rocking stand), and the pack-n-play. They were life savers!

For an added bonus, here's a picture of Julie's first fat lip. She was walking by the coffee table when she fell and smacked her lip. Honestly, it doesn't look as bad as we thought it would. It's mostly just bruised. Here you go, though... the first of many future bumps and bruises

ode to little blue

The big news of the day: we sold our kia rio, which we affectionately referred to as Little Blue. Arek is jumping for joy that we no longer own this "bane of his existence." (note: the car was really not that bad, but Arek is a car person, so it bothers him when the car needs repairs before it's been driven 200,000) Anyway, we are now down to one car, our little 1992 Nissan Sentra (a.k.a. Little Red - yeah, we are creative with our car names). Even though we are happy Little Blue sold so quickly (we put its ad online not even a week ago) we will miss it a little bit, too. That was the first car we bought together just two weeks after we got married. So, goodbye Little Blue. We will miss you, but as Arek said when the new owners drove away, "Now you can go plague someone else." :)

Night at the County Fair

This past Saturday was my parents 28th wedding anniversary. Since they had dinner/theater plans we decided to invite my sisters to spend the day with us. And what did we do? Well, the fair was in town, which is something Arek and I try never to miss (our first date was to the State Fair almost 4 years ago) so came with us. We had a great time. Here's some of what we did:
Katherine wanted to see the sheep... Rachel wanted to see the rabbits... so in addition we saw the goats. Here's all us girls about to go in. Hold your breath!Julie loved the goats. She kept reaching out her hand to try to touch them, which, mean parents that we are, we didn't let her. But she sure liked to watch them!
Aunt Katherine and Julie on a tractorLook at that smile... she must get her interest in tractors from her dad!Standing inside a tractor wheelwell
Rachel wanted to get her face painted and while she was getting her face painted, Kat and I decided we wanted to as well. So since people say we look so much a like we got matching designs on opposite cheeks. Call it corney, but we had a blast. Thanks again my seestors for coming and playing with us!

Adventures at Trial Lake

Two weekends ago Arek's entire family had a reunion campout up at Trial Lake. We had a blast! Aside from the relentless mosquitos, it was a perfect family trip. Thanks so much to Arek's parents for arranging everything and providing us with so much to do! There are a million pictures in this post, and it doesn't even capture everything. The things we did that aren't photographed are paint balling (my first time... it was a blast!), dirt biking (the boys... us girls stuck to the 4 wheelers), and a mini hike (there are photos but I didn't include them). For the rest, scroll down and enjoy. Oh, and special thanks again to Arek's mom who took all these photos... Arek and I were very bad about getting our camera out.
Julie's first ride on a 4 wheeler. She loved it... until Arek revved the engine a little too loud!
Thomas and EthanArek's mom even went for a ride
splashing in the water at trial lake
Julie discovered how YUMMY rocks taste... she kept us on our toes with us trying to make sure she didn't swallow any!
Our first time going in our littly dingy as a family. Julie loved being in the boat, but hated the life jacket we made her wear
Lilly testing out the water with Todd
All the boys LOVED to throw rocks... from Ethan to Liam (pictured) to all the uncles and even Grandpa Higgs
It was surprisingly cold in the shade by the lake... we soon wised up and moved into the warmer sunshine
Julie loves to play with Lilly and her Grandpa Higgs. We often had the two little girls either in the protection of this tent or the trailer to keep them away from the mosquitos
the boys throwing hatchets
Lastly, marshmallow guns. Liam was the only one big enough to really know who to blow the marshmallows out of them, but Julie loved to wave hers around. In a couple of years I'm sure there will be some epic mallow battles!