My 2015 Resolutions

A few weeks ago I posted on the Review of My 2014 New Year's Resolutions and today I am following up with my 2015 Resolutions (and crossing my fingers that I keep most of them!) I hinted in my last blog that we have a lot going on in 2015! This year, hopefully, will be the year that we will remember for a long time! (Not sure if it will be a good thing to remember or not!)

So here are my 2015 Resolutions, in no particular order!

BE HEALTHY 
In years past I have always wrote I wanted to "lose weight" to get my pre-baby body back.Well, newsflash (probably more to me then the rest of you) it's not coming back! Gone are the days of tight skin on my tummy and a metabolism that allowed me to eat Jimmy Johns and ice cream multiple days of the week. This year my goal is to be healthy. Don't get me wrong, I am a pretty healthy person and workout 5+ times a week. However, my diet is BAD. I am constantly on this binge eating roller-coaster. You know the one...eating healthy for 4 weeks, then eating HORRIBLE for 3 weeks ...and repeat! I have decided for me and my family (probably against their choice) that we are going to eat healthier for good. What does this mean? It's very simple in three little steps:

1. Eat Out Less- We eat out WAY too much! We enjoy food and going out is a fun thing for us to do! However, it's so expensive and the food is never really honestly that great! The plan is to try to only eat out twice a month (maybe with the occasional Jimmy Johns for lunch.)
2.  Eat Less Sugar- Maybe it's because on New Year's Day I watched a bunch of food documentaries about the amount of sugar our nation is eating, but it was scary! It's very addictive and I know that I have a HUGE problem with sweets! My goal is to keep my sugar intake to only 30 grams a day and lessen the amount of candies, sweet breakfast cereals, and cookies my kids get.
3. Cook With 1-Ingredient Foods- Just like it sounds. It's really pretty simple. I am just going to try to make things from scratch myself more (which I do a lot anyways) and use less of the prepacked food items.

LEARN A NEW SKILL
Do you ever have something you have always wanted to do? Like learn a new language, learn how to fix a car, learn to not hit curbs when you turn corners? Well, 2015 is the year that I am taking up a new skill....or I should say I am learning something new. I find when you become an adult and have kids you end up hitting this wall where you have all these ideas of things you want to learn, but never really make time for them. This year, I am making time for it...uh really we are making time for it. My husband and I are doing learning it together. I really don't want to go into much details, but it's an activity my husband have started learning this last month (without the kids) and it's been a pretty fun time! I'll go into more detail on this later on in the year.

BUILD THIS TABLE

Yes, this was on my last post but this super cute table is from Shanty2Chic (or something very close to it) will be sitting in my dining room at the end of 2015! We have already started cutting the boards for it to make it happen.

BECOME A LANDLORD

My husband and I, for a long time, have been wanting to have a rental property. When a nice looking foreclosure came on the market, we put in an offer on it and it was accepted. The house has quite a bit of work to do on it, but overall is a pretty cute place. I'm super excited to get in there and rip out my THIRD set of shower doors! {see this post} I hate those things! I can't wait to post blogs on all the repairs we do to this place as well. Some day, hopefully soon, this place will be a cute little house for a family to live in....and when I say a family to live in I mean OURS! {Read More Below}

BUILD THIS HOUSE

It's almost been four years since I wrote this post on the house we moved into here in South Dakota. In short, we found our current house on a beautiful acreage with a pond, but the house has a lot of problems. We LOVE our land and after consulting over eight contractors on remodeling our current house, we made the decision to bulldoze and build a new house. The last four years we have saved, invested out time in the land, and waited for the time to come that we felt we should build. I am excited to say that the summer of 2015 we should break ground on building this house. (Barring any unforeseen circumstances.) Our plans are to move into our rental house and build a new one on our current land. We still have a lot of work to do before we can make this dream happen, but it's getting closer!

Well that's all my goals for 2015! I know I am a bit late on posting this blog, but my life is a little crazy right now and I am just happy I was able to write something up before 2016! 

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Review Of My 2014 New Year's Resolutions

It seems like every year I write New Year's resolutions but every year, I never really update the blog on how I did with them.  I have to be honest, most of my resolutions go right out the window within a few months...but doesn't everyones? I wrote this post last year about my New Year's resolutions and I thought now would be a great time to update them before I decide my goals for 2015.

Here are my 2014 New Year's resolutions in review:

1. Lose the last 10 pounds of baby weight.
Here's the same picture that I posted last year and still I find it a little embarrassing, that I gained 60 pounds while pregnant.

I lost most of the baby weight through calorie counting and working out 5 times a week, but the remaining (and elusive) 10 pounds I couldn't get rid of. So in 2014 I changed up my dieting plan and tried some "fad" diets out there. I did Paleo for a month, Power Protein for a month, 3 day Lemonade Diet, and 21 Day Fix Diet. Also, I increased my workouts to 6 times a week. So did I lose the weight....NO! And actually I am up 4 pounds, so that puts me at 14 pounds to lose. I will rant more about this in my 2015 goals. 

2. Build this table.

This super cute table is from Shanty2Chic and I couldn't be more in love with it. We had removed 39 trees from our yard two summers ago and we had some of the trees milled into boards for us. They have been sitting in the basement waiting to get the bark removed. In 2014, we did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING on the boards. However, January 1st hit this year (2015) and my husband and I got after cutting the boards down to size and remove the bark. We are making some progress on this! We are about 75% done with the bark on all the boards and my super sweet neighbor is going to let us borrow her shop tools to plane the rough boards smooth. 

3. Get organized.

Like most Moms, I felt completely unorganized in my life. 

Between all the kid things, the dishes, the toys, the puzzle pieces, the dog, the laundry my life is all sorts of unorganized. I spent the better half of 2014 organizing cupboards, toys, rooms, etc. and it worked out great! I created the cool puzzle organizer for my son's puzzle pieces.

I also created a cool Lego Table for my son's legos, that I have yet to post on. However, all my efforts of organizing this house will be wasted in 2015. More details on this in my 2015 New Year's Resolutions to come. 

4. Be More Present.
My friend Greta over at Modern Garden wrote the goal of being more present in life for 2014. What a great resolution!

Honestly, in 2014 I was more present. I had to be. I have a very precocious 4 year old son who wants to learn all the time. We spend hours with him reading books, doing math problems, writing, making science experiments. He takes a lot of my time and it sort of made me regret not starting him in preschool earlier then age 4. We also have a spirited, very independent daughter that has had her struggles this year with eye surgeries and stomach issues. Life of a mother is always busy right?? In addition to all my mommy duties, I still work from home and 2014 was my busiest year since having kids!

5. Climb the highest free-standing mountain in the world.
Yeah, I know crazy goal right and did it happen in 2014? NO!

I blame the US Department of State for issuing a travel warning to any American citizen going to Kenya and that pesky Ebola for getting in the way. It's an adventure I know my husband will make one of these days, but we would rather be safe then sorry on this trip! 2014 was not without travel, I feel like every year we go more and more places. In 2014, I went to Kansas City, Omaha, Dallas, NYC twice, Vegas, Colorado, Oklahoma, St. Maarten, and California! (Typing all that made me exhausted!) 2015 we have started planning our year trips, but trying to keep it down because of some major life changes we will be facing. Again, more on that in another post.

There's my 2014 New Year's Resolutions updated! As I predicted, many were not accomplished but I feel good that a few were. Even though I didn't accomplish all on my list last year, we did accomplish a lot of projects around the house. We finished the little bit we had left on the fire pit, we dug landscaping trenches around all of our 500ft of  bushes and filled it with wood chips, I added a new 150ft of landscaping to our side yard, we built a dock, and we stocked bass in our pond.

As I said above, I have some big plans for 2015 so stayed tuned for my upcoming post on my 2015 New Year's Resolutions and plans for the year!

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New Year's Resolutions

I hope everyone has started off 2014 with a Happy New Year! Every year (almost) I write a blog about my New Years resolutions and end up usually failing...but why break traditions this year right!?!

With that being said, here are my 2014 New Year's Resolutions:

1. Lose the last 10 pounds of baby weight.
I have to say I was a little apprehensive on whether or not to put this picture up of me. It's a little embarrassing, but then again-- this is what happens when you gain 60 pounds while pregnant.

This is what a year of mostly calorie counting and working out 5 times a week can do for you. The last 10 pounds always seems to be the hardest, so I will be finishing up this round of Total Insanity (I have 12 days left), then onto a hybrid workout of Total Insanity/P90x for 60 days, and then I plan on training for a half marathon to run in June.

2. Build this table.

This super cute table is from Shanty2Chic and I couldn't be more in love with it. We have 39 trees ready in our basement to make this table. Really, we had to remove 39 trees from our yard last summer and we had some of the trees milled into boards for us. We just need to get on making this table! I need the husband's help because each board is a full 2 inches thick and I can't lift them myself!

3. Get organized.

Like most Moms, I feel completely unorganized.

Between all the kid things, the dishes, the toys, the puzzle pieces, the dog, the laundry....did I mention the puzzle pieces....my life is all sorts of unorganized. My goal is to try to organize one area of the house a day a few times a week. Take little steps to hopefully a more organized life.

4. Be More Present.
As my friend Greta over at Modern Garden wrote today, the goal of being more present is my daily life is really my top priority.

I need to learn to turn off the electronics, close the books, quit making lists in my head, and just be there more for my kids and my husband.

5. Climb the highest free-standing mountain in the world.
Yeah, I know crazy goal right.

Plans are in the works and as long as my husband's schedule works out and the kiddos do fine with the Grandparents this will hopefully be me in the fall of 2014.


Well that's it, only a few short 5 resolutions. Who knows if I will keep them, but I hoping some of them will come true! Happy New Year!

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The Joys Of Toddlerhood: Bad Behavior

I am really not quite sure how to write this blog, so I guess I will just start out with how much I love my little angel Aiden. He was born with the blondest hair, the longest eyelashes, and the cutest smile. He is a spirited toddler to say the least but always so cute and sweet that I have no problem putting up with his occasional orneriness....until this week....

It all started the other day at Target. Aiden and I were having a Mom's day out with my Mom's group at the local orchard and I had it all planned out:  Aiden and I riding the hay ride to the orchards, him asking all sorts of cute questions, teaching him how to properly pick apples, and getting a few Mama & Me selfies with my phone. It was going to be perfect! However, on the way out to the orchard I realized that I forgot my lip gloss. (For those of you who know me, I am very addicted to the stuff.) I had this brilliant idea to pop into Target, pick up some lip gloss and a Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte and head to the orchard. The idea of sipping a PSL on the hayride with the brisk morning air blowing through my hair holding my little man's hand, just made the morning seem even more appealing.

As I was daydreaming in the checkout line I hear the cry of another kid and turn around to find my toddler standing over some stranger's kid yelling "NO! You put that back!" I was shocked! I have never seen him act this way. Sure I have seen other toddlers be bossy, push to get what they want, and throw tantrums --but that's not my kid. I apologized about 10 times to the other child's mother and made my toddler apologize not only at that moment but again when we were leaving. This poor child's Mom just looked at me and shook her head with that look of "you are the worst Mom ever!" 

Fast forward to today. I am involved in a local MOPS group and today was the meeting. My son loves MOPS days because it's his time to play with other kids in a daycare setting. This morning I walked him into the daycare and let the ladies working know we had been having issues with him pushing other kids and being mean. I figured it's my duty as a parent to let them know. I thought maybe a little pep-talk before playtime would keep him from being a mean little boy, however on my return I find we had not one but two more "mean" incidents with other kids.  WHERE DID MY LITTLE ANGEL GO!?!?!

I arrived home with my son without saying much to him the car ride. When Mom is quiet, he knows he is in big trouble! After talking with my husband, we both agreed that we really had no idea what to do about this mean behavior. The normal timeouts just don't seem to be a big enough punishment in situations like this. Hurting others and being mean is not OK and he needed to learn that. We decided the best punishment for him would be to remove all toys and books from his room. He HAD to figure out that this is not good behavior and maybe being bored with no toys in his room will teach him that.

While my toddler took his nap today I still couldn't get over his attitude and all the questions I have about why he is acting this way. Where did our sweet toddler go? Where did he learn this? Are we yelling too much? Is it something he is watching something he shouldn't? Is he not getting enough attention? Are we not punishing him enough? The questions went on and on.

I felt the sudden urge to go for a run, even though it was raining and we were having threats of tornadoes (in October??) I went anyways. On my run, there was something I figured out. I am not quite sure if I am more upset about my toddler acting out or was I more upset with myself? Don't get me wrong --my toddler was being extra naughty this week, but isn't that what a toddler does? No one says, "Oh, the toddler years are so easy!" They wouldn't call the the terrible twos or horrible threes without a good reason. I wonder if I am more upset because these incidents have me questioning myself as a parent. I don't like the feeling of being judged by others as a bad parent because of the way my toddler was acting. I don't like thinking that maybe we really don't know how to raise a good child. I don't like questioning if we are raising him to be a good adult or maybe another Dexter? How does a parent really know if they are doing the right thing with their child?

Later that evening, I happened to be at the grocery store and watched another child about my son's age throwing a tantrum in the produce section. He was yelling at his mom, smashing the children's cart into stacks of produce, and pushing his sister to the floor. The mother looked at me with embarrassment and then looked away quickly. It was at that moment I decided to walk up to her and say to a perfect stranger, "I know how you feel, my son was having a bad day too. Don't you just love this age!" She smiled and laughed a little with both of us in silent agreement that these toddler years are tough. We all have our bad days and it's important to remember that toddler's do to. They are learning to become little adults and all of these new found social skills are tough. That doesn't mean that we let them get away with murder or throwing tantrums that hurt others, but we do need to realize that this is part of what they have to learn in life. Parenting a toddler takes patience and true understanding that none of us are perfect parents. We just need to keep trying our best, stay consistent in the disciplining, and say lots and lots of prayers that our children will turn out fine.

UPDATE: I wrote this blog a month ago and can say that the "mean" behavior has gotten much better. Being consistent with timeouts, losing books before bed, and taking toys away has really helped him realize that there is always a punishment for bad behavior. He is back to being a sweet little boy again...on most days!

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Pink & Green Princess First Birthday Party

It's official, my little baby girl Remy turned one!! I still can't believe how fast the time has gone! My little girl came in to this world weighing a petite 6 pounds 10 ounces and had the thickest head of hair!

*photo taken by Adara Photography

I decided to keep up with tradition and throw my daughter a 1st birthday party! (See my son's Halloween themed first birthday party here.)

I wanted a princess themed birthday party, but the more I looked into the decorations the more I thought it just looked too "store bought". I always like designing my own stuff, so I came up with some decorations and planned the party! Here are a few shots of the decorations:

This is her 1st Birthday Cake. I made it from one of those large cupcakes molds and decorated it with a hand painted candle (which I did with nail polish) and a crown from the store. 

The guests dined on homemade cupcakes decorated with pink and fudge frosting and sprinkled with crystallized sugar. 

The tops of each cupcakes were adorned with handmade (by me) white and dark chocolate molded crowns and home designed paper cupcake toppers. 

Here's my cute cupcake stand that housed all the cupcakes for the guests.

Here is my decorated buffet stand for all the presents.

And of course the Birthday Princess's Chair

And the party room all decorated.

Of course no party would be complete without pictures of the birthday girl! Here is her enjoying her cake!

It's hard to believe how fast she had grown.

*photo on left taken by Adara Photography

I love my little girl Remy and I am looking forward to how much she will change, grown, and learn in the years to come.

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Why I Run

I recently read a little comic by the guy who runs TheOatmeal.com about why he runs long distances and it got me thinking on my run this morning. Why do I run....

 (Me post 5 mile run   ---please don't judge my for my fanny pack....I love my water!)

1. To Lose Weight- I am 13 pounds away from my pre-baby weight and I have found that running burns a ton of calories in the shortest amount of time. I run to lose that 13 pounds --and I will lose it.

2. To Exercise Without Kids- I love my kids, but because that I stay home with them I am around them ALL THE TIME running allows me to run away.  --Run far, far away from my responsibilities of being a mother/wife and have some good alone time.

3. To Create Memories With My Kids- I know, this totally contradicts the statement above, but I cannot always run without my kids. My husband works a strange schedule, so it is very rare when I get to run alone (without waking up at dawn while the family sleeps.) Luckily I purchased this awesome double jogging stroller that I can ACTUALLY run with!

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I love this stroller and use (and talk) about it all the time. I load the kids up and I do "running park tours". We run to the first park and I set my timer for 10 minutes for them to play. Then we run to the next par, etc. The little breaks allow me to recover and I can usually get a good 5 mile run in, they get to play, and we have lots of fun going to a ton of parks in a few hours. In the evenings we end our runs with a stop at the frozen yogurt shop in town and everyone enjoys that!

4. Vanity- I run for defined legs, smaller rear, and tighter abs. It is VERY rare that you see someone who is a regular runner and they don't look good. Running works so many muscles in your body that it's almost impossible not to see the side effects. And like I said above, I still have some baby weight to lose!

5. My husband- My husband is a runner and without him I would still be that girl that runs a 15 minute mile. (Really I would be that girl who walks a few blocks and feels winded.) He likes to run, I like to try to run with him, we like to run races together, and it's nice we have in running in common. We constantly ask each other how far we ran, where we ran, how fast we ran and it's a normal topic of conversation we both have. (Secretly I am trying to run faster and father with him, but he is a 15 mile type of guy so I have some ways to go!)

6. Nature- I run to enjoy the beauty of the outside. I live barely outside of city limits and my runs are always scenic. Most of my neighbors have horses, there are acres of forest, acres of fields, deer galore, and bunnies that hop out of my way when I run by. Every once in a while I have to stop and take a picture of something that reminds me how much I love this area we live in.

7. For Myself- The final reason I run is for "ME" time. I can say that 75% of the days I go running I don't want to do it. It's hard. I feel every muscle in my legs working, my chest is tight from breathing hard (or maybe my asthma?), my abs start hurting after a while, and I am usually pretty tired after my first mile. However, the feeling I get when I am finished is AWESOME and keeps me going. Not only do you experience the phenomenon known as runner's high, but you also have the chance to really think while running. It is sort of my therapy to mull over thoughts in my mind, hatch out problems, make plans, or even sometimes it's my time to just have nothing in my mind.


That's my reasons for why I run. I may not be a marathon runner, the fastest runner, or the best looking runner, but then again I am really just running for myself and that is really all that matters.

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Do you run? If so, I would love to hear the reasons why you run!

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Losing The Baby Weight With The Second Child

This has been the post I have been dreading the most about writing. I have not had any time over the last few months to really post as much as I would like, but this post has been weighing on my mind  ---literally. It's the dreaded "losing the baby weight" post.

If you follow our blog regularly, you know that I was SOOOO good about documenting this baby weight battle with my first child. (Read previous posts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, & 8). At the time I wrote the final post of this series Aiden was 9 months old and I weighed 124 pounds. I had lost 46 pounds in 9 months!

Here's a nice before and after pic:

As of right now, my daughter Remy is 9 months old and can't be any cuter!

However, being that this is now my second child I wanted to confirm the rumors that are true....losing the weight with the second child is harder! At least it seems that way!

There are a number of reasons I think it seems harder...sleep deprivation, chasing around two kids, lack of time, lack of energy, and honestly I love my nightly glass of red wine with chocolate! Whatever excuses I want to give you, the honest truth is I just decided not to put the pressure on myself the way I did with my first child. My mother always told me that it takes you 10 months to put the weight on and it will take at least 10 months to take it off. I decided to take it easy this time around, spend more time with my kids instead of time with my treadmill, and try to eat healthy most days.

I started out this pregnancy weighing 8 pounds more than my ideal weight and ended the pregnancy at a whopping 181 pounds. With the help of myfitnesspal, endomondo, total insanity, p90x (parts of it), and a few other workout videos I can say I am getting there! I may not be as far as I was the first time around, but at least I am working at it and focusing on not putting too much pressure on myself. I currently weigh 133 pounds. And for those math majors out there, that's a lost of 48 pounds which is surprisingly more then I lost with my first at this time. (BTW, this was a surprise to me as I wrote this post!)  I still have a good 13 pounds to lose to be back at my pre-baby weight, but I am not sweating it (except when I workout!)

The moral of this story for all you second time moms out there is:

You will lose the weight.

Focus on eating healthy, take your kids for walks to parks (far away), and reward yourself periodically so you don't deprive yourself and binge. You will lose the weight!

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The Joys of Toddlerhood: Potty Training

It's that time in every parent's life where you have to tackle the fun 'potty training' adventure. My son is officially 2 1/2 years old and we felt like it is time to begin this somewhat interesting (difficult) process.

For the last 6 months we have taken him to the potty on several occasions, but nothing really serious. I could tell he just wasn't quite ready, until now. We went on a week long trip down to Oklahoma to see GG (great grandma) and while down there Aiden told me very loudly that he needed to use the potty...and he went...not once, not twice, but five times. It was time.

That is where this guy came in:

Meet the Potty Penguin.  I had this genius idea to order this timer for him to set every 30 minutes to remind him (really me) that it was potty time. And boy, did I build up this Potty Penguin. While on our trip I kept telling him, "You know when we get back the Potty Penguin is going to have to you sit on the potty!" and "Are you excited for the Potty Penguin!" and "It is going to be so fun for Potty Penguin to live with us!" Really I think I built this guy up WAY TOO MUCH! I think in his mind, this Potty Penguin was cooler than Santa. I seriously wonder what was going on in his mind and it makes me laugh a little at all the scenarios he was thinking about this Potty Penguin. 

The moment arrived when we returned from out trip to find a small Amazon box sitting on our porch. We waited until the morning to open it up. His excitement was unreal! As I opened the box, he looked in --almost disappointed-- at this little tiny penguin timer. Then I showed him his new Mickey underwear and he became a little more excited. I explained to him "Aiden we are done with diapers. The Potty Penguin will make a noise and that will mean you need to sit on the potty. The noise sounds like this..." and I set the timer to a minute. The minute went by and nothing....no sound. We were both disappointed now. I forced it to ring and he became very excited! I put him in his new Mickey undies, set the timer to 30 minutes and waited for the "potty time". At 15 minutes, the timer went off for about 2 seconds....what?!?! was this! Needless to say, after a few attempts this awesome idea of the Potty Penguin was over. The timer was broken to start with.

Even though my original idea fell through, I thought I would just write on what I felt has worked so far in this potty training adventure. We are going into day 3 and other then naps/night he is very potty trained. Here is what I have done so far that has seemed to work.

1.Wait until they are ready: Advice I have received from so many of my friends who were mothers before me was to wait until he was ready to start. They all said the same thing. It's something that will happened eventually, but don't force it. Some kids just do it later then others. When I tried in the past, he just wasn't that interested but really was showing the signs now. This post on baby center is a great resource.
2. No Pull-ups: The first time he went in pull-ups he didn't care --it was just like a diaper. The big boy undies work best. He knows when he is wet and doesn't like it. Honestly, most of the day I have let him go commando around the house and he has no accidents. The two accidents he has had, he was wearing the undies and forgot to hold it. The naked method seems to work the best.
3. Timer: Even though it's a plain old timer, it works. I set it for 30 minutes and he knows he needs to sit on the potty. He stops it and starts it on his own each time.
4. Potty Chair: Some parents hate dealing with this but I don't have to lift him up to get on it which is great for me. It is always close by and when the timer goes off he will run over and sit on it himself.
5. Routine: It helps to make a routine. The timer goes off, he shuts it off & starts it again, sits on the potty for a few minutes. When he goes, I pick up the potty bowl and carry it to the toilet, he dumps it in the toilet, flushes it, washes his hands and gets a treat. He likes the routine and gets mad if I don't stick to it (totally a first child!)
6. Treats: Have lots of them --I didn't and wish I would have. I started with gummy worms, but ran out. I went to fruit snacks, but ran out. Now since I haven't had time to make it to the store he is eating all my Dove dark chocolate :) Whatever works right?
7. Rules: Make rules like "No sitting on the couch or bed" and "You must wash your hands after going potty" Also, I no longer buckle him in his chair for meals so we have an easier escape to the chair if needed.

Anyways, those little tips have seemed to work for us. We are on day 3 and he is doing great. I figure once we tackle the daytime we will work on naps next. I predict some wet sheets in the future...

If you have any potty training tips, I would love to hear them! Anything to make this toddler adventure easier!

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And I'm back...for now!

I know, I know...what happened to this little three sister blog of ours?? Almost two months with NO posts?!?!

Well, I am sorry to say that life has been a little busy for me (and my sisters) and I just haven't had time to write much. Just so you don't think I haven't been up to nothing, here is a little sample of what has gone on in my life the last two months. 

There have been some box houses and basket hiding...

Also, some lovely spring storms....

There have been smelling of flowers  ---uhh whatusetobe flowers anyways.

There have been two birthdays--- a half birthday and a whole birthday. I will let you decided which is which.

We have had some unexpected company...

Old friends have come back to visit...

We have lounged around...

Met some new friends...

Swam with the creatures of the sea...

Even the fast ones...

Learned a new hobby {paddleboarding}...

  And enjoyed some sunsets...

I hope to take more time to blog more this summer, but right now I am trying to balance life with an active toddler and a now 8-month old!

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