Life keeps moving

We have been one busy family. There has been a lot going on. For an update about my back, it got extremely bad and I finally went to the doctors and they gave me a muscle relaxer that has really helped. I still have days that are worse than others, but I'm finally able to function and stand up longer than 5 minutes at a time. My birthday was last week and I celebrated number 28. We had a fun day spending time with my sister and her kids. I love when your birthday doesn't feel like any other day and this one didn't. The kids were excited about their presents, which I think they picked out more for themselves since they contained candy. I also got gardening stuff that have come in extremely handy. I also got a niece for my birthday. Congrats to Lance and Stacy for popping that little girl out before the end of the night was over.

Nate picked up this cake and it was delicious. It had dark chocolate layer on top, white chocolate layer (my fav), and a final milk chocolate layer on the bottom. My favorite part about this cake was it didn't have that nasty grocery store frosting that most cakes you buy have.

The Saturday before we had our families over to celebrate both of our birthdays. It was fun having everyone over.

My mom did an excellent job making the cakes. On my request she made an angel food cake, which turned out perfect even though not so pretty much to my mom's displeasure. She also made a mint chocolate marble cake. It just doesn't feel like my birthday if there's not angel food cake, strawberries, and real whip cream.

This month we have had some new additions to our home. Our couch and chair finally arrived after two months of waiting for it.

We also traded in our CR-V for a bigger car. I was so sad to see my old car go. I loved that car so much. Since our family is growing to 5, we needed a third row and we decided on a 2008 GMC Acadia. I love this car now. At first, driving it around I felt ginormous. It is a lot bulkier than our CR-V, but after much driving, I am finally use to it. The kids favorite part? Having a back seat and the built in DVD player. Honestly, that may be my favorite part too. My sister and Ashton and Zarah live about 45 minutes from us and my parents and Paula live about an hour. It really is nice to just put a movie in and hear quiet the whole ride.

We decided to get it this month because our registration was up on the CR-V and it just worked out perfectly. As Nate pulled in to the dealership the oil light came on and the gas light.

Katelyn has lost more teeth, but not quite the way we wanted her to. Nate was playing Frisbee in the backyard with her and she caught it with her face. It knocked out her loose top tooth and much to our dismay it chipped her two permanent bottom teeth. Nate felt so awful and all I could say was "Oh, Nate." We will be getting them fixed, but thankfully they haven't been bothering her at all.

It just had to be her only two permanent teeth in her whole mouth. Oh well, that's how life goes some times.

We have started our projects in our yard. This is my future garden. It has been fun to remove the heavy grass. There is still more grass to be removed plus adding in a lot of fertilizer so that our clay will be plantable and usable. I'm excited but trying to be realistic about how it will turn out this year. The baby will be born some time at the end of May which is around the time that everything will be needed to be planted and then I hope I have enough time and energy to take care of it all.

Nate picked up 80 cinder blocks for free from some guy on Craiglist. I felt bad I couldn't help out more. That's a lot of work for one guy. We were so glad we saw the listing (for free items must call within 15 minutes of the post for those that would like to know) it saved us a lot of money and is just what we wanted for the back of our wall we will be building.

We removed all the rocks in the back and will be building a raised bed along the back fence. The cinder blocks will go a long the fence and we will be watching Craigslist even more in hopes to find retaining wall bricks for the front of the raised bed. I know we won't find those for free, but if we can find them for 50 cents apiece it will save us a lot of money since they run from about $1.50 up to $4 depending on the size at the store.

We are excited about our projects and hope they turn out well. It will be nice to add a little more depth to our yard.

Almost 30

Nate had a birthday on Monday and he is now 29.
The girls were excited to give the presents they picked out.

I felt like I had really failed this year for his birthday. I mean come on, I didn't even make him a cake. I went to a new low and went out and bought one. The kids had fun picking it out though.

We love you Nate. Happy Birthday!