Grandma Love

Jude loves his time with Gma and Gpa. Here is a great shot of him with Gma Gee showing off his baby chub.

Jon and Jude

Professional Eating?

This kid will eat anything!

Hamburgers

Can you read the flyer? Starting him young with a hamburger eating contest. He was in love with this piece of paper tonight...perhaps he has a future in professional eating?

Loving the late summer

Jude played along for a photo shoot outside last weekend. Here is one of my favorites....not the best photgraphy but it totally shows his personality and makes me smile.

Papa and Gma Meendering

We went to visit Papa and Gma M a few weekends ago. Jude thrilled us all by rolling over from his back to his tummy and from his tummy to his back. Since then he just won't quit. He rolls over and smiles and looks around the room to see who is watching. It is cute because you can just tell he is so pround of himself!

Home Owners

We are soon to be home owners again. We made an offer on a house in Brookings and after a lot of back and forth it will be ours on September 18 (my birthday). We were hoping we could find something we could move right into (because we had our fill of home improvement with our last house), but it was not in the cards for us. We have a list of projects a mile long already but are trying to be more realistic with this list than we were on our last house. To be honest - we are not jazzed about the look of the house (NOW) at all - (we had to contemplate posting pictures) but we bought it because it had the core things we wanted (great neighborhood, on a trail, close to a park, great deck and enough room to grow. It does need a lot of help on the outside and inside in order to look the part....we plan to knock out a wall before we move in between the kitchen and dining room and put an island there to make the space more open. That is project 1. Project 2 will be turning the den into a bedroom and huge walk in closet into another bathroom. Project 3 - the outside...it needs major help. Although we wish it could all be done right away we are trying to be realisitic on the timeline and hope to have it the way we want it within a few years....another project. Hope we have it in us and we are not calling that guy from HGTV that comes to help people when they are in over their head on home improvement!

Here are some pics of the outside (we will post pics of the inside soon)....

The front now.....
The front with our touch....We are trying to think of a good paint color....any suggestions?
The back.....The deck....

A new routine

Jude had his first day of daycare on Monday (SOB) and my first day back at work. I think it was more stressful for Jon and I than it was for Jude. I made Jon take him to daycare becaue I knew that if I did I would have never left! He had a good day and we are happy to have the first day under our belt.

All packed up and ready to go......

Jude's first day at daycare and my first day back to work... (do I look tired or what)

The end is near

Summer is coming to a close and school is just around the corner. That means I go back to work and Jude goes to daycare. We went to Lake Okoboji last weekend for one last weekend of summer fun. We go with my family every year about this time and it was great to be back and spend some time with our feet in the sand, soaking up sun in the boat, playing a little golf, and hanging out with famiy.

Alison, Jon, Jude and Sophie gearing up to make smores.....

Sophie, Num Num, Rita playing with Jude....

The whole Gee clan.....

The three of us...

Hanging Out

We are slowly checking off our list of all of the logistics that go along with moving (getting new drivers licenses and registration, finding a new house, finding daycare for Jude, ordering new cell phones that will hopefully get service here, etc) and boy does it feel good. Jude and I are enjoying our last few days at home together. The summer went so fast and next week I go back to work (sob) and Jude will have his first day in daycare (sob sob). To take our mind off of it we are heading to lake Okoboji this weekend with my sisters and their families and my parents for some end of the summer lake time. We can't wait and will give a full report when we return.

Sunny Day

Ava's Turns Three....

Happy Birthday Ava! We loved celebrating with you.

3 Months

Jude is three months old. He is full of smiles and has adapted quite well to all the change that has happened over the past few weeks - (probably better than his parents). We are officially moved to Brookings. All of our things are in storage and we are living with Mom and Dad Gee for now until we find a house. It is quite the dificult task to live our of a suitcase with a 3 month old. Jon starts work on Monday at Design Arch a new architecture firm in town and I have a few weeks and then I will start at the University. We are busy trying to get all of the moving logistics taken care of and find a house for our family to get settled into. Man - I had forgotten what a pain it is to move! We are really looking forward to getting settled.

Visiting the Hofers

On our way to and from visiting Rachel and Sam we visited Sam and Nick in Cedar Rapids to celebrate Ava's third birthday. We had a great time - grilling out, sitting by the fire pit making smores, building a built in bench for their dinning room, and celebrating Ava's birthday.

Jon sitting outside with Jude...
Eden and Jude chillin on the chase lounge outside....

Ava laughing on her blanket after running through the sprinkler...

Ava drinking the water out of her sprinkler....