State Fair 2011

Last Friday Jon left a bit early from work (after a terribly long week) and met us at the State Fair. I was so looking forward to seeing Nolan's reaction to everything and it was even better than I had imagined!

I would be remiss not to mention how extremely sad we feel about everything that happened just one night after we were there and that we have been praying for their families.

Here are the boys seeing the cows- Nolan pretty much just stared at the cows- they were our first animals to visit

Doing soooo great at walking

He loved the sheep- he would imitate their noises

We all indulged in some delicious fair food. The pork tent and sweet corn! Yum!!

They had a little "farm experience" for the kids. It was so cool and Nolan loved it!! He would gather different produce items at each stop and then at the end they turned them in for a prize. He had to carry the basket!

He also got this hat. What a cheese!

Planting some seed

Holding on to mom

Riding the tractors- when I look at these two pictures I just have to pinch myself- is this blessing really ours?

And his prize- A JUICE BOX! Yum!

And then right before we left we managed to get him a balloon- that pretty much just made a perfect day for him!

And then the funnel cake just sent him over the edge! :) Ha- I cannot help but laugh at this pregnant mom face I have- like- I'm going to need to eat a lot of that- NOW! :)

And a 15 week belly pic

And- I'm officially caught up! :)

Projects! And More Nolan!

So here is the post where I have to talk about what a huge blessing my mom was while she was here. We always love to have a project to tackle and this was a good sized one! No one was injured too terribly and we finished- so we'll call it a success! :)

It all started because Jon surprised me with the best anniversary present! He hired California Closets to come and design a custom space in our master closet. The closet is a really good size closet but was completely non-functional because there were no drawers or really anything but hanging space. So- since our closet was going to be so fancy, I really wanted to redo the bedroom and bathroom that we had been talking about doing for quite a while. I always said- if we re paint this bedroom, we need to hire it. Well- Vanessa Mays and Jon Hughes are cheap labor- fix them dinner and they are happy! :)

Here's the start of the bedroom project

Lots of high spaces!

And the finished project- we'll continue to add yellow accent around the room as I find things I like.

The bathroom before was terrible! It was gold with a very "different" texture on the walls. I was so glad to get this changed!!

After- the light makes it hard to see the color but it's the medium shade of gray from the bedroom. We also added the shelving unit

And the best part!! Our new closet!!

We love it!!!!

And now for a few pictures of Nolan!

We installed a ceiling fan in his room last weekend and he was quite the helper. That afternoon daddy got him his own tool set. Here he is with the safety glasses! :)

And here's an update on how things are going with breaking Nolan from the pacifier!!

And this was so sweet- his daddy left him a note in his chair for him when he came to breakfast. Jon was gone a lot this week so they were missing each other. He really loved getting this letter! :)

A Late Anniversary Present

Jon and I celebrated our 5 year anniversary in June but just now had the opportunity to get away and celebrate like we wanted. Jon's parents graciously stayed with Nolan and we left Saturday evening and headed downtown Indy to stay at the new J.W. Marriott. Beautiful!

That night we walked downtown and ate at Weber Grill- it's one of my favorite restaurants downtown, however my favorite entree is the lettuce wedge with steak skewers and I LOVE their bleu cheese! Apparently you're supposed to avoid that when your preggo so I had to settle for a ranch lettuce wedge instead. It was still a great meal together though!

When we booked the room, we booked the Romance Package, which included a high rise park view room, chocolate covered strawberries and champaign, and then free breakfast buffet for two in the am with late check out (which was amazing!). It was perfect!

My handsome husband!

The view from our window

The beautiful room!

Our strawberries and juice :)

Pretty sweet!

So on our way down the elevator on our way to dinner, we rode with a very nice man- to say the least. We made small talk with him and he asked if we were in town for the Brickyard 400- the Nascar race for those who are not familiar. We said no and explained our visit to the hotel. He said, well, I've got two great tickets in my room that my clients just canceled on- would you like them? We quickly thought through our options (babysitter, time, heat, etc) but said, "um, sure!" Jon had never been and I had told him I'd like to at least go once since we live in Indy! We offered to pay but of course he would not let us. He ended up giving us seats in the Paddock Penthouse seating along with an escort to the race with free parking to avoid traffic!! :) Praise God for surprise blessings!

Before we left on Saturday, Jon's parents offered to let us take his dad's convertible and we said- well, okay. Boy were we glad we did when we got in the line for that escort! :) We felt like we were living the high life! Ha!

The best picture I could get of the escort. We were ridiculously giddy during the whole drive.

A view of the race

We were just off of the brick finish line and had a great view! Here's Reba singing America the Beautiful- she doesn't even have to try!

And Rascal Flats doing the National Anthem- amazing!

You can see the finish line just off to the right

We had such a wonderful time! What a special weekend to celebrate 5 wonderful years together! And we pray that God will bless that man for providing us with such a special opportunity! Here's to the next 5!!

A visit from my Family

Just after the 4th, my family made their annual summer trip out to see us. It is always so good to have them here and they love to help us with projects and to spoil us. (Project pictures to follow) My dad was only able to stay a few days, but we're always thankful for the time we can get with him. He mowed the lawn for us and bought us a new trimmer ( a much needed new trimmer!!). We then took them all to an Indians baseball game. It was a great time!

Nolan and one of his favorite foods!

Dad, Mom & Iz

Nolan with dad's hat!

My parents flew to Reno for a few days for my dad's work and we kept Izabel. We had a great time and Nolan loved having her to play with! She's also a really big helper! Then my mom came back and stayed another week and a half. What a blessing!

Nolan was spoiled rotten!!

Then we helped my mom and Iz drive to Lincoln and they drove on the rest of the way home.

Enjoying some snacks

Nolan liked to listen to his worship CD with the headphones on- he would sing- it was so sweet!

We spent the weekend in Lincoln and I was TERRIBLE about taking pictures!! We met with Jon's previous co-workers for lunch on Friday and had a great time catching up with everyone.

This is Nolan in his aunt Ginny's chair- she was gone! :(

We stayed with our dear friends Mozart and Colleen and their son Tre. We had such a great time catching up. They even took us to a true Nebraska summer event in Eagle, NE. They had a BBQ contest and it was soooo good! We also had the opportunity to see our friends the Francis' and the Potts. We missed a bunch of people from church, but hopefully next summer we will coordinate better!

We drove the 10 hours home straight the next day but stopped in IA to see Katie and Shane. We had yet to meet the beautiful Bree, so we had to stop. Plus, it was a great play break for Nolan. They treated us to a delicious lunch!

We made it home around 9 that evening and EVERYONE was really ready to be out of that car!! :) It was all worth it though!