Just when you think you’ve got everything in place, it seems that there are a ton of items you missed…  At least that’s how it feels when we’ve been working on an ongoing project for a while.  It’s okay, though.  We’re making good progress.  We’ve picked out a lot of the materials for our next home; it’s just a matter of making sure that we can get everything that we want, without causing the price to skyrocket…  Jeremy & I have been able to come to good decisions, easily & smoothly, because we tend to like the same look of certain things & we agree on the things that we feel are necessary & the ones that can be left out, or that we can compromise on.  It’s just strange to us how the homebuilder we chose uses different vendors for almost every item that we have to pick out.  We can understand the appliance & lighting vendors being separate from the rest.  But, for most of the other materials, why not use someone who offers them all…?  But, seriously, it’s fun deciding on different elements.  We’re just amazed at how quickly time passes when we’re doing it!  But, we’re getting there.  Wish us luck on making “final” decisions!

We’re enjoying the planning of our next home.  We began this adventure at the beginning of this summer.  We are hoping to have the house all built & ready to move in to around the beginning of next summer.  We have the floor plan all done & signed off on.  Now, the next step is what our builder calls “the design phase”.  We met with their design center rep. earlier today & had a nice appointment.  We made a lot of decisions, but some are still up in the air.  The nice thing is that Jeremy & I pretty much know what we want.  The not-so-great thing is that most of it is not included “standard” & therefore, we are going to have to shop around at each of the vendors they use a bit more, in order to nail down our exact choices.  The two of us have been very agreeable, when it comes to the colors, textures & things that we both would love to have in the home, so that makes it a bit easier, at least.  We probably got about half of the decisions taken care of today.  Now, begins our fun “homework” of picking out the rest, shop by shop, before we meet with the design center rep. again in a couple of weeks.  Wish us luck!  🙂

We had a nice time on Sunday, the 4 of us.  It had been a couple of months since we saw some of our friends that are in our small study group from our church, better known as the Bridge.  But, the hosts gave us a meeting time & we all got together for about an hour & a half.  It’s a nice group of people in their 20s & early 30s, many of whom are married & have young children.  Katrina is the oldest kid in the group, but she still enjoys seeing & playing with the younger ones.  Alyssa’s best friend is the hosts’ daughter & she is only 10 days younger than Aly.  It was great for Jeremy & me, learning a new Bible-study technique & catching up with the adults.  But it was also a special treat, seeing how much the kids are growing & meeting one of the couples’ newborn daughter for the first time!  Those that weren’t able to make it were missed, of course.  But we feel blessed to have such great friends & it’s a pleasure to know each of the members of our Bridge Journey Group (and their kiddos)!

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Pellentesque eget lorem lectus, et commodo elit. Ut a tortor sit amet enim fringilla aliquet. Donec nisi nisi, condimentum ac hendrerit vitae, consectetur vitae nulla. Fusce id dignissim quam. Pellentesque imperdiet placerat lacus, nec tempus erat hendrerit sit amet. Aliquam erat volutpat. Cras ultricies, tellus euismod pellentesque porttitor, ante risus malesuada orci, ac interdum ligula lectus quis arcu. Morbi vel risus quis est auctor condimentum. Pellentesque habitant morbi tristique senectus et netus et malesuada fames ac turpis egestas. Nulla ut mi turpis. Integer molestie enim id ante commodo sit amet luctus justo malesuada. Vivamus vitae dui a enim accumsan consectetur. Etiam pellentesque varius iaculis. Class aptent taciti sociosqu ad litora torquent per conubia nostra, per inceptos himenaeos. Duis cursus euismod velit a euismod. Morbi ut tellus est.

Donec porttitor vestibulum ante, ut hendrerit justo adipiscing id. Phasellus non ligula eu erat Matthew 10:8 cursus varius. Maecenas dapibus hendrerit ipsum vel posuere. Quisque dapibus massa sed libero vehicula nec elementum libero semper. Mauris ut commodo eros. Cras luctus adipiscing erat eget pharetra. Vestibulum et velit risus, vitae sagittis ipsum. Duis a nibh sed neque ornare eleifend. Etiam at turpis in nisi malesuada egestas. Vestibulum auctor rhoncus metus, nec lobortis est vulputate eget. Nunc sit amet mi felis, non commodo ante. Ut quis purus odio, nec pellentesque odio. Vestibulum libero eros, pellentesque quis vulputate a, hendrerit vitae nisl. Phasellus mattis sagittis quam, id eleifend nulla ornare porttitor. Fusce suscipit, nibh lacinia mattis vulputate, dolor enim sagittis magna, vel vehicula augue magna sed sapien.

Plugin test:

Song of Solomon 3:5

Genesis 1:1

Exodus 2:1-2

at 9:17

Genesis 1:2

John 1:1

Genesis 1:5

Genesis 5

John 1:2

Well, we’ve been making good progress on having our next home built.  As you may already know, we plan on moving next summer, but we’re staying in town, only going a few miles from where we are now.  Most of our home plans are custom, meaning that we got to choose the size, locations, etc. of the rooms, and they had to be drafted up, rather than us having chosen one of the pre-planned models that the homebuilder typically builds.  It’s been a fun, exciting process, with many ups & downs, so far, but all toward the progress of a really great end-product, in our eyes!  Just today, we signed the initial documents & put a down-payment on the building.  We had a lot of reading to do, prior to that, to make sure everything was worded correctly & we were getting exactly what we wanted, but it was worth every minute!  We met with our contact & after signing the papers, went out to dinner to celebrate.  The home shouldn’t be entirely complete & ready to be moved into until sometime late next Spring/early next Summer, but we planned that schedule, as well.  The next meeting will be to pick out materials/colors from their design showcase, which should be fun!  We’re learning a lot in the process, and dealing well with all the decision-making, so far.  Here’s hoping for the best, throughout!

Last week, I wrote about the crazy heat we’ve been having, because it was really hot outside, here in our town.  Well, this week we got the relief that we needed, in the form of several rainstorms & thundershowers.  They have been happening mostly during the night, which is nice because our family are all good sleepers & the rain helps lull us & keeps us in that blissful, dreamy state.  The girls have been sleeping in longer in the morning & giving Jeremy & I little breaks from having to get up too early, which has been nice.  The local temperatures have also dropped significantly, making it feel like fall is just around the corner – it’s been in the 70s & 80s for the past few days & we’ve really been enjoying it!  Although the skies have been somewhat overcast, that doesn’t bring us down a bit!  We hope it continues, although knowing the “normal” weather patterns here (if you can call them that), we are probably in for at least one more blast of summer heat, before things settle down & the leaves start changing…

We don’t know exactly how bad the heat has been for everyone around the world this summer, but we’ve been experiencing pretty high temperatures, lately.  The past week or so, our local weather has been reporting highs of between 102 & 106 degrees Fahrenheit.  Although it’s really hot, we thankfully haven’t been affected too badly – no droughts, or anything like that.  We’ve just been staying indoors, for the most part; although our poor air conditioner has a hard time keeping up, sometimes, it’s still cooler than being out in the blistering sun!  We hope everyone else is able to keep cool & enjoy the last few remaining weeks of summer & that we get all get a break from these hot days, soon.

Well, our weekend was fairly uneventful, but it was a nice change of pace, since this summer has been pretty activity-filled for us.  Saturday, we stayed home & just hung out together.  The girls played with their toys.  Jeremy & I got a little bit of work done (chores, etc.) & later on, we played our video game together for a bit.  Sunday, I started getting sick, which was no good.  We missed church & I rested a lot, but don’t think I actually napped, that day.  That night, I had a hard time sleeping, though.  Being sick makes everything more difficult, but I’m not complaining.  Jeremy took good care of us girls & we had a nice, quiet, relaxing weekend at home.  Sometimes I prefer being a “hermit” like that, even when I’m not ill…  We enjoyed each others’ company & got some much needed relaxation in.  🙂

Well, we went on a little “mini-vacation”, I guess you could say, just yesterday.  It wasn’t even a weekend or long weekend, but a day-trip to a city which takes about an hour and a half to drive to from here.  Katrina had been begging us to go to a science center, like the ones we typically see when we’re on vacation, out of town.  Even though there’s one in our own locale, we’ve never been to it, because we’ve been told it is quite small & not as spectacular in comparison to ones in other cities.  So, we planned the day to go to one we’d been to & enjoyed before.  It was really a great day for it, too.  It was one of the hottest days of the summer, so being indoors was a “perfect” plan.  We all enjoyed it, especially Kat, who couldn’t get over all the things there were to see & do.  There is a Planetarium, where we saw a brief show about the night’s sky, and we saw a show about explosions in their auditorium, as well.  They had remodeled part of it, since we’d been there, last, adding some cool new play areas for the kids.  Most of it was too big for Alyssa, just yet, but she enjoyed riding around in her stroller.  She didn’t take but a really short nap during the day, inside the planetarium, when everything was dark.  The rest of the time, we thought she’d get tired & “pass out” at any moment, but she was just so alert, not wanting to miss a thing!  She especially loved seeing the “choo-choos” – a display of model trains, going around a little city.  We all had a great time, though!  It was a wonderful getaway & something fun to do as a family!

We have just been having so much fun, this summer!  It’s kinda’ sad, in a way that Katrina has to go back to school, soon.  Just looking back, it’s amazing to think of all the things we’ve done & what is still going on.  Good progress has been made toward the planning of our next home.  We are still working on drafting it up, but the meetings with the builders have been great & Jeremy & I have learned so much from them, so far.  I began clogging again, which gives me such an awesome feeling – to enjoy a hobby I’ve always loved!  Katrina has completed the library’s “Summer Reading Program” for the second year in a row, got to go to day camp for the first time ever, raised some caterpillars into butterflies & let them go, practiced bike riding, went roller skating for her first time, and enjoyed VBS.  Alyssa continues to progress in her vocabulary, motor skills & other areas.  She’s got a different personality from her sister, that’s for sure, but we are enjoying watching it develop, just as much as she grows & changes from baby to toddler.  We’ve enjoyed family gatherings & time with friends, as well.  Jeremy & I both hit level 70 on our World of Warcraft characters, and are now enjoying other aspects of the game that are reserved for those that reach that top-level.  It’s really hard to believe that Kat’s school will be back in session in a matter of just under a month, now…  Although, we’ve had a couple of spells of either Jeremy or I (or both of us) just getting entirely worn out here & there this summer, we’ve each been able to bounce back quickly & keep chuggin’ along!  We still plan on squeezing some more great activities in, before it’s all over.  We hope everyone is having as much fun as we are!

We had a great 4th of July celebration!  First, we went over to the girls’ Uncle Jason & Aunt Stephanie’s house for a cookout.  Many other family members were there, also.  Everyone brought something, so there was a lot of good food.  We also got to swim while there.  With Jeremy’s help, Katrina dunked her head underwater for the first time!  Alyssa enjoyed splashing in her baby float & just playing in the water, in general.  After that, we went to a local soccer field/park to watch the big fireworks display that’s put on by the city each year.  Even though this has kind of become a family tradition over the years, it was even cooler, beforehand, this time around!  Some military planes & helicopters flew over the field in various formations, before it got dark.  It was really neat watching them – we were able to catch a few pictures, as well.  This is the first time they have done this.  We hope they keep it up, annually – it was a real treat!  All the kids enjoyed themselves & thankfully the fireworks didn’t scare Aly one bit, as we thought they might.  She pointed up in the sky at them & cooed & just seemed to have a good time, too.  We are grateful to have grown up in a country with the wonderful freedoms we enjoy!  We hope everyone had a great Independence Day this year, too!