how does she sleep like this?! =-)

farmers market

Today was such a nice Saturday morning. It is so nice to live close to things! (You are going to get SO tired of hearing me say that, I know.) I took the kids and went to work at 8:15, then we went to the farmers market down by the river and had sandwiches in the park. Now we are home for naps. I'm going to take one too, but first you must see my yummy finds.

A group of Amish women and their daughters had a booth set up and I bought their wheat bread and let Ellie pick out what cookies she wanted. She picked the sugar cookies. I still feel bad because I gave her a $20 when my total was $5 and she only gave me $5 back, thinking I had given her a $10 bill. When I told her I'd given her a $20 I'm not sure she believed me, but she gave me the change for a $20 anyway. I still feel bad! I would never lie about something like that. I bought 2 jars of jam. One strawberry rhubarb and one called blue barb. I can't wait to try them. Then I got green beans, tomatoes and an onion. Tonight we are having chicken with fresh veggies for dinner. I can't wait! Also not in the picture is a little pumpkin. I asked how much they were and the lady just gave Ellie one. Isn't that sweet?! :)

First time at the Farmer Market = a success. I suspect we will be there almost every Saturday from here on out!

our new home

**Disclaimer** Please remember we just moved in and the house is a work in progress. :) In other words. It is a total mess, but I've had requests for pictures so this is what you get exactly one week into the move.

Our nice big private backyard.

Patio.

Basement storage room.

Big extra basement room. Playroom? Man room? Photo studio?

Basement guest bedroom.

Lower level bathroom.

Half bath off garage.

View from the front door.

Kitchen and front room.

Lower level tv/playroom.

Lower level tv/playroom.

Front room. "Formal living room" (there is nothing formal about me so I hate calling it that.)

The biggest closet I've ever had in my life.

Our room.

Our room. Can you see there are spots on my camera lens?! :)

Upstairs bathroom.
Ellie and Cooper were both in bed when I took these pictures... I will take pics of their rooms tomorrow and post them! I will also post a pic of the outside of the house as soon as Greg can photo shop the address off the front.

*Updated*

Here's the outside.

what have i created?

ouch

Last night I was upstairs putting Cooper to bed, then reading to Ellie and I heard some yelling and swearing downstairs. I figured one of the cats had peed on something. So I just kept reading. When I got downstairs I found Greg in the kitchen with a towel to his face crying and swearing. He'd been outside messing with that tree that fell on his car and something flicked up into his eye. So at 9:15 last night I had to call my parents to come out (23 miles) to pick up Greg and take him to the ER. He couldn't open his eye. It was red all around it. Ugh. What an icky part of the body to have be in pain.

He started texting me at 10:44 from the room and he still hadn't been seen. He was finally seen at 11:51. Given something to numb his eye so that the dr could actually open it. He used his flashlight, saw the speck of whatever it was and used a q-tip to get it out. Greg said he felt instant relief but it was still really sore. It ended up scratching his cornea and now he has drops to put in every 2-3 hours for a week.

The worst of it all was that he didn't get home until 12:45 and had to be up at 4:30 to be to work by 6. He tried to call in and see if he could take the day or even the morning off but they have the most eff'd up way of doing things he couldn't. I think I could be lying in a hospital bed giving birth and if he was scheduled to work they'd expect him there. They irritate me.

All this and we are moving tomorrow. Should be an interesting day!

life

I have been up since about 3:30 this morning. It has been storming pretty bad here. I have never seen so much lightening in one storm! Our power went off, then on, then off and now parts of the house aren't working?! The kitchen and the bathroom don't work. I'd say those are probably the 2 most important rooms! Our fridge is plugged into an extension cord right now, thank goodness. We went to the basement when the sirens went off but before doing so we grabbed lawn chairs from the garage. I noticed some leaves plastered to the garage window. Then we realized it wasn't just leaves. It was a huge chunk of a tree from our back yard... and Greg's car was under it. Ugh. Happy Friday the 13th, huh. Oh and water is pouring in our basement from the window sills. Just lovely.

I am SO ready to move. So tired of the luck we have in this house. I am ready to start fresh. The basement is finished in the house we are moving to, so bring on the storms I say! I can't wait to post pictures of our new home for you. It is beautiful. 4 bedrooms/3 bathrooms. So much more space than we have now. We have so many neat little pieces of furniture that I don't have room for in our house now so they are in the basement or upstairs in the closet. I'm so excited to be able to use them again. We even will have a 3 car garage. I'm sure I don't even have to begin to tell you how excited Greg is about that! He will also have a shed in the back yard that is insulated and has electricity in it. He is thrilled.

I'm most excited that everyone will have their own bedroom and big closets. We will even have an extra bedroom for guests which will be so nice. We've never really had the room for Greg's mom to stay and now we will which will be really nice.

Now that half our house's electricity isn't working and we surely aren't going to pay to have it fixed, I'm thinking I might email the owners and see if we couldn't move in sooner.

This is going to be a crazy busy overwhelming couple weeks. I'll be sure to take as many pics as I can and keep you updated!

One of our favorite things to do this summer is sit out in the driveway and run through the sprinkler. Ellie fills up Cooper's tray with water and he has a blast splashing. I am so sick of this humidity that I am ready for fall to be here tomorrow. But I know come January I will miss this time!
Seriously this is each of their signature poses. Cracks me up!

Love this picture... splash!

It's been a while since I've posted a yummy recipe. So here ya go Lindsay... get the crock pot out. "Easy" has to be a word written in the title of my recipe or I just don't have the interest in making it. I'm that lazy.

Easy Crock Pot Beef Stew

5 cups (I used almost 7 cups) of fresh chopped veggies - potatoes, carrots, celery and onions
2 packages of stew meat
1 packet of McCormick Beef Stew seasoning
1 1/3 cup of water

Put your meat and veggies in crock pot. Mix water and seasoning packet and pour over veggies and meat. Cook on high 4 hours.

I told you it was easy. And even on a hot summer day it tasted soooooo good!






Sorry I don't have an after picture. But you get the idea.