Happy Birthday "two twins" !!

Happy Birthday Patrick and Cecilia!!! We can't believe that you are three already! Thank you for inviting us to your fun birthday party. I'm shocked that none of us have a belly ache from all the goodies that we consumed. Be careful on your new toys.

And these pics are posted because we have had a request for a picture of the two of us from our "Minnesota parents" Rich and Karen. Emma actually took it and it is brave of me to post it.

More excitement...

A very powerful storm rolled through here about 4:30 this afternoon. I have never heard such strong gusts before. We were definitely (atleast the girls were) down in the shelter but luckily the storm went as quicky as it had come. The biggest fear for Lauren though is sitting in the shelter next to the loud "conditioner." (air conditioner) So, that is one more thing I have to remember to do before heading down there. Of course, nothing freaks out Emma and she even loves the sirens and the chance of a tornado. :)

Dave was on his way to work of course and left a little early to beat the storm, which he did. Stacy and the twins and the girls and I had this fun evening planned but things didn't pan out the way we planned, which was ok.

Of course our next door neighbor and I were out in the front "checking out" the very cool clouds while the girls were chilling out in the shelter. (I still had the toys, blankets, pillows from 2 weeks ago, so they were set) The clouds are so cool and I love it that there aren't too many houses out here to block their view. Here are a couple pics of the clouds to the west and southwest of us....... (I should have been a storm chaser)

The clouds in the photo on the right were just literally rolling over eachother. I got my "you know what" inside once that first gust of wind hit.

The girls had a good time with the camera again:

Once the storm blew through, of course we had to "survey" the damage. The girls were absolutely thrilled and amazed by the hail.

Did I mention I am SO DONE planting petunias or any flower for that matter......

And, our poor little trees need a little adjusting tomorrow. oops! I guess that's what 80 mph winds can do.

And, the little play houses were scattered into the neighbor's lawn. The small beige square in the background of the pic is the other play house that was broke into several pieces.

After all of this and watching the 10 o'clock news, we are VERY THANKFUL once again that we were spared the worst of the storm and just have some very minor clean up tomorrow.

Stacy and Ted's power has been out now since the storm so we may have some extra roommates tomorrow depending on when the power comes back on. I guess there are something like 120,000 plus people without power.

Again, we are thankful.

More Outside Adventures

Before I get into the "latest" around our house, I have to say another "Happy Father's Day" to all of the special fathers in my/our lives.

I am SO incredibly blessed to have a wonderful, sacrificing, always willing to help with whatever, father.

I am also SO blessed to have a fabulous husband and father for our soon to be 3 "drama queens."

With that said, we have spent an entire two days outside working on the landscaping in the front yard. We are wore out, but our work is done and if I'm not too lazy tomorrow I'll take a picture of the results which I think are perfect.

The lot next to us is still vacant and the weeds are growing taller and taller, which I don't like, but what are you going to do. Also in the next door lot are some really pretty "palm tree" looking plants that mom really liked the other day when she was over for father's day. She even thought that her and her granddaughter should plant one for her front porch. (we should have let her keep it but) dad immediately said, "Brenda, that's marijuana" as Stacy and I laughed so hard we almost peed our pants. Then we made her give up her "palm tree." Of course I had to document the moment with the camera and now the blog but I'm sure whomever sees this (mostly our family) will totally understand the humor of it all.

Just look at how happy she looks. :)

work and play

Tonight, aunt Stacy and the twins came over to play since uncle Ted had to golf.

The nursery called today and is dropping off the 4 trees that we bought tomorrow and they have to be in the ground in the next day or two. Thanks aunt Stacy for doing most of the digging for us while Dave is at work.

The kids loved to play in the new hole........and pretend as if they were chipmunks......

Grandpa is feeling better each day (we think) because he has been so busy working on this playground set for the girls. It was finished tonight and all four of the kids LOVED it!!! GRANDPA, YOU ROCK!!!! Thank you so much for all your hard work! Just look at the fun we all had tonight.

Mason and Kenzie, we can't wait for you to come play with us in October.

Thanks again grandpa, WE LOVE YOU!!!!

Very thankful!

We are exhausted, wore out, nerves shot, BUT very very thankful that we are all safe and have "weathered" another night of severe storms.

With that said, please pray for the families who are dealing with the deaths and injured at the scout camp near Sioux City, Iowa. This is so hard to hear about and it just reinforces how grateful we are for our safety etc.

I am truly unable to put together much that even makes sense. We have been in our shelter for probably 3 hours as the tornado warnings were extended several times. At one point at the beginning of the night, there were rotating clouds literally within a mile of us. All 3 (or 4) :) of us were under the stairs in the basement literally praying that everything would be ok. Of course Dave went back to work tonight so he wasn't here with us. :( We were fortunate enough though to stay in touch with family throughout the night.

At one point, the girls were getting quite bored so I let them take pictures of things in the basement while I watched the weather downstairs also. Here are a couple funny pics that they took tonight. (obviously the outside cloud ones I took before the real bad stuff rolled through) :)

It is still thundering out here and we are probably in for a little more less severe storms tonight and already I am wore out and wish Dave was here as they just said that we will experience thunderstorms through atleast 2 in the morning. :(

Just so you know, Ernie and Bert (although looking a little nervous in the above picture) weathered the storm with us also. :)

It's quiet

It's 10pm and "all's well" (and quiet) I think the girls were so tired tonight from their "bedroom party" lastnight that they were quiet from the minute we tucked them in. :)

We had another fairly productive day. I worked, Emma had Vacation Bible School, Dave cleaned the mud from the street :), and good old dad started building the playhouse.

We went to Mulhalls tonight and bought four ash trees that wil be delivered next week. I am off tomorrow because I have to work on Saturday. We hope to get some more accomplished including figuring out where those trees will go. I started mowing tonight after dinner and didn't quite get finished before another storm blew through. The clouds were so cool and the rainbow to the South afterward was so pretty. We are enjoying the moisture of course and love the view we have of the clouds and sunsets.

Here are just a couple pics we took of the rainbow and clouds.

More Firsts

Well, more firsts tonight!! We had a very busy day today despite getting up late and lacking a little bit of sleep. Emma and I got a TON of errands accomplished. I thought that maybe I would go by myself to take a little break from them but she wanted to go and how could I tell her no. It is SO SO SO much easier with just one and especially one that can walk on her own etc.

She was very good and actually we enjoyed our alone time together since it will be less and less here in about 7 weeks. Speaking of #3, I THINK we have settled on a name but are not telling anyone till she's born. Emma and Lauren know so please mom don't try to trick them or ask them any questions. :) It is actually a different name and only about 6,000 babies in the US in the 2000s are named this. I am probably making our family members nervous with those stats but I promise you will either like it right away or it will grow on you. I promise it isn't "Felonie" "Potpourri" "Abracadabra" "Shi Thead" etc. :) (those are real names by the way)

Anyway, back to "firsts" in preparation for monster #3, we had to get Lauren transitioned from her crib to a "big girl bed." Well, that wasn't too tough so far. Her and Emma are now sharing the "Pepto Bismol Pink" bedroom. They are adorable tonight, kissing and hugging eachother. I better enjoy that while I can cause they fight like cats and dogs. Emma has already come out and asked if they can play with her Cinderella jewelry box together. Uh, No! She just came out again to warn us about the grey clouds out their window.

Here a couple cute pics from bedtime, Lauren is so thrilled to be in this bed and she kissed her Sesame Street friends goodnight three times too. Yea for hand-me-downs.

Tornado season continued

We have gotten off to a very slow/sluggish start this morning. The kids weren't up until 8:30 or so which was a nice break, all due to mother nature.


We have had so much rocky weather here this last week and have dodged the worst so far.


I think I was awake most of the night and by 2 or so the rain and lightning started AGAIN!! I have not missed a storm yet this year and how I wish I could sleep through them like everyone else seems to. Except last night I think it was a blessing that I was already awake. I tried to call Dave to tell him we were getting hammered again and no answer. I thought about turning on the TV and thought, no, try to sleep. Just then this very quiet whistle. I thought it was just the wind but turned on the TV to check. Of course that noise wasn't just the wind, yep, tornado warning. Ugh!


Anyway, you can imagine the drill although a little more frightening at 2:30 in the morning with no husband here to help this big pregnant lady. :) Even Ernie went down to the shelter and this time we were prepared with flashlights and a radio. I even managed to grab both phones.


I got the girls settled in the little shelter under the stairs which they thought was the coolest thing ever, then it didn't take Emma long to teach Lauren all she knew about tornados. They were worked up about the loud air conditioner so after the main part passed I went up stairs to turn that off and of course grab the camera. I think we were out of the warning by 3 but the girls were having too much fun in their shelter with their lights and blankets. I told them that as soon as dad was home that was it for taking shelter and it was bedtime again. Emma was so tickled that she was up at 3 AM and was trying to share her excitement with Lauren who could of course not have cared less about that.


Here are a couple cute pics from the girls' exciting night.



We are again VERY thankful that we are all safe and being a little tired is no big thing compared to others in SW Omaha who actually got hit.

Tornado season

It's definitely tornado season in the midwest. The last two nights have been quite stormy BUT we cannot complain! We managed to dodge many twisters both last night and especially tonight. I even ran to Walmart today after work to buy flashlights. Can't find half of ours and the other half of course have no batteries. We are ready now although we would rather not have to use them.

I have done my best "toughing out" the heat and humidity so far and so far haven't turned on the air conditioner. Usually we can get a cool breeze at night and with the ceiling fans on max speed it isn't the end of the world. BUT, tonight I decided I no longer wanted to "tough it out." So after the girls and I ran to Walmart, my phone rang and it was Dave. I think he was a little nervous to share the following message...

"uh honey?"

"yea"

"I tried to turn on the air but it's not working at all, I have a call into 'the guy' to see what's wrong"

I must say I handled it quite well and really am not surprised as many things needed a little fine tuning in this "new" house. :)

"The guy" called back right away and had Dave check several things. Yep, seems as if our electrician didn't run power to it. Seriously!!! Supposedly......and I do mean SUPPOSEDLY our electrician "Steve" will be out first thing in the morning. (we heard that line many times in the fall) :)

Not a big deal really, there are so many worse things in life and atleast our house is still standing etc.

Here are a couple pics I took tonight off of our deck. The sunset one really doesn't show how gorgeous it was, but I am not Thomas Mangelsen either. How I can't wait to sip a cold apple beer with Dave in the fall and sit out on the deck and watch the kids play. (That is if we get the two footings underneath it fixed and some stairs) OK, I promise, I'm done! :)

Hopefully we will all get some good sleep tonight. I don't think there is much for thunder and lightening in our near

future.