H.O.M.E

Pictures of our home

**Side note: These pictures are from the internet when it was for sale, so all the furniture and everything inside is not ours and it looks quite different now. Also, they used a nice camera so things in the pictures might look larger than in real life;) I haven't had the chance to take my own pictures... but maybe that will come eventually! 

Our new house! 4 beds and 4 baths

This is the view from the front door looking into the living room and dining room

Dining room

One of the bedrooms (the other is not pictured)

Master bedroom

Master Bathroom

Master bathroom

Basement

Bedroom in the basement (now it has carpet)

Basement

Bathroom in basement

You know that whole thing called "real life" that you always heard about when you were younger, thought about it... but never really understood what the big deal was? Well, I officially get it now, fortunately and unfortunately sometimes.  Being a mom, owning a home, and working two part time at home jobs has really helped it sink in quickly:)

Life has changed quite a bit for us over the past couple of months, and it has been a crazy and slightly hectic transition with so many new things. But now we are officially unpacked, completely moved in and have been living in our new home for 2 months and we are loving it! Though we don't often spend much time there because of busy schedules, we love being there and having a place to call our own! After many years of traveling on the road, living in hotels and apartments, it has been so fun to have a home:)

One of our new favorite things to do is challenge each other at ping pong. My parents gave us their old ping pong table a few weeks ago for our open house so Ben and I love to go down into the basement at night once Jed is asleep and play. We also love it because we are about 1/2 mile away from a dog park and Sadie loves it!

Since this is what most of you likely come here to check...Here are a few updates on our sweet little Jed:

Jed got up on the first step by himself... time for the gates!

All he wants to do now is stand

Holding his bottle like a big boy!

Taking Sadie to the dog park

Rocking with great grandma

This is what Jed looks like when he refuses to sleep....

Playing and having fun with Sadie!

Having fun with daddy!

Jed also loves our new house! Since he is now able to have a routine and a place of his own to sleep, he has become the champion of sleeping through the night, and we are so grateful for that! We usually put him down around 7-7:45pm and he sleeps until 7:30am without needing to get up for anything during the night, it's so nice!   He is also LOVING exploring every inch of the floor.  He has mastered the army crawl and is getting really quick, especially when he sees something in the distance that he wants. He will begin to breath really heavily, his eyes get wide and he hurries across the floor as fast as his little arms and legs can go. Most of the time his excitement is for Sadie's toys or our phones...he loves what he knows he's not supposed to have!

At almost 8 months, time is flying and he is changing so fast! We are convinced he will be walking in no time... he pulls himself up onto things and stands on his own holding on to the table or whatever else is in front of him. The other day we looked at the monitor during his nap and he had gotten up on his feet and was standing in the corner of his pack n play looking for us to come get him out. It has been such a joy to watch him take in everything around him and learn so much in such a short amount of time!

His favorite new activity is eating finger foods (Sadie loves it as well! She knows exactly where to stand during meal times) Sometimes I feel like my whole day is spent nursing, pumping, or giving him solid foods... followed by changing diapers, cleaning up toys, and then it repeats. Good thing he's cute, he makes it all worth it!

Jed went through a small phase recently where he always wanted to be held and would scream if you put him down, even worse if you put him down and left the room even for a second. But since learning to crawl and eating finger foods, he has learned to enjoy being on his own and exploring. He keeps himself occupied most of the time on the ground crawling all over the place, and he is so focused on his food in the high chair that he enjoys just sitting by himself. Which makes it much easier to actually get things done when we are at home!

Jedidiah's week at a glance...

Jed and I have been fortunate to spend three days a week at my grandparents house, so on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays he gets to play with great grandma and great grandpa Johnson most of the day. There are also two little dogs there, so between them and Sadie he is learning to really love animals! Great grandma enjoys laughing with him and rocking with him in the rocking chair. Both my grandpa and grandma have lost their short term memory, so they often don't know why we are there, but Jed sure loves them, has fun playing there and he brings them a lot of joy and laughs as well! It's been so much fun to watch the interaction between them:)

Jed is already very much like daddy... an extrovert:) He LOVES people! He will not sleep when we are out and about and people are around. On Wednesdays Jed and I go to church and youth group with daddy, He loves watching his dad teach!...Jed is definitely the star of the show (sorry Benny...) He gets passed around and just soaks it up!... until he starts getting tired and then he gets slightly picky for mom or dad to hold him. We love sharing him with the youth and I am blessed watching others laugh with him, play with him and love on him. As a mother I have found that I get such joy watching people love, care for, and enjoy my son! It is a lot of fun having Ben work in a place where Jed and I can feel welcomed to come and be a part of it. We are enjoying sharing life with so many wonderful people and I am excited to continue to get to know the youth and youth staff as time goes on.

Fridays and Saturdays are Ben's days off... so if there is nothing going on for church that weekend, we normally do something fun together as a family or try to be productive and get things done around the house. Either way, we love those days when daddy is with us, we are all home, and we get to spend time together! Growing up, my dad always made us pancakes on Sunday mornings before church, and it was my favorite... I really love traditions... And one thing that has been fun so far in our new house is that on Friday or Saturday when we get up, Ben makes us homemade pancakes for breakfast and we just relax and enjoy the morning together, it's the best!

Sunday is church most of the day and we are enjoying it. It is fun to be back at my home church, fun to see my parents on Sunday morning, fun seeing old friends and catching up. It has also been so great to meet new friends and have many married friends who we can live life with, and even some that are also having babies and in the same family stage that we are! We are blessed and I know God has us at City Hill for a reason.

Life is SO good, and yet overwhelming at times... We are blessed, and I am learning so much in this new stage of life... more on that next time!