Trusses and pumpkins

This is kind of a random post, but it's what I have pictures of. We have the latest pics of our slow-going house project with the beginnings of a roof. These pics are about a month old, and yes, sadly little work has gone on since these were taken. Our head guy, and Aaron's best friend, Dave, has been on vacation, other workers are working on other projects, and blah, blah, blah. The good news is, once the crew is here and working, it gets done really fast. The plan at this point is to resume work the around the first week of November. Luckily, we haven't had much snow, but the temperatures are flippin' cold!! It's only in the twenties lately, so the crew won't be having too much fun, but I don't really care at this point! Does that sound heartless?? 

  

As you can see, there are still more trusses to be put up, but after that it gets sheeting, and shingles. Then it won't snow in the house anymore. After that, we install my custom ordered windows and doors. Can't wait!

 

  Here are some pics of Jolee getting ready to carve our Halloween pumpkins. We ended up with about 6 pumpkins because we carved a bunch for a youth activity a few weeks ago. Of course, each kid needed to carve their own, and those pumpkins are now frozen solid on our walkway.  So far, they have not become moose candy. I hope to post some Halloween and birthday pics of Haylee's 14th, (which is tomorrow), but with all the fun activities planned, we shall see. 

Happy 34 Aaron!!

Aaron crept one year closer to 40 on Friday when he turned 34! It seems like yesterday, we were going to prom, and now look at him; still as handsome as ever! Okay, that's my one cheesy comment for the post. I wish I could say that we had incredible plans to celebrate Aaron's big day, but as Young Women's president, I was in charge of decorating and setting up for a youth dance.  We spent five and a half hours stringing lights, taping decorations to the wall, and Aaron built me a 20 foot tall paper barn. The theme for the dance was "Boogie at the Barnyard". It turned out really cute and the kids had a great time, but I know Aaron would rather have been getting a massage and sitting in a hotel spa. Oh well. 

 

We officially celebrated his birthday on Saturday when, after getting our chores done, Aaron blew out his candles on the cake the kids made him and opened his birthday cards. The kids loved watching Aaron blow out the re-light candles on his cake. My parents came down to visit, so they were nice enough to watch the kids while we went out to dinner with the Ponds and Hansens. After dinner, we missed our planned movie so decided to go bowling. What a joke! Aaron has a bum elbow right now, so he had to bowl left handed! It was hilarious.  After some ice cream at Coldstone, we headed home to watch Sarah Palin on SNL. All in all, Aaron said it was a great birthday, but what else can he say?

 

Here we are, Aaron's girls (Haylee is behind the camera). Chloee's guilty green face is from the cake decorating markers she sucked on while making Dad's cake look pretty. 

Running Strong

As a wanna-be runner, I have been really proud of my Haylee for running in the past season of cross country running. She just finished the season a few weeks ago, and I was so proud to watch her push herself to cross the finish line. Here are some pics from her last meet at the awesome trails at Skyview High School. It was a beautiful fall day, and the other kids had fun playing in the sand volleyball court and the open field of grass.

Jolee is giving us a really perturbed look after we woke her up from her nap. She eventually got happy after discovering a nice patch of grass to play in.

Brady participated in the community run after the athlete runs. Brady has always been a great runner and he is looking forward to next year when he can run with the school's team as a big sixth grader. Go Kiddos, Go!

Basketball Boy

 
We are in the throws of the sports season at the Swanson home. Jaron really wanted to try basketball this season and he is enjoying it. He is the only first grader on his team, but hangs in with the other kids just fine. We normally don't do basketball because it overlaps with the hockey season, but we made it work. Jaron is starting to understand the basics of the game with defense, offense, and shooting the ball. Dribbling, on the other hand, he is still working on. It is the funniest thing to watch him dribble down the court to about the top of the key and run the ball in with both hands to shoot. The refs usually laugh and remind him to dribble. It's great. His favorite part of the games is the snack afterwards. We only have a few weeks left, and it's a good thing because hockey has started.

 

Jaron lining up his shot and giving us a thumbs up from the bench.

 Jaron always misses about the last 5 seconds of each period because he is covering his ears anticipating the loud buzzer. Gotta love this kid.

Slow and Steady

Most of you know that we are in the incredibly huge process of having our dream house built. We had hoped to have the house "dried in" by now, but like most construction projects, there have been some hold ups. Our plumbers took 2 weeks to show up for the job, our trusses were delivered way behind schedule, and so it goes. These pics are from about a month ago, just after the main floor was framed. You can see the view of the lake from our family and dining rooms, Aaron's dream garage, and what the back or lake side of the house looks like. This is also when the weather was still relatively nice. Wish I could say the same today, but we got about an inch of snow IN the house today. I will try to get more recent pictures posted soon.

Gymnastics night

 

 

 

Instead of watching TV some nights, we watch the kids do their tricks. Jolee has lots now that she is cruising all over the place, climbing stairs, and exploring as much as she can. Chloee is always ready to put on a show, mostly dancing and flips. After doing Yoga with me a few times, she likes to show that off too. Here she is doing some cartwheels and somersaults. I really need to sign  her up for classes because she is really flexible (see the splits pose) and enjoys dancing. Daddy even had to show is Yoga skills in doing the "Crane" pose. Props to Dad, because it's a tough one.

FINALLY! We figured it out!

After much stress and frustration, Aaron sat down at the computer and figured out how to get the add image icon to our MAC.  I don't know what he did, but I can finally blog!! We have been so incredibly busy that I have dozens of pictures to post. I am going to try to take it in small chunks, so here we go.

Jaron is a big first grader now, but since the invention of velcro, he never really mastered tying his shoes. Well, about a month ago, we got him some new P.E. shoes which happened to have laces, so it was time he learned how to tie his own shoes. After a quick reminder lesson and a reference to the SpongeBob episode where SpongeBob learns to tie his shoes and sings a song about it, Jaron got it. He does a great job with his shoes now, and it's one less thing I have to do for him. Yeah Jay!

Still Blogging

Yes, I am still in the blogging world, but right now life is crazy. We have all managed to catch the first fall bug that came around in the form of head colds and coughs. Now that that is over, Chloee proceeded to catch a headache, fever, and puke bug. Good thing it only lasted 24 hours. Alas, my little Jolee is not looking so hot right now and I think she may be getting it too. No fun. I also have been working on some beautiful pictures of the new house construction, Jaron mastering the art of tieing his shoes, Jaron's basketball games, Haylee and Brady running cross country, and a hilarious picture of my now not pregnant friend, Pepper's belly. Hooray, Pepper and Shayne had their gorgeous boy on Monday and all is well. I say I have been working on these pictures because Aaron and I have started using a Mac to download our pics into. Apparently Blogger is not very Mac friendly because we cannot figure out how to get our pics on the stupid post!! Anyone smarter than me in this area? I really don't want to go to a new blog address, but we will keep you posted. Get it, "posted"? I know, I am hilarious.