Before beginning this post, I was looking back at our photos of vacation at the lake so nostalgically! I was again craving the peacefulness of the lake and the relaxation of summer. August has proven to be a rather interesting month in our household! Here is a recap:
.
One of the highlights of this month was a weekend trip to Houston for my cousin's wedding. This was Ben's first ride on an airplane and his first stay in a hotel. He was equally excited about riding the shuttle buses at the airport, which would also be his first bus ride. The trip went very smoothly and it was fun to see a lot of my family while we were there. However, we found ourselves slightly exhausted due to the quick trip and the quick turn around of Brant leaving on another business trip at 5:00 am the morning after our return.
Another highlight in the few last weeks was a quadruple baby shower with college friends. Four of us are all due between October 1st and the 29th. I had so much fun catching up with the girls and enjoying lots of laughs! Thanks for a great time, girls!!
Ben continues to grow and amaze us. Lately, he loves to help me cook. We have been making lots of zuchini recipes with the many zucchinis from our garden. He also discovered that frosting cupcakes is most fun when you just eat the frosting! I really can't make any sort of baked good anymore without him wanting to "help." Ben has also recently shown a fascination with sharks, especially hammerhead sharks, which has led to some interesting conversations. Another new thing is that Ben has begun to be concerned about scary things. We're not sure where this stemmed from, as this is the kid that has never flinched at a thunderstorm and always slept with his door closed, but lately, he has expressed concern over scary voices (such as those on books on CD in the car) and noises at night. It is, no doubt, another phase we are entering, but I'm always so interested in how these things just seem to suddenly appear.
Another highlight lately is that I began my new position as an instructional coach this month. I've been back at work for several weeks, which is always a transition from summer. So far, things have been going really well and I'm enjoying the new challenges!
When I said we have had an interesting month, I didn't mean it all in the most positive way. Amid all the flooding in Iowa, we were one of the thousands of people who ended up with a wet basement. I woke up on one of the many mornings after a night full of rain and looked out the window to see our pond higher than I've ever seen it, our dock completely submerged, our neighbors pontoon gone and retaining wall collapsed, and a paddle boat in our backyard (which was not our paddle boat). The picture I've included above was actually taken the morning before night of the "big rain." Additionally, our cats would not leave me alone that morning, so I decided to go downstairs to see what was wrong. Sure enough, I reached the bottom of our stairs to find water all over the hard surface floors in our utility and storage area. I then discovered that the entire carpeted area of our basement was also wet. URG! To make a very long story short, after much frustration and our house beginning to smell like a sweaty sock, we finally were able to get a company to our house four days later and were immediately told that the carpet needed to be ripped out, along with the bottom two feet of dry wall throughout the entire basement. Since then we've also confirmed that it was a drain outside our basement door that was overwhelmed. Luckily, we didn't have any furniture downstairs and most things we were storing were in rubbermaid tubs, so we didn't lose any personal belongings. We weren't really using our basement as a living area yet, although we were planning to relocate our guest bedroom down there. We are much, much more fortunate than so many other people, so I'm trying to keep our inconvenience in perspective!
When I said we have had an interesting month, I didn't mean it all in the most positive way. Amid all the flooding in Iowa, we were one of the thousands of people who ended up with a wet basement. I woke up on one of the many mornings after a night full of rain and looked out the window to see our pond higher than I've ever seen it, our dock completely submerged, our neighbors pontoon gone and retaining wall collapsed, and a paddle boat in our backyard (which was not our paddle boat). The picture I've included above was actually taken the morning before night of the "big rain." Additionally, our cats would not leave me alone that morning, so I decided to go downstairs to see what was wrong. Sure enough, I reached the bottom of our stairs to find water all over the hard surface floors in our utility and storage area. I then discovered that the entire carpeted area of our basement was also wet. URG! To make a very long story short, after much frustration and our house beginning to smell like a sweaty sock, we finally were able to get a company to our house four days later and were immediately told that the carpet needed to be ripped out, along with the bottom two feet of dry wall throughout the entire basement. Since then we've also confirmed that it was a drain outside our basement door that was overwhelmed. Luckily, we didn't have any furniture downstairs and most things we were storing were in rubbermaid tubs, so we didn't lose any personal belongings. We weren't really using our basement as a living area yet, although we were planning to relocate our guest bedroom down there. We are much, much more fortunate than so many other people, so I'm trying to keep our inconvenience in perspective!
To top it off (and yes, we are laughing about this now, but I definitely wasn't before), in the last week we have lost water due to a pressure gauge in our well breaking, had issues with Brant's office phone, and a small, easy to fix breakdown of our air conditioner. All of these are now fixed. Ha, ha, ha...!
Posts
