Thanksgiving

Well, we had a wonderful Thanksgiving this year. We went to Iowa to see Courtney's family. We got to see the whole fam and of course Isobel loved being spoiled by everyone! Courtney made his famous trash can turkey and it turned out perfectly. We had an amazing dinner (thanks Linda!) and enjoyed catching up with everyone. Isobel got to see all the farm animals, she especially loved the cows. And the cow poo especially loved her shoes! April and Lola stopped by and I couldn't believe how much she'd grown. She and Isobel had fun playing together. The boys did their usual clay pigeon shoot on the hill at the farm. They all did a great job, but Chris took the trophy! Ugh, not again! Better luck next year guys! Somehow Greg ended up with all the kids piled on his head the whole time, but he held his own. None of us ventured out for black Friday deals...I think we were in a food coma for a couple of days. Isobel kept everyone pretty busy reading books, playing, watching her shows, and watching videos on the computer. But she had so much fun, I think she realized the fun was over when we got home! So our holiday was fun and relaxing and we loved see the whole family. We love you all so much! Now it's time to buckle down for Christmas shopping.

Pumpkin patch

We took a family trip to the Red Barn in Weston, Mo. It is such a cool pumpkin patch! They have all kinds of animals, a horse drawn hayride, a country store and tons of pumpkins. It was a really hot day, but we had so much fun. We got a lot of great pics of Isobel. She loved the animals! A goat tried to eat her stroller but she didn't even care...she just pet him and laughed. She wanted her very own pumpkin, so we got her a tiny one to carry around. We ended up buying a ton of gourds, pumpkins, hay bales and corn stalks. Then we went across the street to an apple orchard where I gave Isobel a sample of fresh apple cider, which she loved! I later found out that is was unpasterized...it's a miracle I haven't killed her yet! All in all, it was a beautiful day and we had a great time.

Halloween

So, it's a little bit late, but I thought I would put a pic of Isobel in her costume. She was a sheep this year, but was mistaken for a dog and a rabbit...so maybe we'll stay away from the animal costumes next year! She had a great time. We went trick-or-treating at Papa Phil's with Aunt Bridget and Philip (which Isobel sometimes calls Phil-bop). Philip was Harry Potter and looked awesome! It was a little sad because Papa's neighborhood wasn't too Halloween friendly. Only a couple of houses were handing out candy, but I guess it was okay because I just ended up eating it all! Our neighbors gave Isobel an apple and she was so thrilled! Being a baby must be great!

Better late than never!

Hi everyone! Well, sorry that the blog hasn't been updated in FOREVER! We moved out here to the country and I had no internet for a while to update our page. But I'm back online, so I'll try to do better. Anyway, so much has happened since the last post. As I said earlier, we moved to Holt (which, for those of you who know MO, is just north of Kearney). We have a beautiful home out here on 5 acres. Courtney has loved all the space and of course he has endless projects to keep him busy...so he's in love! I'm slowly getting used to being out in the country, but I love the peace and quiet. Isobel is now 18 mos old and is doing great! She is such a crazy girl...she keeps us laughing constantly. She has learned how to tell jokes already and loves it when we laugh at her. Today she went up to her Daddy, who was sitting in the recliner, and she tickled his feet. I know that doesn't sound that funny but you should have seen her little hands tickling his huge feet, and she even said, "tickle, tickle, tickle"! It was hilarious. So we have other big news, Isobel is going to be a big sister! Yes, we are having another baby. We already found out it is another girl. I guess Courtney will have to be surrounded by beautiful women...what a drag! So far this pregnancy has been great (unlike last time). So we're doing great. There have been alot of changes in our little family over the past couple of years, but we are all hanging in there. Luckily we have a lot of love to share with eachother. I will post some new pics too, as soon as I can find them! Thanks for coming to the page! Love you all.

Hi everyone!

So, I guess since the other web page I started was a bust I'll try this blogging thing. After much prompting from others, I will give it a try!

For all of you that would like an update on how we've been doing lately...here goes! Well, Courtney loves his new job. He started working for Eli Lilly in March, selling pharmaceuticals, and is doing great! He is still in the animal medicine side, so he is in very familiar territory. We just took an amazing trip to San Diego in May and I finally got to see the ocean. It was so incredible! We had an amazing time, despite the cold, rainy weather. The Shriver family campout was a couple of weeks ago and we all had a blast! We took Isobel and both dogs with us and they loved it. Suprisingly the dogs stayed right by the campground without running away...now if we could get them to obey that well at home, we'd be set!

Isobel turned one in April and grows by leaps every single day! She is the brightest place in both of our lives and we are so blessed by her amazing spirit. She's not walking yet, but for those of you that know "the Boo", she keeps her own pace ~ to say the least! She finally started crawling on her hands and knees instead of the army man crawl. Who needs to walk when you can crawl at 15 mph? She has four teeth and eats like a little piggy. She is a big talker too! (I wonder who she gets that from? :) ) Her new favorite words are shoe, thank-you, NO, and bite (as in a food bite, ha ha!) Swimming is her new favorite past time. She would stay in that water all day if she could.

I am looking forward to spending a lot of fun in the sun this summer as a family. We have been so blessed the past two years, I can't imagine what will be ahead for us. There will be more blogs to come, I'm sure, so thank you for visiting. Love you all!!!