Illinios, Here We Come!

We have a house!

433 Gillman Ave

Washington, IL 61571

We came to Illinois a week ago and the mortgage broker fell through and didn't have our home loan ready. So, we ended up staying in a hotel for a week! Ben started working, I spent all day on the phone with various people trying to sort out the big mess, and the poor neglected kids got to watch a lot of the Disney channel. It was a stressful week, but it finally came together last night just in the nick of time!

Most of our things are still in the moving truck, so the kids got to have a sleepover in the living room our first night  in our new house:

And everyone ended up in bed with mommy and daddy by morning :)

We are so glad to have a house!!! It's not perfect, but it's ours. I'm so excited to make a home here in Illinois. Let the adventures begin!

Goodbye Iowa!

After a crazy week, concluded by an allnighter of packing and cleaning, we are finally loaded and ready to move on. The big boys get to drive the big truck. Cole is super excited about it!! I think he has half his belongings in the cab of the truck with him :)

  

It's a little bittersweet leaving Waukee, IA. We have had a great 4 years here in Iowa! Our kids have had everything a little kid could dream of, we have been a part of an amazing family community with terrific schools, and we have been surrounded by terrific neighbors and friends. Although medical school was really hard, the "family" we had here made it doable and even enjoyable. We have been so blessed to be in such a great place and have the best friends anyone could ask for!

We will really miss Iowa...and especially our great friends!

It's time to move on though, so Illinois here we come....

Bear Lake

Mindy invited us to Bear Lake to stay at her friend's timeshare...so I got to go to Bear Lake for my birthday!!

We had a blast hanging out in the pool with cousins!

Cole had fun "swimming by himself" and with Maryn's girls:

Dax and Ben had a great time "splashing" around in the baby pool :)

Ellie has issues with water up her nose so she spent most of her time in the baby pool too. She had a blast hanging out with Edyn, Dax and Daddy:

  

After dinner and ice cream Ben, Cole and Ellie hit the mini golf course. Ellie took a few lessons from proffesional golfer Daddy:

 Cole didn't need any help. He's basically a pro already. Just look at that form :)

 Dax had fun hanging out with the big cousins back at the condo...although I think Landon and Brittyn had more fun playing with their favorite cousin baby Daxton :) No one can get enough of this little guy!!

Our second day at Bear Lake was my birthday-the big 30!

Our little family decided to head down to the beach, but we forgot a few things so Ben and the kids waited under a tree while I ran back...by the time I got back to them Dax and Ben were both asleep :)

Dax stayed asleep when we got to the beach...

 Cole and I headed to the water...

and Ellie and Ben started in on their super amazing sand castle:

Cole decided to pitch in on the sand castle...

 And Dax finally woke up!! And he was super ornery! We got some good cuddle time in under the umbrella. Here is a terrible picture to prove I was actually there on my bday :) 

 Dax eventually decided to explore, and by explore I mean eat the sand and then throw it :) And we eventually even made it to the sand castle where Dax had a ball splashing in the moat!

I had a super fabulous day at the beach with my cute little family! Afterward we went out for pizza and a Bear Lake milkshake with my parents and Mindy's family. And Ben, being the best husband ever, made me homemade cheesecake!! So far it is great to be 30!

Mr. Chubster's First Fat Lip

Daxton got his first fat lip, poor bubba. It's hard to look past his big beautiful blue eyes to notice it, but it's there.

We came to Utah last minute to visit family before we move to Illinois. Mainly we came to see Tyson and Jami sealed to sweet baby Porter!! We already said all of our goodbyes in Iowa and are just waiting for our home loan to come through, so we decided to stay a few days longer and hang out with  family for a bit. It seems like every time we visit grandma's house one of my kiddos gets a fat lip or some kind of wound. When the cousins get together they play pretty hard!

A few of our favorite things...

We decided to go to a few of our favorite places here in Iowa one last time. 

First stop was the zoo. We have loved our zoo here! It's not very big, but it has been perfect for us.

We love the rainforest area with all of the fishes, frogs, birds and snakes...

 We love watching the wallabies hop around us...

 And we LOVE the train!!

  We love the petting area where we can feed the goats and fishes, and play on the playground...

 We love watching the sea lions swim under water...

 And we absolutely LOVE feeding the giraffes in the African exhibit!

  And today we even got to make a little music on some drums :)

We will miss our cute little Blank Park Zoo in Des Moines!!

Next stop was Union Park with the rocket slide and carousel. This is our favorite park in Iowa!

Cole loves the big, steep slide! Ellie and I are a little chicken for it :)

 We also love the splash pad to keep us cool in the hot, humid Iowa summers...

 And we LOVE the carousel!!

Unfortunately the carousel was closed today  so we didn't actually get to ride :(

We are REALLY going to miss Iowa!! There are so many fun places to visit and things to do. We have had the best friends and neighbors. It has been a perfect place for our family for the past four years. We have made so many amazing memories. Even though the kids are really young, I hope they never forget what amazing experiences we had in Iowa.