Hello!?

I was addressing Christmas card envelopes this afternoon and was hoping to find a little inspiration from evergreens that I drew on the invitations from Corynn's camping party. I was hoping to find a pic on this blog since my desktop top computer is still in pieces from the move. It was THEN that I realized it has been FOR-freaking-EVER since I've posted on here. My oh my!

Well, a lot has happened since June. We sold our house on Almira, moved into the new house at Davey, the girls are finishing up first semester, and the twins contemplating colleges. Evie is in preschool and Corynn is going to pass John and I up in height any day now. The twins were in a single car roll over accident the first week of school and it took a month for us to convince them to drive again. We adopted 4 baby kittens from our neighbors across the street and Emma's age is really starting to show. Country living is amazing- I never get tired of the views. Summer will be heaven out here! I can't wait to get chickens, plant a garden and start plotting the orchard.

Christmas is right around the corner and then before you know it- it will be 2016! Hard to believe!

Here are some pics for posterity sake:)

The girls and each of their respective kittens: Max, Achilles, Hello Kitty and Glaucus

Kwynnie

Kynna

Corynn and Evie

Evie and Hello Kitty

my twinners

Nancy's sweater

Nancy gave the twins some sweaters a few years ago. They were hand-me-downs from her for the girls. Somehow one of the sweaters made its way through the wash and into the dryer. Unfortunately it was a wool sweater and shrunk. I mean it really shrunk. It was a cute oversized wool sweater....that quickly became a hand-me-down to Evie. Evie was just a year old at the time. But she would fit into it eventually. Nancy found the humor in it and couldn't wait for Evie to enjoy it. 

Well, that day finally arrived. Over Memorial Day we went to GI town to bury Nancy's ashes. It was rainy and 49 degrees. It seemed like a perfect day for her to wear her grandma's sweater. 

Adorable! 

House update

Here are a few pix of the house. Things are progressing quite nicely. It's feeling more and more like a house everyday.

Here are some of my finish selections; carpet, granite, tile and paint colors. 

My mom bought a fixer upper in GI town. The previous owners abandoned their cats. Two little kitties, one boy and one girl. We are hoping to rehome them to our new home as farm cats. They live outside right now and have been fending for themselves for over a year. They are great little hunters and friendly. My mom is feeding them until the house is finished. Here's the little guy we call Rory (Roar-y). 

I'm so excited about moving to the country. John and I have so many plans and we can't wait to embrace the country lifestyle. And the views are amazing! Soon this will be the scenery we wake up to every morning! How cool is that!?

Jeff's birthday bash

At one time my sister in law, Amy, and I had grand visions of a full on birthday bash for Jeff. He turned the big 7-0 and we really wanted to do something fun with lots of friends and family. But somehow Jeff caught wind of these grand plans and nixed them. He said (in a very firm voice) "I appreciate what you want to do, but don't. I don't want a big party with friends. "

Some would have been discouraged by that. But I just heard- don't invite my friends...he didn't say anything about family!

So Amy and pulled together a family dinner at the acreage for his birthday. KC, Kim, Sheila, Steve, Kelly, Ed and girls were all in attendance as well as our families. It was a lovely evening. I absolutely love getting the Kelly family together. They are a great bunch of people. And celebrating a wonderful man was awesome too!

The cousins ran around, played with water balloons and jumped on the trampoline. Evie tagged along the whole time. And it definitely tuckered her out. She was asleep before we hit city limits and slept in until 10 the next morning. She sure is a cutie! 

Summer 2015

Well, summer 2015 has been chugging right along. I can't believe June is half over. We officially have two seniors, a 7th grader and a preschooler in the house. Complete craziness.

The twins are busy working on volunteer hours to fulfill their LPS requirement for graduation. Corynn is busy sleeping in and playing minecraft. And Evie is busy keeping everyone on their toes.

Evie has really taken an interest in Emma. She loves to comb her, pet her and play fetch. It's super cute!

Not a lot of fun adventures. It's been rainy since the beginning of May. Yards are marshy and mosquitos are fierce this year. Despite all that, we have made a few visits to the zoo. Evie LOVES the zoo. Not sure if its all the animals or the popcorn and ice-cream. But she LOVES it nonetheless. Especially the butterflies! :)

Fingers crossed for better weather so we can venture to parks and spend more time at the acreage. We've accumulated more than 20 inches in the last seven weeks. That's a years worth of moisture in under two months. Wowzers is right!

House update

Not much to report or update....but we do have a basement! 

Better than nothing! 

Twinners

The twins are busy finishing up their Junior year. Last week was full of AP testing and taking the ACT. They also competed in the State level of Science Olympiad and represented LSE high school. They came home with a medal in Astronomy. Which was kind of cool considering they really like their Astronomy teacher and he is retiring at the end of the year. So it was nice to win that for him.

This summer will be busy visiting a few colleges and start applying to their favorites. McKynna really has her heart set on going to school in Scotland and I'm not going to lie, this mama is having a hard time digesting that. Thankfully she is also open to attending UNO...so at least I can sleep at night.

Kwynn is thinking UNL for a year and then transferring to BYU. Both girls actually like BYU, they just need to verify that the college credits they've already earned will transfer.

Hard to believe my little twinnies are getting ready for college. Complete craziness!

Best Bud

My dear friend, Kristina, and her family visited last week. That was a house full! Kristina has 6 kids!!  Kris was in town because her granddaughter was being born. Kristina's eldest son, Mike, was killed in a car accident last November. His pregnant girlfriend was with him. She sustained serious injuries that required surgeries and physical therapy. Despite all that, the baby survived. And sweet little Amiya Paige was born Tuesday April 21st. Kristina was able to be there in the room and cut the cord. It was such a bittersweet moment for everyone.

It was fun week full chaos and kids...what can you expect when you house 13 people together!?

The girls snuggled on baby Scarlett! 

I took the older boys to our family acreage so they could explore and run around. They spent hours catching frogs and had a blast getting muddy. 

We didn't think to take any pictures until they were literally packing up to leave. Kids were cranky, some were in the shower and I was still getting ready- so not really great photos of our two families, but that's ok! There's always next time

Poor Ems

Emma is our Australian Shepherd. We've had her since December 28th 2005. She's part of the family. John and the girls love her dearly. But lately she's been really showing her age. She whimpers when she stands, doesn't eat as much and has become really needy like wanting to ride with me every time I leave the house. She was due for her annual vet visit, so I was sure to ask about her changes in behavior and movement. The vet found a cancerous lump on her leg. We scheduled her for a lumpectomy and had it sent away for a pathology report. Poor girl.

Tuesday was rough for her. The vet took much more of the lump and muscle than we initially thought he would.

We should know how bad it is in 5-7 days when the report comes back. Meanwhile Emma is being spoiled and pampered by the whole family. :)

Loving Spring

The spring weather the past few weeks has been absolutely amazing! We've had mild temperatures and rain which has turned the drab and dreary winter yards into amazing green landscapes blooming with beauty. We have been busy enjoying all this loveliness. 

We've been to the zoo a few times. Evie loves it there. During the summer we'll end up going 2 or 3 times a week. 

We have a brave little friend living in our backyard trees. He comes right up on the porch, sometimes right up to the door and peeks inside. We also have a wild bunny that Evie has befriended and feeds spinach and carrots. He's become so comfortable with the family and Emma that he/she built their home right by our deck. Evie named him/her "Bugs".

And believe it or not- Evie has already played in the sprinklers! Crazy little bugger! After about an hour, she came in and told John "Dad, next time you turn on the sprinklers- use the hot water! It was cold!" I bet dear! 

I can't believe it's just about May! Summer will be here before we know it! 

Crazy kid

Evie is reaching the age where her personality is starting to develop and she's becoming a little person, rather than just a toddler. It's been so much fun watching her grow up. She is full of sass and can have a meltdown that rivals Chernobyl, but she's so much fun! We love her to pieces!

She loves visiting John at work and "helping" him cut purchase orders

Her fashion sense is second to none! This little number is something she threw together for quick visit to Dairy Queen. 

When she is tired- she is tired. She will fall asleep anywhere (attributed to the Kelly genes). She was playing a game on the iPad. I left the room for less than minute and ZONK... she was OUT! 

She will be starting preschool in the fall. There are days I think how lonely it will be with out my partner in crime. But most days I'm pretty sure I'll survive just fine! :)

Building a foundation

We officially broke ground on our new home March 19th. It's kind of crazy and surreal. John and I have been wanting to build our own home out on the family acreage since we bought the place 13 years ago. It was always a dream, a goal we were ultimately working towards. John and I realize how incredibly fortunate we are to be able to do this.

We designed our new home, which was an exciting task. We poured over floor plans for months, literally thousands of them. We never found the perfect one to fit our needs and long term plans for the home. Then one day we found a plan was very very close, but not quite. So we took that plan, eliminated the second floor, add a master to the main floor, reconfigured the other bedrooms and moved a few walls. Finally we were at a point where this was the house we wanted. We took our crazy drawings to a few builders, who liked our vision but had floor plans that were similar and tried to push us that way. Then by chance we found James. We had worked with James on a previous project and experience was great. So we met with him and showed him our sketches. He immediately saw what we were going for and fully embraced it. We knew he was our guy.

James is a super great guy and has high expectations for the standard of work on his builds. He's great to work with and has been super accommodating with our requests. It has been so much fun picking out flooring, cabinets, tile and granite. I pretty much have a vision in my head of what I want, so picking out the actual material has been pretty easy.

Of course there has been stress, mostly because we have our current home on the market and we want it to sell. The waiting game is stressful. So is living in a home while trying to sell it, especially when there is 6 of us here. But it will all be worth it! I know the right buyer is out there. :)

Here are the first pix of Casa de Kelly: