Sam and Grace with Grandma

So, I was not there for this but it is so cute I have to share it.

The Minnesota Trip

The first weekend of October we went to Minnesota to see Mike, Alia and the kids.

My Grandparents went up there, my parents and us. We all when to the casino for dinner. And boy can those kids eat!

Sam's birthday was in September so we wanted to take him to get a build a bear, he was so cute he picked out a cheeta, named it Cheeta (takes after my brother) picked out pink bunny slippers and a really cool motorcycle for it to ride. Then we went to the amusement park in the mall of America. Uncle Gabe was the luckey one to go round and round with him. Except for a few that we all went on.

It was also Grace's baptism (finally) Alia had to cancel 4 times because of all of us. Sorry, Alia but thank you. Grace is a character she just smiles but she will tell you what she wants, she has a mind of her own, but man oh man does she have a great personality. At the baptism, she just wanted to play with the water and when we came back for a spaghetti dinner she told us she was hungry by sitting in her chair on the floor, it was so cute.

Sam did really good at the baptism and so did Sophia (she is such a cutie)

It was a very eventfull weekend because, on sunday my brother ran this 26 mile marathon, which as normal he did great at. After 26 miles he was still smiling. The year before in 95 degree weather that was another story.

The last weekend in September

Well the last weekend in September was another busy weekend, Rich and Becky stayed the weekend to Go to Chris and Anna's wedding and they also helped us design the Kitchen. (Which, thanks to Rich is going to be Great!) We also got some wonderful and exciting news. After Three plus years of trying Rich and Becky finally joined the Baby Blog YEAH!!!!! Did I mention I am excited.

I also decided to take a picture of the top of Gabe's head. I wanted to see if the house was getting to him. NOT YET!!!

I almost forgot, the weekend before we had Demo day, Becky and I threw a bridal shower for Anna and then had a old school pj/slumber bachelorette party for Anna. Anna is such a cute bride and Becky and I had a blast doing it.

So now back to the fun of the house. The blue prints are done, we try to get the permit and it is not going to fly we needed way more info. But it worked out because we could not move the stairs. There is an extra brick wall in the basement. Must have been an addition along time ago. So, no permit, no stairs but we can still remove a wall and close up a door. We finally got the permit(oops). We had to do more demoing which was actually a lot of fun. Rich and Becky came to help again. Thanks Guys.

Becky knocked out the side wall with all the tile, it was insane she had it done in like 10 minutes.

Gabe pulled down the Saufet and two feet of the ceiling with all the insulation came with him.

I did the wall with tile that we could not go through the other side or we would have been in the living room.

Rich did everything else.

And my dad built the layout for the breakfast bar and closed up the side door. So stylish! HEHE

It was Labor Day weekend so we headed to my Dad's Condo in Indiana(where he works) to go relax, spend some family time with my parents and the dogs and go on the boat.

The dogs love the boat but not the water! They would only go up to their legs and then sit down. I thought retrievers loved water.

Gabe Drove the boat for a while, I was nervous with the other boats around, but not my dad he got to relax.

It was nice to finally have a break

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Well after the dads started the demo, Rey and Benito came over to finish gutting it out. My dad and I went in to look around and turned on the kitchen light. My dad made a comment about a hissing noice and I smelt something and then we looked at the light switch to see the smoke. Yeah that wasn't good! Good thing my best friend is an Electrician and was on his way to look at our electric. Minus the smell it was not to bad.
When Rich showed up, my dad and him got to talking and came up with this great idea to close the side door, move the basement stairs and add the breakfast bar. It really did not sound like a bad idea.
So, my dad started the blue prints( it is great when you know an engineer/architecht and your his little girl :)) So we could take them in to get our permits, and then we took a break!

Wow I was looking at my last blog and realized I have a lot of catching up to do.

Since the tree was cut down, Gabe's dad came over with my dad and were going to remove the bottom cabinets to and put new tile in, from that it went to the top cabinets becuase there was no insulation in the walls to, no cabinets, no drywall, never any insulation to new electric.(Thanks Rich) oh to tearing out a wall, closing up a door, and adding a breakfast bar.

It all sounds like it will be great but man what were we thinking. Well this all started in the middle of August. And this is our old Kitchen being demoed! Only one injury, which was my dad and thank fully he did not pass out. (we have weak stomaches) I walked to the grocery store and am fully supplied with, bandaids, gauze, medical tape and lots of neosporine for the next oops!