July!

It’s already July and I can’t believe it. I have a lot of kind of random pictures from the last few weeks.

First of all, my bestie best friend just moved to Connecticut :( Brian got a job out there for just a year so luckily they will be back soon. But I will definitely miss Shell-Bell, Brian and Thaddy. Shell is the bestest friend a girl could ask for. We have been friends since I was in 7th grade! We played volleyball together in high school, lived together in college, we were bridesmaids at each other’s weddings and a whole lot more! She has been there for me through so many happy and sad times and I give her a ton of credit for my testimony and a lot of the good decisions I made in my life came because of her amazing influence. She is such a good person and it’s been so neat to watch her as a mother. I look to her for advice and she never lets me down! I will miss her so much, but I know we will still talk all the time and we’re planning on going to visit in the spring. We have stayed close through so much over the past 10 years so I know we will through this too! Connecticut is nothing compared to Russia or the Netherlands :) I love you Shell!

They had a BBQ at a park before they left and it was really fun. I bawled a lot when I said goodbye but I just love her and will miss her and her great husband and baby boy.

The boys had too much fun on the tire swing. Brian, Dan, Todd and Ben all managed to fit on the swing at once! Thaddy pants was obsessed with the bark in the playground! He kept picking it up and putting it in piles all over the place! He is so stinkin’ cute! We had some family over for dinner on Sunday and it was really fun. I have said this before, but I absolutely LOVE when people come to our house and eat and have fun! I only took a few pics and they were all of my cutey cute nephew Everett!

Our fire pit is done! I can’t believe how fast it came together, but Dan’s brothers came and helped him and they pounded it all out in one day! Amazing. But we love love it and here are a few pics.

Before: imagine this pit full of 3 foot tall weeds, grass clippings from the past year, an old Christmas tree and herds of mice and rats. No joke. It was frightening. The boys working in the super hot sun. And now here it is! I would say it’s about 75%-80% done. We are going to build some benches to put in there and then next summer we will dig out a little more grass around the entire thing and plant flowers and plants. But it’s getting there! We had an inaugural (can I use that term for a fire pit?) fire last night just to make sure nothing blew up and it went perfectly. We busted out our camp chairs and cooked up some delightful tinfoil dinners. Then we had s’mores and invited our neighbors over. It was a glorious summer evening and we absolutely loved it. I can’t wait to do more! We’re having Dan’s family over on Saturday and I’m so excited! Dan did the vast majority of the work and planning for the pit and he works so hard in our yard and it looks amazing. I couldn’t be luckier to have such a funny and hard working guy as my husband! He is my best friend and I just love hanging out with him! Even though we have done so much in the yard and to the house and I love it, I still have tons of plans and ideas and other things I want to do! I have about a billion ideas in my head and written down and a few projects I’m in the middle of that I need to finish! But I really want to paint the front and back doors and I’m trying to decide what I want.

Here is what it looks like now: I thought I wanted a red door, but now I’m wondering if I should just go with a classic black door. I also really want some wooden shutters and a window flower box. So I photo-shopped some pictures to get an idea of what it might look like. I’m pretty impressed with my skills haha. I also added the rocking chair because I want one on the porch!

So what do you guys think? What color looks best? Is there another suggestion you have? Of course the red isn’t the exact red I would use, but you get the idea. I also need to re-stain the back steps and back door, but I don’t know if I should do the back door a color or just white or what?? Give me ideas people! I love having color so I’m not opposed to a colored door (I’d have to convince Dan though!), but I don’t want it to look weird…let me know what I should do!

Here is our back porch right now: Let me know what you guys think I should do! I also finally bought the rest of the supplies to completely finish the laundry room so I just need to get the cabinets painted and installed! Yay!