The most wonderful time...

Of the year! And the countdown begins....

0 hours until the last day of school is over!!!!! ahhh.. feels good to be off for a little while

12 hours until Kyle's siblings come into town: looking forward to lots of laughter, games, pedicures:) giving gifts, cooking together, decorating gingerbread houses, and reading books to the kids

3 days until Christmas Eve and the Wayside Inn Dinner tradition (its my first Christmas in MA- can't wait to see all the traditions that Kyle grew up with), Christmas Eve Services at New England Chapel and Old South Church in Boston

4 days until Christmas: family, food, and celebrating Jesus' birth.

5 days until we drive the MICHIGAN! 12 hours in the car and we arrive in Michigan at a new house (will be kinda weird at first).

7 days until we see Brandon and Amy-- and get to stay all four of us in one room at Mom and Dad's condo... will be interesting, nice and cozy! Can't wait to see the Grandparents, family and friends.

10 days until Mom Deur's birthday!!! (oh yea... and its New Year's Eve)

and we won't talk about what comes after that, it just gets too close to thinking about driving back to MA and getting back into the swing of work.


....And one more note we should share: Kyle and his friend Mitch, just closed the deal on a duplex foreclosure in town today. Looks like the list of house projects just got a LOT Bigger!!! It has a lot of potential and will be fun to renovate all together :) (will post a picture later)

'PINspired'

I just can't stop crafting now that I am addicted to pintrest!
Here are my latest projects! (I may have gone to the craft store immediately after I saw these wreaths on pintrest... I think I need a support group-- or maybe just a crafting group :)

For this wreath I used a straw wreath and spray painted it with a caramel metallic color. The flowers are made of felt and ribbon. I bought the 'berries' from the store for .98 cents. I added a couple beads to the flowers to dress them up!

For this wreath, I started with a green foam wreath and wrapped it with thick yarn (this took forever!). Then did similar flowers as the one above with felt and beads.

Giving Thanks...

...for such a wonderful weekend full of family and good food. We had a lovely thanksgiving meal at Lance and RoseAnn's with a small group of family. It was so nice to keep it small this year! The food was outstanding, we were the lucky ones who got to celebrate with Abigail and enjoy the AMAZING turkey!

Beckett was just as cute as ever... poor guy only got barley and prunes for his first Thanksgiving feast! He'll have more to look forward to next year!

Birthday's, Bashes and a Baptism

In the past month we have celebrated Duke's first birthday, Beckett's baptism, and started demolition in the upstairs bathroom!


I have also been obsessed with Pintrest. Its a website that has inspired so many craft ideas! I love getting diy tutorials, new recipes, and decor ideas! So... here are a couple of the crafts completed.

New curtain in the kitchen, covers up the somewhat unorganized closet/pantry!

made a camera strap cover with cute fabric and christmas trees from paper covered in tissue paper! thank you, pintrest!

Its beginning to look at lot like....

CHRISTMAS!!!! I wanted to go Christmas shopping today... but then looked at a calendar, and its still October! We had a winter storm last night, getting about 3-4'' of snow on the ground. Our day yesterday included mowing the lawn, raking the leaves, and before dinner we shoveled two inches of slushy snow off the driveway. Seems like we skipped the month of November. I actually didn't mind the snow though... it was really pretty this morning when we woke up, snow covered branches and a dusting of white all over the ground.

Mt. Wachusett

We drove up to Mt. Wachusett today! The day started as a windy, but beautiful fall day. Once we got on the road, it started to rain... so instead of doing some hiking with Duke we drove up to the top of the mountain. It was a gorgeous view, seeing fall colors and the Boston sky line. I would love to go back on a clear day!

Summer again

This weekend felt like summer again! The weather was perfect. Sunny, blue skies, 80 degrees, and a light breeze, what more could you ask for? We had a wedding on Saturday for a co-worker of Kyle. It was a fun and beautiful night. Sunday, we went down to Newport for the afternoon. Walked around town with Duke and sat by the ocean. Kyle got his fill of fried clams and Kilwin's ice cream. It was a perfect day! Here are a couple pictures... back to work tomorrow (Happy Columbus day!).

wedding celebrations!

Congratulations to Annika and Spencer Hartfeld!
Photos from the wedding... unfortunately, I didn't get one of the lovely, beautiful bride!

Good to see old friends!


Photo booth at the wedding!

two more days...

...UNTIL WE GO BACK TO MI!!!
We (or at least I) can't wait to go back home for a couple days. We have Annika and Spencer's wedding on Saturday and are looking forward to celebrating their special day! So excited to see new little ones and old friends and family. We will definitely miss Duke, as he wouldn't be a great companion on an airplane, he will be staying with "Nanny and Papa" for the weekend!
Here is what we have been up to lately....


Teaching Beckett to love dogs at a young age! And teaching Duke to love kids too!

What happens when Kyle is in charge of Duke!

Irene

Light, camera, action! We can finally see in our house! Sunday, the tropical storm came sweeping through the north east. Church was already cancelled on Saturday, and the storm began to hit hard early Sunday morning. As the wind was howling we were watching out the front windows, only to see our neighbors big tree come crashing down on the wires. As the tree feel, all our lights went out immediately! Thankfully, God kept all our neighbors safe and sound without any tree damage to houses. Some had water in the basements, our stayed pretty dry. Another thanks, to our New England parents for letting us move in for days until our power was restored! After checking every day to see if we had power, the good news finally came on Thursday afternoon. I looked up to the technician in the cherry picker and gave the thumbs up, then a thumbs down.... he returned with a thumbs up!! Good news... we would have our power by the evening. It really made us realize how much we have to be thankful for each day, and how much we take for granted.
(In preperation for the storm, I cut down all the sunflowers and put them in the house... I ran out of vases there were too many!)
Since we were without power, my parents and I decided it would be best for them to reschedule their visit. This was upsetting, but I look forward to going home in a few weeks for Annika's wedding, and they will visit sometime in October. We will enjoy tomorrow off of work by doing some house work and going to see the movie "The Help". I have heard that it is such a good film, can't wait to see it!

Duke update! Duke has been going through his 'teenage' years! He is being stubborn and defiant, but we still love him! Kyle and I have been teaching him some tricks. He can "sit pretty" on his back two feet, and he can balance and twirl on his "tippy toes"!

Dogs, closets and surprises

Duke, loving the backyard in the summer!
We have been making more progress on odds and ends in the house. The past few weeks we been slowly finishing up the closet in the kitchen;now it just needs a nice floor and a curtain!

This past Saturday, Kyle and Josh decided to surprise Rochelle and I with a picnic... pretty impressive for them, but I was slightly curious about what type of picnic surprise it was when Kyle said that I could make the food, if I wanted to :) haha... I said NO! Well, it turns out the picnic wasn't the surprise, they took us to the Maroon 5 concert! It was my first concert experience and I LOVED it! Maroon 5 was great, Train followed them and was good, but I didn't know many of their songs. Thanks boys!

Yahtzee!!!!

Not often that you get paid for doing the laundry... I found $24.00 when I was folding our clothes today. FINDERS KEEPERS!!! (thanks, Kyle!)

Vacation

We had so much fun on vacation this past week! We went home to Michigan and enjoyed life at the cottage for a long weekend and some time at home in Holland too. Between riding the boat, swimming in the lake, grilling, playing in the yard, and no naps... Duke was pooped at the end of the week!

Going fishin'

Duke new favorite cool down with the hot weather.... going fishing... for ice cubes! It is so cute... he even blows bubbles with his whole snout in the water.

New best friend?

Duke wasn't quite sure about this moving red thing! We had lobster last Saturday and thought Duke should check 'him' out first!!!

We also had a great Father's Day, hosting dinner with Mom and Dad Engbers, Lori and Andy along with Bek, and Andy's parents too. It was a nice way to spend father's day... with family.
We are looking forward to vacation next week to MI!!! Can't wait to go home, go to the cottage, teach Duke to swim in the lake, and see family and friends!

Beard... or no beard

Kyle and I have been taking bets on whether Duke will grow a doggy beard or not. I am not a fan of the dog bears... and for heaven's sake, Duke is only 7 months old! No puppy needs a beard. But on the other hand, Kyle won the 'bet' we took, so technically we should keep the beard when Duke goes for a hair cut next week. So... I decided we need to leave it in your hands.... beard, or no beard?

Crazy weather

We are safe and sound after the tornado ripped through parts of MA on Wednesday evening, just thankful that it skipped over us! It brought some very nice, dry, cool weather and we had the privilege of catching sights of an awesome rainbow in the backyard last night!

catching up

My mom and I spent the weekend catching up on a girl's weekend in Maine. It was a great first trip to Maine for both of us. We spent our time touring small coastal towns, eating at fabulous restaurants, relaxing, and enjoying each others company! It was a great to be with her for a few days... can't wait till we go home this summer in July!

When we came home we found that Kyle had quite a productive weekend while we were out having fun! He started to tackle the project of finishing up the garage! It looks great, but still needs to be finished. We will work on it this weekend. And of course, I couldn't post without a picture of the ever growing Duke!

Happy 1/2 Birthday Duke!

Today is Duke's half birthday! I can't believe he is already 6 months old! He is getting so big, about 30 lbs. now and still growing. Unfortunately for Duke, his half birthday came with a visit to the vet.
A treat for the pup before his surgery. (Duke and I share the same love for McDonald's ice cream!)

Duke officially lost his manhood.... poor guy, but he is recovering like a champ! He is supposed to be restricted for exercise for 10 days and he is already running all over the house... not sure how to keep a puppy calm!

Spring is in the air!

The warm weather is coming and the flowers are in bloom! We are ready for spring on Spring Street. Duke is loving the warmer weather and has been enjoying long walks every day and playing with sticks in the back yard, unfortunately he also love digging up the grass! We have a lot of training to do when it comes to being outside... but at least he loves the outdoors! It is so nice to have him outside with us while we do yard work and cook dinner on the grill!

BOY are we happy....

to be blessed with another nephew! Kyle and I have the joy of being 'aunt and uncle' for a third nephew! After growing anticipation Lori and Andy had a baby boy at about 3:00am this morning, naming him Beckett Andrew "Beck" for short. We visited with Kyle's parents this afternoon and he is a beautiful baby boy with curly dark hair, weighing 8 lbs 1 oz.

FINISHED!!!

yahoo... here's the kitchen all finished!!! well.. not really, we won't ever be able to say 'all finished', but we just have the closet to finish yet.

Spring Cut!

BEFORE!
Duke went to the groomer for the first time today! He went a puppy and came back a young boy. He is so cute and looks much darker now because his 'puppy fur' was cut off. He's still so soft and he loves his new look! The groomer at 'Puppy Cuts' was SO nice and she put a cute Easter bandanna on him... I love it!
AFTER!!!!