we're in for it..

It's recently been brought to my attention that everyone thinks Lacey is the most independent almost three year old they've ever met. I guess I've never really thought about it, she's my only child and I don't know any different. But for as long as I can remember, she truly has always been so good about playing by herself, keeping herself entertained and somehow doesn't get herself into too much trouble. We babysit one of her cousins twice a week and that's when I started to realize Lacey is so much different. She doesn't constantly need to be watched for me to know she's being good and I fully trust that she knows her boundaries. How did I get so lucky? I'm more than positive that won't be the case for my second child. lol. With all the people at the property lately, we've had more visits from the owner of the company we're getting our house from. He always mentions how good she is for her age and he can't believe how she can just keep herself entertained with the horses, chickens, or even just the dirt. I started to reminisce a little and found a few gems on my phone of our little miss independent.

We have totally been blessed with the best darn kid around. Kinda scary that I call her a 'kid' now, not a baby, crying now. Which is not to say there aren't hard days, but she always somehow knows when she's pushing it too far, and turns my grumpy mood right back around. I think my next post will be about her ridiculous sayings she's been coming up with and saying to her dad and I. Kids say the darnedest things, don't they?! 

i'm dreaming of a white christmas...

This morning we woke up to about 4 inches of snow! It doesn't usually fall this early in the year, but I'll take it. Lacey was over the moon when she woke up and saw all the snow, I just don't think she quite realized how cold it would be. We raced around inside getting her bundled up in about four layers and took the rhino from my in-laws, to the property to visit the ponies and give them breakfast. When, we first got there, Lacey wouldn't stop saying how excited she was and that she "loves snow". After about fifteen minutes of aimlessly wandering around, she quickly decided it was time to go home. She was cold to the bone, poor baby. Funny thing is, she never once asked me if she could go back outside the rest of the day, lol.

I, of course decided today would be the perfect day to get a Christmas tree as well. So, i drug my sorry husband to the christmas tree lot and spent a ridiculous amount for a tree that will die in a month. But the look on my child's face was worth it. Somehow, every possible thing that could go wrong in our life, literally always does. The one tree that I chose, for some reason wont seem to work in any of the three tree stands we have in the garage. After an hour of sawing at it with a chainsaw, Kameron decided to just drill a huge bolt through the bottom of the stand. into the tree to get it to stand upright. Apparently, he forgot that we have to water this damn thing for the next month and I can't have water flowing through the hole he drilled in the stand. So now, the tree is sitting in the garage with a coating of flex-seal (you know, that can of spray you see on commercials, that apparently can fix or repair a hole in anything, including a boat). Considering its 28 degrees out tonight, I'm not sure it will be drying within a matter of a few hours so we will decorate tomorrow morning. Like I said, everything in my life has to be difficult.

Which leads me to an update on our house. I'm not sure I can even type this without feeling like smashing the computer, this whole process has been so ridiculously stressful. Long story short, the loan officer whom I thought was taking care of everything and portrayed to me that she was. got fired from her position, leaving our file open and nothing done to it. We were under the assumption that our file had already received approval from the actual lender, which it hadn't, and our house was already done! w.t.f. After driving to Oregon for one signature, emailing and calling ten times a day, frantically visiting the courthouse for paperwork, pretty much running around like a chicken with my head cut off, we got our file sent to the lender and as of Wednesday, it was approved! I can not explain how much of a relief this is. On Monday, we are now able to schedule all of our contractors and we are expecting to be moving in to our house the beginning-middle of January. I think I can see the light at the tunnel. It's dim, but it's there.

On the bright side, Kameron and I have been hiding a secret for a few months now that we are so excited to finally tell everyone about. There will be another baby thompsen as of June of 2015. We are so excited about this adventure and can't wait for Lacey to experience a sibling. She turns three in January, so I feel like this will be a good age difference between the two. She doesn't quite understand when we explain to her I'm going to have another baby, all she insists is that it be a girl and she gets to feed it bottles. I think she truly will be a great big sister and such an amazing help to Kameron and I. I must say, I planned on wanting another one, but this pregnancy has been worlds of a difference than my pregnancy with Lacey. I had literally no symptoms with Lacey and I have been sick every waking moment with this one. Maybe it's a sign of a boy? This one just seems like a 180 compared to Lacey. I will be sure to keep everyone updated as we continue through this amazing journey, I'm just ready for my life to slow down for a few weeks. Unfortunately, with the approval of our loan, Christmas in a few weeks and then Lacey's birthday, I'm not sure that will happen any time soon. A girl can dream, right?! Until next time...

i'm so glad i live in a world where there are octobers...

Welcome back fall! I've been patiently awaiting your arrival. With everything stressful going on in our life, I'm glad I now have a reason to sleep in a little longer, sip my coffee with Lacey watching cartoons, throw on an over-sized sweatshirt and put my hair up to conquer the day ahead. This year has been absolutely insane for us, to say the least. And recently, we've been thrown some crazy curveballs. We finally started to make some headway on the house building, got our loan secured and were able to proceed. My wonderful project manager has been so helpful throughout the whole process and went ahead and submitted our building permit. How exciting right?! Wrong. We quickly received a frantic call to meet with her immediately to discuss an issue that arose. Of course, I ran out there in my jeans and sweatshirt to find out the county had placed a six year moratorium on our parcel because we didn't get a permit to cut the standing timber previously. Let me tell you how much that was a slap in the face. Six f-ing years. It sort of seemed like our life had stopped, we considered many options, one of them being running away to Idaho and leaving this place we were about to call home. But, I guess being an adult means taking care of your own shit right?! So, I did some research, scheduled meetings and somehow by the grace of God was able to get the moratorium lifted. Don't ask me how, I'm still asking myself the same thing.

So all was back on schedule and we were able to breath for a minute. Until today. If it's not one thing it's another, I swear. Today we had a septic designer come to do a soil analysis, his ending analysis was that because we took the stumps out of the ground, we pretty much can't get any kind of system. This seems extremely bizarre to me, because just a few months previous, I had a different designer climb in the exact same holes and tell us we would need a standard pressurized system. How is it possible for two people who should have the same level of knowledge, have two completely different opinions. So of course, here I am again. scrambling to fix everything. I spoke with the previous designer we had up there and he's scheduled to come up tomorrow afternoon to take a look again. I feel a little guilty, because our home builder really likes to use the first guy mentioned, but then I realize, why should I feel bad? This is our life were talking about! Who cares if I give our business to somehow whose actually willing to help. (Somehow this typing extremely fast on here makes me feel so much better about the whole thing) And the waiting game continues. Can anything just go smoothly for at least a week?! Wishful thinking I guess.

Now that I'm done bitching for a minute, I would also like to throw in that I have sooo much to be thankful for!! My daughter is healthy, constantly learning new things and always asking me 'why' about everything, my husband is so awesome and responds extremely well to all the bad things happening (usually) and generally puts up with me complaining all the time. I think living in a 22 foot travel trailer on my in-laws property is really taking a toll on me. Sometimes I dont even know why I'm grumpy. I'm just grumpy. I'm so ready to have my own life again and my own space again so let's pray everything works out tomorrow with the septic, or were back to our plan of moving to Idaho. hehe.

Here's to a crazy next few months and everything getting even crazier. I just can't wait! ;)

Rainy days are the best days!

This morning, we woke up to tons of rain, which was so needed after literally weeks of scorching hot weather. There have been so many wild fires in our state this month and this rain is exactly what we needed! Yay! Throughout this blazing hot weather, of course we decided it would be the perfect time to build our barn. Let's just say it hasn't been fun. But it's worth it! We finished up the siding this last weekend, so Monday I started painting. 

It was so hard picking the right paint color! I knew I wanted the original red barn, but choosing the correct red was quite a test. I ended up choosing a color with the name Red Garnet and I am soooo pleased with the turnout. It's not too bright, looks a little aged but still gives it the pop of color I wanted. 

I still need to work on the second coat, it was so hot the day I was painting that the paint dried so fast and it's a little patchy in spots. But of course, now it's pouring so I can't do that. There's just no happy medium around here, I tell ya! Now, we need to finish the roof and start the trim! I'm thinking classic white for the trim to give it that "barn" look. 

Last night, we started on the fencing, we were so blessed to get a bunch of t posts from the family we're getting the boys from. Kameron and Dustin started pounding them in and it seemed to go pretty quickly! Today I think I'll visit Home Depot (our favorite place to drop thousands of dollars lately) and get some wire for the posts. 

Lacey helped line up the posts, she's such a cute little thing always asking what she can help with! 

For now, I'll snuggle up on the couch with my coffee, watch Snapped and enjoy this amazing weather! 

such a bad blogger!

Here we are again! Of course, I can never keep up on this whole blog posting thing. Sooo much has happened since the last time I posted. I think the last update I had for you guys, we were still working on the property and so on. Well, it's now almost August and were still in the same boat! We got our well drilled and that was probably the most nerve wracking thing I've ever actually gone through. After about 170 feet and eleven thousand dollars later, we have water folks!

Lacey enjoyed sipping on her coffee (chocolate milk) and watching the drill bits make their way down, however I wasn't too fond of the view of each bit lol

Spring came and we decided we needed something to spruce up the entrance to our property a little bit! With a little sweat (and money) we built ourselves an awesome planter box next the driveway that made me smile every time I saw it! I can't wait for next spring to come around so I can see all those beautiful flowers again :)

We started a little early in the year for camping but we just couldn't wait! Lacey is at an age where all she wants to do is be outside 24/7, so I knew camping would be right up her alley. We visited Salt Creek for a one night stay out there. It's close to home and right on the ocean and we thought it would be the perfect spot for her first trip! It did rain most of the time, but the spot we had was pretty well covered and that didn't stop Lacey at all! 

After Salt Creek, we felt pretty safe going farther out of town for more of a getaway, so we made our way to Ocean Shores. Of course, it pretty much rained the whole time we were there too, but I promise we didn't melt! We had sooo much fun down there. We went into town and visited a kite store and found the perfect little pink piggy kite for Lace. Oh my gosh, she was in love when that thing went up in the sky.

Pure enjoyment!

Our next Summer trip was to Sandpoint, Idaho to visit my aunt Angie and family. I don't think we quite realized how much of a drive it would be for just a weekend but it was awesome over there! This has been a subject on Kameron and I's mind for quite a while now, and visiting there just made it worse. We were literally considering leaving everything and everyone we know here at home and moving over there! It's actually quite a bit like home, just with better climate, better hunting, a huge river to play on all year and a ski resort ten minutes from town. Okay, maybe it's a little better than home but right now were just too wrapped up in this property that it's not really in the cards for us. Maybe a few years from now! We visited so many antique and 'junk' places over there and I was hooked!

I wish I would've had a truck and trailer to haul all these goodies back!

Then the month of June came around and we had sooo much planned for that month. We were literally booked with something to do every weekend. The first weekend of the month, Kameron had his bachelor party out on Lake Sutherland. They did fishing, drinkin and bull shittin'. Right up his alley! The weekend after was our good friends Justin and Alicia's parties for their wedding and we all had tons of fun! The following weekend was their wedding in which we were maid of honor and best man. It was such a beautiful celebration. And let's not forgot that all the while, we were getting ready for our wedding! All I can say is I'm so glad that its's over lol. The day went perfect and just as we imagined, besides a little drizzling, but I'm just so happy to have my life back and not have to worry about planning a wedding now! I have so much time for things that actually matter now (like this blog) and we can finally start focusing on things to get our house going.

See the full details of our wedding here!

In the past few weeks, we were able to get a dozer up to the property and get it completely flat and ready for grass! We haven't quite told anyone yet, but we have two sweet ponies that will be joining our family in the next few months so the dozer being up there was essential before building a fence and barn for the boys. 

Boy, does it look better without all the huge bumps and humps everywhere! Special thanks to Jake for helping us out on this one!

And then of course, in my nature, I'm always ten projects ahead of where I should be, so we instantly started working on the barn. I truly don't know where we'd be without my dad. He has helped us and continues to help us with everything possible. Who knew he was such a good carpenter?! 

Lacey is so very excited to be making progress on Trigger and Chippy's new home!

As I sit here typing this my dad is actually working on the roof of the barn, I am so blessed to have him in my life! We really have gotten so much accomplished already this year, from signing on our property, to moving in with Kameron's parents, to getting married, to building a barn, and now to building our house which should be done within a few short months! I would say that's a pretty productive year, and now I feel like it's already time to start planning my sweet Lacey's THIRD birthday! Where does the time go?! I'm going to really, really try to stay on top of this, it makes me feel so much more accomplished when I get one of these posts done! I promise I'll be back with more soon! 

2013 look back!

Well, here I am, with a free second to get on here and catch up! One of my New Year's Resolutions (who keeps those anymore?) was to stay on top of my daily planner and keep everything in my life organized. So far, so good! Something I've been writing almost twice a week in my planner is to blog about our 2013 year! It's only been 45 days since the first of the year, I'm not too late right?! Wow, last year was really something for us! We had so much happen that's worth recognizing, this is going to be an awfully long post! To start off with, we got engaged!! January 21, 2013. Our engagement story is not too sappy, but perfect for who we are, Kameron is such a simple guy, and that's what I love about him!

How perfect is this ring?! He truly knows how to spoil me! Of course I said yes, and we are now patiently waiting for the big date! The very next day was our sweet Lacey's first birthday! How bittersweet it was to see our little girl growing up sooo fast! We had her birthday party at our house, and everyone in our family and some close friends came. I think there ended up being over 40 people in our small house! She was so spoiled and got tons of stuff, like so much stuff, we literally had to turn our spare bedroom into a playroom because we just simply didn't have enough room for all the toys she had accumulated. She still was not yet walking on her big day, but looking back now, I wish she still wasn't! lol. here's a few shots of her party!

She is quite the ham, is she not?! And look at that grumpy face in there, she looks like she's very tired of having her picture taken, haha. She is definitely her father's child. Just like him, and daddie's little princess. Gosh how we love her! Looking at these pictures, she already looks so different over such a short amount of time, granted, she still has chubby cheeks, but look at them! So freakin' adorable. The weekend after her birthday, we took a trip out to La Push and walked the beach and just got away for a while. Bailey was still such a puppy and we forgot her leash! So we wrapped a tie strap around her neck and called it good. 

It was so beautiful out there, I can't say it was very warm, but still amazingly beautiful. I think we sometimes take for granted how great this place we live in really is. After we hit the beach, we went into Forks and visited Forks Outfitters and daddy treated Lace and I to some new clothes, camo and all. 

We always stayed busy doing things throughout the house, around this time, I had quit my job working at a local bank, I just really wanted to spend all my time with this precious girl, and time truly does slip through your hands in the blink of an eye. She's only a child once, and I intend to be in her life as much as possible! Who needs money these days anyway? :) On March 2nd, 2013, our babygirl decided she was ready to walk! This literally brings tears to my eyes.

Once she decided she liked walking, there was no going back. She was constantly on the move! We couldn't believe we had a baby on the run all the time! We were in for it from there on out. Shortly after she started walking, we took a trip over to Toys R Us in Silverdale and got Lacey her first bike! She still to this day loves this thing.

We as parents totally love this thing too, Right now she is still in "trike and we push mode" but once her feet can reach the pedals, the parent handle comes off and she can race around on her own!Shortly after, it was Easter! This Easter meant a lot to me, it was our 'first' Easter as a family with Lacey. Her first actual Easter, I had spent with Kameron in Harborview Medical Center after his accident and Lacey spent the weekend with my mom. Thankfully, my mom was able to have her for that long, but it pains me to even think about being away from her for that long! So for her second but first 'family' Easter, we went all out. When she woke up that morning, the Easter bunny had visited our house and he was quite generous! 

Not long after that, I had my cosmetic surgery, April 11, 2013. Everything went super well, I just wasn't supposed to hold or lift anything for 4 weeks. I can't say I totally stuck to those restrictions, I had a 15 month old! My parents were so helpful throughout the whole process, they both pretty much lived with me for the first week and watched over Lacey and with each day I just felt better and better. Lacey was so amazing throughout the whole process, she must have sensed Mommy didn't "feel good" because she would just snuggle on the couch with me, watch movies and let me rest as I needed to. What more could I ask for?!

For some odd reason, her father let her have a chocolate sucker, but that's a different story. Our next fun outing was for Mother's Day! We went with two of our great friends, Michael and Chelsie, over to Seattle for the day and went to the Seattle Aquarium and the Woodland Park Zoo. I think this will become a Mother's Day tradition. We had so much fun, Lacey especially, but I couldn't have asked for a better day, I got to spend it with my family and there's nothing greater than that. 

She loved the bears, I think they were her favorite, that's what she's pointing to in the above picture. And of course, on her daddy's arm. Just a few weeks later, it was Memorial Day! We took a vacation with my dad over to Ephrata to visit my Aunt Deana and Uncle Rob. It was nice to just get out of town for a weekend! Lacey did not do well with the car ride, but were still working on that, and she lived. :) 

Isn't that place beautiful! The top picture is of Sun Lakes, which is north of Ephrata, we visited up there for a day and explored the area, quite a different atmosphere than home!We visited the airport and got to see all the show planes take off and land right in front of us, that was quite a show, and Lacey learned how to fish by her Daddy! All in all, it was a great weekend. In the beginning of June, Kameron and a few of his friends got this crazy idea to run down to Oregon 'real quick' and all buy UTV sidexsides. They came home with three brand spankin new Yamaha Rhino's and the fun began. We really have gotten so much use out of this sucker so far.

Lacey of course loves it too, she is such a little daredevil! Takes after her daddy. At the end of June, we visited nearby Port Townsend for a drive-in movie. We watched Fast 6, but I will say it probably was a little too young for Lace. She loved all the preliminary activities, like pop, popcorn, running around and us chasing her, but by the time the movie started, it was way too late for her and we ended up leaving in the middle of the movie. It was fun while it lasted though!

The very next day, we got our kitten! Lacey was just starting to have her obsession with animals and she was so in love. We had to bring my dad to the Seattle airport the very next morning and we didn't want to leave a tiny baby kitten alone with our young hound dog, sooo, we decided to just bring him with us for the ride! He rode in Lacey's carseat next to her leg and she was in heaven lol. 

So sweet! At least he was then, haha, a few weeks later, I and a few of my bridesmaids spent the weekend over in Seattle and visited the town of Snohomish for some wedding dress shopping! I had so much fun trying on different dresses and deciding what would be the perfect fit for our wedding!

I ended up choosing one of the dresses pictured above, but no one will know until the wedding! In the beginning of July, Kameron's job took him out of town for a few months, but he only had to work four days a week so we got to spend our three day weekends together. The time actually seemed to go by farely fast and before I knew it he was back working in town. Lacey and I surprised him down in Humptulips, we drove four hours and he had no idea we were coming! It was quite a drive but so worth it to stay with him! On the way home, we stopped at Kalaloch and got to enjoy the sunshine a bit.

In August, mom got married to a great guy, Ladel, and Lacey starred as flower girl! She did amazing and looked absolutely adorable as always! It was really a beautiful event and I am so happy for her. 

Summer came and went within the blink of an eye it seemed, and then it was the most important time of the year, hunting season of course! This is a really important time in our household, I can pretty much kiss my hubby goodbye, but of course, being the amazing girl I am, I LOVE to spend my time hunting with him! It gives us a chance to just get away from everyday life and really be with each other. It may be one of my favorite 'seasons' of the year.

Quite a few things happened for us in September, one of them being that we got our Engagement pictures taken! Here are a few of my favorite.

I just adore my family! Something else that was a big deal for September was...we put Lacey in a big girl bed! I will say, this was harder on us than her, she all the sudden had the ability to decide when she wanted to get up and it was not easy. Long story short, this only lasted about two days before I threw the crib back together. It was cute while it lasted, but emotionally she just wasn't ready.

How cute is she trying to screw the bolt in?! Haha. Next was Halloween! We had so much fun hanging up our pumpkin lights and decorating the house and of course trick-or-treating! We went downtown to all the businesses that celebrated with Rae Anne and Lacey's best friend Hadley. The girls were to die for.

Of course we visited the pumpkin patch as well earlier in the month, but that wasn't nearly as fun as receiving candy from every possible stranger! That's my sarcastic attitude coming into play lol. In the beginning of November, we made the decision that would completely alter at least the next ten years of our life! We put an offer in on a piece of property just on the outskirts of town. We are so fortunate for everything life has dealt us. 

Later in the month, it was of course Thanksgiving. Lacey just so happened to get totally sick so we weren't able to visit all of our usual rounds that were supposed to. We had a small dinner at our house with us, my dad and grandma and that was plenty! Lacey ended up being diagnosed with Fifth's disease and had a terrible rash all over her body, but thankfully, she is now immune and will never have it again with no lingering side affects!

After Thanksgiving, you know what that means! It's the most wonderful time of the year! This Christmas was one to remember, Lacey was so spoiled, as was I, and it was really just a great time with great family. We did catch a hint of snow towards the end of the month but nothing worth shouting about!

 

It was such a great holiday! We enjoyed the little snow that we got and had a half snow day but it left as fast as it arrived. We visited my mom's house for Christmas Eve and Lacey got tons of stuff there, we then came home and opened her stocking, and gave Bailey her presents. Kameron got me a Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1, but it's kinda a shared present because we use it equally :) I am beyond blessed. I have a healthy, happy family, I truly could not ask for more. This year was full of so much excitement and as sad as I am to see it go, I am so beyond excited for 2014! There is so much ahead of us in the upcoming year, some huge life changes! Building a house, getting married, Lacey is officially a toddler, so much! I love my family! Stay tuned!

XOXO