Building a birdhouse

When we got back from Oklahoma, Mike wanted to do some "projects" with the kids. I guess he must have missed us while we were gone. So on Saturday, while the girls were napping, Benson and Mike headed out to the garage to build a birdhouse. Benson did a great job hammering and glueing. They even put the side with the door on the wrong way so that they would have to use Daddy's newly purchased power drill. Benson was very proud of the finished product. Too bad we don't have any trees to put it in. We had to settle for hanging it from the light on the back patio.


You might notice in the first two pictures the sweet bandage Mike has on his right leg. While helping with a move earlier that morning Mike ran into a ramp while carrying a piece of a sectional. Since we live so close to Ft. Riley, lots of people in our ward are in the army including several of those helping with the move. When they saw Mike's wound they "mobilized" and bandaged him up with their military grade medical kits they had in their cars. They were joking that they might even have some morphine in them if Mike wanted it. Mike assured me that it wasn't going to need stitches until after he took a shower SEVERAL hours later and the cut was still bleeding and looked like it was splitting open more. After 6 stitches and a tetanus shot he was good to go. If going by number of stitches, this is his worst injury yet.

Mini Vacation

Benson has been asking where we are going on vacation all summer long. Who would have guessed that our vacation would be to Oklahoma? Last week the kids and I spent a few days in Oklahoma at my parent's house. The 4 hour drive each way actually went really well both times until about the last 30 minutes, but we survived.

On Wednesday, Sabrina and I headed down to Broken Arrow early to get our hair done. I seriously hate finding someone new to do my hair when we move, so I plan on putting it off as long as I can since we aren't THAT far. While getting my hair done I learned that the ward's in Broken Arrow had rented out the city pool that is right across the street from our old house for an activity. So we decided to crash it. My mom and sister Kathleen brought Benson, Grace, and my nephew Spencer down and we had a great afternoon of FREE fun. It was so nice to see our friends, although it made us miss Broken Arrow more afterwards.

1 - Sabrina kissing Spencer, 2 - Grace with her life jacket and goggles, 3 - Benson and Spencer, 4 - Grace and Spencer, 5 - Benson, 6 - Aunt Kathleen with Spencer, Sabrina, and Benson...I think Grace is behind Sabrina too

On Thursday, we played at Grandma's and got started on some curtains for our sliding glass door (our last step to privacy now that we have blinds on every other window!). Then on Thursday night we headed to the Kiddie Park for some major fun. Our friend's the Goodmans and the Fuller's came up from Broken Arrow and it was great because each of the kids had a friend to ride all the rides with. I kept Sabrina and her friend Skylar with me, which is why they are the only ones I have pictures of. It was fun to see the two of them together again. They are both kind of quiet, mischevious little girls. They will follow each other anywhere and are much braver together than separately. I don't think Sabrina would have gone on any of the rides if Skylar hadn't been there. Benson got to ride with Zachary and I wish I had gotten a picture of them together. They especially loved the roller coaster and went on it several times together. And Grace got to ride with Winter, who was willing to go on any ride and had tons of fun. I definitely think Grace was braver with Winter than she would have been on her own as well. It was Spencer's first time at the Kiddie Park and he was braver than Sabrina and seemed to have lots of fun, cute boy! We stayed until closing time and the kids could have kept going they were having so much fun.


I borrowed some pictures of Grace and Winter off of Facebook so they aren't the best quality, but they are such cute pictures.







Don't the girls look excited to ride the roller coaster? My girls were both crying by time they got off.

On Friday we played in the backyard on the tree swing, Spencer's little pool, the sprinklers, and the hose. It was a nice, relaxing morning. Benson found a little snail that he named Charlie and really enjoyed playing with until he held him a little too close to the sprinkler and Charlie went flying. Benson is such an animal lover, it's too bad I'm not a nicer mom because I'm sure he would love a pet. We've decided maybe we'll let him get a boy fish for Christmas so he won't feel so outnumbered with 3 little sisters.




By time we got ready to go it was a little later than I planned but it worked to my advantage because the kids were worn out and therefore all 3 slept at least an hour in the car which made the drive easier.

We were glad to get home to Daddy, but I'll admit that we (I) didn't really want to go back to Kansas. Moving is hard. I'm sure it will get easier with time, but I wish we could just fast forward through this transition time. At least we are close enough that we can take little vacations to Oklahoma.

Introducing....

Baby GIRL Richards!!

Grace and Sabrina are thrilled that they are getting a baby sister. Good thing they are too little to understand or care that this means they will each be sharing a room with 2 sisters!

Benson's initial response was "I don't even like girls!" But he is warming up to the idea of being the big brother protector for 3 little sisters.

Mike and I are wondering how we are ever going to survive having 3 teenage girls!?!?!?!

But seriously we are just thrilled that she is healthy. She looked absolutely perfect on the ultrasound and we couldn't be more grateful!

My favorite island

I think my favorite thing about our new house is the island in the kitchen. It is so nice to have the extra counter space, but the best part is that 4 stools fit around it perfectly! The kids sit up there to eat for every meal, which is buying us more time before we have to buy a new kitchen table since we currently only have 4 chairs.

Come One, Come All!!!

We have already had two sets of visitors since we moved into our new house two weeks ago. And we would love more! We are just a little bit out of the way of anyone driving from down south out west.

First up, Grandpa Jeff, Grandma Stacey, and Aunt Sarah came up on Thursday before the 4th. Grandpa Jeff got right to work installing a ceiling fan in the master bedroom for us. Grandma Stacey fixed our couch that was suffering from being used as a trampoline for so many years. Then that evening Mike and Grandpa put up a swing for the kids. They LOVE that swingset. Sabrina calls it her playground and asks to go out and play on it a million times every day. She would sit on the swing for hours if someone would push her that long. We were hoping to install blinds on all our windows while they were here so we can take down the ghetto sheets we've got hanging up but we found a website where we could get the blinds for half as much as at Home Depot and Lowe's so we decided to wait. We bought some fireworks on Thursday night and Aunt Sarah the pyro had lots of fun helping the kids set them off.

On Friday we went to a "beach" at a local lake for a picnic lunch and then went and saw Ice Age 3 in 3D. Just a sidenote, what is WITH all the 3D movies they are making all of a sudden. My kids kept the dumb glasses on for about 3 minutes and I had a huge headache by the end of the movie. What a WASTE! After the movie, Aunt Sarah watched the kiddos while Mike and I went out to dinner with my parents. Let's just say the lack of eating out options in Manhattan will surely save us some money.

We are so grateful to Grandpa, Grandma, and Sarah for spending their vacation days with us and helping us settle into our new house.

Then on Tuesday of this week, Aunt Kathleen, Uncle Bryce, and Spencer spent the night on their way to Oklahoma from Utah. See we are a convenient stop on the way. Anyways the kids loved seeing and playing with Spencer and I think they only hurt him once (sorry Spence!). We are sad that we won't be as close to the Wright's as we could have been if we hadn't left Oklahoma, but at least we are MUCH closer than we were before. We'll take what we can get and I'm sure we will see them more frequently!

Settling In

So we are finally mostly settled in our new home in Kansas. This post will be a little random since I have a few weeks to catch up on.

The week before we left Oklahoma, Aunt Sarah came down to Broken Arrow so we could go to the pool there one last time. The kids had a lot of fun and Aunt Sarah wore out before they did.


The Friday night before we moved (the 19th) Mike was heading home from Manhattan to Broken Arrow one last time. He stopped in Topeka to get gas and when he got back in the car it wouldn't start. After spending the night in Topeka, hoping that there would be an easy fix to the problem, we learned that our 2001 Ford Escort with only 107,000 needed a new ENGINE! Lovely. My parents very generously loaned us one of their cars to use for a few weeks until we can figure out what to do with the Escort. We are still working on it. Even though this threw a wrench in our plans, there were many blessings along the way. We are grateful it happened when it did since Mike had to have a car to go back and forth from Manhattan to Broken Arrow for the month and a half before we moved. The mechanic that worked on our car was basically a saint, buying Mike lunch, letting him stay in his shop on Saturday after it was closed, and finally giving him a ride to the nearest mall since I hadn't arrived to pick him up yet. And grateful that we live so close to my family who watched the kids while I drove back and forth across Kansas to pick Mike up, my dad who took care of a bunch of the stuff we needed to get done on Saturday to prepare for the mover's coming, and of course loaning us their car. We know we are being cared for and watched over even in the trials that come up.

On Sunday the 20th (Father's Day) the kids said good-bye to the house before church because we took them to Bartlesville during the move. Mike and I came back that night to finish up some preparations. Monday and Tuesday the movers packed and loaded our house. It's amazing how fast other people can pack and load your stuff. This is the first time we have had someone else move us and it was awesome. I hope we never have to do it ourselves again. Mike left Monday night so he could work and ensure that our new house would close on Wednesday.




So they loaded up our stuff on Tuesday, the kids and I drove to Manhattan on Wednesday and we closed on our house with just barely enough time for it to fund that day so we could get the keys, and Thursday the movers unloaded. And by Saturday we had all the boxes in the house unpacked and the garage organized enough that we could fit both cars in there.

The kids helping to unpack. Benson was a groundhog burrowing in all the packing paper. Mike came home at lunch to help unpack the kitchen and the kids each hid in a box and jumped out and surprised him. Sabrina is still in her pajamas because she had thrown up that morning, just breaking in our new house I guess. :)

The kids entertained themselves pretty well while I was unpacking. I had been working on my room and closet for a while and things were pretty quiet when I went to check on them. I found Sabrina on the bathroom counter playing in the water with some bubbles. She is resourceful....it could have been much worse I'm sure and I got a good laugh.