November 2007

I knew it had been a while since I last updated. But we have all been busy here since moving into our new home. We moved in September 21. We got some great help from a co-worker of Rocky's and a co-worker of mine (we've even found a babysitter!). We are in love with our new house. Rocky has done a great job of getting us unpacked and settled in (my job is to keep Maggie out of the way -- easier said than done some days). We bought a nice dining room table and chairs and are looking for a rug to go underneath. We recently purchased a sofa/loveseat set for the family room. We have found we need more bookcases (big surprise). Rocky has been hanging pictures so it really feels like we are home. Next spring, we will fence the backyard and look into some landscaping. I think we are going to try using rock around the fence to deter Otis from digging out.

Rocky's parents came out the weekend after we moved in. They brought the china cabinet we got from Uncle Matt and Bonnie helped me wash the china. We only lost 3 pieces -- which I thought was pretty good from it being packed in 1992 and having traveled quite a bit in the last 15 years. We got all the china in the cabinet with a little room left over for some crystal. While they were here, we celebrated Maggie's 2nd birthday. She had a lot of fun opening her presents. I think her favorite presents were her Piggly Winks dolls and her tea set. She opened the dolls first and was having so much fun, we saved the rest of her presents for later.

We also took a trip to South Dakota. I attended a nursing job fair at SDSU and Maggie & Rocky came along for the ride. Jeffery Darnell was born September 28th, so we also got to meet him while visiting pretty much all the other relatives in SD. It was a quick trip, but fun and hopefully worthwhile as far as recruits!

Maggie loves all the room in the house. She loves to run in big circles in the family room. She really loves just hanging out on the stairs. They are the perfect size for her. She is getting really good at going up and down them by herself, but will sometimes ask us to "care-we-u" (carry me). Her hair is getting long and sometimes she will even let me put in ponytails (not very often though). I have to be a little sneaky. We are working on Maggie sleeping in her own bed right now. She's doing pretty good, but does wake up at least once a night looking for me -- I need to train her to ask for Daddy.

We took Maggie trick or treating for the first time this year and she LOVED it! We took her to just a few houses in the neighborhood, which gave us a chance to meet some of our neighbors. It took her a few tries to get "Trick or Treat" out, but by the end, she was an old pro. I think at the last house she said "Trick or treat. Tank you. Welcome." She also enjoyed giving canny (candy) out to the kids who knocked on our door. Though I think she tried to give one little girl the tootsie roll that was in her hand and half eaten! And she always had to take a treat for herself after handing it out. I think we probably saw over 50 treaters, which is much more than we ever saw in Grand Rapids or Chester.