Laundry Lover

I pile it up for him, but the rest is all Bennett's doing as he 'helps' me with the laundry. He gets a kick out of playing hide and seek with the t-shirts and I get a kick out of watching him!

Closed

We have mixed emotions as we officially closed on our home in Seattle today. It is exactly what we needed to happen but at the same time, we LOVE that house and all the memories and goodness that came with it. We hit a favorite local spot as we tend to do at times like this and Andrew enjoyed a pint for the both of us. We give thanks for being able to sell our house so quickly and although we lost out by a higher offer on the SLP house we loved here, we know it will not be long until we find a great Minnesota home where new memories will be made. Cheers to fantastic and favorite 26th Ave memories and the start of many more to come!

A Day with Casey

I love living in the same city as my big brother Casey. Bennett loves it too. Uncle Casey was so nice to help watch Bennett today so that I could focus on work. They had fun playing and took a long walk where they even found and fed some geese. Bennett was really sad when nap time came as you could tell he did not want the fun with Casey to stop. Thanks for the help and for going out to get me lunch! What a great brother and uncle!

Minnehaha Falls

After a play date with Ann and Esme this afternoon, Bennett and I headed home to grab Andrew and take a stroll through Minnehaha Park. It was a little colder than we planned for so we were not out long, but we had fun seeing the falls. I remember the first weekend Andrew ever came to visit me, when we hardly knew each other at all, and we took a walk through the same grounds. I love that almost 5 years later we are back in the park, only this time we get to share it with our growing son and a baby on the way.

Sunday Smiles

Another lovely Sunday where we visited friends this morning then had a visit from our realtor this afternoon to make an offer on what we hope will be our home in St. Louis Park. We all had a good day as you can see from the smiles!

Saturday

My wonderful Mom drove up to spend the day with us today. We started the morning with a few hours of house hunting and ended with a walk in the fresh crisp afternoon air, then had lots of fun in between. Thanks again Mom for being here (and for the Bloedows)! How cool that we live so close now!

Happy Friday!

This week was filled with some doctor's appointments (which by the way, we have had great experiences with our new Mpls docs so far), some house hunting tours, play dates, lots of errands, and several hours in the evenings of us coordinating our Seattle move (all of our belongings are currently still at our house), organizing and signing documents, working with our realtors, our bank people, our move coordinator, and so on. We are really lucky to have so much involvement from a relocation team and are happy to have such support from everyone too. I will say though that we are eager to get all of this work done so we can move ahead with taking more time to explore our great 'new' city!

We also had Baby Lou's 16 week check-up this week. It was great to hear the heartbeat and begin forming a relationship with our new doctor here. Lou is definitely starting to make his/her presence known in my expanding belly. I seem to have popped this week, very similar to what happened when I was pregnant with Bennett. We will learn and share the gender with everyone in just 3 short weeks!

Hope everyone had a great week!

Today we enjoyed a Wild Rumpus date with Jill and Nova and also had a fun family dinner at Pepitos! Happy Friday to all!

see what i mean?

Feeling Better!

Plus, bath time with Dad always cheers me up!

Fever

Our little man had a fever start last night so we hung at home today to keep an eye on things. It stayed pretty steady all day, then the pre-bedtime check showed a temp of 103.7 under the arm along with a draining ear. The nurse and doctor we spoke with advised that we bring him in since he seemed to be getting worse instead of better. Since it was after hours, we had to visit our first Minnesota ER but luckily were not there long. They ruled out an ear infection and said that it was likely a virus that just had to run its course. I hope my little guy feels better soon!

One Year Old Look-Alikes?

bennett maxwell, 1 yr

bennett's mama, 1 yr

Party Time

We of course had fun celebrating Bennett's first year with my family down in Winona this weekend. Bennett sure did enjoy all the attention, play time, and hugs and kisses given by the whole family. He was one tired boy that night and for the first time ever he slept until 9:30 the next morning. Being the early riser and morning person that he is, I don't recall him ever sleeping that late in his whole first year, but I guess all that excitement wore him out!

Thanks to my family for being great party animals!

Happy St. Patty's!

Bennett, Hampton, and I had fun exploring our side of the city on foot today. We would wave up to Andrew every time we noticed his big tall building when we would turn a corner.

Later, all my boys hit the annual St. Patty's day parade downtown while I went on another tour with our agent in hopes of finding the perfect home. They all had a great time and I am told that Bennett was 'raising the roof' whenever the music would go by.

Hope everyone had a great day!

Minneapolis!

(wave and friendly scream in full effect)

It's still hard to believe we live here! Bennett loved all the attention he received today as he laughed and waved at passersby as we strolled across the Stone Arch Bridge in the sunshine.