The house that love built

Richard and I spent Saturday morning volunteering for a Habitat for Humanity project.  What a cool experience.  It's something we've always talked about doing, but never really had the opportunity, so when our church got involved with a build we signed up!

We didn't know what to expect, just jumped in with both feet.  We left early Saturday morning and got almost to the site when the rain let loose, but the work goes on rain or shine.  The houses, two actually across the street from one another, were in downtown Indy, and not a very nice part.  We were part of Thrivent Lutheran's build group and there were a few other churches working as well.

I worked on house wrap, and Richard helped with supports for one of the porches.  It's pretty amazing, how complete strangers come together for a common cause, and despite that many people stepping on, and over each other, stuff gets accomplished.  By the time our morning shift was done, both houses were completely wrapped and almost all of the doors and windows were in.  One of the homeowners was helping my little group with house wrap, as they're required to put in so many hours of work on their own houses.  She was pretty quiet so we didn't get to hear much of her story, but she seemed overwhelmed with gratitude over the whole process.  And it made me appreciate what I have a little bit more too:)

It was a wet and tiring day, but very rewarding, and we definitely plan to do it again when church gets in on a project closer to home.

Injuries

Well we had our first call from the school nurse last week. Logan had somehow gotten a plastic binder in the eye, it scratched his eyebrow and then poked the corner. The way the nurse described it, you'd think his eyeball had popped right out, I was expecting it to be WAY worse than it was. But I had made an appointment with the eye doctor before seeing it. He did cut the corner pretty good, but managed to miss scratching the eye, which was good, but the doctor still made me feel dumb for being there, oh well! I'm sure its the first of many calls from the school.

Well, I can report that Miss Avery seems to KNOW how to crawl, she just chooses not too! ha ha! She'll crawl a couple of 'steps', and then drops right back to her belly to commence scooting. Friday night we took a picnic to the park, and she was having trouble scooting on the blanket so of course, she had to crawl, but once we got home and back on the slippery hardwood floors, back to her belly. Little stinker! And she's managed to start pulling herself up to a standing position. But still not teeth :(

We had a good labor day weekend, didn't do too much which was kind of nice for a change. We went on the picnic Friday night, and it was a bit chilly. Then Saturday night we had a cookout/bonfire with the neighbors, it was like a perfect fall evening complete with s'mores. Then Sunday Logan went off to spend the night at Auntie Jamie's and Richard and went to a wedding reception while Avery stayed with Grannie. On Monday, since Logan wasn't home, we napped when Avery napped :) It was great, although we did miss Logan.

Hope everyone is having a good week so far!

September?? Really??

Just where did the summer go? Things are good in the Gusty household. Logan is thoroughly enjoying school, and is favorite part is still the bus ride home:) I'm struggling with keeping school stuff organized though, I need a new system. With more dates to remember, papers to keep track of, our sidetable in the kitchen officially looks like a bomb exploded. Any tips from you seasoned moms of school-agers??

Avery, at 8 months now, yikes, still is not crawling. She's mastered the Army crawl and uses that as her main mode of transport these days. And she's getting good at the leap frog, but no official crawling. And still no teeth! This little girl is miserable, drooling, chewing on anything and everything. And with the weather change here in Indy, she's got some stuffy sinuses to go along with it. But depsite it all, she's a pretty happy go-lucky baby. And recently she started giving kisses, and the best kind open mouthed sloppy ones. You ask her for a kiss, make a kissy noise and she leans in mouth wide open. Melts your heart:)

We had an awesome time at Megan and Paul's wedding a few weeks ago! The ceremony was beautiful and the reception was a blast, couldn't ask for a more perfect day.

My mom came to visit last weekend, she's officially settled in to her new house and new job in West Virginia, and seems to be loving it so far. And she's only about 5 hours away. We're thinking we'll be spending Thanksgiving there, maybe making a trip to DC too.

We're hoping for a nice relaxing Labor Day weekend! And hope yours is too.

Logan's First Day of Kindergarten

Well, it's official! I'm the mom of a school-ager, aahh!!

We had our parents meeting last night, where we learned everything we wanted to know about kindergarten. Because Logan is in the afternoon session, we drop him off and he rides the bus home. So today being the first day, parents were allowed to accompany the kids to the class. Logan matter of fact told me "mom I'll be okay, you can just drop me off" That made me sad, but made me feel good that he was ready.

I came home for a long lunch hour today, so I could take him for his first day. I cried most of the way to the house. He was dressed, shoes on and backpack on, about 30 minutes before we needed to leave. He asked Grannie all morning if it was time to go, I think he was a tad bit excited.

So off we went, I didn't just drop him off, we waited outside with all the other parents for the teachers to come get them. I snuck in to the classroom with him, and got "the face" He didn't complain too much and even let me take a few pictures.

Two of his friends from our street are in his class, as well as his good friend Mia from daycare days. He was very excited to see her, they had been at daycare together since a year and a half old.

I did okay with the drop-off, until I saw Mia's mom, she was crying and we were both commenting on how it was just yesterday when they were in the toddler room:) And I cried most of the way back to work.

He got to ride the bus home, and loved it, that of course was the favorite part of his day. And he wants to go back tomorrow, so that's great.

His teacher is great too, she's so incredibly organized, its awesome. I think we're going to have a great year!

Sickies

In case you are keeping track, just two more days until school starts. And the big kindergartner is sick :( About midnight last night he woke up crying, running a lovely fever and complaining that his throat hurts, ugh! Poor guy. Today, no fever, but throat still hurts, so he's hanging out in mom and dad's bed watching cartoons, and drinking lots of fluids. Hopefully this passes before Wednesday, he'd be so bummed if he had to miss his first day of school.

Me on the other hand, I would love to just take a vacation far far away and come back when he's finished with high school :) It's going to be a rough week for momma. We bought supplies at Target and I got teary eyed while he was trying on his backpack, bring on the Kleenex!

Cool, quiet mornings

Ahh, finally a break from the heat. We slept with the windows open last night while temps dropped into the low 60's. While trying to falling asleep while the cicadas chirped outside wasn't easy, the cool breeze was fantastic!

This morning I opened up all the windows, Avery is down for her morning snooze and Logan is watching his favorite Phineas and Ferb. (After a much better week, he earned a tv show back.) Richard is off cutting grass and church, so I'm enjoying a cup of coffee, and a nice breeze while blogging on the deck, the joys of wireless internet!

This should be a fairly quiet weekend, except for some back-to-school shopping. We'll enjoy the no major plan weekend, as the next few weekends will be jam packed with weddings and road trips.

Hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!

The heat is on....

Well it appears Blogger has been unblocked at work, not going to question, just going to enjoy my writing time :)

The summer heat is really upon us here in Indiana, temps in the upper 90's and heat indexes in the triple digits the last few days, it's really been miserable. I'm not a humidity girl!

I think the heat and summer are getting to Logan as well, ugh we've had a rough few weeks with that boy. I think the heat, which means not much outside time, being stuck with Grannie for the summer and new sister are starting to get to him. Last week he had to pack up a large chunk of toys, and lost electronic privileges. Just not sure where this kid came from. This week has been better, he's earned a few things back. So I'm hoping once we get into a school routine, and he's around his friends again things will get better and he'll be back to his sweet old self, well close anyway. And school officially starts next Wednesday. We got our letter today, that he'll be in afternoon kindergarten. We have an ice cream social on Monday, and then orientation on Wednesday where we get to go to school with him and hang out for a few hours, then Thursday is his first official day. He's very excited, more so to ride the big bus than anything. And he has his first loose tooth, so lots of changes at our house, prayers that he handles these changes okay.

Avery gets bigger everyday I swear. She's so close to crawling, although some days I wonder if she'll just skip it and go right to walking! Her teeth are bothering her lately too and it looks as if she'll get a top one first. She's been chatting away lately too, really starting to find her voice and all the different sounds she can make. It's too cute, this really is one of my favorite baby stages:)

We've got a busy wedding season coming up. Jamie and I took a road trip to Lansing this past weekend for our cousin Megan's shower (can't believe she's getting married). We had a blast, the shower was fun and then it was great to just chill out on Saturday night, gabbing. Her wedding is the 21st, so we'll be traveling to Grayling for that, then next Saturday is my friend Erin's wedding. It's a small simple wedding, so as her present I've offered to be the 'photographer' for the event. I'm excited about it that and have some great ideas:) Then we have another friend's wedding Labor Day weekend, whew! Tis the season.