The Last Hurrah of the Summer

Our little family went with my sister Jenny and her family for a fun 2 night camping trip to P.E.I. to end our busy summer of fun and craziness! All the girls (9of them!) had so much fun  together in all our adventures. One of the favorites was Avonlea Village. We all had so much fun looking at all the old fashioned things and playing with all the old toys.

                                             Emily and Charley looking at the displays

                                                 Elin and I looking at Lucy M. Montgomery's photography

                                          It is so fun getting all the girls together.

                                                   We do get lots of grins and smiles as people see us all together in a row!

                               Elin "shopping" in the general store

                                                  Elle a little mesmerized by all the hats!

                                               She did find a favorite!

                                 Leila ,Penelope and Elle having a lazy game of crokinole on the front porch.

                                      We were treated to live music and did the girls ever love the experience! Great East Coast melodies.

                               Now we finally got to the dress-up house. There were hats and dresses flying everywhere, with little girls running around squealing.

                                                        Elle's favorite hat choice!

                                    Eva's!

                                                  Elin and I just watched and helped with the dress up  this year.
                             


Well that was our summer. Lots of new, and it is starting to get normal. School starting was next on our family agenda,and after frantically searching through many boxes of books, we finally found all the ones we needed.Life is still busy ,but now that we are more settled, it is easier to stop and breathe in between the craziness. God has been so good to see us through all the changes that he has brought our way, and I'm so grateful to him for all the blessings he has given and that his "mercies are new every morning". We have all made new friends and are very happy with our new church family and home. Our new community is fun to be a part of too..don't get me started talking about Dunster's donuts 5 Minutes away, and the fabulous cappuccino they sell.My post- move  5 pounds weight gain says enough about that!!!! Yikes!!

                                         

At our new Place

The girls quickly settled into our new home. The paved driveway was a huge exciting world to explore!! The band aids we went through those first few weeks!! Skinned knees and toes!

                            Elin put Eva's Trike basket to good use pretty quickly!

                        Then the construction began on the new barn!! This was Ryan's first solo building adventure, and he was pretty unsure of his skills, but after some phone calls to his dad, he started, and it quickly began to take shape. The girls loved helping(or hindering!) Our goats were staying at a farm close by until we got their barn ready for them, so we were very excited to get it done so they could come home to our new place!

             The roofing! The girls quickly learned to take the plastic strip off of the shingles for Ryan and I . Did they ever love helping !

                                      The roof going on.

                                                  Elin enjoying the heat!

                  After Ryan and I got one side of the roof shingled, we had some friends come and help. What we did in 6 hours, they did in 1  ..Crazy!!!

                                   The girls have made new friends (with new toys!) and are very happy here.

Renos and Moving Day!!

                                                Our upstairs bathroom all  torn apart..yuck....Wall paper is not a favorite of mine to try to remove!

                                              The downstairs hallway..many gallons(or so it seemed) of fabric softener later!

                             Ryan hard at work preparing the wainscoting for painting.

                     Terry with the caulking gun.

                                        More scraping fun! The hours we put in that week. Crazy! But we did see lots of good things when the paint finally dried.

                                        Back at Wood Point the night before the move. A  packed up lonely house. We had a game of skip-bo before bed on our makeshift table (the cooler!!)

                                     Ryan Picked our big girl up from camp before we headed out with the full moving truck. She had had a great week at camp.She seemed to have grown up overnight!

                                 Daddy and his girl!

                                              Emmy, her cousin Charley and their friend with their counselor.

                                           All set to head out....sniff sniff.

                                           The last to leave were the "girls"

                                        They weren't too sure about jumping in that truck...Poor Ryan.

                                    Emily reunited with her lonely cat. That kitty kept her paw on Emmy the whole ride to Sussex. So cute. Emmy and I traveled in the truck with the goats and Ryan drove the moving truck. We were a little sad as we said goodbye to our home. Looking back at the last 7+ years, we could see how much God had blessed our little family and used the people of Wood Point Baptist Church to be a huge part of that blessing.We were looking forward to how God was going to use our family in this next chapter of our lives, but it is always hard to let go of the loved ones in the "old chapter"!!

Our Last Days At Wood Point

Our last Sunday at our beloved little church was filled with tears and hugs. All the girls were given gifts that they loved.

                                      Elin opening her gift with all her sisters' help.

                             Ryan and I were presented with a painting of the view from our home for the last 7 years.

                                   

                                                              Elin spending time with some of her favorite people, and her new toy!!

                                                  Elle and Adrianna, her" bestest" friend in the whole world!!

                                           Our last day at our home in Wood Point. Things were quite a mess and boxes everywhere. The girls were watching a movie on the laptop so I could get some uninterrupted packing done.

                                               Well after a very adventurous day, which included dropping Emily off to Bible camp for her first time , leaving the laptop computer in the rooftop carrier which wasn't properly closed, subsequently mourning the loss of that same laptop after it made a very unfortunate acquaintance with the blacktop, and a very messy round of car sickness for Elin, we were on our way to our new ,recently purchased home. Mom and Dad were going to take the 3 little ones to their place for the week, so Ryan, I and Terry my brother-in-law could paint and get the house move in ready. We were within 10 minutes of  our house and our awaiting hot supper,compliments of Mommy and Daddy who had the house all opened up for us, when the van sputtered and stopped. Ryan, in the midst of all the stress and excitement of the day, had forgotten to watch the gas gauge, and for the very first time ever, we ran out of gas on the highway!!!  Thankfully, a call to Mom and Dad, and for them a trip to our new neighbors, the gas station down the road, then a drive on the highway to meet us us,remedied the problem. So here is Ryan awaiting our rescue!

                                                        Elle enjoying the in-van movie while we waited!

                                         Eva hanging out watching for Grampie and Grammie to arrive. We had spotted them on the divided highway coming from the other direction, and had to wait for them to get to the next exit, and then get on our highway.  The long suffering Terry....probably longing for the comforts of his home and family right about now!!

                                             At long last our rescue!!

                                              Still smiling!!!
     We did arrive and thus began a crazy paint filled week...counting down to moving day..