Catching Up...

I would like to begin by saying that there is no way that I am ever going to be able to catch up on the months and months of blogging that I have not done.  My world has been turned upside down, shaken, and gently set back down since my last post.  My life was just set down in a little bit of a different area...Central Point, Oregon.  Whoa!!  That's a long ways from Cedar Rapids, Iowa.  About 1,930 miles. So this is what has been going on...

Shawn and I sold our house on Mallory Street.  Can you believe that we sold our house after only nine days of being on the market.  Praise the Lord and may His will be done in our lives.  And if you can believe this, we got asking price and the buyer bought all of our furniture.

On another date I will have to post the amazing transformation before and afters pictures of the house.  It turned out incredible. 

September 11, 2012 finally came and I graduated Kaplan University with my Licensed Practical Nursing diploma.  Wow!  And my final semester at Kaplan I achieved straights A's.  This was a major accomplishment for me. 

And November 15th I took the NCLEX-PN and passed my boards.



In October, Noah celebrated his 9 year old birthday.  He enjoyed a day of all things Angry Birds.  That's his new obsession.

Love the Polka Dots!

Make a wish sweet 9 year old boy. 

See, I told you.  It was an angry birds kind of day.

Another Thanksgiving has come and gone.  I got to host Thanksgiving in our new house this year.

Everything turned out amazing.  It was delicious.  Here are a few pictures of my homemade pies.

I made homemade apple and pumpkin apple butter pie.

Shawn and I also celebrated our 10 year anniversary this November.

This was Shawn's gift, but Noah wanted to get in on the action too.

I got a beautiful ring.

And for the not so exciting news, my grandma Shirley went home to be with the Lord

November 16th.  Although she was ready to be taken home she will be sadly missed. 

Its very sad to think that I've been gone for the past 14 years and when I finally return home

to be near family, a member is taken from us.

Life is so precious and so short.

~Kate Anne



Backbone State Park, Iowa

Happy Easter

Praise the Lord.  He has risen and we can experience new life through Him.  What an amazing day it has been.  Church this morning was awesome.  I have never been to a church when the pastor has had such a huge heart for the congergation.  I'm sure that all pastors love the church body.  But never have a felt cherished and so welcomed as I do at our church.  The people are so warm.  I am sure going to miss our church when we leave Iowa.

Didn't the eggs turn out beautiful!!

Yesterday Shawn, Noah and I went to the church Eggstravaganza.  The church filled 26,000 eggs for the hunt.  While Noah and I stood at the starting point, Shawn stood in the back hoping not to be trampled.  Once the whistle blew it was on....I had told Noah that we were going to run to the back and skip all the eggs in the front.  I knew that all the kids would begin collecting in the front.  He did pretty well for himself.  He collected about 25-30. 

Noah must get some of his weird quirks from myself or Shawn.  As you can imagine, with 26,000 eggs to scatter they tend to be pretty much on top of each other.  Most kids would stop at a pile with 20 eggs and collect them all right?!  No, not Noah.  He would stop at a pile of eggs and collect just a few select eggs and move to the next pile.  He sure makes me smile.  I love that boy.

Look at this madness.  Notice that all the kids are in one place.  I'm smart and we started in the back and moved toward the center.

Luckily security was not needed. 

I'd say it was a pretty good weekend.

Hope you enjoyed yours.

Kate Anne



Finally Some Snow

We've had a very mild winter thus far for 2012.  But these past two weekends we've gotten our fair share. 

And my boys have been having a blast playing.  Unfortunately I've been stuck inside studying for finals.  Although it's been some nice quiet time, I would have much rather been outside playing in the snow.

Noah's snowman...

And daddy's....

And Noah and Daddy's Igloo..

What a great daddy!

Merry Christmas

A little late, I know.  I figured it was better late than never.  I have several photos that I really thought turned out nice.  I'll show you a few.

Of course cookies for Santa.  I got really lucky though this year.  I did not have time to make cookies for Santa so we gave him some that were made by our aunt Marie.  Thanks Marie!

Santa was good to us this year! 

Even Bryer received gifts.

Me on Christmas morning.  We were waiting for Noah to get up.

Noah going through his goodies from Santa!

A deadly weapon, but he was happy.

Oh the excitement of Christmas morning.

Love these crazy boys.

I hope you have a blessed day!

Merry Christmas!

~Kate Anne~

Happy Birthday Jesus

My sweet boy has been singing this Christmas tune since last year.  A younger girl sang this song at our church last year and it's been stuck in his head ever since.  We just finally caught it on tape.

I love the innocence of children.

Happy Anniversary

Happy Anniversary my love!  On Thursday, November 24th, Shawn and I celebrated our 9th year of marriage.  Can't wait to spend the rest of my life with you and continue to make sweet memories.

For our anniversary, we went to the Nutcracker today. 

It was amazing.  Then we went to Chillis for dinner.

Amazing day, with an amazing man!

Happy Halloween

My sweet little vintage boyscout from the 60's.  Shawn had a client awhile back that was boyscout.  This was his uniform when he was a scout.  The gentleman was not sure what to do with the uniforms, so he gave them to Noah.  Noah loves playing dress up, and they fit him perfectly.

Yes, that would be my child in the center winking at the camera. 

I love that boy!

Pirate Pumpkins

How cute is that?  They have the same expression on their face.

Ewww...pumpkin guts.

Noah singing.  He's so theatrical.

Fall Festivities

Today we went in search of a pumpkin patch.  Although we found several, we opted to stop at a little one  on the side of the road out in farm country.  

After pumpkins were picked and paid for it was time to leave.  Noah had his mind set on getting a large bucket in which he could fill with lots of candy on Halloween night.

The picture above is of "ugly fruit" as Shawn described it.  The man at the patch said they sell off his shelves like crazy.  People put them in their basements and they ward off spiders.  He said they release a terrible odor that spiders tend to not be very fond of.  With my disgust for spiders, I told the man that I would take the whole crate.  No..not really.  But I don't care much for spiders.  Or any or sort of insect for that matter.

This was the original pumpkin that Noah wanted, but we talked him into getting a smaller one. 

You know who would be scooping all the guts out.  Noah took our advise and chose a smaller pumpkin.

We also were able to get one dozen farm fresh eggs.  Yummy!!

Happy Fall!!

My Crazy Boys

I had to share this goofy and crazy picture.  Shawn took this picture a few weeks ago of Noah.  The boys were blowing the leaves in the yard to get ready for the removal the following day.  Noah wanted Shawn to point the blower in his face.  This is the image of my sweet child that he got.  I love it!  These two are crazy and share a pretty special relationship.