Making a New House a Home

We are here! And it is feeling like home. We are loving the space and even more, the yard!! Ivy loves to be outside and that was the hardest part at the townhouse. This morning we watered flowers and the garden and Ivy was in heaven. She even picked the one ripe tomato we had, rinsed it in her bucket, and took a bite! We have met our next door neighbors (a very sweet, older couple) and we hope to meet more this week. We hear there is a family two doors down with a little girl who is 3! HOW FUN!! We are settling in to this new place called home. Here are the many pictures that were promised!

Greg mowing on his new toy!!

Love that I am storing most of Ivy's toys in the chest that was in my kitchen since I now have cabinets galore! It is wonderful to sit in my family room and not feel like I am in a toy store!

I am looking for a mini table and chairs for Ivy's room- any suggestions?

Last night we ventured to dinner and shopping and are learning our way around a new town. We already are enjoying life without Lexington traffic. We notice that we are in the country when we can see the stars so bright and I saw 2 deer on my run this morning! We have made our new house a home :)

Moving Day.... I mean week!!

On Monday, we officially closed on our new house! I had no idea what the week ahead would hold. I have never been a big mover. I have really only moved three times, with that being said I am no expert. And now that I have really moved this time- independent from my parents- I will say it is one of the most stressful things I have endured. It was good for losing 3 lbs in one week.... and good for a new house! Otherwise, it sucked!

In the midst of moving week we tried to take time out to remember our lives in the townhouse, have final picnics on the hill, and spending time at our new house to see what life has in store for the Smorstad family!

Outrider Way is where our family began... but we have outgrown the space!

Ivy and Rantz taking a break from swimming and enjoying pizza on the hill!

Ivy is excited to look around her new yard- discovering flowers, green "matoes", and a "barm" intact with her horse (only in her imagination)!

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Yesterday morning we woke up tired. Tired from a week of painting, packing, and keeping the townhouse spic and span in case of a showing. We missed our time together as a family and we were feeling the stress of the move. But as the alarm went off bright and early, for the last time at Outrider Way, we new the end was near! We were on our way to a new home on none other than Lefty Loop!

Ivy is ready to go!

Goodbye old house, hello new home!

We arrived to find our kitty cat, scared to death in Ivy's closet. Ivy was excited to "comfort" her with lots of Ivy loving!

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Last night, after unpacking our life, we slept good (Ivy included-yay) and woke up refreshed. We are putting the finishing touches on our house to make it a Smorstad Home!

Coming REALLY REALLY soon!
Pictures :) and LOTS of them!!!

From 1 to 13... really?

Ivy is all about the pretend play these days. She plays mommy, cooking, grocery store, cleaning, school, and you name it! Anything that she sees happening in real life she acts out during play time. I didn't think that she would ever play "teenager" but that's how I felt today.

Our 1 year old (I get to say that for a month longer) should look like this:

Until she decided with the help of an Easter egg she could look like this:

With the smile on her face... she looks pretty proud of her new buds!

I couldn't miss this photo-op that I will use for blackmail when she really is 13- haha!

The Story of an Impatient Girl

Ivy is a full blown two year old.... a little over a month early. By 9:30 this morning she had approximately 8 melt downs. If she was told no-- fit-- if she couldn't figure something out-- fit-- if I didn't come running when she called for me-- fit-- not wanting to get dressed-- fit-- orange shorts not green-- fit... I think you get the point. This is draining and never ending but sometimes you just have to laugh at their stubbornness! Tonight we got home from the grocery store and Ivy wanted to go swimming. I obliged, considering we tried to swim this afternoon just as it began to thunder. (You can guess what followed as we had to get out of the pool due to the coming storm- FIT!) So, I thought she was following me through the maze of boxes in our garage to go in and get on her bathing suit, only to see that she was headed straight to the pool. Low and behold I got to the backyard shortly behind her to see this:

In the pool, fully dressed- shoes, bow, non-swimmy diaper- and she didn't even drop her sucker on the way!

She was happy to play just like that until her diaper really started weighing her down. She allowed me to strip her down (no fit- YAY!) and then she decided she wanted to sun tan in her birthday suit!

It's a good thing that at the end of a day full of temper tantrums I still can say this little gal is the keeper of her Mommy's heart!

Brayden's Birthday Bash

Our friend, Brayden turned 1 this weekend! All week as we anticipated a fun party, Ivy would tell me "Bayden one and Ivy two." Our kiddos are growing up :) Ashley hosted an excellent first birthday. It was the perfect summer party- baby pools, cookout food, and and enjoying the sunshine. Yay for summer babies!

Happy Birthday, Sweet Brayden!

Graduation Celebration

I feel like after this weekend we are seriously done celebrating graduation! We had a party that my mom and Greg's mom hosted for Greg and Anthony. Lots of family came but we didn't bust out the camera until the very end. I saw the shyest side of Ivy that I have ever seen. I actually couldn't believe how she acted. She woke up from her nap to lots of people that she did in fact know... but wasn't too happy to see them all there. I took her outside after she began sobbing and she continued to say "Too many people... stay outside." She was bound and determined to be antisocial. Little by little she warmed up and by the end she was having fun! I have noticed that to a room full of stranger she is Miss Social Butterfly but to a group that she "should" know she gets very backwards until she warms up! Kids are funny :) and I am excited to see more of her personality develop.

Daddy'sDAY SaturDAY!

On Saturday, Ivy had a day with Daddy!! They had so much fun and Greg even took pictures so I could blog about their special time. I had to go to Georgetown to start my first 2 master's classes. I am really excited about the ESL program and I think these 2 classes are going to be great. I didn't come home half as anxious as I was before I left. So anyway, on to the exciting stuff.... Daddy'sDAY!

Greg took Ivy out to Veteran's Park. They have hiking/biking trails, lots of plants, and a creek running through it all. It is one of Greg's favorite places to go and enjoy nature and just relax. He had been planning all week on this little adventure. Ivy LOVED it! She walked on the trail, picked flowers, collected rocks, and even got in the creek! She was impressed to see dogs swimming in the water, too :) I am so excited that Ivy has a Daddy that is no doubt going to impress his love for the outdoors on his little one. Yay for a SUPER day with Daddy!

On her way in.... Ivy was a step ahead!

Posing with a big tree---- a REALLY REALLY big tree



Taking a photo break on the walk back toward the car.

*Greg apologized for not getting pics of her in the water.... are you kidding? Honey, I was so glad that you didn't let go of her when she was standing in water that runs into a waterfall. Good call on avoiding a catastrophe!

*Also, please note that Greg made sure Ivy had all her girly accessories in tact before heading into the wilderness!!

Dress Up

So this morning, Ivy got her first real dose of dress up. Her style wasn't quite as "princessy" as I had envisioned, but I would call her get up eclectic instead....

So here's to our eclectic beauty!

Smorstad News-flash!!!

I have a lot of things to tell (some random, some big time, some exciting, some dreadful) so I will be doing it in my all to favorite bullet style:

* Things are moving along on the house process. We finished up the loan process and had it inspected last week. The inspector said that it was a "cream puff"~ which of course we loved to hear! We are still scheduled to close on June 22nd and hope to do some projects before moving in. We would LOVE to be in by July 1! Also, a fun bit of information on our house- it is on Lefty Loop but you take a right (instead of the stated left) and it is actually a court rather than a loop! Haha, who names streets these days?


* I have 1 day left as a part time teacher..... and that means.....


WHOO-HOO my friends, I will be employed full time this fall in my usual first grade location!!!!


Thank you for your prayers and support in this matter. I was so excited to receive a phone call from a principal on Friday afternoon confirming my spot- this is a principal who was so patient to put up with my worry and calmed me 1,000+ times in the last month. I have a totally new appreciation for my job, my school, and the amazing health benefits. Not only that, but I am SUPER DUPER excited to have my class next year to myself. I will miss my fellow teacher friend, but I will not miss sharing my kiddos!! :)


* This coming week I start my first 2 master's classes. I am going to Georgetown and getting it in Elementary Education with an endorsement for ESL (English as a Second Language). I am nervous, excited, and dreading it all at the same time. I don't remember how to be a student and I've never been a student and mommy! Ahhhh- we'll see how it goes!


* We went to our first work picnic for Greg's company- weird, we felt old but young, as we were definitely the babies of the group! It was fun, but I took no pictures as I was chasing Miss Ivy trying to keep her from diving head first into the muddy slip and slide.



* Niko- update- So Ivy's babysitter, Christy, has 4 boys, 1 named Nicholas whom is often referred to as "Niko" by his big brothers. So that explains the name of Ivy's "friend." However, it does not explain how Niko is playing with her and making her laugh sporadically! It also doesn't make sense that she left Niko in the drawer when going to Nana's house the other day. So as of now, I believe Ivy has a full blown friend, but the name was not so original!



* Lastly, our girl has been sleeping in her crib transformed toddler bed for 2 days. We have new toddler bedding that we will be using in the new house and went ahead and changed the bed over to see how she would do. She has been so excited to get into her "big girl bed" and actually throws a fit when you go to get her out. Ivy has yet to realize she can get out on her own but I heard that comes later.... not going to be fun! However, for now she looks so stinking cute that I had to snap a photo! (Greg would have killed me if this would have woken her up- but I could not resist!)