A few little reasons why I love where we live lately.

Cute old people in our neighborhood.  One couple stopped us the other day and gave the kids these airplanes they make for all the kids in the neighborhood.

 Watching tractors in the field do their thing.  Since this picture the corn is really growing.  "Knee high by July" is what our neighbor told us makes a good crop, and I think it might be there.

Nightly visits from "Peter Cottontail".

 Picking berries from the bushes in our backyard.  They are currants- too bad I don't can because I've heard they are good for jam.

And one thing we don't love- mosquitos.  I only wish our distaste was mutual.

Miami

We had a great time in Miami, and it's a good thing because Josh and I decided we are not going anywhere again with the kids for a LONG time!!  (It's like giving birth though I think, you start to forget soon after just how painful it really was!)  Marissa got sick on the plane after downing 10 chicken nuggets, 3 packs of fruit snacks, and about 32 ounces of water shortly before takeoff.  Luckily we had carried everything on and so I took her to the bathroom to change, came back and sat her in my lap, and one minute later she threw up again all over both of us.  And then of course Sadie decided she wanted to eat at that very minute.  At least Marissa crashed out in her seat shortly after like this.  Here is my "what the heck were we thinking?" face.  Shane was a gem and so good the whole time, except for leaving his backpack in the lobby of the place we parked our van.  We decided it was a good thing he was our Dominica baby!

 Josh's sister Sarah and her husband Ben had just moved to Miami for his residency, so it was an added bonus that we got to see them and stay at their place.  The kids LOVED spending time with their cousins, and it was cute to watch them together.

 Graham and Sadie are just a few months apart but she was almost as big as him.

 We went to the beach and to the children's museum and had a lot of fun with everybody.

Thanks for letting us crash your place Ben and Sarah, we had a lot of fun!  And to Greg and Shelley for coming too!

Oh Happy Day!

It's official, you can now call Josh Dr. Dettinger (and you better believe I do all the time!).  I am so glad we were able to go to his graduation in Miami on Friday and celebrate this great accomplishment.  Being in Miami with all its tropicalness took my mind back to where our journey started in Dominica and it was fun to reflect on how far we've come these 4 years.  Here we are at the White Coat Ceremony his first week of medical school on the island,

4 years and 2 more kids later

It was not an easy road by any means, there were many sacrifices made on both of our parts, a lot of hard work, stress, uncertainty, dealing with Ross and worrying if everything was going to go as it needed to.  But we made it!  Sometimes I have to pinch myself and wonder if this is all too good to be true. I am so grateful that Josh had this opportunity to get his MD, and while it was not the path we initially pictured, I would not trade our experiences for anything.  We have made lifelong friends, had many adventures, and have grown stronger and closer as a family.  I know residency will be far from a cakewalk, but we are happy to be starting this next chapter.  And I am thankful to have a Heavenly Father who loves us and has a plan for each of us, even when it wasn't what we anticipated, he knows what is best for us and truly has our happiness in mind.    

The Zoo

We have been here about a month now and have already gotten our money's worth out of our zoo passes.  If it's been a few days since we've gone, Shane will tell me "we haven't been to the zoo in a looong time."  They both love it, and have yet to show any inklings of being tired of it.  Shane makes it his personal mission to see all the animals every time we go, and luckily the zoo is not so huge that that is impossible, but it's big enough that it is still fun.  Here are a few pictures from our recent outings

The sea lions really like when you rub money in front of them

 We always have to stop and sing "I like to move it move it" when we see these guys.

Marissa says this komodo dragon is her favorite.

Marissa was timidly holding her lettuce out for the giraffe but couldn't quite bring herself to get close enough

So big brother stepped up for her.

Bless her heart, she is sure not afraid of the goats, they take quite a beating from her.

Upon seeing this bronze turtle Shane yells, "Oh look, it's a dead turtle!!  Did somebody shoot it?"

 Cute Sadie along for the ride.  I have to admit, there are a lot of babies at the zoo right now and I feel like I can relate to the mamas ha ha.

Deja Vu

Sometimes I feel like I'm having deja vu with Sadie.  Sometimes when I am holding her, I will think to myself, is this really a different baby or am I just back in time with one of the other two?  As far as my memory serves, she looks pretty similar to the other two, though when I look back to pictures they don't look as similar as I had imagined. 

(Sadie)

 

(Marissa)

 

 (Sadie)

(Marissa)

(Sadie's eyes are a lot darker than Shane's or Marissa's were.)  Maybe it's partly that I'm using pretty much all the same things I used with them, especially Marissa's clothes since they were born around the same time.  They generally like the same sorts of things (being swaddled, taking a bath when they get fussy at night, staring at the fish mobile on their swing), or maybe I have just gotten used to doing things a certain way. Also, we were kind of at a little break for Josh around the same time for both Marissa and Sadie.  Except for one thing- I got a little spoiled with Marissa sleeping through the night so quickly!  

The House

Here is our little house, or at least some outside pictures of it.  It is smaller than our last house because there is no basement and no upstairs, but the living areas are bigger and we have an attached garage (woohoo!).  

 Here is the backyard looking from the side of the house.  There is not a fence but behind it is some really big bushes and a field so the kids can't get too far.

 They have loved the yard and have really been playing together a lot more.

Course one of their favorite places to play is on the side of the house where there are a bunch of little rocks, or "nuts" as they like to call them, you know, since they are chipmunks.

 Josh has been working hard on the yard, this is what it looked like when we moved in.  Shane for one was thrilled with all the flowers (dandelions) in the yard.  There were a couple days in Saginaw when it was supposed to be spring and it snowed and he burst into tears and said, "I wanted flowers!  It's just not beautiful!!"  In fact one of my friends was over one day and was talking to him and was saying it was a beautiful day and he informed her, "No, it's not beautiful. There are no flowers or leaves on the trees."  So he was very happy to see "flowers" here and told me "I always wanted flowers!" and picked several for me:)

This is from the front yard looking down the street, it is a cul-de-sac and there are a ton of kids.

 In pretty much every neighborhood here there are at least a couple lakes.  I can get a pretty good run in going around all of them.

We love that  our neighborhood is kind of on the edge of the city and right next to that big field so it has a country feel to it but it is five minutes away from a huge shopping center with a Target, Kohls, Chipotle, Chick-fil-A, etc.  It can sometimes be hard to find places to rent instead of buy, but we feel like we lucked out big time with this one because our landlord only posted it on some obscure sight that only people as "thorough" as my husband would find.  She really liked Josh from talking to him on the phone and when we came down to look at the house she offered to let us stay the night in it and had an air mattress and table all made up nice for us and she even stocked the fridge with snacks for us.  And when we moved in she had her daughter who has a little business on etsy make us a welcome package filled with goodies.  Basically, we are really really happy here.