Update

Life is a whirlwind these days.  I don't know which way is up most days:).  I am trying hard not to let myself get overwhelmed, since most of it are things we have chosen and things we are excited about.

We are officially sleeping at our new home!  It has been so fun to have the "big" stuff over here and start to get unpacked a little.  We still have way too much stuff over at the other home, and things are much too disorganized for my liking, but we chip away at it a little each day.  It is coming.

My parents and two nieces, Stephanie and Mikayla, came the Thursday before Memorial Day to help and were here until Saturday afternoon.  The rest of the Alva & Wendy Barney Clan came on Friday evening and were here until Monday morning.  And they were all a HUGE help!  We got the Master bedroom, main living area, and kitchen painted, as well as the entire garage.  I was so excited to have that done before anything was in there!  Wendy and Alva are awesome painters, and my mom is awesome at the taping/prep work.  The kids had a great time playing together and we had awesome babysitters.  The older kids would come and ask me what else they could do to help!  We got several other projects done on the house and my dad measured and got the layout of the yard, and has already done several landscape designs for us!  He also ran several errands and managed to spoil all 11 grandkids with ice cream from the ice cream truck!  It is all so appreciated.

Sunday afternoon we were able to take the Barney's to the cemetery to see where Anneca is buried.  It was so special to me to be able to take them there.  It felt good to cry and remember.  The cemetery was so beautiful with the flags and flowers everywhere for the holiday.

We also had our first experience with ticks!  Kyle had taken the kids to a friends' property for a bon fire and to see their farm animals.  The man warned us their dog has had ticks.  He checked them but found nothing. (I was out of town.)  Spencer's teacher found it on his head a few days later when she put her hand on his head and felt something.  Yuck!  We found two more in Skyler's head.  I was rushing to Urgent Care to have them removed and decided to call the Advice Nurse on my way.  She was a cute Texan who told me there is no way I should go to the doctor to remove a tick.  I pulled off on the side of the road and she walked me through how to remove it.  (I had grabbed tweezers before I left, thankfully.)  And I did it!  My "mommy powers" definitely came out, because there is no way I could have normally done that.  Spencer has had some very swollen Lymph nodes on that side of his head that scared me a bit--and I did end up taking him to Urgent Care for those--but hopefully they will go away and he'll be fine.

Skyler and Spencer finished up their soccer seasons.  They both loved it and had a great experience.  Spencer has three Eastern Washington University soccer players as his coaches and they did a great job.  And Skyler had me as his coach!  He was so proud and I loved helping those darling little kiddos.  It was a lot of fun.  By the end of the season, none of them were kneeling down and grabbing the soccer ball with their hands: mission accomplished!

There has been lots of end-of-the-year school stuff happening.  Kylene's class performed plays I was able to go see, and they had a class field trip I chaperoned.  Plus a few PTO planning meetings for next year.  I loved how on the field trip Kylene kept telling me how glad she was I got to come with her.  I'm glad she still likes me being with her!

I also took a weekend off and headed to Las Vegas....to finally get to meet my sweet, amazing nephew Calvin!  I was able to be there when he was blessed and to attend my brother, Nate's, graduation from Medical school.  Go, Nate!  They are moving to Tulsa shortly for him to do his Anesthesiology Residency at Oklahoma State University.  I was so glad I got to meet Calvin before they live even farther away.  He has been such a blessing to our extended family.

We have had so much wonderful help on the house.  Besides the family, many, many friends have served me.  I have had help painting, watching kids, bringing me cookies, helping me pack and haul stuff over, letting us borrow things we need, dinner brought over, etc.  I have really felt loved!

I know there's more, but that's all my tired brain can think of right now.  Sorry no pictures, those will hopefully come later.