Backyard Landscape

Sometimes it's just easier to pay someone to do the work!

Matt and I have wanted to add to our landscaping for a long time. We are blessed to live across the street from a landscaper who owns his own business. We talked with him just after Ryan was born and we thought his quote was reasonable and the best part was we didn't have to do the work, ha! See, last summer we planted 5 evergreen trees and 4 viburnum evergreens in our backyard and only 2 have survived. Yes, you heard me, TWO!!! We were so mad and call it our "stupid tax". We learned we do not have green thumbs! So here are the before and after pictures of our now beautiful landscape!

Side of the house before

After - Hydrangeas

I love Hydrangeas and can't wait to see what color they come up in the spring!

Before

After

Before

After - love it!

The tree is a river birch (not sure what everything else is called, ha)

Before (what we look at from our deck or out the window)

After - much more privacy!

I love the stone steps leading off the deck!

We are really pleased with the work and hoping nothing dies this time! If it does at least we know it will be replaced under warranty!

Race for the Cure

This morning I was up bright and early to run/walk the Cincinnati Race for the Cure 5K! I was a little nervous about the race. Matt stayed home to watch Ryan so I had to drive myself to the race. I have never before run a 5K this large. I found a great parking spot and made my way to pick up my shirt and bib. Not sure on the official numbers but there was atleast 10,000 people there! It was so touching to see the breast cancer survivors walking with their husbands, family and friends! Made me teary eyed!

The race was great! I'm ready to do another one next month, ha! My goal time was 45 min. but I thought realistically it might be closer to 50 min. When I ran on the treadmill on Thursday my time was 43 min. My time today was 43.25. I was very happy and surprised! I achieved my goal! I was able to run alot of the race and really push myself!

And here is a pic of Ryan for the grandparents! We just can't get enough of this sweet baby! He's such a cutie pie! This is us before our date night at Rendezvous in Memphis!

Road Trip

Our road trip to Memphis started off great last Friday! The car was packed to the hilt with people, dogs and stuff...lots of stuff! Ha! We were so excited to be traveling to Memphis to visit my family! I was a little nervous about how Ryan would do on the 7 hour road trip but he proved to be a good traveler! The only bump in the road came just past Jackson about 50 miles from our destination. Ryan decided to scream the entire last 50 miles. Many deep breaths and some prayer later we finally arrived at my parents house.

Ryan was snug as a bug in his car seat! We hung out in the back seat as our driver (Matt) drove the 500 miles south. I told him just call me Miss Daisy the rest of the day, ha! At first I wasn't looking forward to sitting in the back seat butI ended up loving it.

We stopped at Sonic not once but TWICE on Friday, HA! We stopped the first time about 2 1/2 hours into the trip and we gased up, took dogs potty, we went potty, fed Ryan and ate lunch! They asked us if we wanted the free drink upgrade to a route 44 and I said sure not thinking about how big it actually is. My diet coke was so big I think I only drank about 1/4 of it, HA!

We stopped again at another Sonic just past Nashville a few hours later to feed Ryan! We of course had to order something so we each got slushes and the best thing was it was happy hour!

This is where Annabelle spent most of the drive! We put the middle seat down in the back and placed the dog carrier, with the door off, where the middle seat was. The dogs could lay in the carrier or my lap. Of course Gracie chose my lap, her favorite place.

The girls enjoying the ride snoozing between Ryan and I. Do you see my feet propped up? I was pretty comfy back there! Ha!

Besties

As I mentioned in my previous post my best friend Rachel and her 15 month old son Alex came to visit us last week! I enjoy and cherish every opportunity we get to spend together and hang out! We usually only get to see each other about twice a year! We loved having them here!

Raych is expecting her second baby next spring! We are so excited about baby Tichy and can't wait to find out what she is having!

Here we are with our boys! Hard to believe that 17 years ago we were riding the bus and gossiping over boys and here we are 17 years later as wives and moms to these adorable little boys! It was so neat to stroll our little boys and do our mom thing! I so wish she lived closer =(

I love this pic of Raych and Alex, might be one of my favs!

Alex absolutely LOVED the pool! All I kept thinking while he was playing in the water is how much fun Ryan will have next summer at the pool! He's gonna be a water baby! Have you seen his feet? He might just be the next Michael Phelps, ha!!!

We are in the process of planning our trip to Connecticut sometime before next spring!

*post coming soon - before and after pics of our landscape we just had done and our trip to Memphis!

We have been busy this last week! My best friend Rachel and her son Alex were in town to visit and meet Ryan! We had a blast and loved hanging out with them! It was great having another Mom to hang out with and do our "mom" thing together! We definitely both had our hands full but it was so fun and we can't wait to see them again! We hope to make it up to Connecticut either this fall or winter!

We went shopping at the new outlets here in Cincy one day! Got some cute stuff for Ryan and Alex at Carter's and Osh Kosh B'gosh! I'm so excited about fall! Ryan has some adorable outfits I can't wait to put him in for the fall!

I just love this smile! He smiles with his eyes!

Raych has some family who live in Northern KY so we took an afternoon to visit them! I've known Raych since we were 12 years old! We meet in Jr. High when our lockers were side by side and we rode the bus together! Raych is like a sister to me so meeting her family was like meeting my own family! They are super sweet and made us feel right at home! I'm glad Raych got to see them while she was visiting!

We went to the pool twice! Ryan did great and actually took a great nap at the pool! Alex, who is 15 months old, had a blast at the pool! I can't wait to take Ryan to the pool next year! He will just love it! I'm sure we will be spending lots of time there!

It's football time in TENNESSEE!!!

We are so excited about football season around here and can't wait to dress Ryan up for his first TN football game!

Go Big Orange!!!

Wordless Wednesday

Bumbo Time

We decided to try Ryan out in his Bumbo seat! He seems to hold his head up well and thought he would like the new view, ha! He liked it for about 5-7 min then I think his neck got tired and he had had enough. He looked like such a big boy in it. He was adorable! I just love him to pieces!

I insisted that Matt take our picture before church. I told him it's the only day of the week that I look decent and "done" up and someone home to take our picture, ha. He obliged much to my delight!

I could just eat him with a spoon!

So who do you think he looks more like?