Days with the Dorans

 I have mentioned before that that my kitchen (or lack there of) has been a source of stress for us. We have done a lot of things to save money~ a few of which we ended up throwing in the towel and paying the professionals to come in and save the day.  I will save those lovely stories for the final reveal (which should come sooner than later... God-willing!). One thing that we did 100% on our own was our new walk-in pantry or "Costco Closet" as I like to refer to it. This was a MAJOR bonus to getting our new kitchen, especially because we have four kids that I think have tapeworms.  I say that because they are all pretty thin but you'd never know it if you saw what they ate each day.  We can't wait to have a door for our pantry so we can put a lock on it (and yes... I'm serious) to keep them out.  Especially sweet Sean who got into the apples (we found 10 apples around the house with one bite taken out of each... sigh). While my mom and I went to Home De...

When you have a song in your heart, clothes can wait.

I am so behind on blogging (which seems to be a trend lately).  Last week I was in class all week and then I started a new blog (on how to start a blog) for teachers (and for anyone really!). Jeff's sister and her family recently moved to the Chicago area (well about an hour from there I guess) and were back in town for a visit. We got to see them twice while they were in Michigan which isn't too bad considering our soccer/ dance/ school etc schedule as of late... It was a hot day and so it was a great idea that we spend the day in Uncle Jim and Tia Trish's pool with all the cousins!  It was wonderful to see them all together (though I am kicking myself for not getting a picture of them ALL together!).  They all got along 'swimmingly' and loved jumping off the diving board and going down the slide.  Goose made me laugh because he usually had water-wings and a tube to keep him afloat! We didn't need to worry about him sinking! At first Sean wanted...

 Sometimes it's those everyday moments that you think to yourself... I don't want to forget what life feels like RIGHT NOW. I do that a lot.  I forget funny things the kids say... or I forget that sweet moment from last week...  I've been bad about updating this blog and am hoping to get back into the swing.  Now that the stress of our kitchen seems to be lifting, I feel like I have a moment to write. A wonderful thing happened... MY DAD CLEANED UP!  What I mean by this is one day he was cleaning and put my mom's Cannon Rebel (aka super awesome camera) up on a shelf in the closet and like me, and my mom and of course my Nan... he forgot about it! My mom searched for weeks, thought perhaps it was stolen or something and finally went out and bought a new (updated fancier version of her) camera.  Well... what made this WONDERFUL was that the camera has now been found and guess who gets it... ME! Of course she took all her fancy lenses, flashes and o...

 The actual Fourth of July was a beautiful day.  We began some work in our kitchen and realized that the island was not plumb so we gave up and headed to the lake.  I can tell you now that the problem has been fixed, but at the time we were very upset and frustrated.  We joined my brother and his family at the lake and drank in the sun.  My mood turned around when I spoke to my beautiful cousin, Nicole (who was recently engaged), about her upcoming trip to see us.  Jeff drank (and probably got a little dehydrated in the sun too... not good mixes for him).  Jeff and I were supposed to take the boys to the Tiger game but it soon became clear that Jeff would not be making the game. I was really upset (apologies have since been given~ as has forgiveness).  So my dad joined me and we were off.  I never drive downtown but my dad's eyes aren't the best and it had begun to rain (well... downpour).  At one point all of my passengers had ...

I LOVE this picture Nan too! Ryan and Joe had a great time in the water! The fireworks on my folks' lake this year, fell the last Saturday in June.  It was a beautiful day and even better because we were joined by some great people!  Nan and Paul (Nan takes AMAZING pictures and took the first three pictures on this blog) came over with their kids and we also had some old family friends over too.  We had a great time playing on the lake and had TONS of great food!! The day tends to fly by when you're having so much fun and the sun seemed to set before we knew it!  We headed out on the boat and the fireworks were AWESOME!  I wondered if Sean would be afraid (since last year we were stuck up in the house because he was in a leg cast).  He seemed to like them (did some oooohs and aaaahhhhs) but after a while he just nestled into my arms so I would hold him close (which I did happily).  It was a wonderful time and we are already looking forward to...