Chicago!

Last Thursday Brock and I headed off to Chicago for our "anniversary getaway"! Our 3 year anniversary was really on the 9th of July, but we found this time to be a great opportunity to celebrate, mainly because Brock's best friend, Mike, got married this past weekend...(and Brock was a groomsman!) It worked out pretty well, however we didn't take Isaac along on this trip. Fun to not have to stress over carting him everywhere...but it was my first time leaving him for 2 nights straight...and that was very hard! We were so anxious to get back to him! But he was still in one piece..thanks to both g'ma's babysitting him:)

Thursday evening was the rehearsal @ Bahama Breeze restaurant. Very cool place and totally my style! I wish there was one close by around here!

Friday evening they had their wedding which was an outdoor ceremony. Perfect weather for it too! A tad on the hot side, but sitting in the shade wasn't so bad. They had around 100 guests, so it was a nice personal evening for them.

Mike and Casey are absolutely perfect for each other too. This was totally their style. It was cool that Brock was a part of Mike's wedding, just like he was a part of ours. Them two go way back...went to high school together, played football, and were roomies their freshman year @ BSU. Great buds! Here are some pics of their wonderful day!


Picture time before the ceremony:

The "3" of us:)

Brock and Mikey!

Yeah....he cleans up pretty nice, I'd say;)

Brock looked so short next to some of these guys! ha ha!

Mr. & Mrs. VanPutten!

The wedding party...loved the bright flowers with the black...AND she had the girls all find their own black dresses...what a cool idea! They all looked very unique-nice touch!

The boys and Casey!

The "cocktail hour" took place in a carousel room. Very cool! After the wedding party was introduced they all hitched rides on their ponies:) Apparently my husband doesn't know how to ride a horse:) (He's backwards!)

Mike is so silly!

So after one more night in Chicago, we headed home Saturday morning after having breakfast @ Denny's with my great gal Jess and her fiance' Mike! It was awesome to get to see her, even for the short time it was.

The only downside of the trip was that I got sick both nights after eating dinner. The first time was actually @ the Bahama Breeze and the second time was once I layed down to go to bed at the hotel after the reception. I have no idea what that was about! I was in complete discomfort as my belly would get into a really tight ball and I'd feel really yuck! But after I got sick I immediately felt better afterwards. It was so strange. I don't know if I was literally home sick or what the deal was. I have heard on rare occasions that women can get sick towards the end of their pregnancy too...I hope that's not the case! That would not be fun!

But anyways, that was our fun weekend getaway in Chi-town! We'll be back there in November for Mike and Jess' wedding then! Yay!

*Stay tuned for pictures from Brock's bday which we're celebrating tonight...and tomorrow night! What a spoiled boy!

4-H Fair Outing Day #2....

Wednesday evening was our last outing @ the fair before we left for Chicago. It was a pretty good time! The weather was awesome and NOT HOT which was a huge bonus:) We ate supper and hung out with Brian, Liz and Lincoln for the evening...great fun! Here are some pics of our stroll around the fair one last time:

Isaac thought the ducks were pretty funny!

My big boy on the John Deere!"Hey, waz up!" hee hee...too funny!

Daddy and Isaac

Looking @ more animals...from his favorite spot:)

Isaac & me

Playing with my ears again!

Annual family fair pic with the ferris wheel! (kinda cut Brock off...oops!)

Strolling around listening to "Hootie and the Blowfish" and I look down and Isaac is passed out! Enough fair for him!!

4-H Fair Outing Day #1...

So last Friday was the first official day of one of my personal favorite times of the year...FAIR TIME!! For my family...this is like a week-long holiday for us. After growing up and being used to camping the entire week out there...some people thought we were nuts....but I didn't know any different-I loved it! I can remember a couple years I didn't go home one time and was out there the entire week! Being involved in 4 different animal clubs, that will do that to ya:) It's in the blood!
So....now I have Isaac. My hope this year was that he would show just a tiny bit of interest or something in the animals. Nope-not happenin'! And it definitely minimizes the time I get to spend out there, cuz the kid can only take so much fair exposure at one time. He gets that from his daddy...but that's ok:)

Anyways, Saturday was my first day out there with Isaac. So Mom, Dad and me took Isaac and Kylie around to see some animals. Our first stop was Young McDonald's Farm.

Here's Grandma and Isaac looking at the miniature horse:

And petting the duckling...so cute!

Papa taking Isaac on the pony ride...doesn't he look like such a pro?!
(You would never know he only lasted 1/2 way through the ride...then he was done! ha ha!)

And here's Kylie on the pony with Grandma....

Later we met up with my brother, Liz and Lincoln! He was loving the Pat Benatar concert that night!

This was Isaac's expression pretty much the entire time...but he still had a hold of both of his clappers...his favorite toys in the world right now!

This was on Sunday after the fair parade. During a long, hot and sticky day, this was the only thing that kept Isaac from running away from the campsite! Thanks to Aunt Kristi and her portable DVD player so Isaac could watch Nemo! Whew!

So that was our first outing...stay tuned for more pics from this coming Wednesday, which will sadly be our last opportunity to go out there. But we're heading to Chicago for the weekend so that will be a blast!



I'll leave you with pictures of Isaac's hair cut from today! Doesn't he look so grown up?! And so blonde now! This time he cried the whole time during the cut, but we got it done quickly!

Lastly, here's a belly shot of the baby @ 31.5 weeks. We're just shy of the 8 month mark! Yay! He's definitely sticking out a lot. He's already so much like Isaac, as he always sticks his rump up on my left side and I look oddly lopsided sometimes! So weird!

4th of July Weekend and more!

So I've been kinda MIA from the computer this past week. Brock and I house-sat his parent's place all last week while they went on vacation. It was kind of a mini-vacation for us too, considering we had a pool to be at all week, satellite TV (since we still have "amish tv" ha ha!) and we even had a washer and dryer to use that works! So those conveniences were fun for us to enjoy for a while:) They don't have a computer at their house so I kind of made myself take a break from blogging and being a computer worm for a bit...and it was kind of nice! So I have a little catching up to do now.

Anyways, before his parent's left they had a party on the 3rd so we went to that and had a fun time. Here are a couple pics of Isaac geared up in his new muscle T! It said "4th of July Tour" on the shirt and "from sea to shining sea". I thought he looked pretty studly in it:)

He's got a mean glare, doesn't he?!

On the 4th my mom and I (& Isaac) went to visit my great friend, Kelly and her new baby girl, Abigail! It was great fun getting to see her again! She now lives in Myrtle Beach so we were excited to get our kids together to finally meet. Her baby girl is SO beautiful! It's so crazy that her and I are both mommies now, considering we grew up together and were in each other's weddings and all that great stuff. It really made us realize we're growing up now!

We did a lot of relaxing on Friday, since oddly most of our big plans were every other day except for on the 4th...which never happens! Here's Brock and Isaac napping...I just thought it was too cute:)

Saturday my friend Tricia and her hubby and son came up from Lafayette to visit. We went to the drive-in in Syracuse to eat then were off to watch the Wawasee fireworks on my parent's boat. They spent the night and we spent part of the afternoon back at the pool at Brock's parent's. It was fun to finally get our two boys together to play too!

Here's Isaac reading his "Where's Spot?" book on the way to eat.

On the boat: Isaac on the left and Aidan on the right. They are exactly a year apart by 3 days.

Tricia & Aidan, Me & Isaac getting ready to watch the fireworks!

Isaac looking at the water on the lake

Our annual Maust family picture on the boat. We do this every year for the Wawasee fireworks:)

Isaac really did watch a couple of the fireworks and liked them, but then he got more and more sleepy....

...and before you knew it he was OUT! ha ha! I can't believe all the booming noises didn't keep him up!

My parents and nephew Brady up on the fly deck. Brady looked so silly with his huge ear plugs on! He enjoyed the fireworks though!

The remainder of our stay at Brock's parents gave Isaac the opportunity to learn to LOVE the pool! It was so crazy how a week ago he would always complain at first then warm up to the water. Now he can't wait til he touches the water! It is so funny! We even have him going under quite often and it doesn't even phase him now! Brock even said he was smiling at him under water cuz they both would have their eyes open:) I hope he likes it after being away from it after some period of time...guess we'll see!

Here's Brock putting Isaac under...

...and he's OK!

So that was our fun-filled weekend!

Here's the "more" part:

* July 9th Brock and I celebrated our 3-year anniversary! SO hard to believe! We were invited to a friend's place and they made us a wonderful dinner so that was nice. Other than that, we're waiting til the end of the month til we go to Chicago for a wedding to have a little anniversary getaway. We're pretty excited for that!

*Last Thursday I passed the 30 week mark with our bun in the oven! 10 to go! (Hopefully around 8:) That would be so great!) Isaac was only a day early, so I'm not getting my hopes up! I'm gonna get some pics up sometime soon! It's so crazy I'm starting to go to my appt's every 2 weeks now instead of 4. That's just weird-it's going so fast now! I'll keep ya updated the best I can!

Next post will probably be about non other than the FAIR!! It starts this Friday so hopefully we'll spend some good times out there. My family is huge into the fair so Isaac better learn to like it too! I'm anxious to see his reaction to the animals....so stay tuned for some pictures of that! :)

Good Friends...Good Times!

Last Saturday night was a blast for Brock and I! My best gal pal, JaNae had gotten in touch with me earlier in the week seeing if we were free that night to go out to dinner with her and her husband, Matt. Surprisingly, we had nothing going on for once so we made a date with them to go eat @ Hacienda! And coincidentally, it was also JaNae's birthday too, so it was tons of fun to celebrate with her on her day:) We met up with them and high school bud, Darin and his wife and 2 kids. So we had a great and goofy time!

I can never say enough about JaNae! She is just so awesome and I love her to pieces! She was one of my bridesmaids and also sang in my wedding. This girl has the voice of an angel:) To be honest, I really don't know how her and I kept such an amazing relationship over the years. She was 2 grades older than me in high school and it never even seemed that way. We always got along so well. Even after we both graduated and did our own things, we still would find time to hang out and always picked up where we left off like nothing ever changed...it's so great! Once she got married it had been harder to get together since she moved to Bluffton. It's like an hour 1/2 drive. But when we do see her and Matt we have so much fun. Brock and Matt always have a great time together too!

After we had our dinner date they came back to our house and we had some great fun and conversation. It was also so great that they got to see Isaac again since it had been almost a year since they'd last seen him. Too cool! While JaNae and I stayed inside and talked for eons (like we do best!)...Brock and Matt went outside and played a few rounds of botchy-ball. How funny they were! After a bit you couldn't even find them in the yard it was so dark out! But I managed to get a couple of pics of the 2 crazies!

First, here's JaNae and me:) Happy Birthday, JaNae!!

Matt and Brock playing....

Good toss, honey! (How silly does he look!)

The boys

Thanks for a great night you guys! We love ya!

*Oh, and today I finally got to get Isaac in for his "1 year check up" Even though the kid will be 14 months in a couple days! That was seriously the soonest they could get him in..kind of ridiculous! But oh well! He weighed 26 lbs. and was 32.5 inches long! That puts him in the 75th percentile for weight again and he dropped from 100% to the 95th percentile for height. Guess he's shrinkin:) Not really-the kid is still so stinkin' long...it's crazy! But he's good and healthy! The only downside the doc found is that he needs to up his vocab skills a little more...so we're gonna start crunchin' down on that. That's the update on Mr. Isaac! :)