So Very Thankful

If you read my last post (or know me personally) you know that the end of 2016 was somewhat of a whirlwind for me.  Moving my entire family and all of our possessions, even just 10 miles, was a hug undertaking and then trying to create a home in our new space took a lot of mental and physical energy for me.  I see it all as a huge blessing and cannot even begin to express how grateful I am for our new house.  So although, I didn't photograph a lot of it, I do remember consciously trying to include the surroundings of our house in my images.  As you can see from the photos, I am not the only one who has been enjoying our new space.









We invited my cousin, Andrew, to veterans day at the school this year.  The kids got to introduce him.


He was also honored in a slide show along with their dad and grandpa, all men of whom we are so proud!




One of my favorite parts of the new house is our island.  I think Morgan is the one who utilizes it the most.  She likes to play there while I'm cooking dinner.  It's a highlight of my day.




Another part I love is our backyard.  I took this photo just before sunrise.  See this daily really helps me to feel relaxed and energized at the same time.


(I dare you to look at this photo and NOT smile.)


The parody of our home is that while it is definitely bigger than our old house, it also feels cozier to me.


Finally, the day before Thanksgiving, we closed on our sweet home on Walden Ct.  Before signing the paperwork, we visited it one more time.




Morgan was the most apprehensive about moving.  Even now she won't admit loving our new house more. I think she'd feel disloyal to her first home if she said that. Morgan kissed every wall as we said goodbye to our first family home.






Our Thanksgiving celebration was held at the Wells house again this year, but we spent a nice leisurely morning at home while Mark cooked and the kids and I watched the parade.






We enjoyed the rest of the day with family playing games, conversing, and eating wonderful food!




















Since we had an early dinner at the Wells, we decided to join the Damon's for a Thanksgiving dessert (and more games, of course).

The next day I celebrated my 39th birthday with my family and the obligatory cookie cake.  Yum!








The next day was my mom's 24th consecutive craft show.  It's always such a great opportunity to come together to support my mom, a woman who spends so much time supporting and encouraging our interests.


Thanksgiving break finally afforded us the opportunity to go to the bank and open a savings account for Morgan.  This photo is deceiving; she was actually quite excited about having her own bank account.


The visit to the bank sparked their imagination and the next day I found them pretending to be bankers.








Thanks for reading :)

Jodi in Wonderland

Looking back at this month, I realize it's all a blur.  So much happened and yet somehow I managed to enjoy every bit of it without feeling overwhelmed.  What I don't have photographic evidence of is the many, many, MANY hours spent cleaning, scrubbing, painting, and packing up my home to make it worthy of showing.  Believe me, my house had never looked so good.

I did take some breaks for the important things like Charlie's cub scout family campout.


(Don't ask me what they were doing here.  I assure you- I don't know.)


Finally on Friday, October 5th our house was officially on the market.


The timing was perfect because Mark had to travel out of town for work that weekend and I had travel plans of my own.




For the third year and a row I traveled for a photography conference called Click Away.  Also for the third year in a row I roomed with this lovely lately whom I met at our first conference.


I also spent time with other photography friends that I know around the country.






We even found time to shoot a little bit.






While I was gone, we got an offer on the house!!  On our first night back, Morgan asked if we could eat pizza and have a dance party on the deck.


Of course I said yes.


Next up during our whirlwind month was Charlie's birthday.  We started with waffles and whipped cream for breakfast.


Then I chaperoned on a field trip with Morgan to the farm.












That night Charlie chose milkshakes for his birthday dessert.


The kids had the following day (a friday) off of school so we took advantage of the day off by throwing Charlie's birthday party at the Web.


Laser tag was a party favorite, for sure!




We also bowled.






Charlie has been having a great first season of football.




He's so fast!

Taylor's birthday came a few days later.  It also happened to be the day we closed on our new house.  So we celebrated both with a pizza party in our new back yard.






The following weekend Taylor had some friends over for a slumber party.








We did not move in immediately after closing because we decided to have the house painted first.  But we did come visit it.  I just loved this photo of the first time the boys watched a bengals game in our new living room.


Then we went to Taylor's volleyball game.


Before moving, Morgan and I decided it would be a good idea to take photos of every square inch of our old house.  (I'll spare you the boring ones.)






The day finally arrived last week.  On October 26th we said goodbye to our home of 11 years and hello to the home of our future. I don't have much to say about moving day other than I'm glad it's over!


One of the many benefits of our new home is it's close proximity to Charlie's football games and practice.  Grandpa made it out to see him play last weekend.












Somehow in the midst of all this we also managed to come up with three coordinating outfits for the Father Daughter Halloween Dance.  Can you guess what Mark is?


Yep! The white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland.  Morgan was Alice and Taylor was the Mad Hatter.




I needed to dress up because I was volunteering at the dance (as the photographer) so I came as a witch.  Then someone suggested that I jump in for a photo.


Everyone seemed to have a great time!




Before we knew it the last day of October was upon us- Halloween.  The kids got to wear costumes to school.


When they got home we carved the pumpkins that I had been putting off all month.




Then we drove to the Wells neighborhood for some trick or treating.


The boys were so fast!

Morgan had a tough time keeping up.




Phew- I'm exhausted just thinking about all the activities and changes of last month.  Here's hoping to a nice, relaxing November.  If you haven't seen the new house yet- what are you waiting for?  Give us a call!  eE'd love to have you.