The past few months have been really busy, but were lots of fun.  My sister, Julie, came to visit Michigan during her last vacation of residency.  She helped me clean and reorganize our entire house which resulted in about 4 loads of drop-offs to Good Will, 9 bags of trash, and our truck full of recycleables.  From our kitchen pantry to every closet in our house, everything was sorted and cleaned out.  She purchased a bunch of storage containers for us to help us keep organized too!  I wish we had taken before and after pictures!  Anyway, it was great.  I feel so much more ready for baby #3 to arrive.  On top of that, we planned a surprise baby shower for our brother Jukes and Aileen.  After sorting through all of the kids’ closets, we were able to give a bunch of the boys’ clothes and baby items I didn’t need to them and with so much extra, we had a bunch to give the Conways too!  (Yes, we had an over-abundance of baby boy clothes!) 

On our trip downstate, we stopped by the DeYoung’s Family Zoo and enjoyed seeing the animals up close and personal.  Imanuel was able to bottle feed a baby camel, pet a baby bobcat and hold the leash of a New Guinea Singing pup.  It was such an awesome zoo! 

We really enjoyed spending time with our family during our brief visit downstate. 

When we came back up, Israel had his work cut out for him.  In preparation for the winter, he decided to purchase entire logs instead of pre-cut wood.  It was a couple hundred dollars cheaper this way, but he would have to chain-saw and chop them himself.  AND, he ordered LOTS of logs.   

With the help of some church members, he got the majority of the logs cut.  The only problem was that we had to stack them…and we only had a garden wheel barrow that we purchased at Walmart.  It was beginning to fall apart.  So, today, Israel bought a cart that could be pulled by our riding lawn mower.  We had to assemble it ourselves, but it was fairly simple and after an hour, we were able to haul tons of wood into our garage.  It was a great investment…not only for hauling wood, but to take the kids for rides! 

After loading a few carts of wood, we were tired so we decided to take the boys for a “wagon” ride in the backyard.  We stopped by our apple trees to pick and eat a few apples.  I was privileged to be the “tractor” driver since Manu thought my tummy was too large to fit in the back cart.  So, I drove our lawn mower while Israel, the boys and Bentley sat in the cart.  It was lots of fun!

Hopefully within the next few days, we’ll have all of our wood cut and stacked for the winter.  The leaves are already beginning to change the the weather is cool and crisp.  I think after living in the Yoop for 3 years now, fall is my favorite time of year.

Manu and Micah are much easier to handle now that they enjoy playing together.  Micah is becoming more vocal and learning to express himself.  It just seemed like last week when the only words he could say were, “ready?” or “hot?”  Now in the car he always asks, “Almost there, Mama?”  He knows how to sing almost every song in the “Kids Sing Praise” CD.  He tries to pray by himself too.  He is always willing to repeat words or phrases that we try to teach him.  That’s lots of fun too.  It’s so cute to hear him calling, “Manu, where are you?!”  I think his speech development is much more rapid than Imanuel’s was.  Probably because he tries to say everything that Manu does. 

Micah is definitely more of a risk taker and is more adventurous than Imanuel too.  Maybe that’s why we already had to take Micah into the ER 3 times and we never took Imanuel in.  (It would have been 4 last week if Imanuel wasn’t there in the woods to yell at Micah to spit out the poisonous berry he decided to put in his mouth.  Micah just suffered for a day with fever and diarrhea, thank God.) 

I just cannot wait until this child is born.  I feel like once he’s out, I can at least start going back to my own physical self.  I’m feeling so large it’s not even funny.  But I can’t complain.  God has been very good to us and we are so thankful for the life we are able to live up here.  Okay, I think I wrote enough!  Until the next time I’m struck with inspiration…

(I’m going to put the rest of the pictures up on Facebook including exclusive pictures of Israel chopping wood!  🙂