Fun times with Grandma & Grandpa Bohlen

My mom and dad came to visit this weekend (Thursday night through Sunday morning). We had a great time with them like always! We had connection group on Thursday night, so they ate supper with our group and then watched Brenna while we had our bible study. Brenna was busy modeling her jewelry...
showing Grandma how her piggy bank works...

and playing with the remote that Grandpa handed over to Brenna for a little while! Grandma was shocked! :)

The rest of the weekend was filled with the mall, thrift stores, naps, Wallaby's (Jared and my mom's favorite Ames restaurant), church, play time, making apple crisp, bath time etc. It was definitely fun filled.

"bye-bye, grandma & grandpa! thank you for coming to visit me.

come back soon!" ~Brenna

Books! Books! Books!

Brenna is really into books right now. Instead of getting dressed this morning, she wanted to read some of her books, so I ran to get the camera to get a few shots.

I think she has "book ADD"....3 books at one time :) She would look at a few pages in one book and then open another and read a few pages and then go on to another, etc.

If you look close, you can see that she's imitating the little boy in the book playing peek-a-boo.

It's good timing that Brenna is starting to enjoy books since it's so stink'n cold and snowy here and we've had to spend more time indoors. I am so ready for Spring!!! I like to be on the go, so it's a little hard to be at home so much.....but maybe it's a good thing that I'm forced to stay in a more. I've had more play times with Brenna, more time to update my blog, more time to get things done on my to-do-list, etc. Speaking of to-do-list, I better get to it :)

Cute Sunday Dress

New Year's/ Christmas Celebration with the Van Cleave's

We had a great time with Jared's family on New Year's Eve and New Year's. Brenna and her cousin Easton had fun playing with grandma and grandpa New Year's Eve, while we went on a hot date :) We went to the movie Seven Pounds...we thought it was really good....sad, but good. Then we went to Centro in downtown Des Moines for dessert. Great atmosphere! It was fun spending the last day of 2008 with my best friend! We stayed the night at Jared's parents and then celebrated Christmas on New Year's. We ate yummy food, played cards, watched football, opened gifts, etc. We had a great time and always enjoy spending time with Jared's family.

We were in our pajamas half the day, so we didn't get many good pictures...but here's a few.

Easton and Brenna were playing with Jared & Caleb's old toys. They were getting hot from the fire place, so we took off their pants and hiked up their socks. They looked pretty cute!

Where Do I Start?

It's been so long since I last posted that I don't really know where to start. Several family members have hinted around to update my blog, so they motivated me to take the plunge :)

Where did December go? The month went so fast. I so look forward to Christmas and spending time with family and then it seems like it's over so quickly. Even though it went quickly, we had a wonderful Christmas season.

We went down to my parents in Burlington for four nights the week of Christmas. We mainly relaxed, ate, watched movies, read, and my mom & I went shopping the day after Christmas. We celebrated Christmas day at my Grandma's house. There were 14 adults and 3 kids. I got to meet 3 new family members (or soon to be) for the first time. My cousin Sarah brought her boyfriend, Dalon, for Christmas and he proposed to her on Christmas Eve. It was fun to meet Dalon and celebrate their engagement. He's a great guy and we are really excited for Sarah.


The other family members I met were two foster children that my two cousins are caring for. One is Brenna's age and the other is ten. It was so fun to meet them and love them as if they were part of the family. My cousins are doing a great job parenting them and loving them. It is so neat that they are opening up their home and heart to children that are in need. What a great example of Christ.






Brenna enjoyed Christmas as well. She's getting better at unwrapping gifts and enjoyed all the fun things to play with at grandma and grandpa's house: Zeke (their dog), my mom's old jewelry, tree ornaments, baby stroller, etc. She also enjoyed a bath in their big tub. She is at such a fun age and doing so many new things. There were several times that my parents, Jared and I would just sit and watch her play.

"What do you think of my new hair-do?"

I will update more later. One post is all I can handle tonight. :)