Go?

My little 2-year-old friend, Ian, is in a time of deep discovery and learning. One of his favorite things is to either hide something or have someone hide something from him, and he throws up his hands and asks, “Go?” which is really short for, “Where’d it go?”

 So in the words of my little amigo, “Go?” AKA: Where did June (and July) go?

Here’s a little re-cap:

June:

June 1: School was officially out as of 11 AM.

June 4: Celebrated 7 years of marriage! The most exciting part of the day was our ultrasound, finding out that we’re having a boy & and a girl!

June 5: headed our looooong trek back to America to spend 5 weeks in MN. The 2 flights were incident free & we even got bumped to economy plus bulkhead seats, which made the long flight from Japan to MN much more bearable. I made sure I had plenty of snacks to make it home. I think I over calculated...

June 7: had a little reveal party with the families. I ordered two cakes from a friend from church. She colored one cake pink and the other one blue, and then frosted & decorated them with MN Twins jerseys (more pictures forthcoming). We had the two “grandmas” cut into the cakes to reveal the gender of the twinks. We also had printed out the letters for their first and middle names & had our family members work together in groups to unscramble the letters to discover what their names are. (I know, we’re such teachers!!) It was such a fun way to share with our families!

*This was also the night that we met our little nephew for the first time. What a little pumpkin!

June 9 & 10: 2 baby showers where little Owen and Emma received so much love from family and friends. We are so blessed by the generosity of so many. These little ones (and us) are dearly loved despite the fact that half a world separates us.

The rest of June and into early July was spent shopping, eating, visiting with friends and family & probably more shopping (or at least wandering around Target with baby gift cards in hand).

July:

July 4: best & longest childhood friend (from 3^rd grade) got ENGAGED!!!!!! We got to celebrate with her downtown at the stone arch bridge for some great fireworks

We weigh the same...

July 5: Not the most momentous day ever, but an incredibly fun and memorable one… out at Lord Fletcher’s for an Oake on the Water concert, meeting new friends, being asked to be the Matron of Honor in my bestie’s wedding, cruising around and swimming in Lake Minnetonka (never thought that the lake would feel like bath water in early July!), & being afraid that I would never be able to get back in the boat with my big preggo belly! (Miraculously, my friends managed to pull me back into the boat 2X).

3 of the 4 bridesmaids

July 7: Seeing the twinks move for the first time from the outside… my belly was “rippling”… SO CRAZY!

July 10: Left to head back to Thailand. It was a little bit stressful leading up to this because we were trying to bring back a second stroller that didn’t fit into a duffle. We had to borrow a hockey bag from Krissy & hope that they wouldn’t give us any trouble for it (especially since there wasn’t any hockey equipment in it). Thankfully, we had no problems and were able to bring back just about everything that we had hoped. There were a few things that we had to pawn off on people that are coming later (my parents in November, my brother & his fiancé in December, and a friend from church in February), but not essentials that we need for the twinks anytime soon.

Other favorite things:

Emily & me taking Tracy (the soon-to-be newest married in Aust girl) out for hazing. JK. We just told her every deep, dark and dirty family secret we knew (mua-ha-ha-ha-ha), which makes us glad that there never were any TRUE Aust girls in the family… just the married in ones, as it’s definitely more fun that way!

Look at B's little cheeser face. <3

Meeting Jed’s (Mike’s friend from college) parents down in Red Wing and Maurice (I can’t say/type his name without thinking of the line from Beauty and the Beast… “Maurice! The Baguettes!”) calling me a “gall darn cottin’ pickin’ woman” when I didn’t believe him that the cornbread we were eating was from corn that he grew and picked. Additionally, we played quite the rousing game of “bounce the grape”. It was a couple hours of non-stop laughter. I can only imagine the things that he will say/do to our children in the future… I can’t wait. HA!

Watching Mike interact with so many of our friend’s kids and seeing how great of Papa he’s going to be.

Having maternity pictures taken by Mike’s brother, Pete (more pictures forthcoming).

Getting to go to a Twins game.

Spending time with the nephew.

B sitting on the cousins

Teaching B how to properly wai.

Going down to the stone arch bridge for an art festival