Julie and Jon's Wedding

My step sister Julie and Jon were supposed to get married on Saturday, March 28th, 2020.  Well, in the middle of March when the coronavirus started to shut things down, their big, traditional wedding celebration also got shut down.  Big groups of people were not allowed and locations were shut down.  A 'stay at home order' was set to start on that Saturday, March 28th.  They decided to still get married, thank goodness, but it was not at all the wedding they originally planned for.  First of all, they had to call or email most of their guest and un-invite them.  My family and siblings were on the chopping list unfortunately, but very understandably!...we're a big group and would definitely have put them over a "10" person limit.  The only people that actually attended the wedding were very immediate family and some of the wedding party.  They also moved the wedding up a day to Friday, March 27th and had the wedding all at Jon's parents house instead.  They recorded their wedding on Facebook Live so that all of their original guests could still watch.  Jon and Josh came over to watch the wedding with us and we enjoyed it.  Julie and Jon posed after the wedding so that all of their guests watching at home could take a selfie with it and send those pictures to the bride and groom as a keep-sake.  After the ceremony, from what I heard, they had take-out Olive Garden, a cake, and a small wedding dance, all at the parents house.  Their photographer did not cancel on them, what a guy, and they ended up with some terrific pictures capturing this unusual wedding day.  The bridesmaids and Jon's family did a super awesome job of transforming their living room into a really pretty wedding ceremony and reception site!  It's a wedding day none of us will ever forget.  They might still have a reception and invite all their guests for their 1 year anniversary or something like that, but they haven't decided on that yet....partially because they don't want Covid to ruin a 2nd wedding lol. 

We had Julie's Bridal Shower at the end of February, right before all of the virus stuff started happening.  Who knew at that time that we wouldn't be having a normal wedding!!!

Laura, mom, Kristen, Julie, Lisa, Mollee, Rachel

Watching the wedding on Facebook Live from my basement family room.

Micah's first wedding!

Our selfie with the Bride and Groom.

This would have been Micah's fancy wedding outfit for the real wedding.  There was no other reason for him to ever wear it so I dressed him up for the wedding viewing party.  Jonah wore this outfit to Kristen and Luke's wedding.  

Covid-19 Recap/Update

Covid-19 Recap...
Last day of school for the 2019-2020 school year was Monday, March 16th.  Bennett and Ashley went to school to wrap up anything they had to do, get their books all ready to come home and to spend some time with their friends.  They also had a special chapel service at the end of this school day which I went to and it felt very weird - so much unknown.  At this time, we were only supposed to be out of school for 2 weeks.  That 2 weeks got extended and went to the end of the school year and our last day is coming up later this week on Thursday, May 21st, which is what our regular last day of school would have been.

Distance learning started on March 23rd and our school week went from Monday's to Thursday's.  The first 2 weeks of distance learning were tough.  Well heck, the whole thing has been.  But the first two weeks were not easy on any of us as there was so much adjusting and figuring out what worked for us and the teachers were just getting used to it too.  As the 9 weeks went on, it has gotten better, but there were tears and/or fighting multiple times every week.

Bennett - he's not minding this at-home thing too much - except missing friends.  He is usually able to have his homework done within 2 hours and he's able to do most of it by himself (total opposite of when he was in school all day).  His teacher has been doing a daily meet with the class for those that want to pop on.  He's been doing this about 2 days a week.  His teacher has also been making the homework part pretty easy - she does a short lesson video for every assignment and many times gives hints or doesn't make them do the whole page of problems...hence the reason he is liking this style of homework hah.

Pre-covid haircut.

Ashley - she is not doing as well with this type of learning - total opposite of at school.  She was always a quick learner and did her homework neatly, on time and rarely came home with homework.  During distance learning, I've found that she needs the schedule and the teacher explanations and she has struggled in getting her work done.  Granted, Mrs. McManus is definitely giving more work than Bennett's teacher.  But, I wouldn't say that my mom is giving her that hard of work, just alittle bit more than Bennett.  But it has been taking Ashley what seems like, all day to get it done with lots of nagging from me.

Mike is also working from home during all of this.  His job of IT for the city of Chaska had him working most of March, getting all of the city employees their computers ready and unplugged for them to take them home to work from there.  He would do a department at a time until they had all employees at home - so his department was the last to end up at home.  He has had to go in a few times in the past two months but most of his work he has been able to do from his office at home.  Work calls are forwarded to his cell phone so he is able to remote in to peoples computers if they're having problems.  I won't lie, it's been nice having him home during this time.  Even though he's technically working, it's been nice to have another a set of hands if I really need it.  He's also been helping Bennett with his math homework every day which has been great.  Now that everyone has been home for so long though, all of the kinks are pretty much worked out and Mike hasn't been getting many calls lately so, what else is there to do but to build a deck.? Yep.  His best friend Wade, who is also a co-worker, has been coming out (during the work hours....remember, their calls get forwarded to their cells), a few times this past week to help Mike build our deck since they have time on their hands.  If there is a problem, they would just go down to Mike's office to do the work.  Mike is hoping he'll get to go back to the office in June.

Jonah - Poor thing has totally gotten the shaft in all of this.  He goes from having it just be me and him for most of his life.  Then a new baby comes along.  And then two months later, he's 1 of 6 people in the house full-time.  And of course Micah gets plenty of attention and so do Bennett and Ashley with the school stuff right now so Jonah has just kinda gotten left out.  He's struggled and I feel for him.  But at the same time, he's almost 3 and 3 year olds are just pain in the butts anyways so, yea, he's real fun.  He's gotten lots more Ipad and TV time than I normally would allow but right now, it's what is working for us so I really don't mind.  Jonah had been going to Speech for the past 9 months but once all of this covid stuff happened, those appointments also quit (he goes to the rehab dept at our hospital).  In the meantime though, his word count and also words per sentence have increased dramatically which is super!  But, it's still not all that clear so speech class will definitely continue.  His appointments should be starting again in June.  Oh, we're also working really hard on potty training and he's doing great at staying dry during the day and even some nights, but, #2's are a different story and always does that in his morning diaper or underwear once a day.

Micah - Well this kid isn't gonna know about any of this.  He was about 2.5 months when this all started and now he's 4.5 months.  I'm sure he must think this is just the normal - that we're all home together all the time.  I wish I could say that he's the best baby ever and not causing this momma any extra stress during all of this but that is not the case.  He likes to be held, fed, looked at or played with all the time.  Well kid, when you're 1 of 4, and all 4 are home 100% of the time, you're not going to be played with or held all day long.  The one thing he has gotten during all of this though is my time at his bedtime.  I started taking him to his room to give him his bedtime bottle and rock him to sleep every night.  When the stay-at-home all started and I was stressed and scared, rocking him to sleep was my one little sweet spot of the day.

Rachel - So I do not have the teacher gene like my mom and other family members.  That is determined 100%.  My patience level is nowhere like I'd need it to be a teacher in a classroom.  I would love to tell you that I got all these projects done around the house or unpacked the last of the boxes or did cool things with the kids.  Well none of that happened.  I kept them alive and fed and we made it through each day.  I have had to do some church work still but not nearly as much which is totally fine by me.  My normal 5ish hours a week is now only around 2 hours and during this, I wouldn't have wanted any more honestly.  Other than to the office for a short time or to my moms house to break free from time to time, I really haven't been much of anywhere.  Mike has done most of the grocery shopping for us - partially because he has been out and about more often than me so he just stops on his way home and partially cause I think that is his out and time to get away from all of us too lol.  I'm ok with this.  I've been trying hard not to let this whole thing stress me out or to let the fear win but now that it's been two months since I've been inside Target or anywhere like that, it does have me alittle uneasy, knowing how much has changed inside these places that I normally lovvvved going to.  Just the fact that things are opening up again though makes it feel more normal, even though it will all not look normal for awhile.

(Micah had his 4 month checkup last week so I had to get masked up)

Anyways, I'm glad that we're all still well and healthy and sane for the most part.  And I'm happy that those of you reading this are still healthy etc. also.  2020, you were supposed to be my easy and relaxed year since 2019 house and baby stuff kicked my butt.

A few more pictures from these past two months of the coronavirus....

This was a tough day for all of us and I decided to take Micah and go for a walk one evening.  They all wanted to come with me and I decided I still loved them :-) 

This was a treat meal for me - Lola's Lakehouse has been offering to-go meals and I saw this meal on their menu one night.  Mike didn't want any of it but it sounded too good for me to pass up.  It was a 2 person meal for $30 - 2 huge chicken breasts, tons of pasta, garlic bread, green beans and a lettuce salad!  It was delicious and sooo much food that it lasted me 3 meals; well worth the $30.  

There have been SO many meme's out there that I have laughed at, loved, shared and saved.  This one Kristen sent me and it was probably my favorite.

  

We turned on our Christmas lights one night in March for a neighborhood pick-me-up.  

Micah is Born

December 26th, after our Mielke family Christmas, we left Bennett, Ashley and Jonah at my moms to sleep for the night.  I teared up saying goodnight to Jonah, knowing that the next time I'd see him, he wouldn't be my baby anymore. 

On Friday morning, December 27th we headed to Glencoe for my induction with Micah.  After we got there, the nurse checked me and I was at 5 cm dilated!  I had made alittle progress on my own since my last appointment - progress without pain!  My backup doctor, Dr. Leino was the first one there that morning so she tried to break my water - thinking that if my water broke, that maybe I'd start contractions on my own without needing the pitocin drug to get things started.  She tried to break it but didn't know if she got it since she didn't see any big gush of water like she was expecting - she didn't even get a trickle. (Even after Micah was born, there was barely ANY amniotic fluid - the guess is that I had a small leak and have been leaking for awhile and didn't know it.  I had been wearing a pad daily for a few months by this point, thinking it was discharge or pee - whoops, might have been a tiny bit of fluid instead!). At 11:00am they started the pitocin IV since I was not contracting on my own much at all.  At 12:00 noon I was checked again and was at 6cm so the pitocin was working.  Because of that, I asked to get the epidural scheduled right away.  I wasn't in much pain at all yet but, knowing what was about to come and the fact that I was at 6cm already, I knew I needed to get that done asap.  By 1:00pm I had my epidural in and was definitely contracting more.  Around 2:00pm I was getting more and more uncomfortable, even with the epidural.  My nurse checked me and I was at 8cm.  Very shortly after this though, the contractions were getting so painful that I was needing Mike for support and after about 10 minutes of very regular, painful contractions, I made him get the nurse in there.  I had an epidural, I wasn't supposed to feel any of this!!!  My nurse checked me and I was at 10cm and ready to push!  They figured that I went from 8-10cm so fast that the epidural couldn't keep up at all!  Ahh not was I was expecting!  My doctor, Dr. Knodel, and Dr. Leino both came in my room and quick got the bed switched to a delivery bed and I began pushing.  I had 4 sets of contraction pushes and out he came!  It's a boy!!!  Micah John was born at 2:47pm weighing 6 lbs 14 oz and 21 inches long.  He's a beauty and looks so much like my other kids.  Micah is definitely my smallest baby, almost 3 lbs smaller than Jonah.  This doesn't surprise me that much though because I only gained 10 pounds the whole pregnancy.  

Because of the terrible cold and flu season, our hospital unfortunately had strict visitor restrictions in place.  No kids under the age of 5 were allowed to come visit.  This meant that Jonah wouldn't have been able to come see the new baby.  If Jonah couldn't come, I thought it'd be kinda weird to let Bennett and Ashley still come.  So we made the decision that as long as baby and I were both well, we would only stay the required 24 hour hospital stay and then leave to get home so they could meet their new brother.  I did video call them from home later that night so they could see us. 

The next day, December 28th, Micah was doing well, had all of his tests and got his circumcision and Mike and I were able to bring him home.  We got home about 5:00pm and the big kids were excited to meet their new brother. 

Micah's name:  Mike and I had been struggling the entire pregnancy to pick some good names.  For a girls name, we were not agreeing on the name we picked of Libby.  I loved Libby, but Mike thought we should call her Elizabeth and then we could call her Libby for short.  I didn't like that because Elizabeth didn't flow with the other kids names.  And for the boy name we were stumped for so long.  Every name we'd throw out as an option, the other would veto it.  I saw Micah in a list of baby names on a website but I figured Mike wouldn't like it so never even mentioned it to him.  One night Mike and Ashley we on a website and throwing out names and he came to Micah and I told him how I liked it but never mentioned it to him and that was pretty much it - we found a name.  Yes, it's similar to Jonah and to Mike but it flows nicely with the other kids names and fits with our last name.  So no, we did not name him after Mike, which is a question we have gotten.  And no, we aren't following the Bible and having a Nahum next either. :-)  

Look how teeny tiny he is!

Yes, Micah has a tinge of reddish hair.  Some days it looks very red, some days it look more browish - it all depends on the lighting in the room and the pictures.  I'm very curious to see if the reddish sticks around as he grows or if he'll turn dark like the rest of us.  My other 3 kids were all born with brown hair, which turned blonde, which then turned dark as they grow.  

Last Christmas I bought the Santa jammies on clearance and gave them to the kids during the Christmas season.  When Micah came home from the hospital in his Christmas clothes too, I had to get a picture of them all. 

We Built A House 2019

At the end of March 2019 we found out that the city had one final housing lot open and the builder was planning to start building as soon as the weather was ready in the spring.  When we found out about this open lot, we immediately called a realtor and got information about it.  It really didn't take long and a few days later, we were committed!  The builder had house plans already but since they had not started yet, there were a few minor things that we were able to tweak on the plans.  The house is a 5 bedroom, 3 bathroom house plus an office so we knew it would fit our family perfectly.  They broke ground and dug the basement on Monday, May 20th, 2019.  

Before the building started, we talked to the builder about finishing the basement out for us and he gave us a price of an extra $25,000.  To us, this was definitely worth it since then we didn't have work to do, we would have the extra living space right away, and Bennett and Ashley would have a finished bedroom when we'd move in.  Alot of these his finishings are standard to what he builds but there were definitely a decent amount of things that we got to pick out and customize which was fun.  The things that we didn't get to, luckily are still in my style and I like them.  

We got to pick out the following:

• All flooring - carpet in the main living areas and bedrooms, wood laminate in the kitchen/dining, linoleum in the entryway and the 3 bathrooms.
• Paint color - we choose a pretty gray for the whole house.  We'll update with some color in time but for now, I like the gray.
• Kitchen and bathroom cabinet style, color and hardware.  I went with a very dark espresso color (almost black).  I L.O.V.E. it!  The design lady that we met with said that white is a popular choice right now and I'm like nope, how about the complete opposite and let's go as dark as possible.  
• Counter top color in the kitchen.  It is a laminate counter top but the color that I choose makes it look more like real granite.  I upgraded a small bit and had them put an extra coat of something on top of the laminate to give it an added shine - which in my opinion makes it look alittle bit more like granite too.  (We could have gone with granite but that of course would have added to the price of the house.)
• Counter tops in the bathrooms.
• House and shingle colors.  This one was the one pick that made me suuuuper nervous the entire build.  This too, I went with a very dark gray and I do love it.  But it was ordered months before it was installed so the whole time I was doubting myself and afraid I was gonna hate it and that it'd look too dark.  And I knew that this wouldn't be a cheap fix if I really didn't like it and that we'd just have to live with it.  Like I said, luckily I do love the color and glad I went with the dark.  
• Window and garage door style - how many panes are in the windows and garage door windows.  

It was so fun to live just a few blocks away from the new house so we were able to watch the whole thing being built.  About once a week we'd all head over to the new house in the evening when the workers were gone and do a walk thru to see the progress.  

Isn't it pretty!?!  

It really was a fun process and I'm so glad we did it.  I'm also glad we had the builder with the plans and some of his standard things already - so that we didn't have to pick out every single thing.  The total cost was about $275,000.  It's great to have a brand new house and not have any major things to be repairing and fixing for now.  We are on a .22 acre lot (old house was on a .5 acre lot).  We would love to live on an acre or two of land some day, but for now, this fits us pretty well. 

I'll let you know more about the moving in a different post.

We Moved!

In March 2019 we had started talking about moving during the summer and had alot of should we/shouldn't we talks.  At the end of March we found out out that the city had one final housing lot open and the builder was planning to start building as soon as the weather was ready in the spring.  We wanted to stay in the New Germany area but we were looking to find our dream house on an acre of land.  Things were not working out well with that so when we found out about the lot in town, we knew we needed to jump on it fast.  I'll write more about the new house in a different post.  But for this one, we moved!

At the end of March we met with a few realtors - even before this new construction lot was in the works.  The first realtor walked through our house and gave us a sell price of $199,000.  The second one we knew wasn't the right realtor for us and she never did end up giving us a list price.  And the third realtor was the one that we were in touch with about the new build, so he came to look at our current house too.  His list price was $216,500!  Gee, $199k or $216k, which guy should we go with!?!  

April consisted of signing papers, cleaning, packing and staging the house.  In May a professional housing photographer that the realtor hired came out to to take the website pictures and they turned out great!  On May 23rd (which happened to be the last day of school too), it went on the market.  We had a few showings right away that morning and then an open house later that day.  We had 3 offers that first day on the market and we accept a full asking price offer plus the buyer was willing to wait until August 8th, when we were told the new house would be done.  

Here are some of the website listing pictures.  Like I said, they turned out great and it didn't even look like our house!  We had a 3 bedroom, 3 bathroom house on a .5 acre lot on the edge of town.  

Living Room

Ashley and Jonah's Room

 

Bennett's Room, Downstairs

Mike's Office

Basement Bathroom

A few small hiccups during the summer... During the inspection, we were told that the front windows in the living room and dining room needed to be replaced.  It was something we knew needed to be done but we were hoping it would just kinda sneak by during inspection - nope, $3500 later, we had two new windows for the new buyer.  And we had to give him a $500 allowance because the radon inspection also failed.  

We really did love this house and it served us well for the 13 years that we lived there.  I did not want to leave and shed many tears during those couple of months but we were out of room and knew there was a baby coming too so moving was the best option for us.  

Final picture before we moved out.