Progress

Last Monday the Fletcher's invited us over for dinner and we found a lot of action going on at our lot.  They were pouring the footings for our foundation!  We were really excited!  Emily and Adrienne said that their kids had enjoyed watching all the fun.

 

 I think the coolest thing was this truck.  Because they can't get a cement truck into the pit, they use this truck that has a long arm with a tube attached to it.  They pump the cement into the pit through the tube.  It probably seems obvious that they would need to do something like that, but I thought it was clever and way cool!

 So, they poured the footings on Monday and this is what it looked like by Thursday!  Emily called me and said, "They are just cruising on your house!"

Another cool truck!  You can see Emily's house in the background.  I never thought that I'd have so many pictures of inanimate objects on our blog, but I am loving this progress on our new home!

FINALLY!!

As soon as Nathan was hired by Mayo we decided that we wanted to build a new home.  He was hired in 2010, then we went to San Francisco for 2011-2012.  While in San Francisco we bought the lot between two families in our ward, the Dangerfields and the Fletchers.  Our lot is in Oronoco which is about 10 minutes north of Rochester proper.  As soon as we got back to Rochester from San Francisco in July 2012, we started the process of building our home.  We contacted a builder and had our brother-in-law, Tyler Kirk, draw up the plans for our dream home.  Tyler did such an awesome job and we were so happy with the results of his hard work.  Our builder was excited to work on such a beautiful home.  All that was needed was money (isn't that what it usually boils down to?).  Nathan did his research and found a bank.  We needed to have so much in our bank account to be approved, so we started saving.  We finally were able to turn in our plans to the bank to start the process of getting a loan.  We heard at the beginning of May that the plans that Tyler had worked so hard on were too much for our lot and that the plans could not be appraised.  We started downsizing and the appraiser told us that we would need to start over with our plans or buy a bigger lot.  We were very discouraged and were even looking at homes already built to buy.  But, we both felt strongly that we were supposed to live on that lot.  We asked the kids, "would you rather have the house of our dreams or would you like to live on our lot?"  Unanimously they said that they wanted to live on the lot.  So we went online and found a plan that we liked.  We had Denny, our builder, and his architect make the changes that we wanted to the plans.  We finalized the plans and got them into the bank about mid-July.  Then we had to wait again for the bank.  We finally heard that these plans were able to be appraised and then we heard that they underwriters ordered another appraisal.  We kept running into these road blocks and were afraid that we would run out of time and have to wait another year before the house could be built because of the approaching Minnesota winter.  Everything finally went through at the bank and we finally closed on the loan on September 13 and we were finally able to break ground on September 19!!  I had texts and phone calls from both Emily Fletcher and Adrienne Dangerfield telling us about the "show" that was going on between their lots and how excited they all were that it was finally happening!  We will post more as things progress!

Fall Festival

Every year in September, Quarry Hill Nature Center has their Fall Festival.  We look forward to it every year.  We buy tickets and the kids can use the tickets to do crafts, play games, and buy food.  It's a lot of fun!  We had a lot of fun again this year, but we had one unfortunate thing happen.  At the end of the festival, we decided to buy sodas and cookies with our tickets.  The bees were everywhere and were LOVING the soda.  Michael was trying to swipe them away from his cup and got stung on his forearm.  They gave us a bag of ice and it helped ease his pain.  Poor little guy!

 Alina and the boys all decided to paint a ceramic frog.  They turned out really cool.  The most awesome thing about it was that the paint dried really quick!

 Haley and Alina were wearing matching shirts, so we had to get a picture of them together.

 

One of the favorite things to do is to decorate sugar cookies.

2nd Annual Taggart Penny Carnival

Last year on the Saturday after the first week of school we had a penny carnival.  Haley had been asking me all summer if she could have one and we were finally able to have it that Saturday.  It was so fun and successful that we decided to do it again.  So the Saturday after the first week of school we had our 2nd Annual Taggart Penny Carnival.  I recruited Nate, Haley, Andy, and the Towe girls (Autumn and Hayley) to work the booths.  It was a lot of fun again and we've decided to have it every year!

 

 Hayley Towe was in charge of the Treat Table.  It was so hot that the Rice Krispie treats melted into giant mounds.  I don't think we will do those next year!

 

 Haley did balloon animals and hats again.  Next year we will get the nice expensive balloons because they kept popping and she had a hard time sculpting her creations.

 

 Nate was working the fishing booth and Andy (below) was working the Penny Toss booth.

 My sweet babies!  I just had to throw these in as well.

 Nathan helped by running the Shooting Range booth.  It was the most popular and he was really great with all the kids!

 

 Marilyn brought these walkie talkies back from China.  They have earbuds and microphones on the ear bud cords.  The boys were wearing them and I thought they looked like the secret service.  They were wearing them so that they could talk to each other during the carnival.

 Alina got the idea to stand behind the glass of our shooting range.  Nathan was giving the kids extra points if they hit her nose or got it in her mouth.  Haley joined her.

The First Day

The kids started school on September 3rd.  Once again it was kind of chilly in the morning, but it warmed up.  Nathan took the day off - which was such a treat!  Nate and Haley rode bikes to school.  Nathan, Alina, and I walked Michael and Andy to school.

 

 Nate started 8th grade.

 

 Haley started 6th grade.  Our 6th grade is in middle school, so she has 7 classes a day and has to remember 2 locker combos (P.E. and regular locker).  So far, so good for her this year.

 

 Andy started third grade and has Mrs. Murdoff as his teacher.

 

 Michael started 1st grade and has Mrs. Mertesdorf as his teacher.  He's at school all day.  It's been an exhausting change for him, but he's getting into the groove of it.

 

 Alina had to have a first day of school picture too!  Here she is with her Dora "backpack, backpack".

 

 Andy waiting in line.

 

 Michael waiting in line.

 

I had to include this picture!  Nathan's parents arrived for a short visit on the first day of school, so we went out to eat to celebrate their arrival and the kids surviving the first day.  Marilyn had brought some cute hair stuff for Alina from China.  She thought it was funny to put it in her hair herself.  The colorful beaded necklace also came from China.  The Dora and Boots necklaces and bracelets, Alina already owned.  As Marilyn kept saying, "It's all in how you accessorize!"

The Dells

We decided to have one last summer trip and went to the Wisconsin Dells 4 days. We had so much fun!  The first day we were there it was kind of rainy, so we decided to go on a shopping spree to spend all of the kids hard earned money.  We went to an outlet mall there in the Dells.  Andy decided to buy a Build-a-Bear. 

 Pump up the filling. Haley was there to lend support and expertise since she's done this before.

 Make a wish.

 Air bath (Andy thought this was the best part)!

 Alina showing off her new Crocs.  They change color in the sun!

 Nate didn't want to spend all his money in one place, so he got a "SmallFrys" which is a smaller version of the Build-a-Bear.  He named his frog "Rook".

 Meet Vortex.  He's stylishly dressed in his Iron Man costume.

 Last time we visited the Dells we only stayed in and around our hotel.  This time we ventured out and discovered downtown.  We met this nice man.

 There was a restaurant called "Macs" that served crazy variations of macaroni and cheese.  Part of their motto is "Be Cheesy".  Haley loves cheese and so we had to stop for a photo shoot.  Look at that cute little mimic!

 

Noah's Ark

The second day of our vacation, we went to "Noah's Ark" which is well known in the Dells as being the biggest water park.  Nathan had made an impulse purchase (his words) and bought a waterproof digital camera before we left. It turned out to be a wonderful buy!  We took it to Noah's Ark hoping to take lots of pictures but the battery was low when we got there (some confusion with the charging?  we still are not sure).  So we only got a few pictures.

 

 

 This was the first ride the kids and Nathan went on.  It's called "Flash Flood" and it's a log fume ride (Nate said it was kind of like Splash Mountain). We got there first thing and this ride was the farthest from the entrance, so there was no line.  They were able to go 3 times right in a row without getting off.  Nathan said it was awesome not having to worry about the camera getting wet!

 This was Alina's favorite "ride". She did not feel very good and was not too anxious to get in the water.  We did get her to go on a few slides.  Her other favorite was the wave pool.  It was my favorite too!  A couple of times it almost rocked Alina to sleep.

 

 After swimming all day at Noah's Ark we decided to try "Macs" out.  So the base for all of their dishes is yummy, creamy, and definitely cheesy macaroni and cheese.  Then you can decide what you'd like in it or on it.  The boys all had "Cheeseburger Mac" which had an actual cheeseburger (minus the bun) on top of it.  Haley had "Mama's Mac" that had a fried hot dog on top.  Nathan enjoyed "Memphis Mac" which had bbq sauce and other things I cannot recall.  I had "Taco Mac" which had pico de gallo, tortilla chips, sour cream, beef and guacamole on top.  Alina had the original.

 Each macaroni was served in the dish it was cooked in.

 

Sorry about the "already chewed food"!

 

Chula Vista

The first time we visited the Dells we stayed at the Kalahari, which was awesome!  This time we stayed at Chula Vista.  It wasn't the Kalahari, but it was great all the same!  This time the waterproof camera worked, so we got some great shots above and under the water!

 Michael surprised me and went on every water slide in the indoor water park, even the ones that I would never go on.

Wizard's Quest

This fun place was recommended to us by a friend and got great reviews, so we decided to try it.  We didn't get any pictures but this one.  It was a place where you are trying to save 4 wizards and to be able to do that you earn "glimmers" by answering questions and finding clues.  They had 4 realms: water, earth, fire, air and the realms were decorated and set up really neat.  It was fun to work together as a family to save the wizards - even Nathan got into it!