New home

Well, as of a few minutes ago, our offer has been accepted. Pending a home inspection and financing, we are going to be new home owners of a home at 1608 Dawnville Road, Dalton, GA. You can look on Realtor.com for more pictures. Bally and Pepper will have 17 acres to share with other critters....looking at dogs, cows, goats and maybe a laying hen or two. Moving date will be the last week of October!

New Blog

Hi everyone! Christi requested a while back that I start a blog to share how things are going with the pregnancy. I'm sure there will be some changes to the way that it looks, but I started the blog.

It's http://wonderfuljoyahead.blogspot.com/

Feel free to follow!
Love to you all
Nicole

P.S. We booked our flights, and we'll be arriving in BM on Nov 18-23. Gandaddy, I'll be in touch with you to give you exact details. We're flying in/out of Pensacola.

News!

Well... I'm pregnant! I'm right at 7 weeks, which means that I'm due right around April 1. We found out almost 2 weeks ago, and I've been so sick since then. I'm not close to showing yet, but I do have some lovely symptoms of bloating and belching.

I've been eating lots of crackers, Ginger Ale, mashed potatoes, and soup (though I hardly have the appetite for soup). It's a really odd mental transition to go from eating healthy to just eating whatever will stay down. I've never been so exhausted before, but at the same time I find it really hard to sleep through the night.

John's been good about embracing his new chores. Granted, he has always done a lot, but now he gets the added bonus of the kitty litter and making his own dinner.

I am not going to be posting the news to Facebook until after the 1st trimester. It's not a huge deal if you comment there, but I'd rather you either post here, call, send a message on Facebook, or email.

John and I are most likely going to be heading down to Bay Minette for Thanksgiving and would love to see you all!

Love,
Nicole (and John)

We're MOVING!

Dearest Family,

Greg has accepted a position with his company, The Dixie Group at the corporate office in Dalton, GA. We are extremely excited about moving to the hills of North Georgia/Chattanooga, TN area. Of course, we are looking for a home with more land, rather than a big house. Not sure when the move will take place. Pretty quickly, I imagine. With the housing market the way it is, we are most fortunate that he will get a moving package. It is a pretty good deal in such a bad economy. We already have a list of farms to look at close to Dalton, Ringgold, and Chickamauga, Georgia.

Greg had told the powers that be a long time ago that he would not move. Well now, Carter and Will are grown and things change. There will always be a place for them to come home to visit, just not Baldwin County, AL. I know each of you will open your doors to them as well. We will be much closer to Corey (Nich is in the Navy), yet, he too will be attending college and soon on his own. I am sure the rest of his family will be excited to have us closer to them.

Life is full of surprises! Jody and Chris will have to give up space during holidays. It will be a lot of fun and togetherness. We will always have room for visitors at our home. It may be in the barn, but there will be room.

We love you all and do so much appreciate your help and support.
Katrina and Greg

Devil's Lake trip

John went to Dallas for the weekend for work, so I spent today at Devil's Lake with a friend. The weather was perfect, though the water is still too cold for swimming.

Mindy and I climbed up some small boulders to get to a trail. It took longer than planned to find the trail, so we were a little tired at the end. It was fun and a good change of scenery. The summers in Wisconsin are so pretty that it is easy to quickly forget about the brutal winters.

Here are a couple of pictures. These pictures don't really show how far we climbed but that's the way it goes, I guess. We started out at the beach down there.

Trip to Milwaukee

John and I took a trip to Milwaukee last weekend for our 1st anniversary. We wanted to do something outside of Madison but not too expensive.
We ate at a couple of really nice restaurants, walked around the downtown and historic areas, and stumbled upon a kite festival. It was windy so I guess it was the perfect weekend for a kite party!
Our first hotel was motorcycle themed and next to the Harley Museum. They turned an old warehouse into a trendy, dimly lit, and well-decorated boutique hotel.
The second hotel was a Residence Inn that overlooked the river and lake with a view of the art museum.


It's not letting me post more than one picture so you'll just have to deal with just this one.
Love to all of you.
Nicole

Missing you

Today, we celebrate the death of our Dear sister, mother, daughter, and aunt, Bridget. Derek and Nicole continue to carry out her love, passion and personalities as her children. She would be so proud of you two. She loved you so much.

However, I do see a bit of Bridget in all of us in one way or another. I could explain, but it might be embarrassing!

I wish that we could plan to be together each Easter to celebrate not only the Risen Christ, but also Bridget's re-birth in heaven. Maybe we could plan ahead for that from now on.

Whatever. I love you all anyway.

Pics and News

Hey Peeps!
I just added some pictures from our trip to New Orleans and BM (just one) on Facebook, but since not all of you have FB, I thought I'd share them with you here. Enjoy!

John and I went on the South Beach Diet as of Jan 1. We've lost some weight (about 10 lbs each) and have really enjoyed the food. We've been using the recipes from this woman named Kalyn who has a blog with tons of SBD recipes. It's pretty neat and very thorough. We've like all of the recipes that we've done of hers so far. See Kayln's website here. Be careful... it's addicting to browse the recipes!

Young Life is about to get started again for the semester. Since I lead a group of college leaders and middle-school kids, it's always very busy for me. John just joined Committee, which is the group of adults who support the area by fundraising, praying, planning, and helping out where needed. He's also helping lead an RCIA class through the church. He'll be busy with that and traveling for work.

That's about it. Hope y'all are continuing to do well.
Love,
Nicole

Here are a few more shots. It was so nice to have everyone (except Mandy) at G&Gs! It's been too long since some of the grands were together. Lots of laughs and lots of love were spread around.

Nicole, John gets our family seal of approval. He's definitely a keeper!