Short Hike

Yeah, I wouldn't even call it a hike. More like a short walk on an incline haha.. We decided to go check out a trail in the Cumberland Gap National Park but we didn't have a hiking backpack for little miss yet so we couldn't go very far. We decided to make it more an activity than a hike. Sam printed out some tree identifying information and we had lots of fun trying to find and identify the many different trees. We took pictures of each tree and their leaves but I won't bore you on which was a sycamore or a virginia pine or a sweet gum. haha.. Instead, you get lots of cute pictures of the babe and her many different faces. She loves being outside. Her favorite part of the hike was all the rocks on the ground. Pretty sure she is holding at least one in every photo... 

Cool map at the start of the trail.. One of these days, we will hike up to the tri-state point. I've never been to 4 corners out west but this would be almost as cool, I think:

Yeah, she's cute:

Oh and I do have to note, this was her first time wearing real jeans (instead of stretchy pants) and tennis shoes (instead of her jellies). It was hilarious watching her try to walk. She caught on pretty quick though..

Post of our longer hike coming soon....

Just life...

Just wanted to write a little update on what we've been up to this past month.. not much has been going on. Sam is studying away and doing great! I have to document that he actually made a 100 on part his anatomy test a week ago (90 on the other part)!! and a 108 on another test (undergrad test in his program). His hard work is surely paying off. Way to go babe! Keep it up! Anywho, We have met some wonderful friends here and luckily, all our kids get along which is a bonus when we get together.. Sam's study group is known as the Baby Daddy group because they all have kids, lol.. 

A few weeks ago, me and a couple of the other wives met at Cumberland Gap town which is the smallest town I've ever been to, even smaller than our tiny Harrogate. It's located in between the mountains in the actual Cumberland Gap. Pretty sure we were able to walk to whole town in a matter of minutes. A cute ice cream parlor and a couple antique shops were the perfect excuse to visit...

In the right pic, Ivy with her new friends:

Anyways, just wanted to include some photos of Ivy I've taken over the past few weeks.. She is hilarious these days. Crack's me up every day with her big personality. Can't believe how much she has changed, just since we've been here!

A while back, my friend Diana (wife to a fellow post-bac student with Sam who just also happen to go to our church) invited me and Ivy to go with her and her two kids to a children's museum near Knoxville. Her daughter Evelyn is 3 years old and son Graham is just 2 months older than Ivy. They play really well together, which works out perfect so Diana and I can do a swap twice a week.. I teach voice lessons one day and she works from home with a marketing company one day. It's a great system we have:

Library day is every Thursday. They have the cutest toddler time I've ever been to. Ivy is a big fan:

Pink toes! Finally figured out the trick. Do it while she eats lunch (so she's distracted) and then tell her not to touch, but to blow on them, haha. I keep her in her seat til they dry:

Labor Day festival at the city park.. apparently it's a big deal around here. They even had an awesome fireworks show that we could see perfectly from our house that evening. It was awesome. I love that we live on a hill:

Yep, we are in the South.....

Diana and I made jam one Saturday morning while our husbands were studying.. Peach and strawberry. Yum! It was so fun! Some day we will branch out a little and do more canning.. I'm still kinda scared of it, though, lol..

 Pigtails! When did she grow up??

Ivy totally marched over to those big kids and just started playing like she was one of them. The girl is not shy at all:

She's getting too smart.....

She has been on a serious monkey kick lately. She saw this box on the shelf and kept pointing at it because of the monkey. She loves saying "ah ah ah" if you ask her what a monkey says. It's cute.

Pretty shirt that Grandma Trish and Grandpa sent from their trip to Greece. So cute!

Moorrre teething. The left pic was definitely a late morning of jammies and movies bc she was so darn cranky.. OH and notice the apple? It's her favorite thing lately. One day when the fridge was open, she found one in the drawer and I let her eat it. She practically ate the whole thing! core and all! Now she always goes to the fridge and asks for an "appee." She will hold on to it practically all day long and just nibble on it. (yes she loves oreos too, hehe):

Another favorite lately is bath time. this girl LOVES water. I mean, loooves it. She would stay in there for an hour if I let her (which I may or may not have done before, hehe).. For a couple weeks, she was begging for a bath every single day. She pushes the door open to the bathroom and would stand at the bathtub yelling "BAAA," hahaa:

Here are the two peas in a pod.. This was a morning that we had Graham and Evelyn over to play.. No I did not stage these pics, they were over there for a couple mins before I even noticed them.. So funny, these two... They share so many similar interests.. like yo gabba gabba and goldfish and nilla wafers.. Friends for sure:

A few other Ivy tidbits lately:

-She loves books and puzzles

-Yo gabba gabba is currently her favorite show, although Micky Mouse clubhouse is close behind

-loves the popcorn popping song

-loves to find her belly button, ears, and teeth, still a little fuzzy on the rest, lol

-is talking quite a bit more, tries to say (though not very clear) thank you, all done, binky, night night, bath, hello, yummy

-words that are pretty clear- hi, bye bye, go, nana, baby, daddy, mam (not mama, just mom, sounds like mam, haha)

The house! Finally!

Ok, I know my decorations for my home are a little blah. Just give me a few months and a few tutorials from pinterest, I'll try to add some more fun stuff here and there. At least the house had personality even before we moved our furniture in! It is the perfect size for us! We love everything about it, especially the view from both our front and back yards. Anyways, here we go!

Front entry way, hallway on the left goes to the bedrooms, to the right is the living room and kitchen:

 View of the entry way/hallway:

 Living room, complete with built in cabinets, perfect for ivy's toys!

View of the living room from our office (dining room turned office):

Office/piano room:

I love these built in divider things. I think they add a lot to the room. And it's nice for when Sam has to study. He's separated from the living room, but can still see what's going on:

Kitchen, blue counters, 70's stove. It's pretty old but works perfectly! oh and we have a dishwasher that plugs into the faucet, haha.. kinda funky but I'd rather have that than no dishwasher at all:

We actually have two bathrooms but the other one wasn't particularly photo worthy at the time. It's connected to our room and super tiny. This is actually the "guest" bathroom but is literally twice the size of our bathroom. BUT this larger bathroom doesn't have a single outlet in it. So we usually shower in this one because it's nicer but I have to do my hair in the other one, haha. Quirky but it works. Adds character  right? Oh and don't you love the fluorescent seashells? I'm kind of a fan, hehe:

Guest Bedroom. I'm so happy we actually have one! complete with an old cedar(?) chest and vintage wardrobe:

Extra family room? Not sure what it will be. Our kitchen table is sort of non-existent at the moment so maybe once we get a decent one it will go in here? Or maybe a fooseball table? Some day it will be something other than, the extra room that Ivy likes to run around in, hehe. (please pay no attention to the curtains, they were there when we got there and we tied up the long ones so Ivy wouldn't play with them.) :

The Studio.. It's just an extra room attached to our place that we are using for storage.. It actually has quite a bit of furniture from the lady who used to live here. And most of those paintings were actually done by her too. It's a cool room:

Our driveway and big front yard:

 Backyard:

Love this view:

I know I left out a couple rooms, mainly ours and Ivy's but there wasn't anything too special about them.. It's the same furniture from our other places and arranged in almost the same way haha.. Maybe once I figure out the curtain situation in Ivy's room I'll take pictures...