Team Nolan

Just wanted to let everyone know our family is walking in our local March of Dimes-March for Babies. We are walking for Team Nolan, Nolan is our friends son who was born at 29 weeks-11 weeks too early. Go to the following website to see Nolan's journey (You mommy's and even if you aren't a mommy, have tissues ready) http://www.onetruemedia.com/shared?p=5497b6b7687cf009a9b49d&skin_id=701&utm_source=otm&utm_medium=email
If you want you can sponsor us at the following website.
http://www.marchforbabies.org/hollieclark

Keep watching our blog for moving updates coming soon!

Arms

Here is a picture from the Easter production at our church. Notice the big bad arms in the back row, yes that is my husband the guard. The drama took place in a POW camp. Carl was good at being a bad guy! And for those concerned no that is not a real snake tattoo on his arm:)

Belated Happy Easter

I decided to update the look of the blog to green to celebrate the beginning of Spring(well at least the calendar says it's spring the temperature today says otherwise) It has been a busy past few weeks for us. We are still in full swing fixing up the house, we are hoping to move in this coming Sunday! Most of the paint is done, thanks so much to Chuck from our connection group who spent two very late nights helping us get the majority of it finished and Andrea who helped us get a great start on the very daunting pink hallway. We only have a few touch-ups here and there and the kitchen to do. The kitchen is coming along well, we are almost ready to lay the new floor and rearrange cabinets. Then we can get the appliances in and paint on the walls, we are also getting new countertops but those won't be in for awhile since we have to order them once we get everything rearranged. The downstairs bathroom is still in need of some wallpaper scrape off. We thought we could get away with just priming and painting over it since it is a small room, no such luck, when I put the primer on the wall paper started to bubble up and split at the seems, which wouldn't be a big deal if there weren't 3 layers of wall paper there, oh-well like I said at least it's a small room. The fireplace wall still hasn't been touched but will get attention once the kitchen is done. It feels good to see some progress going on. Our Easter weekend was busy but great. Carl was in the Easter drama at our church so he has been extremely busy with rehersals and then all the performances over the weekend. It was a lot of time but it was a great drama and he and everyone involved did a great job. This past week the boys and I were able to do a few fun Easter activities. On Thursday we went to the library to an Easter party, they did a few crafts and listened to a few stories and then the Easter bunny came and gave them a treat(normally we don't do Santa, Easter Bunny, etc. as we want Gabe to know the true meaning of these holidays but I made an exception since we just needed to get out of the house) Gabe loves anything in costume and ran right up to the Easter bunny. He had to get treats for his little friends who were with us since they did not share Gabe's enthusiasm for the oversized rabbit. Friday we went to Heather and Brady's house and dyed Easter Eggs. We managed to only have one major oops when Gabe knocked over the cup full of green dye, luckily both boys had used that color already and it didn't get on the carpet! Saturday Gabe and Ty got to go to the farm with Grandma and Uncle Pete. He was so excited he got to ride on the tractor and see a few of the animals Great Uncle Dave has at his house. He wasn't so keen on the goats I heard. The boys also had a first this past weekend, they both took a bath in the big boy bath at the same time. This has never happened before but for times sake I decided to try it and they both did great, I was having visions of Gabe knocking Ty over face first into the water but he did a good job, I think he was wondering where all the water was since it wasn't very deep and he is used to a little more water in the tub but he still managed to have fun and get clean. Sunday we all went to church, came home had lunch and then Gabe and Ty got to see what was in their Easter Baskets, Ty was pretty indifferent although he did enjoy chewing on the contents of his basket and Gabe loved his new Mater toy. We tried to do an Easter Egg hunt but Gabe was more interested in eating the candy with each egg he found instead of trying to find more eggs so Uncle Pete had to help him out. Maybe next year the weather will be a little warmer and we can do our egg hunt outside. We will continue to update on the house situation, hopefully I will be able to blog from there soon! We hope everyone had a wonderful Easter!

Build a Bear (or an elephant)

We had a very much needed trip out of the house this morning. We met our friends Heather and her kids and Jacky and her oldest and went to Jordan Creek and Build a Bear. Gabe chose to build an elephant and name him Horton, he just went to Horton Hears a Who with Grandma and Grandpa this past weekend so Horton the Elephant was fresh on his mind. He chose the elephant and a sound box to go inside, so Horton even sounds like an elephant. Then he took it to the fluffing machine where Horton was filled with fluff. After that Gabe had fun giving Horton an air shower and combing his hair. When he was all clean he decided Horton should wear a red baseball cap and have a pair of cool sunglasses, Gabe tends to think the sunglasses are his to wear even though they really don't fit him. I of course forgot to bring the camera with so we only have a picture of the finished product. We are continuing to work on the house, I posted a few pictures of our mess right now. It is slowly coming along and hopefully will start to get a new roof this weekend. Since these pictures most of the upstairs bedrooms are done being painted with the exception of Ty's room which needed some work on a wall so that one will happen soon. The hallway is being painted and most of the first coat of paint is on in the living room. we are continuing to work in the kitchen and our appliances were delivered yesterday even though we weren't quite ready for them yet, we had to do it yesterday or not until April 20th so right now we have a fridge, stove, microwave and dishwasher sitting in our living room. The fireplace wall is still a mess but there is a great cad drawing done of what it is supposed to look like. The weather is finally nice today so we are hoping for some outside time again. Pray for good weather for the weekend so the roof can get started.

So Big

Hard to believe Ty is 7 months old today! We had to use a substitute for our normal big white chair since it is sitting in the trailer in storage. Instead we used Grandma and Grandpa's big red chair. Ty started eating cereal puffs this week, we had tried them a few times before but he wasn't quite ready as he would gag on them because he didn't quite get the chewing concept yet, now he does great and loves to eat them while Gabe has a snack or while the rest of us eat supper. He is starting to look so big and is definitely out growing his carrier car seat. When the weather stays nice we will switch him into Gabe's and get Gabe a new one, it seems kids have to stay in car seats now until they can drive themselves, oh-well. We enjoyed the nice weather yesterday with a walk and tricycle ride. Gabe finally can pedal the tricycle Grandpa Matt and Grandma Nancy got him and did a great job riding along side the stroller. We were watching my nephew yesterday who is a few months older then Ty and the babies both loved the stroller ride and being outside. We hope it continues. Gabe is very much ready for the nice weather to come. Every day he asks me if it is Spwing yet? Mostly because he know that in the spring the tractors wake up at Lowes and on the farm and he can go for a ride. He had a blast being outside yesterday and we discovered that Lowe's does indeed have the lawn mowers outside, so to Gabe "spwing" is officially here, never mind the impending snow we are supposed to be getting this weekend, gotta love the weather in Iowa. The insulation in our house is done, I wish we would have had a camera, I have never seen such a mess in all my life. It seriously looked like a tornado had hit our house, insulation and pieces of wall everywhere. The insulation kid of looks like fake snow and when we walked in Wednesday night Gabe looked and said "It's snowing in our house" It did indeed look like snow in our house. They were coming back to clean up this morning and my dad got the holes filled last night, let the painting begin!

Step 2

So the fun is in full swing. We are busily working on the new house and trying to get it ready to move into. So far it looks much worse then before but I'm sure that will change soon. We have ripped off the wood paneling on the fireplace wall, torn down most of the wallpaper in the house, have demolished a few cabinets and an archway in the kitchen and really managed to make a nice mess of the place. The house is being insulated today and after that we can finally start painting and getting the house finished or at least move in ready, we are trying out paint colors now and will be painting the entire interior and exterior of the house, the exterior will wait until it gets a little bit warmer outside. I am excited for it to be done, before I was just ready to close on the house and get started working on it and now I am just ready to move in and have it be home. The boys are adjusting fairly well to being at Mom and Dad's place. Gabe thinks it is great to have Grandpa and Grandma around all the time. He also loves the new place, he think the stairs are great! He is very excited to have his brown room, I don't know why he wants brown but he does, that is what he says every single time you ask him and when shown paint samples he picks brown too, funny kid. I will post pictures as time allows and we get them taken, we need to post a few of the mess we have going on now so when it is done it will really look impressive. We have a big roofing project on the house coming up the first week in April so if you know of anyone who really enjoys ripping up shingles and putting new sheeting and shingles down volunteers are more then welcome! Please pray the weather holds up those few days as our roof really needs to be replaced quickly before too much more moisture occurs. The pictures are of Gabe in our old house all empty, the boys at Grandma and Grandpa's getting ready to get PJ's on and thanks to Brady and Mya for making Gabe some play-dough, he loved it!

Step One

Step one is done! All of our stuff is out of the old house and into the trailer and my Mom and Dad's house. It is strange to see the house so empty, it is a bittersweet moment for us. We had a lot of great memories in that house, watching Gabe take his first steps in between us in the living room and then watching him start to toddle around the dining room table, bringing Ty home from the hospital, kitchen remodels, ceiling fan experiences, the list goes on and on. We are super excited to get into the new house and make it our home too and make many new memories there but our little house on Kellogg was good to us. Gabe still doesnt know quite what to think, we are staying at Grandpa and Grandma's for the time being and I think he still thinks at any moment we are going to say it is time to go and take him back to the house. Today we are going to take him to the house so he can see it empty and maybe that will help things sink in a little. We will try to get a few pictures then too. Thanks so much to everyone who helped us move yesterday, it went so smoothly because of all the great help we had!