Calvin James

I'm an aunt!!! I'm an aunt!!! 

Kim and I went to Michigan last Monday to visit Jim and Mia.  We joked around about the baby being born but didn't really expect it to happen quite yet as Maria wasn't due til September 6th.  Well, things don't always go as planned...

We came home from MI on Thursday and Mom left for a cousin's wedding in Oregon on Friday morning.  Being the good grandma she is, she was very nervous to buy the tickets and wanted to make positively sure Maria wouldn't have the baby while she was gone.  Uh, as I said, things don't always go as planned...

Turns out that due to a spike in Mia's blood pressure (which had been something they were watching for a while), she went to the OB triage during her work shift.  Quite handy that she works at the hospital she delivered at :)  She also left a voicemail on Mom's phone (it was turned off since she was in the air on her way to Oregon).  And when she texted that afternoon that 'there may be a baby in the next day or two' we were all hoping Mom would get home!

Long story short, Southwest got Mom on a very early Saturday morning flight and she took her car from the Chicago airport and made it to Grand Rapids the same time as the rest of us on Saturday.  As we were just getting back to our hotel from supper, we received the text.  It's a boy!! (Surprise! ;D)  His name is Calvin James. (Surprise!)  So, I guess that part went as planned as neither the gender nor the name really was a surprise.  Just a little guy.  6 lbs exactly. 19 inches long.

While we wanted to rush to the hospital and meet him right away, we also wanted to give the new family some space so we hung out at the hotel for a little while.  Dad and Mom went to the hospital before us kids to take Jim and Mia some food.  An hour or so later we headed that way to meet our new little nephew!

You know how everybody thinks his or her baby is the cutest, no bias?  Well, I'm so incredibly biased.  And I think he is so incredibly cute and adorable and absolutely perfect. 

Dad and us kids came home yesterday, which was Sunday.  Mom is staying the week and is so thankful to have made it home for this!  Mama and baby Calvin are doing well, Daddy is smitten.  Well, to be honest, we all are :D

Sweet Summertime

This summer has been one wild (but very fun :D) ride!  To pick up where I left off...

My time in California was full of cousins, morning walks by the mountains, a few beach days, sewing, some cooking, exercises at the Y, and various outings.  The last week, Leah flew out and spent the remaining week with me and we flew home together.  If you're interested in what that week held, here's the link to Leah's post on her blog: A Week in Cali   I hope to do a better job of blogging my adventures in California in the future :)

When we got home, Mom, Kim, and Edie picked us up along with two Romanian visitors that have been in the U.S. since July 4th.
Meet Nathaly (pronounced Natalie, age 16) and Corina (age 15):

These girls are currently in Illinois visiting the Hoerr cousins, but while they were here in Indiana we enjoyed having them around (and listening to them speak Romanian 100 mph). It didn't take long for these girls to be like sisters.  They've been very helpful around the house and when they're around they laugh at all of Dad's jokes so we don't have too ;)

In mid July Danny took Sackett to the fair and we spent a lot of time at the horse end, watching, anticipating, and Mom was probably praying most of gaming day on Thursday.  There are several injuries every year. 

Pole bending

On Dash for Cash the rein pulled apart from the bit leaving Danny unable to steer very well. If you look close you can see the rope flying towards the barrel.

And here it's by his leg...

 

photo credit U. Dave Klotzle

Thankfully Sackett stopped at the gate, a bad habit that Danny was trying to break all day, and Danny got off safely.

 

photo credit U. Dave Klotzle

One of the team events..

 

photo credit U. Dave Klotzle

It was a fun day, but this year it was particularly special as some family was visiting from CA.  After watching other people ride horses all day, we decided to go home and have our own 'fair'.

 

photo credit U. Dave Klotzle

 

photo credit U. Dave Klotzle

After fair was over, we had a little break before a week vacation with the Lehman family in the Smokey Mountains.

Our residence for the week: Buckskin Lodge.

  

Every day we drove past this shed. Isn't it worthy of a picture?

The days were filled with hiking to waterfalls, family time, tubing, rafting, eating, ice skating, alpine slides and coasters, and lots and lots of driving.

We saw a bear on our first hike!  He was such a cute little guy.

Fun in the water at Laurel Falls

The great Smokies!

Aww, aren't they so sweet?

One day a group of us went rafting.  And rafting was an adventure, but getting there was even a bigger adventure.  We ended up on some curvy mountain road where we could only sporadically connect to GPS.  When we saw this we turned around.

We made it eventually (almost an hour late) and the tour was great.  But several of us agree that the ride there was better :)

Another day we went to Cherokee, a small town in North Carolina. There was an Indian Village we enjoyed in the afternoon and a drama in the evening.

These people (some of them having Cherokee blood) demonstrated a few of the Cherokees' dances.  In this one they demonstrated some interesting bear-like clawing movements.

And I think this was the Angry-Ant Dance.

An eagle dance in the drama.  The dancing was probably my favorite part of visiting Cherokee.

The beautiful Abram Falls.

And some happy cabin-ers.

One night Corina saw a coon sneaking under the bottom porch.  Pretty soon somebody brought food out and the younger kids took turns feeding the coon. It became obvious that he was used to people.  Shhh, don't tell the park rangers.

It was an action packed week with lots of good memories and full of God's handiwork.

So there's the brief update of the exciting things with the Lehman's this summer. Thanks for reading!