One day Natalie asked me why I hadn't posted to my blog very much since we returned home from our mission. I told her there really wasn't anything exciting to write about. I hadn't taken pictures and pictureless posts are more boring. Natalie said, "Why don't you write about how fun it is to live with us?" So here are a couple of fun things about having the Schvaneveldt family live with us.

First of all, it is nice to have so many bedtime hugs and kisses. Hailey and Natalie are especially good at this.

We get to help with homework again. Sometimes we are asked our opinion and sometimes our advice is taken. We have a teenager in the house again.

We are getting really good at cutting out 'Boxtops for Education' and stapling them on a redemption form for Natalie.

We don't have to cook every meal, but meal preparation is a challenge. Nothing pleases everyone. We have to get creative. Since some don't like fish, we cooked Tilapia and said it was 'Australian Chicken.' Kaden, who claims to hate fish, poked at it a little and asked why it looked like fish. We told him because 'Australian Chicken' can swim in the ocean. He promptly ate his Tilapia and asked for more. We were eating macaroni salad and each kid picked out something he/she didn't care for. Natalie piled chopped celery on the side of her plate but was otherwise eating and enjoying her macaroni salad. Courtney asked if the meat in the salad was shrimp. When I said that it was, suddenly Natalie wrinkled her nose and had to make a new reject pile of shrimp on her plate. She was fine until it was pointed out what was in the salad. Funny, funny.

It is fun to plan our master suite in the new Schvaneveldt home..ha-ha. We like to go check the progress each day. The footings are in and most of the forms for the foundation are in place.

It is fun to have a little noise in an otherwise quiet old folks home.