it's official

Check out our listing here. Tell your friends, spread the word...we're selling our house. And now I am taking a deep breath. :)

playing hard

On Sunday, Kenton drove to Kelso, Washington with Stu & Jesse for a Heroscape Tournament (which Kenton won, by the way!). My wonderful friends Carolyn & Jacque came over to hang out & to help keep Finn entertained. :) He loved having so much attention & we even did fun stuff!


After Finn's nap, we went to dinner at Laughing Planet: a very kid friendly restaurant with yummy food & cool dinosaurs on the tables. :)

Finn, Carolyn & Jacque

Finn just learned to say "cheese" when he sees someone taking a picture!

After dinner, we stopped at Sweet Life to get desserts to-go & then headed over to Riverplay Park. This time I was prepared with cool digging toys & construction vehicles. Ironically, Finn was more interested in the playground equipment this time. At least at the beginning...


He went down the great big slide alone & got bumped around a bit. So Jacque went down with him a second time & they both got bumped around a bit. :\ It's a pretty scary slide!


After the slide action, he was more interested in the sand & enjoyed playing with his own dump truck & bulldozer. I was happy to not have a tantruming child. :) I do want to try & find a cool backhoe soon so that he can give that a try...

We came home & Finn got a bath before going to bed. It was so nice to have Jacque & Carolyn helping me with Finn. I would have been pretty worn out with Kenton being gone all day! It's nice to trade off a bit with keeping him entertained. Thanks friends! :)

oakway park

On Friday morning, Finn & I met Gretchen, Ronan & Griffin at Oakway Park. It's a newish park with sand & fountains along with fun slides & swings. We had a really good time except that there was a boy there who had a very cool front loader (construction vehicle) toy. Finn is very into backhoes right now. He did not understand why he couldn't have that toy all to himself. It was an interesting experience for me - dealing with a tantruming child without Kenton, in public! Thankfully, the boy & his toy had to leave before we did, so we managed to have some good playtime without the front loader stealing all of his attention. :P

After the park, we met Kenton, Jacque & Stu at Sweet Basil for lunch. Finn did pretty well, considering he was a little sandy & pretty tired. He didn't want to try any of my chicken, rice & veggies with peanut sauce (though the next day he devoured my leftovers!) so he ate yogurt, raisins & slightly stale cheerios. :)

We went home for his nap & afterwards visited with Stu, Jacque, Carolyn, Jesse & Erik. We mostly just hung out & chatted, so no photos. :) It was a great start to Kenton's break & we are so excited that he has this whole week off from work! Yay!

sorry for disappearing

I didn't exactly feel like I was on vacation this week. Kenton was still working, so I worked a double shift to get our house ready (inside & out) to be listed for sale next week. Not that Kenton didn't help; he did a lot every evening after work. But this week zipped by & I'm still trying to catch my breath.


Our amazing realtor, Aimee Stubbert, will be listing our house on Monday, June 30th. I am really excited/anxious, but ready to get things rolling. We've been practicing all weekend to keep our house clean & have done a decent job. We are completing a couple LAST minute projects today & then tomorrow it will be official! C-R-A-Z-Y! Knowing that God is in control takes so much pressure off of me & I try to remember this every time I start thinking about things too much. :) We're hoping to sell by the beginning of October & would appreciate prayer as we begin this process...

sharing

This morning, we shared our neighborhood park with Griffin, Ronan & Gretchen. Carolyn played with us too! It was fun to experience all of the park with Finn's cousins. We don't usually explore the baseball diamond, but Ronan (the sports fanatic) helped us find new ways to play. :)


He showed Finn & Griffin how to pretend to hit the ball & run the bases!


Gretchen & Carolyn pushing Ronan & Griffin on the swings.


Finn really admires his older cousin Ronan. It's so great to see Finn watching him so closely & imitating his play. Ronan was being so kind & gentle with Finn, letting him sit on the teeter-totter with him. What great looks on both of their faces.

So proud!

There he goes, looking so big again...

To finish off, a photo of our yummy dinner tonight: apricot pork kabobs. Hello Summer!

the beginning

On Saturday night, we celebrated my dad's retirement with a Happy Hour Open House at my parent's house. So many people dropped by to celebrate this new beginning. I think the total count came to 83 people (a new record for Hecht family parties). A very large portion of the guests were current/former students & LCC colleagues. Plus, a lot of family & friends joined the celebration. There was great food, good music & fun conversation + some pretty cute kids!


Pretty typical that the majority of my photos from the whole evening were of the kids. :) Here is Griffin, Finn, Macey, Sadie, & Ethan. Sadie was really excited to help with the "babies."

Photo by Jesse Williams
Cohen, Finley & Griffin piled onto the piano bench to give a performance. You can barely see Finn's hand in the hair in applause/cheer.

The children gave Papa a pocket watch so that he doesn't lose track of time now that he's retired. ;)

5 days old

mama & baby

Our visit with little miss Adalie was so nice! I got to hold her & was so amazed at all of her teeny-tiny-ness! She slept for the most part, making sweet little faces & noises. Then she started stirring, so I helped wake her up. :) Finn was equally interested in Adalie & a couple of cars. He also got a kick out of sitting in her tiny bassinet. There was a sweet moment when we were telling him about her tiny hands & he looked down at his own hands, almost comparing. He seemed so huge next to her! So weird to see my baby as such a big kid!

Kenton was happy to meet Adalie & I certainly enjoyed my cuddle time/photo shoot with the sweet girl! Congratulations to Sandy & Nicole! She's such a darling girl!

fun with the chasers

On Thursday night, we had the Chase kids over while Becca & Aaron went to dinner with friends. Finn was so happy to have his cousins over & they all played really well together.


Sadie asked if she could get in Finn's crib & Cohen scrambled in after her. It reminded me of a photo from last summer, so I scooped Finn up & put him in as well.

I went back through my photos & found the one I was thinking about:

These kiddos have grown so much in the last year. It's so amazing how quickly babies & kids can change in a short time!

After dinner & some playtime with Finn's toys, we headed to our neighborhood playground. (We're going to miss this park when we move! Hopefully our next house will have a park near by!)

Sadie (almost 5)

Tyler in his bat cave (8)

Cohen (2 1/2)

Kenton's plan for keeping the kids entertained! It worked for a little bit, but the younger kids got pretty antsy after a while. (This is Heroscape, for those who are unfamiliar).

Again, we misjudged the targeted age range for this toy! :P

Practicing his football moves!

Smoke bombs to finish off the evening!

duck pond & more

After our haircuts, Finn & I met Carolyn & Jesse at the duck pond (Alton Baker Park). Again, Finn was so brave. He would walk right up to the hissing geese & say "Hi!" He got pretty messy while we were there, but didn't mind one bit.


I'm pretty sure Finn was eating more bread than he was feeding to the ducks & geese. :\

Jesse, Carolyn & Finn.
We stopped at this bench for a quick snack.

Finn sitting on the sun.

We've had so much fun visiting with Jesse & Carolyn during the days lately. Since I am on break from work, we've been able to spend lots of time with them.

Finn loves tickles!

And he loves books!

Silly boy. :)

haircut

Yesterday was a very big day. We started by both getting haircuts by my mom. Finn wasn't too sure at first, but did really great!

Colorful hair curlers to keep him busy

Ta-da! Memaw is such a pro!

After haircuts, we continued our big day...