Showers of Blessings: {one}

I'm excited to start a new blogging tradition of posting every weekend little blessings from the previous week. So here goes the first edition!

-one-

Our check engine light has been on for over a month and Tyler took our car into a Toyota dealership in Naples, FL to have it checked out. At the end of the day the estimate to fix the car was about $5000...no joke. Tyler asked if anything was urgent and Tony said no and that the car won't break down but he gave Tyler the list of what needs to be done. So we decided to get a second opinion. Who would want to put $5000 into a car with over 100,000 miles on it? When we got to Orlando we took the car into Red's Auto, referred to us by Tyler's supervisor Andy who had only great things to say about his experience with them. Red's estimate of what needed to be done immediately: nothing. He charged $70, got the check engine light off, and said everything looks good and the recommendations of the other mechanic were for environmental reasons and the bottom line is our car is in great condition. Needless to say we were thrilled.

-two-

My sister organized an on-line baby shower for us and Andy's wife Jenny has been keeping the packages at her place since we were on the move this summer. So this past week she had me over to her house and I opened up our gifts and it was really exciting! Jenny has two boys so she gave me a large garbage bag filled with clothes and several other baby items to borrow. It's such a blessing to finally be able to "nest" and gather everything we will need for James!

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We found this cute little ice cream place, Twistee Treat, three minutes from our apartment and I have a feeling we'll be going here a lot!

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I absolutely love farmers markets and my friend Mirna and I checked out this one in Windermere yesterday. It was the best one I've ever been to! They had tons of amazing things, fresh cheeses, dips, meats, two large fruit and vegetable stands, you name it. We enjoyed tasting a lot of the goodies and since Mirna is 39 weeks pregnant we got a lot of comments since we were there together, which was cute! There are several other farmers markets around the area and Tyler and I are excited to check them out!

Our Latest Purchase

Since moving we've been on the hunt for a bookshelf. Three years ago we bought a few bookshelves from Target, the ones where you have to assemble them yourself, and Tyler did a wonderful job doing that even though it's not his favorite thing to do. After going through the move from Iowa to North Carolina the bookshelves were looking a little rough so we decided they didn't need to make the move to Florida. We also wanted to find a bookshelf that was larger that could hold all our books in one place.

The other day we stopped by a thrift mart a few miles from our place to browse and low and behold we found this treasure. Guess how much it cost? I'll give you a hint: the delivery fee ($25) was more expensive than the bookshelf. It is in great condition and holds almost all our books. Tyler did a great job of arranging our books and my favorite part is his liquor stash on the top shelf.

And Tyler didn't even have to assemble anything. What a deal.

My husband is a "Dynasty"

One of Tyler's and my favorite shows is America's Game. Even though I'm not a huge professional football fan I like them because each show tells a story of a team who won the super bowl. A few of the players and sometimes the coach are interviewed and they re-live the season, game by game. I like that it's predictable, I always know who wins the super bowl. Anyway, from this show is where I first heard the word "dynasty" in relation to sports.

According to bleacherreport.com, a team deserves the title "dynasty" if they:

1) win back-to-back to titles

2) win or have won another title within a few years of the successive championships

It goes on to give the examples of the Dallas Cowboys and the Patriots who both won three titles in four years (Cowboys in ’92, '93 and '95 and Patriots in ’01, '03 and '04 )

Three titles in four years. A dynasty. 

So onto the reason for this blog. My husband is a dynasty. This summer at FOCUS summer training his team won the soccer championship, the third time in four years.

1: Our first year in FOCUS, summer of 2011 in Champaign IL.
2: Last year summer of 2013 in Ave Maria, FL.

3: This year summer of 2014 in Ave Maria, FL.

Three championships in four years. I think that's worth celebrating!

Our New Home

Hurray! We are all settled in our new home and have internet, which means I can post pictures of our apartment!

We love our new place. It is very large and comfortable. It's so beautiful outside with all the palm trees and we have our own little lake outside too!

Lake outside our window

Courtyard with beautiful palm trees

Coming from a one bedroom we feel like we are living in a mansion! There is so much natural light and we enjoy the vaulted ceilings and wonderful ceiling fans in each room (they have already come in handy!) We are so blessed to have three bedrooms so we can have enough room for visitors (that is an open invitation to all of you!)

Our bedroom with an attached bathroom and walk-in closet

Hallway leading to bedrooms and second bathroom

James' room...has a bit of work to do before he comes!

4 Year Anniversary

Today we celebrated our four year wedding anniversary! I can't believe it's been four years already and yet that is still a short time compared to our wonderful parents who have been married over 30 years! We spent the day enjoying our new home and went out for frozen yogurt before our Baptism class at our new church, Holy Family Parish. It seems like just yesterday we were headed to our rehearsal dinner (picture above). We have definitely been on some adventures these past four years and are so thankful for our vocation! 

Moving Day 4: We have arrived!

After 1,283 miles in four days, with 539 of those being in a 17' U-Haul, we have made it to our new home in Orlando, Florida! We are so excited to finally be here. We haven't slept in our own bed in over two months! We love our new apartment and will post pictures soon!

Moving Day 3: On the road again...

What a day. We are exhausted but accomplished a lot. Thanks to the movers from Moving Help all of our stuff was loaded into the U-Haul in record speed, taking only 30 minutes! Tyler vacuumed and cleaned the bathroom and I cleaned the kitchen and we said our final goodbyes to Abbey Court apartments.

As we were on our way out of town we noticed there was a loud scraping noise when we turned. After closer inspection it turns out the bumper was bent on the front passenger side and scraped against the tire. So we took the loaded U-Haul back to the pick-up spot and were quite concerned that we would need to change trucks. We had no idea how we would unload all our stuff and reload it but thankfully we didn't need to figure that out. Long story short, the U-Haul attendants ended up sawing off parts of the bumper and then moved the metal part of the bumper with an iron rod (picture above) and some kind of contraption hooked up to a truck. I don't really understand what they did but in the end the tire didn't scrape against the bumper so we were ready to get on the road.

We were only an hour behind schedule and the rest of the trip went smoothly. One of the highlights of the day was lunch because we were starved! At the beginning of our trip we stocked up on car snacks (that's how I grew up as a Rappana) and lunch food. I've been eating chicken, cheese, and crackers and Tyler has had a different lunchable every day. Those bring back fun memories of when we were little!

Today's lunchable was pepperoni pizzas!

I made them for Tyler since he was driving. I think making the pizzas are half the fun!

Tomorrow is move-in day in our new apartment and we are so excited to get settled! Someone asked me today at the gas station how far along I was and after I said 8 months she asked if I was ready. I smiled and said, "Yes!" But afterwards I thought to myself, "No! We are not ready!" We are ready to meet little James but have a lot to do before he comes!

Moving Day 2: Belmont, NC

We made it back to Belmont. Tyler and I were both feeling a mix of emotions on the drive. We packed up our apartment and left in early May knowing we'd be back in mid-July to load our stuff and move out, but that is a long time to be away and we never really had time to say goodbye. So we spent the evening reminiscing of various memories and visiting a few special places and now we feel ready to move on!

Our first night in Belmont last August we went to Taxco so we thought it appropriate to go there for our last meal. This was definitely our go-to Mexican restaurant. 

 

After dinner we took a walk downtown Belmont. We felt like we were missing someone...our Frannie! We walked her downtown a few times and took her to the park. Another favorite part of downtown was the farmer's market we went to on Fridays and the random little restaurant, Holy Angels, that sold various types of bread for $1.50. That's why I never made bread this past year, because it was so easy to buy delicious home-made bread!

We finished the evening with a drive around Belmont Abbey and a visit to Jesus in the chapel. This is a very special place because we would pray there every morning with our team. It's nestled in the woods and is a very peaceful and holy place.

Tomorrow we load up and head out! It's good to know we'll be back though. When we left Dubuque, IA we had no idea when we would be back, and we still don't! But here we know we'll be back to visit campus since Tyler will be overseeing the missionaries at The Abbey.

Moving Day 1: Brunswick, GA

Sand dunes on Jekyll Island

Our move has begun! We left Naples, FL yesterday and drove to Brunswick, GA. Tyler did a great job planning our trip and we decided to take a few days to complete our move because I am not up for long car drives. It helps to split the drive up and have time outside of the car.

After having a delicious dinner at Five Guys we decided to explore the downtown area of Brunswick. We didn't find much so we decided to keep driving and find the water that was nearby.

Fresh potatoes from Idaho and cooked to order hamburgers! Delicious!

As we were driving we saw on the map that we were very close to Jekyll Island so we decided to go exploring. We paid the $6 daily fee to get onto the island and then drove around and were surprised at the amount of things to do. There were several hotels, a club house with a golf course, shopping, camping, and a historic district. We decided we didn't need to come back here for a vacation but enjoyed the hour or so driving around and looking at the countryside.

We did enjoy the beach and walked down into the water just to say we were in the Atlantic Ocean. It was beautiful and a very different beach than in Naples, FL.

We had a wonderful evening exploring and enjoyed making memories! We're excited to see what more adventures we'll find in the next few days of our move!

35 weeks!

How time flies! We are getting near our "mid-August" due date and I can't believe we're a month out, give or take a few weeks!

We have a lot to do in the next month so I am okay with James coming right when God wants him to! We're reaching the end of our summer adventures and have already squeezed in packing up our apartment in NC, dropping our Frannie girl off at "summer camp" (aka the Rosser residence in AL),  a road trip to Lincoln, time with Tyler's parents in Fairhope, AL before coming to Ave Maria for 5 weeks of FOCUS summer training, and currently are enjoying our vacation with Tyler's parents in Naples, FL at the beach before we head back to NC to load up our stuff in a U-Haul and move into our new apartment in Orlando. Wow.

We are looking forward to getting settled and for Tyler to begin his work as Director of Collegiate Outreach for FOCUS. Oh and also to prepare for James! God has definitely given us the grace to live in the present and enjoy each day but we are anxiously awaiting the time to meet our little one.

Last Monday we had another ultrasound and James is happy and healthy. Both our doctor in NC and the one here in Naples have commented on him being a "big baby" so we'll see what that means when he is born! According to the ultrasound he currently weighs 6 lbs 3 oz (give or take 8 oz).

Thank you for your prayers for us and please continue to pray for God's blessings on our new transitions coming up! You're in our prayers as well!