One of these days I will get better about blogging. My last post was February 2011! Amazing how many changes can happen to a family in a little over a year. Here are just a few things going on in the Woods family...

1. We have expanded our family. We were blessed with the most perfect baby boy on January 30th, 2012. Conan Allen Woods has been an amazing addition to our family. I can't believe he is almost 8 months old!!
2. We have lived in our house for over a year now. While living 20 minutes from Williamsburg is not ideal, we love our house.
3. Grady is almost 3 and a talking machine!! She is the funniest little girl I have ever met. I really do need to start a journal of the outrageous things she says.
4. Right before Conan was born, Zack was diagnosed with testicular cancer. We were so fortunate that surgery was enough, no radiation or chemo. Praise God!
5. I have started taking master's classes through Morningside College. Doing classes during the summer was pretty easy, but it's been a bit more challenging now that school has started.
6. Over my maternity leave, our elementary moved to join the 2-6 building. I had the most amazing long term sub to help move all of my things and great parent volunteers to help put everything away.
7. Zack is halfway through his 7th year of coaching football in Williamsburg. We are pretty excited because it's a possibility that Williamsburg could play Winterest in the playoffs!
8. Our niece, Brynlie, will be 1 in a couple of weeks! Our new niece will be born in mid November. We are so excited to have another precious baby girl to spoil!
9. Zack's brother, Mason, got married in May. Grady was the flower girl and Zack the best man. Grady also gets to be the flower girl in my friend, Katie Pearson's wedding at the beginning of October. She's a flower girl pro by now!
10. Zack and I have been married for 5 years already! We are hoping to take a little trip over Christmas break to celebrate. It is crazy that it has been 5 years already.

Those are just a few highlights of things going on in our life. Grady and Conan keep us busy and entertained. We have the best life.

We're Moving!

It's official....we are moving! Our new house is only about 10 minutes away from our current house, but we are still excited!

Here are just a couple of reasons I'm excited for with the new house:
1. More bedrooms = more babies, right? :)
2. Neighbors! Zack has always said he could never live in town, so I've been forced to live in the middle of nowhere for the past 3 years. Our new house is the perfect mix! We have houses right next to us, but still have the wooded area so Zack can feel secluded.
3. No more terrible lane! Right now the lane to our house has been rated the top 10 worst in the Midwest. Not really, but it's that bad. No more getting snowed in...love it!

We probably won't actually move into the new house until spring, so we have time to get it all cleaned up and painted just the way we want it! Who wants to move in the winter anyway?!

My First Top Ten List

Top 10 Things That Happened Since I Last Blogged...
10. Grady started walking!
9. For Halloween Grady was a ladybug. We went trick-or-treating around the square in Williamsburg and at the Tanger Outlet Mall. Zack and I...I mean, Grady...ate a lot of candy over the next month!
8. We turned our computer room into a toy room. All of those toys have to go somewhere!
7. Football season came to an end. So nice to have a husband again!
6. We took a family vacation to Minneapolis over Thanksgiving. Our plan was to walk/run the Turkey Day 5K, but the freezing temperatures kept us from that (I can't say I was too disappointed...). Grady loved the Children's Museum and Aquarium!
5. My kindergarten class went from 20 to 17. What a blessing!
4. Zack and I took a trip to Myrtle Beach over New Years. We were gone for 3 nights...the longest I have ever been away from Grady! We had a great time even though it was colder there than in Iowa. :(
3. The first snow! Grady, Bruce, and I went sledding and had a blast. I also turned in my Jeep Compass for a more "snow-friendly" vehicle. Can't wait til spring to get it back!
2. Christmas! Although it was Grady's 2nd Christmas, she was a bit more active this year. She tore open presents and screamecd with excitement!
1. Grady turned 1 on 11.11.10!

Fall Update

So as it turns out, I'm not great at updating a blog. Life is so crazy with school, football, and of course an almost 1 year old. We're busy planning a ladybug birthday party and preparing for high school football playoffs all at the same time! Here are some pictures from our recent trip to Carroll's Pumpkin Farm.

Family photo

Grady loving the orange swings.

Driving a Chevy

"I think this is a good one!"


Our newest milestone is Grady learning how to walk! She took her first steps a couple of weeks ago but had really but the whole walking issue on the back burner lately. She took off tonight! She is a little fussy because I had the video camera out. It makes her so mad that she can't play with it.

I'm going to really try to get better about posting more often! We'll see...

Summer Update

Our family has had a busy summer already! Here are some things that we have done so far!

Happy Father's Day! We went to Zack's parents house for a Father's Day dinner. Grady used to cry whenever Grandpa Woody held her, but not anymore!
Grady and Mommy before going to Chris and Michelle Knoll's wedding in Winterset.

Grady and Mommy spent the weekend in Winterset with family. On Saturday we went to Sam Tunell's bridal shower in the morning. In the afternoon Great Grandpa Wayne, Great Grandma Ruby, Aunt Karen, Uncle Jim, Uncle Brent, Taylor, and Tara all came over to the house. Grady was nakey and happy!

Playing on the floor with Great Grandpa Wayne

On Friday night, Uncle Jayson came over. Grady and him played with toys all night. Grady enjoyed hitting him the face with her toys.

Grady is starting to pull herself up! Here she is using Jackson's car seat to get closer to him!

Enjoying the sun!

I took Grady with me to school so I could work. She army crawled over to the blocks, then tried to pull herself up to get to them. I brought some over to her blanket for her to play with, or eat.

Grady and I went to the Jacolyn Park Splash Pad. She was not a big fan of the cold water "raining" on her, but she loved sitting on our towel, playing with her toys, and watching all of the kids run around!

We gave Grady half of a banana to eat the other day. She was confused on what she was supposed to do with it, but eventually got the hang of it. She makes such a mess though!

Grady and I went to the Niabi Zoo with Meredith and Jackson Henry. The babies stayed awake for the 1 1/2 hour drive to Coal Valley, Illinois. They were excited! Meredith found a double stroller on Craig's List for only $10 so we used that on the trip. Both Jackson and Grady took a short nap while we were looking at the animals, but woke up to ride the train around the zoo.

Picture by the dinosaur!

Big girl riding the train

Jack and Meredith on the train

Mommy and Grady

On Memorial Day weekend, Monica Hamilton took our family pictures.

Grady: 6 1/2 months

Sad Day

A week ago today was one of the worst days of our life. Our amazing dog, Winston, got hit by a car and didn't make it. Winston was not just a dog to us. Zack and I picked him out after we had been dating for only one month. Every weekend when I was still in school, Zack and Winston would come and visit me. When I moved to Eastern Iowa, I not only moved to be closer to Zack, but Winston also. He loved to be next to us, all the time, regardless of where we were. He was with us before all of our other animals, before we lived in our current house, before we were married, and before Grady. He was there by my side in the middle of the night when Zack was asleep and I was having contractions. He was there the night we brought Grady home from the hospital. He didn't really think anything was going on that night, he was just so excited to see us after two days. Then I took this little thing out of a carrier that was making noises, and he went crazy trying to figure out what this new thing in our house was. He was so great with Grady from the very beginning. A picture of the two of them was a weekly thing. He would lay with her on the floor and let her pull on his feet or poke him in the eye. I think the thing that I'm most sad about is that Grady will not remember him when she gets bigger and she won't be able to grow up with him. Zack and I always imagined Winston eventually sleeping with Grady someday or playing with her outside.
Each day I start to realize that I need to think about Winston being the best dog, rather than think about all of the things I miss about him. Each day gets a little bit better, but our lives will never be the same. RIP Winston W. Woods. We love you.

First Mother's Day

Last week was Mother's Day! We all went on a walk together in the morning. Then Grady and Mommy spent the day together around the house. Grady was being such a cuddler all day. I loved it :)Luckily Papa Tim and Grandma Steph were on their way back from Chicago so Grady and I were able to meet up with them in Williamsburg.

We all went to Grandpa Woody and Grandma Gayle's for dinner to celebrate Uncle Mason's birthday! We had a great day and an even better weekend! The next week an even bigger event happened...Grady hit her half year mark! Our baby is six months old!! It's unbelieveable how fast the time has gone. Every day she gets closer to sitting up on her own and is in the beginning stages of crawling. We have her 6 month doctor's appointment tomorrow so we will see how much weight she has put on in the last 2 months. To us, she has really been filling out and getting chubby. All those fruits and vegetables are helping to make her a big girl.