A Peek at the Poulsens

We've been doing the paper route for 2 months now! Some things are like we thought, but there are other things that we didn't expect. The last time my family had a paper route, circa 2005? Ananda helped haha. Austin goes Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, and I go the other days. Sundays are the biggest, longest day because there are the most papers (around 215), plus two inserts (which adds bulk and folding time, ugh). Wednesdays are similar to Sundays but there aren't inserts, which makes it go faster. We figure it's fair for me to do the hard days if Austin does an extra day. The BEST is when my dad spends the night so Austin and I can go together - we can get it done so fast when we split it up! But I'm very glad we don't both have to go every day because that would get exhausting. The only way we're not too tired as it is is that we trade off days and go to bed before 9. We laminated the route map so we could just use wet-erase marker...

please notice Aaron, lol Afton, Anthony, and ASHLEE, our perfect niece, drove all the way from Nevada to visit for a week! It was so nice to have tons of fun family time.  Makae and Smalls The Poulsens brought me (us) a gift in addition to Natalie's birthday presents: an awesome double umbrella stroller! I've been coveting one since my friend let me borrow hers. They are compact, easy, and the best part is that the kids don't mind being in it. (They are boycotting our regular double stroller - it's not worth the effort to try to force them in.) The Poulsens remembered me talking about the double umbrella a month ago and surprised me with one! So thoughtful and lovely : ) Stockton gets really mad if I put it away - he loves pushing it around in the living room, sitting in it, and spinning the wheels. Happy birthday Grandpa!! July 29 The boys like to lounge on the Poulsens' stairs for some reason... a view of dinner time (Sam is th...

Four four four four!!! Happy day! It seems like we've been celebrating for the past week! Birthdays were always my favorite growing up (I still secretly/selfishly love birthdays so much) and this year I felt like Natalie understood the full meaning of it being her birthday. She knew it was on August 1st, knew it was a day that we are happy for her and she gets to open presents and we have cake, and she knew that it was over after a day. She loved it! It was fun making it special for her. she did all the black and sprinkles, and told Austin which letters to write to spell "cake" (a little off the mark...) She was very proud of it! She has been obsessed with this black frosting since she saw it at Target a few months ago and was SO excited when we got it for her and let her decorate. She requested basically every color for the inside layers, but we made her narrow it down to 2 and she picked pink and blue. "can I blow yet?"  She loved openin...