New Normal

After our big road trip, we got back to business as usual at home. We ran errands...

... made yummy dinners...

... and visited Nana and Papa, where Carter took advantage of some of the last good watermelon of the season. He took, like, a lot of advantage.

Pretty soon it was time for school to start back up again. Aubrey began kindergarten, and then a week later Carter began his first year of preschool. They were both so excited!

And then, the day after Carter's first day of school, our little Clara love was born! Both Aubrey and Carter were absolutely smitten with her from the beginning. I'm so glad we got these videos of them meeting her!

When we got home from the hospital, things were pretty slow for awhile. There's something about having a new baby in the house that kind of forces everyone to slow down. We did a lot of baby snuggling.

And we were so glad to have Grandma here to help!

Did I mention we did a lot of baby snuggling?

Anyway, after Grandma went back to California, we got back to our new normal. We started going out again. One of our first big outings was the Castle Rock Art Fest. We strolled among all of the booths and wished we had money to buy nice art. And then the kids had a chance to create some art of their own.

Then, of course, we snuggled baby Clara some more. Because duh.

We also started taking Clara to church. (She wasn't really aware though, haha.)

And the older kids returned to their house-destroying shenanigans.

Our new normal turned out to be just fine. And not long after Grandma left, she came back. Only that time, she brought Grandpa with her. More on that in the next post!