Christmas Eve Relaxation

It's Christmas Eve and it feels good to sit down! Kyle, Micah and I are in Stewartville for a few days. He just left to meet up with his dad and twin brother, Micah is finally sleeping after an event-filled day, and I am curled up on the couch with my computer, a baby's hand pushing into my left hip and legs into my ribcage, and a sleeping Brutus next to me. I could not be more content. The past few weeks have been a whirlwind of activity and the marathon is not over yet. We are so excited to be welcoming another Raadt baby into the family later this week. I am long overdue on posts, so here is what we've been up to over the past few weeks.

- We've moved!! We've been in our new house for approximately 2 weeks and we love it. A lot of hard work was put into getting it move-in ready over the past month and I am so thankful for all of the support that we received from our families. My parents and brother have been down to Winona almost every weekend to help with painting, moving, unpacking, watching Micah, etc. Once the place gets a little more organized, I will post some before/after pictures. So far, we all love the extra space, attached garage, and main floor laundry.

- We're going to be landlords. A few weeks ago, our realtor showed our house to a young, married couple who had moved back to Winona from the cities. A few days later, they approached us about renting our house. Initially, we were hesitant about renting it, but after meeting the couple we realized that this probably was an answer to prayer. We've been praying for several months that the good Lord would place someone in the house to love it as much as we have loved it over the past 4 years. After being on the market for almost 6 months with only 1 offer, despite probably 20-30 showings in addition to open houses, it's time to take it off for awhile. Conveniently the rental offer came the weekend before a moving company was scheduled to come to assist with moving "5 large pieces" of furniture. In the end they moved all of our furniture over to the new house. The couple who will be renting our house grew up in Winona and have a 3 year old son. They are currently living with her parents. They both are well out of college, in their careers, and we have complete trust that they will take good care of the house. So, Kyle and I are now in the process of getting our house rental certified and developing a lease. The new couple will start renting in February.

- Christmas preparations. Due to the chaos of moving, we only put a small tree up the bay window of our old house. Fortunately, I had picked up most of Micah's Christmas gifts earlier this fall when they were on sale and our families were easy to shop for. Micah hasn't seemed to take notice of Christmas at only 2 years old - at least the gift giving, decoration part. Next year will probably be different and I look forward to decorating and starting some Christmas traditions with him.

- Baby. We are still scheduled for a C-section this upcoming Friday. I'm as prepared as I'm going to be at this point. I have a few gender-neutral outfits that I bought earlier this year, all of Micah's old clothes are washed in the event that we have a boy, bottles are washed, the pump is rented, and the baby equipment is slowly becoming unpacked. The nursery is not painted, but the paint colors are picked out for each option - baby boy or baby girl. My parents plan to paint while we're in the hospital next weekend. Despite all of the chaos of moving and Christmas, I feel like we'll be adequately prepared to welcome another little life into our family later this week.

I hope that you are enjoying your Christmas Eve too. Tonight at church, our pastor talked about home. Christmas has much more of a significants that just being home with family. It also means opening your heart as a home for Jesus too. Have a Blessed Christmas.