Ethel LOVES car trips.

Hello family & friends!

This past weekend we made the trek home to Wheaton to visit with family and friends. We had such a great weekend, and it flew by all too fast.

Friday we got in a late, just in time to see Ben and Dad Haist before they headed off to New Orleans for the weekend early Saturday. We were happy that Mom Haist decided to stay home so we got to spend a little time with her as well this weekend.

We stayed with the Dean's this weekend and enjoyed a beautiful new guest room as well as delicious food and great conversation. Saturday was jammed packed. We squeezed in visits to Aunt Chrissy & Uncle Leonard, Grandma and Grandpa Nelson and Aunt Joy AND swung by the Klobuchers! We were happy to see the Gerry's and Lucas's out on Saturday too :) We miss them terribly! Needless to say, Ethel was the life of the party and enjoyed meeting all our family and friends on Saturday. Saturday night we enjoyed pizza night with the fam and a classic, Justin Beiber movie (Katelyn cried).

On Sunday, we enjoyed going to church at Blanchard and having lunch at Egg Harbor with the Dean's. In the afternoon we were overjoyed to see KELSEY AND TIM all the way from Washington!!!!! Oh how we have missed them. Sunday late afternoon, I (Katelyn) also had the pleasure of going with Kelsey to meet little Nolan Casey. He is just precious. Sunday evening we enjoyed a yummy BBQ with family! And then headed over to see our friends Anna and Scott that we haven't seen since our wedding! TOO LONG. It was great to visit with them in their new home :)

This morning we woke up to eggs and bacon made by Papa J and enjoyed visiting for a few hours with Mom Haist and the Dean clan before we hit the road back to St. Louis. Ethel met a total of six dogs this weekend, and too many people to count and she did great. We were proud of her. One thing is for sure, she LOVES car trips.

Anyways, we hope you enjoy some pictures from our weekend in Wheaton! It was an action packed weekend, but a much needed time with family and friends. We are happy to be home safely and relaxing in the air conditioning. Welcome summer in St. Louis. We do not like you!

Love,
Katelyn & Sam (Ethel too)

Family photos with a dog that hates the camera, makes things difficult.

Ethel and Cody bonding.

XBox Kinect ... this puts a whole new spin on game night!

Does this surprise you that this was a dance move?

Home bound!

This is how Ethel rides in the car!

Home sweet home!

Birthday Week

This past week, we celebrated three birthdays! Sam's birthday was May 8th, Ethel's was May 10th (since we don't know when her real birthday is, we decided to throw hers in the middle!) and Katelyn's was May 11th. It was definitely a birthday week of celebrating!

For Sam's birthday last Sunday, we left a wonderful service at South City and went to The Original House of Gyros for lunch in The Loop. It was a gorgeous day to walk around! The gyros were delicious. Then we walked down the street to Vintage Vinyl where Sam picked out a birthday record. Once we got home that day, Sam spent the afternoon working on his last sermon of his first year of seminary (he did great)! That evening, we opened gifts and had a yummy french silk pie. I am so blessed to have such a wonderful husband. Thank you Gaye for bringing him into the world 23 years ago!

Then for Ethel's birthday on Tuesday, we put a goofy party hat on her and made her take a picture (she HATES pictures). However, she did get some extra treats and yummy wet food that she enjoyed as her birthday pie! She is such a cutie pie.

On Wednesday to celebrate Katelyn's birthday, I decorated the kitchen (Sam) and Katelyn thought it was "just too cute". We celebrated that evening with Pei Wei, no dishes for Katelyn, and an apple pie & vanilla ice cream by request (we're both not cake-lovers). Then we video chatted with Katelyn's family and opened gifts! My wife is an amazing woman. I am very, very thankful that she was born :)

The week didn't end there. Our good friends (and neighbors), Danielle and Justin took us to Fro Yo in the Loop on Friday to celebrate! Danielle even brought candles and a lighter to stick in our frozen yogurt and they sang to us! It was so sweet.

Well, that sums up birthday week for us! It was fun to be together for our birthdays, and to celebrate with our new little pup :) It was sad to be away from family, but we are looking forward to coming home at the end of the month! Thank you to all our friends and family for the phone calls, cards and well wishes on our birthdays! We are blessed.

Love to everyone.
Sam, Katelyn & Ethel

Happy 23rd Birthday Sam!

Happy 23rd Birthday Katelyn!

Happy 2nd Birthday sweet Ethel!

"Her children rise up and call her blessed."

Sam and I are both SO thankful for our wonderful moms and mother-in-laws. Surely God has blessed us with two of the most wonderful women to walk along side us and support us into the man/woman we have become. Thank you Mom (Julie & Gaye) for being beautiful women of God, leading by example and being a true gift of God's love to us. We can't expressed how blessed we feel by your love!


Proverbs 31:28

Her children rise up and call her blessed;
her husband also, and he praises her:
“Many women have done excellently,
but you surpass them all.”
Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain,
but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.
Give her of the fruit of her hands,
and let her works praise her in the gates.

Sam, Ethel and I are wishing all the wonderful mothers we know (especially our own moms) a very blessed Mother's Day!

Love to you all.
Katelyn, Sam & Ethel

P.S. Sneak peak of Sam's BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION today! I am so blessed to have such an amazing husband! And spending the day with him on his birthday and not having to say goodbye (or being miles apart) was simply the best! Can't wait for many more birthdays spent together. More pictures to come next weekend!

He is RISEN!

HE IS RISEN!

Happy Easter to all our family & friends!

We have had a wonderful weekend spent with the Haist's of Wheaton. We are thankful they made the trek to see us and celebrate this glorious day with us! Friday night we enjoyed good conversation, delicious fine Italian food and some quality time in the basement due to bad weather. Our hearts are heavy for all the families and businesses effected by the tornado that came through St. Louis. The destruction is devastating and scary that it was very close to our apartment. We are thankful we are okay!

Saturday around noon we headed to Pappy's BBQ. It was finger lickin good! Then we headed over to the City Museum. We had heard awesome things about the City Museum from friends in St. Louis, but had yet to check it out for ourselves. It was awesome to say the least! We enjoyed climbing through endless tunnels. It was very unique. All the pieces of the museum were made from pieces of scrap metal from areas in St. Louis. It was neat! We even got to see a circus...which Sam intends to join. Yikes. Saturday night we enjoyed a relaxing evening and headed to bed early.

Today, we started our day with a visit from the Easter bunny (after an early Easter bunny visit on Friday ... thank you Mom & Dad Haist)! Then we headed to a wonderful church service at South City. We felt very blessed to have our family there with us this morning. Our pastor, Jay reminded us that in the face of death, to trust in the world, ourselves, or frankly, anything but Jesus is a hopeless dead end. We have a great God who took away our sin, conquered the grave, and gives us the hope of the resurrection in the midst of a death-stricken world. He is good.

We hope all of you had a wonderful Easter!

We love you!
Katelyn, Sam & Ethel :)

Decorating Easter eggs

Our decorated eggs!

The finished products!

Easter morning- The Easter bunny brought "Blessing Buckets!"

Easter 2011 - Family shot!

Ethel's new friend!

Our little family! Sam mid-sentence.

Dad was a kid again!

Tunnels of people of all ages!

"Big kid" ball pit!

The circus!

Surprise Visit!

Hello Family & Friends!

On Sunday we were SO excited to leave church and hear from some of our wonderful friends, the Robbins clan! They were heading home to Wheaton from their spring break in Texas and within the hour would be coming through St. Louis. We were so happy they took the time to stop and visit with us for a while. It was so great to see them and hear about what's been going on in their lives! They even got to meet the new member of our family (Ethel the dog)! We have missed them dearly! We hope to see all our friends and family in Wheaton soon. Thanks Robbins for ending our weekend with such a fun surprise.

Love to everyone.
Sam & Katelyn

P.S. Ethel is getting groomed for the first time (in 2 years) today! She has an appointment at a "Pet Spa" in Clayton this morning. I can only imagine how terrified she will be. Pictures to come later!

LOVE this family!

Lazy Sunday.

Hello blog friends!

We have been having a very relaxing and lazy Sunday today. Our day has included; wonderful church service this morning, Five Guys for lunch and a walk in Tower Grove Park (Ethel's 1st park experience!). Overall, it has been a great day... 85 degrees and sunny here in STL! 

Some of you have asked for an update on Ethel... so here is her improvement over the past week!

- She can now walk on a leash! 
- She is not afraid of the outdoors or Sam and I for that matter.
- She has been "accident free" for 4 days now and has learned to do all her business outside! YAY Ethel!
- She was social when we had friends over for brunch! She even let them pet her! 
- She has learned to jump on and off the couch (and shows off regularly)
- She now thinks she is invincible. Just yesterday, she developed a jumping confidence that has her trying to jump onto our bathroom counter into the sink (to be closer to Katelyn doing her make up). She has failed enough times, that we hope that phase is over :)
- She no longer (as of last night) runs and hides when the TV turns on!

That's our updated on our new addition to the family. She is a blessing and we are thankful for the cuteness (and fun) she adds to our lives.

That's it for now!

Love, Katelyn & Sam

Family photo!

Sam is on spring break this week ... this is how they will be spending it!

Look at that sweet face!

Our little fuzz ball.

We got a dog!!!!!!!! Oh my goodness, she couldn't get any cuter. If it was appropriate to give a dog an extremely long name, we would name her "Our little fuzz ball". However, we thought she could get confused. So we named her Ethel. She's just too sweet not to have a "grandma name"!

We got her from a puppy rescue downtown St. Louis this afternoon. She is a year and a half Cockapoo who was used to breed other dogs her whole life until she was surrendered to the rescue. She is VERY timid and scared around people because she has had little human contact in her life (how sad is that?). She is also TERRIFIED of grass and the outdoors in general (potty training will be interesting). We just couldn't resist that cute face and have now committed to helping her recover from the rough life she's had. She's made huge improvement since we got her this afternoon. Instead of running from us, she approaches us now and is currently laying on my lap :). She also snarfed down a bowl and a half of food and a few treats. Needless to say, we're proud.


We love her to pieces and will keep everyone updated!

On a different (but equally exciting) note, Katelyn got a full time job! She beings next week working at Bright Horizons Early Childhood Center has there head preschool teacher. She is excited for her own classroom, full-time (year round) work, and we are both thankful for  the benefits it brings! Thank you for your continued prayers and support. We couldn't ask for better family and friends.

We love you!