Christmas Preperations

I forgot how hard this time of year is to be a student, you want to do the fun christmas stuff like shopping, and wrapping, and baking.......yet with final papers, projects, and final exams it is hard to balance it all.

The first weekend after thanksgiving we were able to have time to drive a bit north and cut down our christmas tree. We knew what kind we wanted, and we knew we wanted to bigger tree than we had last year. It was pretty cold, so I wanted to move the process along and just get the first tree we saw...........Alec insisted on finding the 'perfect' tree. It was fun though and we did find a great tree to cut down.

That same day Alec put up a bunch of lights on the house outside. We also decorated our tree, which was fun because we have all the old ornaments from when we were kids given to us by our parents. So we are now all decorated for christmas!

That is the tree we cut down behind us

Getting the tree all decorated

Thanksgiving and catching up

Well again I have let time fly away from me and it has been way too long since I have posted. But I like to think I have a good excuse with being a student......thankfully that is just about over for the semester! I just took my hardest exam (microbiology) this morning, and now just have to finish 2 english journals and take the english test (super easy though so no biggie). So glad to be done with the semester though, christmas break is going to be an excellent break for me and I am excited.

We have been very busy the last few weeks with thanksgiving, then all the christmas preparations as well as trying to finish up the busiest part of the semester.

Thanksgiving:

We had such a fun time, we left Milwaukee early wednesday morning and headed to Dearborn. We were able to go to my parents church for the thanksgiving service that night, which was great to see people again, and then celebrated my dad's birthday that evening. We had a wonderful thanksgiving dinner with my mom's side of the family at my parent's house. As usual my mom out-did herself and we had an awesome dinner. Friday morning my sister and cousin and I went 'black-friday' shopping, very early in the morning. We had done the same thing last year so knew where we wanted to go and what stores would have the best deals.

We then headed to Grant for the weekend. We were able to go with the family to cut down the christmas tree, which was great fun! The whole DeLange family got together saturday night, and it was quit the party. I think there was a grand total head count of about 23? I don't know, I lost count, haha, it was so fun though. On sunday we were then able to go to my grandparent's house for our third thanksgiving celebration. It was a very busy long weekend, but as always we had fun.

Hanging out together thanksgiving day

Shopping 4:50am on black friday

Trying to get some homework done.....

Doggie Sitting

We had the privilage of babysitting Alec's boss' dog for a few days. We had so much fun! He is an Australian labradoodle, named Melbourne. He is an 87lb baby! He warmed up too us real quick, and loved to even sleep in our bed with us.

His favorite spot was on our love-seat. He loved to sit and look out the window. The beauty of this dog is that he does NOT shed a single hair. The greatness of genetic engineering :) But this is why I was ok with him sleeping on the furniture and stuff, I shed more than he does.

Melbourne LOVED to play with Alec, as soon as it turned dark outside (4:30pm CST) he knew Alec would be home soon, and would wait by the window and as soon as he saw his car got SOOOOO excited. Thankfully we also have the perfect yard, fairly big and fenced in, so it really worked out perfect. We had a really good time though, but no we are not in the market for a dog (yet :) ).

Wedding Weekend

We went to Grant this past weekend for Alec's brother, Aaron's wedding. We had such a great time, and its great to have a new sister-in-law! We are so excited for Aaron and Audrey and were so thankful to be apart of their special day.

Alec was the best-man, so per tradition made a toast to the bride and groom before dinner. He did a great job, it was very funny. We arrived friday late afternoon in time to help set up and for the rehersal.

The happy couple!

The wedding party

Raking the Leaves

We decided it was time to rake the lawn, Alec has been pretty good with keeping up with the leaves by using the lawn mower, but they have begun to take over our yard. So it was time to actually rake them up!

We have so many trees in the 'woods' behind our house, so we definitely have our fair share of leaves. Thankfully Milwaukee has curb side pick up, so all we have to do is get them to the curb. It was fun enjoying the nice fall day though, even though it is a lot of work!

We have a ton of trees in the 'woods' behind our house, which gives us plenty of leaves to deal with :)

Alec's job was to rake them on the tarp, mine was to stand on the corner, I think I got the better end of the deal!

These are the fall decorations we got at the pumpkin patch a few weeks ago

Retreat/Poker Night

I have determined the month of October/early November is a bad time to be a student. It is just that point in the semeseter where you have something big due or a test constantly. But I am pushing through and doing just fine. My grades are great and spirits are still high!

This past weekend I went on a women's retreat for church. It was an excellent time, I went with a group of six girls from church and we all shared a room together. The them was Spa for the Soul. We heard some excellent speakers and just had a great time bonding together. We stayed at a nice resort center, which was on a beautiful lake!

We have masks on our face :)

While we did that, all the guys came over to our house for a poker night. They had a lot of fun! No body went home too broke and I think they all determined they wanted to kick their wives out so that they can do that again sometime.

We have a few busy weekends coming up which we are very excited for. We plan to go to chicago with some friends from church for halloween. Then we are looking forward to Alec's brother's wedding November 7, which Alec is the best man. Then the following weekend my parents are coming here to visit!

Fall Adventures Continue!

Again, its been WAY too long............


Fall is here and we are loving it! Alec and I are both fall fanatics, we LOVE it! Alec has been making pumpkin pies every week just about, he has perfected it! He has always loved his mom's pumpkin pie and now that we live away from family he has had to make his own. Super yum though!

Last weekend we went to Grand Rapids to spend some time with our friends Catherine and Aaron. We had such a great weekend, we went apple picking at Crane's Apple Orchard. We stocked up on Honeycrisp apples! Which, funny thing, I had to write a paper on genetic engineering, and so I choose to write about genetically modified foods, specifically Honeycrisp apples! You could say I was inspired :) We also stopped at a vineyard to do a little wine tasting. This was an unexpected stop, and I did not have my purse on me so I didn't have my ID. Apparently I do not look 21, because the wine lady said I couldn't do it without showing ID. BOO! Too bad I just stood behind our group of six people and snuck sips here and there, haha, always looking to beat the system! On Sunday we headed up to Grant for church and to have lunch with Alec's family. Perfect fall weekend!

We had another busy Saturday today. We decided to drive north to a pumpkin patch and pick up some pumpkins and other fall decorations. We did a bit of research, and thanks to a friend, got a great suggestion for a place. It was the perfect place, really cheap stuff! We got two wagon loads of pumpkins, gourds, and squash. Also we got corn stalks and a hay bale to put on our porch. On the way home we saw a cheese factory (yay go Wisconsin!), so we had to stop and check it out. We got some really great cheese at the store there! Then in the evening we had a 20-Something activity with church. We played kickball, then grilled out, then played volleyball. Such a fun evening to hang out with our friends from church, we are so blessed to have such a good group of friends after only living here for a year! And yes I even got some homework done today!

School is going really well. I find the academic level extremely comparable to Calvin (lots of people have asked me about that). I am enjoying my classes for the most part, as much as you can enjoy microbiology, organic/bio chemistry, western lit, and Search for Meaning. The search for meaning class is a required Mt. Mary class that every student has to take. It is a mix of theology and philosophy. It has been very interesting, it is comparable to DCM (Developing the Christian Mind) for all you Calvin people. It is interesting though because it is a Catholic school, so I am enjoying seeing some of the differences from the Reformed view.

The only house update we have is that Alec painted the living room. It looks very nice, it is a nice neutral color that really warms up the room.

Well I think that is it until next time!

Some Pictures:

At the wine tasting place, our friends Chuck and Krista were able to hang out with us all for the day as well! And their baby Isabelle was there.....she was asleep in her carseat though on the floor during the picture.

Picking the apples

Show casing our Honeycrisp apples, with Chuck and baby Isabelle in the background!At Smokeybones for dinner.Alec in the mud looking for the perfect pumpkin.Pulling the wagon through the mud with our prized pumpkins

In the little store picking out gourds and squash

The End of Summer

Wow, it sure has been a long time since I have posted anything I am realizing. I thought I would give a quick update on our lives.

We have had a really busy and fun filled summer. I can't believe the end of August is here already. Lots of house projects have gotten finished, we saw each of our a families a few times, went to a few weddings, and had a lot of fun activities! We have enjoyed having many visitors from Michigan including: Aaron and Catherine (friends from Calvin), Dave and Alyx, and my brother Bryant and Anne (his girlfriend). Also we have had time to hang out with our friends that live here in Milwaukee, we are so thankful to have made some really great friends here. We love having people over for a fire in the backyard or to play some games (like Ticket to Ride, our absolute favorite game!)!

As for the house, Alec is still finishing up painting all the exterior trim. It is a very time consuming job, and there is ALOT of trim. He also marked off where he wants to have a garden next year, he has major plans for a vegetable garden.

In other news, school starts on monday (8/31)!!!! And I have orientation this thursday and friday. I can't believe the time has finally come for me to start classes, it has seemed like this way distant event that has now finally come to the present! I am excited but mostly nervous. I have not forgotten all that being a student entails........it is going to be a ton of hard work and a huge challenge. But in the end it will all be worth it I am sure. This semester I am taking pre-nursing classes, then will apply to the nursing program in October. So please start praying that I get into the nursing program!

We are looking forward to the fall season though and all the changes it will bring!

A Few Before and Afters

We have been working like crazy on the house since we bought it end of April. So much of what we have done has been just bringing the house back to normal condition, the previous owners took such poor care of the house. So here are a few before and after pictures, hopefully the longer we live there there were will be more pictures to come!

All the before shots are taken at the home inspection, so its not our stuff or furniture.

Laundry Room:

Master Bedroom:

3rd Bedroom/Office/Scrapbooking room:

Guest Bedroom:

We are having fun, even though it is alot of work! But so far it is going well. We hope to finish painting the outside trim and then move to painting the living room!

Summer Fun!

Our friends Aaron and Catherine came to visit us for the weekend! They live in Grand Rapids and also graduated from Calvin the same year we did. We had so much fun seeing them again, and were excited to show them around Milwaukee!

We started off the day on saturday by heading to Bayshore mall, which is a huge outdoor mall which is very cool. We then drove downtown and checked out the wisconsin side of the lake. We all concluded that the Michigan side was better......can't beat the beaches there. After that we headed to the zoo! We found out that you can buy beer and other alcoholic drinks at the zoo........thought that was kind of weird........only in milwaukee I guess.

On sunday we went and had lunch at a restaurant downtown right near the lake called Altera. It was really good, Alec and I have been wanting to try it for a long time and we all loved it! We love having our friends come and see us, and it is especially nice not to have to make the drive ourselves :)

DeKruyter Camping

Every summer my parents camp for a week or so on the west side of Michigan. This year they camped at Hoffmaster State Park in Muskegon. We were able to join them friday-monday! My grandparents camped as well on the site next to us in their motor home, and my Aunt, Uncle, and cousins were there starting on sunday. We had such a great time, and the weather was really great! We were able to beach it up numerous times and enjoyed some bike rides, campfires, games, and general DeKruyter madness :)

I made puppy chow, and they attacked it!

Alec's family actually was able to come out and join in the fun for a couple days. They were just a few sites down from us, so it worked out perfect!

We went putt-putt golfing at Craig's Cruisers friday night, and had so much fun! We all had a pretty good game (however we all admitted it was too easy of a course).

At Whippi Dip, the BEST ice cream place ever!!

We went to fireworks downtown Grandhaven, MI. We had to kill some time while we waited for them to start. I felt bad for the people sitting around us......one group actually picked up all their stuff and moved further away :)