House Cleaning=House Bonding

On Sunday, May 15th, we, the residents of the girls house, cleaned like we've never cleaned before. It was hard, but totally worth it. The whole day was a major success, both in the fact that the house is probably cleaner now than it's ever been, and I feel like I know those girls a little bit better. 

The day started off by us saying we were going to get up at 8...waking up at 9, and coming down to find Molli and Allie making breakfast for us! I could smell eggs and french toast all the way in the attic. 

 Here they are, serving us!

 Eating yummy breakfast

 The teamwork of Jenna and Molli. This is what the sunporch look like empty!

 Jenny came over for a bit to help us too! It was much appreciated.

 Molli Miller, Master of Blinds. She took all the blinds down, bleached them and wiped them down, then put them back up and wiped them down again! 

 Eating lunch: Pizza and breadsticks.

 Jenna and Dottie were on kitchen duty. I wish I would've done before and after pictures. They did a great job!

 The infamous To-Do List. It was fun to be able to cross things off when they were done.

 Ky with her magic eraser. She was so excited to use this!

 Ky tackling the mold. It was pretty scary looking!

 Ashley vacuumed all the furniture. I couldn't believe all the gunk that was in there!

 Kathy "Mama" Reed. Bless her soul, she ripped out our old shelves and built new ones with her own two hands!

 Allie and Ky taking a muffin break. This was at about 10pm and we still hadn't had supper. We were on a mission!

 House picture with our honorary roommate.

 From smallest to tallest!

Our gangsta picture. We had to get one in since we were wearing bandanas!

It was a pleasure being able to work hard with these ladies and I am super excited to see how God uses us in each other's lives and in the lives of others! I think that we all have a heart to be hospitable and we are even more eager now that we have a clean, "flipped" house to bring people to. Summer here we come!

Florida

Ok this is going to be a long post...but I want to document my trip thoroughly so I can remember it! We will do it by days.

Sunday

 We flew out of Des Moines at 12:30 in the morning. There was a little scare because Carol forgot that she had her aerosol cans in her carry-on. But she checked it in and she didn't even have to pay! 

 Us with our boarding passes

 A great plane ride! We had some snack boxes and of course bloody mary juice (non-alcoholic of course)

 Almost in Florida!

 The view from above

Right when we got there we went back to the house and then we went to the beach. It was so beautiful! And the sunset couldn't have been more perfect. 

Monday

My aunt and uncle rented a boat for us so we got up early and went out. Only one thing went wrong...the bugs! There is a couple weeks where all these bugs come out called love bugs and we happened to come at that time. But once we were on the water it was a lot better! It was sooo sunny out so we made sure to put on lots of sunscreen...but maybe we should have put on more. 

 We saw a dolphin! It was so close to us. We also saw manatees on the boat!

 Carol drove for a little bit, I think she was nervous but she did really well!

 The birds posing for me.

 The beach we stopped on.

 A beached jellyfish...we saw lots in the water and we were paranoid!

 Carol's sunburn :( It was so bad.

Our snack when we got back! Then we had raw oysters and some shrimp linguine. 

Tuesday

We started off the day by going to Miakka State Park. There was lots of wildlife and some beautiful trees. We went on a boat and even saw some alligators! Then we went to Mote Aquarium and saw dolphins and manatees. 

I found these and thought they were so funny! They are chocolate covered sunflower seeds in case anyone was wondering.

Wednesday

Carol and I went to see my grandma and grandpa in Punta Gorda. I stayed the night there and Carol went back. We walked around a little and ate at a restaurant. It was weird because I didn't really remember it super well, but it still smelled the same! I can always rely on my nose.

Thursday-Saturday

I spent about nine hours on these days driving from Florida to Iowa. It went by way faster than I anticipated and I was excited to see some prayers answered! I didn't get tired while driving, I didn't have any episodes and it was great weather the whole time! The scenery was great the whole way, I think I would have gotten sleepy if I had to drive through Iowa the whole time. States we went to included Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Missouri and finally Iowa! I tried to take pics of all the road signs and I got a few but it was hard to time it right!

 This is driving across the Mississippi river.

 I took this for my friend Katie Carruthers.