This was the week of the Harper photos!! I finally caved and bought her some hair ties and then immediately could not handle the cuteness. Jon also started school this week, so we’re slowly getting back into our normal, school year routine.

Here’s a look at what we were up to this past week:

• I love a good plan for my money. For as long as we’ve been together, Jon and I have been budgeting. It’s how we’ve been able to have so many amazing experiences – have a debt-free wedding, pay off a brand new car, a two week vacation to Italy, cash float having two babies, and so many other things! We’ve been using Mint for years now and I recently found myself getting more and more dissatisfied with it. I found myself slacking on keeping it updated and not being confident and managing your money well is a big no-no in our book! We recently switched to using the Dave Ramsay (of Total Money Makeover fame!) sponsored Every Dollar and I am loving it!! The interface is clean and presented in a way that’s easy to follow. It’s also not linked to our bank account, so it’s a breeze to make adjustments and add transactions as soon as they happen instead of waiting for them to process through the app. My FAVORITE feature though is the ability to look forward. One of my biggest frustrations with Mint was the inability to set a budget until the first day of each month, I could never work ahead! We’ve used it for only one month now, but it’s been a game-changer for us!!
• We suffered some pretty bad storms here last week!! Jon and I are fairly certain our transformer was hit, as all the electronics flashed after a lightning strike that felt CLOSE. As in, I thought it hit our house close. I made Jon go out and check to make sure our roof wasn’t on fire! We have most things plugged into surge protectors, so we were excited that it looked like we came out without anything fried…..until the kiddos wanted to watch a movie. The darn lightning zapped our ethernet connections and fried BOTH of our Apple TVs. Boooooo!! So we did some research and decide to try something new and give Amazon Fire TV a try. I haven’t delved too deep into it, but it pulls up Netflix and that’s all this momma needs to keep her sanity!!
• Both kids officially “graduated” up to their new rooms at school last week. It’s been a little rough of a transition in meeting new teachers and learning new expectations, but it’s great to have two kids that race out the door in the morning because they want to learn and see their friends! I’m excited to see how their new rooms help each of them grow.

1. This girl loves pizza  2. When did we get a teenager?  3. Squinty-eyed photos are my favorite!  4. Napping with Daddy  5. Ahhhh!  6. Piggy tails!!!!!  7. Stretching the limits  8. Diva  9. Bought his very own Maui fish hook!

Much love friends,