Rik in NC

Part of the reason (and I mean a HUGE part, like 99.9%) that we were so successful in unpacking is because of my step-dad, Rik. This is his first vacation away from home in YEARS and he chose to spend it by helping us move. We felt really bad for him because when he was out helping us, he was recovering from a broken rib! What a stud, right?

One thing about Rik is he is a really hard worker. He did not stop, nor let us stop, until things were mostly taken care of. There was a point where Nate and I felt like we had done a big bulk of the unpacking and we could stop and take a break, but luckily Rik pushed us to keep going. So for a week, he stayed to help us unpack, move and put together furniture, hang pictures/decorate, organize shelves, cupboards, and drawers, and countless other big and small things. Especially since we were also trying to take care of our kids, this took hours upon hours!! We are SOO grateful for his help and I'm afraid we would still be unpacking if it weren't for him.

After a few days of all this, Rik finally declared that he was tired and sat down to watch a movie with the girls...

One night we had our friends over, Bill and Christianne. Bill is my step-brother, Ryan's, good friend. When Ryan told Bill we were heading out to NC, Bill immediately came to our aid and gave us all the North Carolina info we needed to know. He even showed up with a couple of pizza's and drinks only a few hours after we arrived to our new home and he helped us unload the first half of the truck so we could get our girl's beds assembled. Seriously, this guy is a stud! And his fiance, Christianne, is pretty amazing herself! Just, the nicest people ever!

Papa Rik was also very helpful with our girls. Here he helped us bathe Rub...

Okay, so the biggest project that took Nate and Rik HOURS was the garage. We had so much crap in there (boxes, tools, and a bunch of other miscellaneous stuff) and they finally got it all organized so we can park our van in there, if we wanted.

This is our ALMOST finished Living/Family room (just need to add a mirror). I'll do another post on the whole house later once it's all FULLY decorated. But that may be a while...

The Toy Room.

Our kitchen. The Shelf Reliance was another huge project that took the boys a couple of hours to assemble.

Rik giving Lyla words of wisdom...

We had a little pool (that we eventually took back) that had a bunch of water in it and there were some spots on our lawn that needed some watering (no one has sprinkler's here in NC). So Rik taught Nate how to siphon a hose to use the pool water for the lawn. We were pretty fascinated!

The back of our house...

Lyla had a lot of fun as Papa Rik timed her running as fast as she could to the end of the yard and back. I think her fastest time was around 13-14 seconds.

Running, running, running...

Good buds...

On Rik's last day, we drove him around Duke's campus. Unfortunately it was raining and we didn't have much time, so this was the only picture we got with him on campus. Here they are in front of the Chapel.

Ruby loves her Papa Rik.

And I love him too :)

Thanks Rik for coming out to help us. We could not have done it without you!! LOVE YOU!!