October Catch Up

At the beginning of the month Mae got to be shining star at preschool. This day means so much to her - and she asked if she could pick out a very special outfit for her big day. Yes, she put together this amazing fashion statement herself, and yes, I let her wear it to school. She was so proud! She got to bring home the class mascot for the weekend, Zoe the zebra, and document all the fun she had with her in a class scrapbook.

We got to help out a great ministry downtown, Smokin for Jesus, with our small group. Some friends from church smoke a ton of meat once a month to share a meal with anyone who wants to stop by. Our small group rented a jump house & helped with cleanup. Kids from an inner city summer camp hold meetings after the dinner each month and the girls got to carve this kitty pumpkin with them.

Anna's school had a "no bullying" awareness week where they got to dress up each day. Here are her & Kylee in their twin outfits. Such sweet friends! I don't think I've ever heard these two argue... they just seem to love & understand each other. We are so thankful for their friendship!

While we were in Mexico Mae had her western day at preschool. Our friend Alyssa was sweet to take pictures of Mae... here she is on her pony that she named Chubby after one of Anna's riding lesson horses.

Nana did a wonderful job taking care of the girls while we were away. She kept everything running (so many details during the school year!), and did lots of fun things with them. She took Mae to Cabelas (love the coon skin cap), took both girls to McDonalds & to some garage sales - they were in heaven getting to pick out a couple of new stuffed animals, decorated Halloween cookies with their cousins, and took two trips to Dallas to visit Uncle Phil & Aunt Suzi. Thanks so much Nana for taking such good care of them!

Mae & Aunt Suzi during her first piano lesson (Aunt Suzi is a piano teacher). Mae said that she now knows how to play chopsticks. :)

We had one day to finish up a major school project of Anna's once we got home from Mexico. Anna had to make a geometric creature using a list of 3D & 2D shapes & present it to her class. Of course, she chose to make Bitsie - who turned out pretty cute.

What a month! I'm still trying to catch my breath (that is no easy task these days). Along with the fabulous wedding trip this month, we stayed super busy with our normal routine, plus some other fun things thrown in, and a few crazy disasters to top things off! About a week & a half before our trip Tom woke me up saying that water was coming out of the ceiling in our closet. He had to take the day off to get to the bottom of things... and the results weren't pretty. After cutting holes in the just-finished nursery and our closet ceiling, we discovered that the upstairs toilet had been leaking massive amounts of water. The subfloor underneath the girls bathroom was soaked and the first plumber told us we were going to have to rip major structural components out. Praise the Lord, our builder (after many phone calls) agreed to pay for the damages & we had restoration work done right up until we left for the trip. Our closet contents filled our room and the living room for over a week - fun times getting dressed each day! We were so thankful that God turned the hearts of the builders toward paying for the costs (even though our warranty was up). While that was going on our littlest trouble maker - Bitsie - got into a suitcase, opened a ziplock bag, unscrewed the childproof cap, and drank a whole bottle of children's ibuprofen. Our vet & the animal hospital confirmed that this medicine is lethal to dogs - especially small ones. Thankfully, after getting her to throw up at home (hydrogen peroxide - who knew?), a few hours at the vet having her stomach pumped with charcoal, and a very expensive bill, she was as good as new. I'm not posting pictures of either disaster, but here are a few cute ones from October...