Christmas Construction

(I'll turn the pictures around and add some actual words soon. We're out the door for now, but I'll be back later to tell you all about how I bite off WAY more than I can chew and then impose impossible deadlines on myself!)

Oh, yeah. It's our new floor.

Meet Oliver

I'll explain soon...

Snow Day in October

Bundled up brothers and best playmates.

Dressed and ready for play.

Look at what I caught Josh doing~ eating snow.

At least it wasn't yellow.

Warming up in the kitchen, waiting for hot chocolate.

For Grandma

Dabney and her good friend, Ella.

After!

Just in time to watch my Phillies!

(Please ignore the cables~ I'm currently devising a scheme to conceal them.)

Before

Do you like my tv console? In a past life, it was a nasty, nasty beaten up dresser with carvings and stickers all over the outside and one of the top drawers was missing. The hardware and finish was hideous.

It was perfect.

It was listed on Craigslist for $15.

I emailed the owner and asked if I could take it for $10 if we picked it up in an hour. She said yes. Yeehaw!

I sanded and sanded and sanded, bought beautiful new hardware (for an incredible price on eBay) and hauled out my trusty can of black paint. After I moved my piece de resistance to the living room, I removed the other top drawer and drawer tracks and placed in my satellite receiver and dvd player. I went to HomeGoods that night and found a small wooden tray just big enough to fit next to the dvd player to hold those ever-missing remotes. The drawers are now lined and hold my Snuggie (yep, I said it) and blankets (see the red popping out of that drawer up there?) and cds and dvds and those other things that you'd rather keep out of view.

See that fancy, high quality, large, state of the art tv up there?

Stay tuned....

Saturday at the Park

We took a few hours after Saturday errand last week and headed over to one of our favorite parks to let our kids release their energy. They dug hole in the volleyball area, played on the equipment and ran races.

The colors of the foliage were just starting to turn the beautiful hues of autumn.

David on the ground after running 3 races: "Alright, WHO took my energy?!"

Even Aaron had a great time.

So they say there's a pumpkin shortage, but in the last 2 weeks, I have bought an enormous carver, and 5 good size sugar pie baking pumpkins, and various small decorative pumpkins, just in case. I think it's a hoax and a scam to make me buy more than I normally would. Did you know that pumpkins will last 3 months if stored properly? After baking them, I'll be making soup and pies and freezing the rest.

August Recap

So, here it is, mid-September (yay!) and I'm only now getting around to posting pictures from August. Sorry!
We began school a few weeks ago and the kids are doing very well. Dabney is a big 2nd grader, David is in 1st grade and Josh is very excited to be in Kindergarten this year. We finished out the summer with lots of bike riding and park trips and general playfulness. The kids were a little shocked when I pulled out the school books again and expected a small level of actual schoolwork top be done. Now we are getting back in our groove and accomplishing things.


Hey Mom and Dad, (the rest of you can skip this part if you want)

We were walking through our neighborhood a few weeks ago and I got a good look at our Dabney and I realized she was 7 years old and I thought about where I was when I was 7 and instantaneously I had a flashback. I was sitting on one of Grandpa's stools at that red laminate countertop, down at the farm and getting a phone call from you guys while I was staying with Grandma and Grandpa that summer. Mom told me that you both had visited with the people at Wilmington Christian School and that I had been accepted and I was going to a new school on the fall. Mom told me about how hard Dad was working so that we could go to a good and safe school. So, as I was reminiscing walking down the street as I watched my own kids on their bikes and scooters, I started to tear up remembering my faithful parents and their hard work and sacrifices on my behalf.

Anyway.

David is doing well learning to ride his big bike. While David was getting his latest lesson and Dabney was riding her bike, Joshua and Adam were poking around and Josh comes to me and says, "Hey mom? Can I do tricks in the grass?" The following resulted:

It's gotten pretty cold here in the past few nights so we hauled out the fuzzy warm 3-6 month

baby pajamas and now little Aaron is even more snuggly (if that's possible).



I'm going to try to get my kids' school pictures done pretty soon so stay tuned..... but don't hold your breath.

Hey Aaron!

How about you leave some cuteness for the other babies? Some might think that it's not fair that you got it all.

Back to Joshua's Birthday

Boy, does our Joshua love police cars! He goes nuts in the car when we see real ones on the road. (We live near a police station.) This one Grandma sent is his constant companion.

o"Dad, they're bases for baseball!"

I forgot to post pictures! Most of the night was a blur~ I was trying to get everyone ready to camp out before their bedtime and set up the tent with Tim and make dinner, etc, so I'm sorry I didn't get too many pictures taken. I'll do better next time!