October Fun

 The kids love to go out in the country to the sand roads and dig.  It's already a bit chilly in the afternoon!

 The neighbor kids came over to help scoop out the guts in the pumpkins.

 Posing with their pumpkins!

 Ready to go trick or treating!

Our little Chiefs fans and their pumpkins!

Summer Fun!

The kids have enjoyed our vacations this summer.

We got to go to Eagle Nest, New Mexico for a few days to breathe the fresh mountain air, take long walks, visit with friends, and dream of one day owning a home up here!

We went to Kansas to visit Phil's family for a while, too.  We got to go to a city water park that was beyond fun for the kids.  Who am I kidding?  The adults had a great time, too!

 It had slides, big and little.

 The kids also got in some fishing time with Grandpa Keith in the pond behind the house.  Not many kids can say their grandparents have a fishing pond in the backyard!

Family Reunion in Red River, New Mexico

What better way to spend a summer weekend than with your family!

The kids got acquainted (or reacquainted), and they were instant friends.

Some of the grown-ups proved they are still kids at heart.

All of us had a wonderful time and agreed we needed longer than a weekend. Hopefully we will do it again in 2013!

God's Promise

Every time I see a rainbow, I think of God's promise:

I will put my rainbow in the clouds to be a sign of my promise to the earth. Genesis 9:13

Today we were blessed with a short rain shower and a double rainbow. Double promises!

20 Year Class Reunion

Can it be? 20 years? Well, however those 20 years went by...here we are!

Are you sure? We're not old, are we?

I had a great time catching up with old friends and classmates this weekend.

The New "Princess" Beds are Up and Running (or Sleeping?)!

The girls now have their "big girl" beds!  The toddler beds and changing table were sold to a family who had little bitties, so we got these beautiful beds out of storage and put 'em to good use!

The bedroom is small, so we had to be creative with the placement of beds!

These beds used to belong to my mom and her older sister, my aunt Sue.  My mom said she got her bed when she was around 5 years old.  That would mean it's been over 56 years since it was "new to her."  The beds were already antiques when my mom and aunt got them all those years ago.  These are some old beds!

After my grandparents got divorced, my grandma sold these little beds to her cousin, MaryBelle.  MaryBelle kept them in an upstairs bedroom for most of the in-between years.  She died a few years ago after a battle with cancer.  Her granddaughter (my distant cousin Heidi) put them in an estate auction.  My mom bought them both from the auction, and now here they are.  Full circle. 

The girls (who are 3) love them. We all think they look like princess beds. We finally got to use this bedding from a long-ago post! Kids--they sure grow up fast. Now, should I cry or celebrate?

Since they're tall beds, we had to put the guards on--unsightly as they may be!

We also got this bench at the auction.

It comes in handy for little girls who are too short to get in/out on their own...

R O Y G.  B I V

(or How I Got My Own Rainbow)

My son, who is 6, made me a gift for my birthday.  He couldn't wait until the big day, so he gave me my gift a day early.  It looked like this when I got it:

Now, that alone melted my heart, but there was more.

It was a crisp one-dollar bill wrapped around some type of craft item.  He gave me his own money and took the time to make me something from his crafting supplies--so sweet and thoughtful!  But wait, there's more.

It was my very own portable rainbow, labeled and everything (sorry the picture does not do it justice)!  He glued it together, then taped it, too (just in case!).  He searched through many sticks to find an indigo AND a violet.  He labeled it with a pen prior to gluing.  Only after he finished gluing did he realize it was backward.  I told him it made it original which was worth more anyway.  But wait, there's more.

He decided I needed a little more mad money, so he went to his room and got a five-dollar bill that the Tooth Fairy recently left him.  Can you say "tear-jerker?"  Oh, and there's not any more.  Now I'm going to go get a tissue--again!

To Tell You the Tooth...

This cute boy lost another tooth today courtesy of the dentist (who had to break it out with pliars).

Of the four teeth he's lost so far, three have been broken out by the dentist and one was lost to a playground accident.

I am NOT a tooth person, and I'm definitely NOT a loose tooth or pulling tooth person.  My prayer is that the rest of his teeth get loose and fall out the regular way.  Join me if you, too, are NOT a tooth person...please!  I need all the help I can get!

I think one of the biggest challenges faced by parents is potty training.  With the oldest, we didn't struggle at all with #1, but #2 was a different story altogether.  I tried everything (even went so far at to cut a hole out of the crotch area of a pull-up so he could still wear it but poop in the potty at the same time.  It didn't work.).

The girls are now mostly potty trained.  The #1 is good--almost 100% success.  The #2 was still a hide-under-the-kitchen-table-and-grunt-it-out issue until very recently.  I guess it really is true--you have to wait for them to be ready or it is just going to be a power struggle that the parent loses every time.  My babies aren't babies any more.  *sigh*  That's not a sad sigh, just a tired one.  I wouldn't want them as babies any longer than necessary. 

Now if we could only get their coughs to go away...one thing at a time, eh?

We're getting a new-to-us minivan from Arizona.  Phil researched, called around, shopped around, and finally came to the conclusion that a minivan on eBay was our best bet.  I've been a little iffy at times, but I'm going to stay positive.  Next weekend, I'll have my new(er) ride!  It has a DVD player with wireless headphones, Stow-n-Go seats, a 6-disc CD player, and keyless entry with remote open/shut.  I will be super-spoiled.  Yay!