We had a great time last night with our friends, the Smiths. We were able to make our visit to Lewis lights with the girls. This is at least the third year we have done this and it was even more special because it was a first for Emelia. All three girls did great together. We also got to continue in a celebration of Mallory's birthday. We enjoyed so much her party last weekend and the girls were able to wear their cute shirts they had made. A neat thing about Lewis lights is that they keep a focus on Jesus, the reason we celebrate.

Snow Day

Hope you enjoy! We certainly did while it lasted. :)

I have so loved the slower pace for the last week. I am spoiled and like Evelyn I dread that our week off is over. She has asked for a number of days how many days we had left. Oh well, just three weeks ahead of us and Christmas break will be here. :)

We had a wonderful visit on Wednesday from our north MS friends, the Bakers. It was so good to have a little time with them. Their four children are definitely a blessing. They were so sweet with the girls. Hope we don't have to wait quite as long to see them again.

Thanksgiving was great. We ate at my sister's and had a good but smaller crowd than usual. There were about 20 of us there. We (me, Evelyn, Emelia, Jennifer and Miss Ruth) braved the shopping on Friday. We did not get started at dawn but went early for us. The girls were really good for that long of a haul. Their Dad was hunting ;( . On Saturday, we went to the movies with cousin Mason. I will let the girls photo give you a hint of what movie we saw. It was really cute and we made it to the end of this one.

Just wanted to report in that Scott made it back home. The girls were quite excited about his return. I want to brag and say that we did well while he was away. We really did but we did have a couple of "interesting" incidents. For the inquiring minds you will just have to ask. Scott came back with a great report of this part of the shoe box ministry.

I have to brag on Evelyn. I spent just a bit of time with her showing her how to blow a bubble. In no time at all, she has it mastered. She now, however, wants to chew way too much gum. :) Emelia is very satisfied to push her gum out her lips and say nook (her version of look). I am very much enjoying having this time with the girls.

I can't even think of where to start. Since I last updated, we had a couple of firsts for Emelia. She met Santa for the first time and had a reaction a bit different than I expected. She is a people person but not a Santa person. The only way we could get a photo was if I was involved. Oh well, whatever it takes. Her other first was a visit to the ER. Whew. She had some sort of allergic reaction. She had shots the day before and also had a bit of a runny nose. I gave her benedryl for the runny nose and that is when the reaction started. Later in the evening, I gave her a second dose and it got really bad. They said at the ER that was the first thing they would have given her as well. After zyrtec, a steroid and an epi shot, it began to ease. Not fun.

I had the opportunity to have a Thanksgiving lunch at Evelyn's school last week. I didn't know I would be eating with Little Feather, her Indian name. That afternoon, she sweetly crafted a head piece for Emelia so she would not be left out. Along those lines, I have seen much progress in the sister relationship lately. I am so pleased. We are now all off for a week break for Thanksgiving. We have so much to be thankful for and time at home together is definitely one of those things. Well, we are not all home right now. Scott has gone with a group from our church to help at the Samaritan's Purse shoe box distribution warehouse. Lets hope the girls cooperate while he is away. Emelia just came and told me her snowman was in time out, that he was ugly to her. I wonder where she heard that one. I am pleased to say that we have already put up our Christmas tree. I wanted the girls to have plenty of time to enjoy it.

Surprise, I am posting mid week. I wanted to show a picture of my new hammock chair. It was a birthday present from my mother-n-law and sister-n-law. We just have not had a chance to hang it. That was an interesting event. I have photos of that on a different card and cannot get them to load. Evelyn was quite concerned. Scott shimmied up a large oak, cut some small limbs, went out on a large limb, tied the rope and then came down the rope. Thank you Lord for no injuries as he was at least 30 feet up in the air. I really like the chair. :) I also have a photo of Evelyn with her school project that is due tomorrow. She had to disguise a turkey that did not want to be eaten. Her dad came up with an excellent idea, the turkey is disguised as the Chick-fil-a cow with his eat mor chikin sign. :) You may also notice another of my birthday presents in the background, a fleur de lis that my sister painted for me. Until later.....

P.S. - Happy Birthday to my niece Madison!

I know it is well past time for a post. Whew, the last two weeks have been full. I am loading a group of the photos that include Evelyn going in her poodle skirt to her dance class party, a fall festival at school, a field trip with Evelyn's school, trick or treat with cousin Mason, a fall festival at church (no photos because we were wiped out) and then going to the state football playoff game (almost 3 hours away) on Saturday for our college. All of that was mostly within three days of last week. The main reason we went to the football game was for a reunion with Rebekah. She was Evelyn's very good friend and survival during preschool. Her dad is now the head coach of a rival school. The girls had fun. They rolled down a hill in the grass and just enjoyed being together. You will notice that Emelia was Cinderalla for the school festival and then Dora (pronounced by her as Dowah) for trick or treat. Did you recognize Evelyn as Hannah Montana? Speed Racer was there to see them through. My brain is past clarity so I will close for now.

P.S. - I forgot to add that Scott had an all nighter in the midst of those activities last weekend. He took our youth to a 5th quarter lock in at a friend's church. Whew again. The golf cart photo is how we got from the parking area to the ticket booth of the ballgame. :)

Just a few recent photos

Photoless

I have not updated in a while. Last weekend was consumed with homecoming duties at the college, a long day. I thought I would have photos of the girls but they chose to stay with Grandma. This week has been another full one. Evelyn got her very first report card on Tuesday. I meant to take a photo of her with it before signing it and sending it back to school but did not. Oh well. She is doing great in school. We were gearing up for a fun event with 50s day for her class. Mamaw Flora did an excellent job making her a poodle skirt to get her ready for this event. We had recently bragged about Evelyn getting this far in to the school year without sickness and what do you know, she came down with a fever. It lasted about 24 hours with no other symptoms, just long enough to miss the 50s day. We are going to have to just dress up as she would have and take pictures because now I do not have those cute photos to share. Today was Evelyn's first celebration assembly (awards after each 9 weeks) at school. Evelyn got several recognitions and I did take my camera for the event but the photos came out dark just like my friend Angela said they would. Oh well. Emelia has been doing great. She loves us all but is still very much a daddy's girl. She has been putting together a lot of words. She also recognizes many letters that our names begin with. She almost has counting to 10 down thanks to Mr. Duke. I am very pleased with her progress. It seems like quite a while but she has just been with us four months now. The weather is supposed to be very nice this weekend. Maybe we can get out and take some photos to share. :)

Pumpkin Patch

We have had another great but busy weekend. We went to the Pumpkin Patch yesterday with our local FCC families. It was a little warm but a really fun event. They have such a great play area for the kids, a ride through the farm and, of course, an opportunity to pick out a pumpkin. We had a picnic lunch with the group after the tour. I forgot to mention the mazes and the corn pit (a favorite of most all the kids). They had a corn maze, a large bale hay maze and a small bale hay maze. Evelyn like the two latter but not the corn maze. She thought we were lost. I told her that Mr. Ron had it under control. We did exit via the entrance after quite a walk but it was fun. We were all pretty wiped out but once home we did have to play again at our park with cousin Mason who was down for the weekend. The photo of Emelia with the boxes is her making her cereal choice. This is one of her favorite things to do. :) The blue tshirt is a hand me down from Evelyn. It says, "that's it I'm going to grandma's." That fits them both but especially Emelia this last Friday when she did go to grandma's after a week of them being gone. She was quite happy they returned. There is also a photo of Evelyn modeling one of her new bows.

Well lets see, I am sure there must be plenty to tell but just no time to tell it. The biggest thing for the last week has been going to the park. Our park here recently had a long overdue upgrade on the playground equipment. You now have to plan when you go carefully because there are tons of kids there. It is funny how Evelyn and her friends have come home from school each day saying, “Mom, so-and-so is going to the park today and I told them I would be there too.” Who can rebuff that one when it would disappoint a friend? We have now been five times in one week and I am sure there will be pleading again. Evelyn is a monkey anyway and is fun to watch. Emelia is our brave one. She will try anything even if her skill level is not there yet. We have to watch her like a hawk. She did do really well on the big slides on our last visit. We timed that one where it was not overwhelming with big kids. Naturally I did not have the camera. Her face was priceless with the accomplishment. The other events of the week included Emelia going to preschool for two mornings. All of our grandparent caretakers have been on a trip this week. Emelia loved the idea of “Hui Hui school girl” but not the actual experience. She did okay and hopefully will be ready for it in the near future. I think the grandparents have spoiled her but isn’t that what grandparents are for? I need to load pictures from Scott's camera. I did not have many. I thought the one of Emelia giving herself a kiss on our stove was too sweet.

Fun at the Beach

The pictures say enough but I will add just a few notes. Scott was not the only one who pulled the girls on the jet ski float. He joined the fun after Ron and I were maxed out. Notice that Evelyn and Emelia do not both have on their matching dresses. Somehow when we got there, Emelia's dress had not gotten packed. Thanks to Adele, Emelia had a pretty white dress to wear. Again, we had great fun and look forward to future trips.

I remember so well our trips to "the gulf" when I was young. We are now making memories like those for our girls. Scott had become a non-beach person until he saw how much fun Evelyn had at the beach. After the last few days, Emelia now loves the beach as well. We have been able to take three beach getaways with our friends the Smiths and we look forward to this every year. As always I am late with things so I will have to share more about the trip and more photos later. I will post just a few for now. Evelyn cried several times today because she would miss her friend Mallory, because she was no longer at the beach, and because she had to go back to school tomorrow.

Another week has passed. The time does fly by. I intended to post early on but I'll just give a quick recap. We started with the kickoff of PRCC's Centennial Celebration with a parade through town and a picnic at the school following. It was a nice change of pace but quite a warm September day. Evie's school came out for the parade and were on the sunny side of the street for too long, poor babies. We were across from Evelyn on the shady side. Emelia entertained herself with Scott's lens cap during the wait. She also enjoyed her moon pie as we cooled off in the office building where I work. Evelyn is now taking dance and is excited about it. Monday was her first day but she has been looking forward her next dance class. She is quite creative with what she comes up with on her easel. I am very proud of both girls with some of their accomplishments this week. Emelia has only worn pull ups at night since Wednesday. I think we finally hit a milestone with the potty training. Emelia was napping yesterday and I decided to get out some Dick and Jane books we had for Evelyn. Those of you who are old enough know about Dick and Jane. Anyway, Evelyn has been doing well with her letter sounds and a few sight words. Dick and Jane are such a memory to me in those early days of reading. I had to help her just a bit but we were so pleased. Her face just lit up when she realized she was reading all by herself. Watching your little one learn is so much fun and truly amazing.

Well you notice I didn't come back with a post griping about the air conditioner. We used fans that night and fared really well. The next morning when Scott tried the unit, it worked. Some of you were definitely praying for us. Thanks! We enjoyed a visit from cousin Mason over the weekend and also enjoyed a visit from our friends in Houma. They only had minor damage to their home and also just got power back on Saturday, all great news. Evelyn made every minute count with Emma, Paige and Isaac. Don't fuss because I don't have photos to share. I was making every minute count in trying to catch up as well. I will try to add a couple of photos of the girls. Emelia is getting so cute with her language. I asked loudly the other day, "Where is your daddy?" The response kind of shocked me. She said, "He'll be right back." I suppose she has heard that from him quite a bit. :)

Notes on photos: Emelia likes to put her stickers on her own self; Evelyn looks a little rough at the end of a school day but she did have on her spirit shirt thanks to my friend, Angela; Evelyn has also become our monkey. She climbs the swing set and the tree in Papa's back yard; Emelia loves cereal and can make a sweet mess with it.

Well I will certainly not complain about what Gustav did in our area. I cannot tell you the amount of rain we have had and there are lots of small limbs in our yard but that is nothing compared to what could have been and what did happen for some. I sit in my air conditioned house that the electricity only flickered off in and appreciate it so much. We are very thankful. We have heard from my neice Shelby and are glad all is well for them. We have also talked to our friends in Houma. They do not know the condition of their home but they are safe. When we did have a short break from the rain today we were all ready to get out and pick up limbs just to get out of the house. The girls were very helpful at the onset but were quickly distracted. We also ventured to the mall this afternoon. : ) Tomorrow we are all back to a schedule.

P.S. - Within minutes of finishing this post I heard a weird sound coming from our central unit. The fan quit running. Oh my, can you believe that? I am still thankful to God that we were not in the direct path of Gustav. We will look at the brighter side, it has been cooler with all of the rain. One more important thing - HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!! It was yet another stormy one. : )