November 2008

November was a very busy month, so I will just get right into the pictures and let them show how busy we were!

All of the girls playing Elefun at Madelyn Mae's 2nd Birthday Tea Party.
Madelyn Mae, her baby sister Kaitlyn, and parents Brad and Amy are good friends of our from church and our small group.

The girls drinking their "tea."

Elaina

Emily

Hannah

Brooke

The birthday girl, Madelyn Mae

The girls playing with Play-Doh.

Elaina and I went on "field trip" to Not Just Popcorn in Edinburgh with our friends who are home schooled. We learned and watched how the popcorn is popped and flavored.

Flavoring the popcorn.

"Fluffing" the popcorn.

Sampling a few flavors of popcorn.

A cob of popcorn to pop in the microwave.

Part of our popcorn cob.

Franklin Community High School presented the musical, "Cinderella," in November. Elaina was just getting "into" Cinderella and princesses, so Jeff and I took her on a Friday night date to see the production.

Hannah and Scott went, too.

Elaina with "Cinderella." She loves her, but doesn't want to get too close.

We visited MeMe and Poppy's church on a Sunday in November to witness Cousin Thad's baby dedication. The church was having a food drive at the time to benefit The Baptist Children's Home in Valparaiso, Indiana. The girls went grocery shopping and dropped off their goods. This is a very special place to us because it is where Uncle Stephen and Uncle Paul were adopted from.

Uncle Stephen, Auntie Leah, and Cousins Luke, Seth, and baby Thad.

Oooooo, we love him!

Having fun with Daddy in the leaves. So cold!

On the hunt for a Christmas tree.

Helping Daddy cut our Christmas tree down.

The boys!

Uncle Stephen and Cousin Luke loading up the Christmas trees.

Emily and Elaina helping MeMe with the Thanksgiving "turkey bird."

Emily helping decorate the Christmas tree. This is her favorite ornament. It is a Snowbaby that Jim and Rosie gave her for her first Christmas. The minute we got it out this year, she clung to it. She absolutely loves it!

October 2008

Well, this is the month that "did me in". What a busy month it was, but it was a great month! The girls and I got to take one last trip to the park on one of our last warm days. Jeff got his annual pair of rats at school, and the girls LOVED them. The girls were able to pick out their pumpkins and carve them. We had a great Halloween by passing candy out to the boys and girls at Jeff's school, and then on Halloween night, we went trick-or-treating with all of our friends. Yes, there was a "Fall Break" in there sometime at the end, but I spent that whole week in the nursery at church with my best friend. I took over the responsibilities of Nursery Coordinator in July, and Jennifer (the Children's Minister at our church), Jill, and I worked together on a plan to make the nursery have a more "homey" feel to it. Jill and I literally spent an entire week in the nursery. Thanks so much to my mom, Jeff's mom, and Jeff for taking such great care of the girls while I was totally consumed with that. It is beautiful! It was a lot of hard work, but Jill and I had a great time. It was a very busy - the fun busy - kind of month.

Elaina fell several times during our Trick-or-Treat experience (those silly dance shoes). Emily was quick to comfort her each time.

Elaina and Hannah Trick-or-Treating.

The girls Trick-or-Treating at our sweet neighbor's, Ruth, house.

Our gymnasts! Oh, how our girls love to do their gymnastics.

Elaina mid-move.

Emily's first sucker. She LOVED it, but oh what a mess!

Elaina passing out candy at Daddy's school for Family Reading Night the eve of Halloween. She was so good. We didn't let her Trick-or-Treat this night. We told her she was going to share her candy with other boys and girls. She was so happy to do it, too.

Elaina playing a game at Northwood's Family Fun Night.

Emily and Daddy playing a game at his school.

The girls each won a prize for winning the game! They each got to pick a new book to take home!

Our carved pumpkins. Daddy and Emily worked togther, and Elaina and Mommy worked together.

Before the carving.

Elaina was determined to pull the wagon at the pumpkin patch.

Emily pointed to a lot of pumpkins that she wanted.

Elaina checking out the pumpkins trying to pick the perfect one.

One of Daddy's experimental rats at school.

Elaina loves it when Daddy gets his rats each fall.

The kids playing while we were painting the nurseries at church.

Hours of chalking and taping.

The "infant side" stripes.

The "toddler side" before the stripes.

Thank you, MeMe for helping us ou during the week of painting. The girls always love it when MeMe visits. They get to make blueberry muffins with her!

A Saturday at Great Grandma McCrary's

Collecting nuts at Great Grandma's.

Emily and cousin, Haddie, playing with sticks at Great Grandma's. Haddie is one month younger than Emily.

Mommy and the girls spent the last warm day of the fall at the park.

Beautiful girl.

Silly girl.

I'm Working on It . . . I Promise!

I know . . . I know . . . it's terrible! I was such an active blogger, and I have completely dropped the ball on it for the last three months. I know some of you finally got sick and tired of seeing "Saturday Morning Donuts" as my most recent blog entry that you have probably all together quit checking the blog, but I promise . . . I'm working on it. Tonight, I have downloaded almost three months of pictures from my camera and am working on organizing those. This week will be the week. There will be new blog posts! I have really missed it, and I am so upset with myself that I let myself get so far behind. Things just got completely crazy at the end of October when I spent an entire week, night and day, totally restyling the nurseries at church. I loved doing it, and I can't wait to share pictures with you, but I had a hard time catching up around the house after that. After I was done with that, Thanksgiving snuck up on me and then Christmas, and here it is 2009! I will be flying through some posts this week just so that I can get some pictures posted and a few memories written down for the girls. I'm just so bummed! More than anything, I just feel like I have let them down by not getting all of this recorded. I WILL get caught up though . . . this week . . . I promise!