Happy Halloween

It's been a candy-filled, fun-filled, party-filled couple of days. Yesterday was the Harvest Party at pre-school. Ryan got to wear his spider costume. They accidently scheduled hearing and vision screening for the same day. When you hear the beep you raise your hand. In Ryan's case he raised lots of spider arms cuz they were all connected. The teacher's helper laughed repeatedly about what it looked like and kept telling all the moms.

Today we headed out to the library, took a long walk through the fall leaves/neighborhood, dinner at McDonalds (really in the car), trick-or-treating, and then Halloween outreach in the parking lot at church. In the middle of all of this, Ty fell and hit his face this afternoon giving himself a scrape and small shiner. On the way to the car he tripped and fell hitting his forehead on the cement - just in time to dress up and go see all sorts of people.

Here are a few pictures of our days...

Birthday Questions

So I'm looking to find out how you handle birthdays for your kids.

Background - Growing up my parent's didn't have money to spend or time to put into birthdays. We would get a present and a birthday meal (we could pick what mom made). My birthday is the day before my brother's so we had to share a birthday meal. As soon as I learned to cook/bake I was in charge of making out birthday cake as well. The exception was my 16th birthday, my mom got a cake for me at our church youth group party. It meant a lot to me.

Birthdays just weren't a big deal in our family. They still aren't. Yesterday we got together for joint birthday dinner and my mom forgot to bake the cake. Kinda bugged me, but at least she made an effort at her age(70). Ryan, however, was crushed that there was no birthday cake for me. It was really sweet.

So now as a parent I'm trying to decide what to do for my kids' birthdays. So far I've done family birthday parties (both sides invited to the same day) with a couple of our close friends & their kids included. Ryan's going to be turning 4 in a couple of months and I don't know what to do.

What are your traditions/plans for your kids?

Busy Days

Tis the season for lots of stuff to happen. We've had a pre-school fieldtrip to the pumpkin patch, lunch with Logziella, hat play around the house, Harvest Party at the pre-school, work day at church, birthday party for great-grandma, etc. They are long but good days. Here are a few pictures for the last couple of days. Happy birthday to Grandma Cora - you look great at 88!

Highs & Woes

It's been a bit since I've blogged, but life is a bit on the full side right now. I'm trying to get all the pieces put together for a ladies night out at church called "Holiday Hints." It's coming together but there are so many little details that are out there. If you are looking for something to do on Fri, Nov 9 - I got tickets...

Last weekend was a whirlwind. It's hunting season so Andy's been out in the woods. We took the boys to pick a pumpkin. It was kinda lame there wasn't really a patch, but more of a mowed grassy field with a bunch of pumpkins in it. Luckily at 1 and 3 they don't really care too much. It was a real tractor pulling wagon, and that's all that really mattered.

We also had a junior high harvest party. It was a pretty good night and some new kids came. That was good to see. We had it out at our new pastor's house and played capture the flag in the woods and made hobo dinners in a campfire.

Sunday is always busy. Andy woke up not feeling great but we managed to make it almost on time for praise team & sound. As the day went on, Andy got sicker (sore throat, etc) and slept all afternoon. Happy Birthday to me! I got the kids and he got to sleep. He felt well enough that we at least went out to eat at my favorite restaurant Charlie's Crab. It's an upscale place downtown on the river. It's pretty pricy so we usually go once a year (birthday or anniv). We had a gift certificate to help cover a portion so it was fairly guilt free. The food was fabulous as usual.

I also managed to burn both of my thumbs on my glue gun. Blisters are an annoying thing on your thumbs. Here's a hint - if your glue gun breaks - don't try to force just a little more out to finish the project you are almost done with... Just a hint.

So we're back into life and the week at hand. Andy was home sick yesterday and that threw EVERYTHING off. The kids never know what to do with dad home sick. I was very happy he went back to work today.

I need to find a cost effective costume for Ryan. He doesn't like the one hand-me-down that fits. I hate spending money on Halloween costumes. It always seems like a waste of money for one night. At least now he can wear it to pre-school for the party as well as for trick-or-treating. Any suggestions?

Name Tag

I was tagged by Lis to share a bit about me.

Here are the rules:
1. You have to post these rules before you give the facts.
2. You must list one fact that is somehow relevant to your life for each letter of your middle name. If you don’t have a middle name, use the middle name you would have liked to have had.
3. At the end of your blog post, you need to choose one person for each letter of your middle name to tag. Don’t forget to leave a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog for the rules.

M - Mom - That sums up most of my day, taking care of mom things. I have two little boyx whom I love and pray that they will love and serve God all of their lives.

A - Anxious - I've always been a bit anxious about lots of things, but have learned a lot about myself after dealing with anxiety attacks during this post-partum time period.

R - Resourceful - I can make a lot out of a little. It comes from my upbringing of not having much. Scraps can become something beautiful. Odds and ends can make something delicious. A good plan goes a long way to making things happen.

I - Introspective - This is a great thing and a fault all in one. I can take the moments to understand myself but I can over-analyze things as well.

E - Excited - I'm excited about what God is doing in my life. I'm watching my kids grow by leaps and bounds, changing so fast. I'm working on a great holiday event for women at church. We are building a house, and have great friends. I'm excited about so many things.

I'm tagging Logziella, Amanda, & Captain Cal.

Mall Babes

Hubby was out hunting again tonight so I packed the boys up and we ran errands and headed to the mall. I have to say that I felt rather frumpy with all the mall babes running around - perfect hair, clothing, lots of attitude... you know what I mean. Even the other moms with their strollers seemed put together. It was a good thing I had a little bit of cash saved up to buy a few new things to help de-frumpify my wardrobe.

The boys did remarkably well for as long as we were out. Ty was a bit shot, but what I didn't realize is he had spiked a fever of 103.3 - I didn't have a clue he was sick until he didn't want to eat chicken nuggets at McDonald's. Hopefully a good night sleep will burn whatever it is off.

...But I Want...

How many times do I have to fall into the same trap of it being about me? I'm working on this Christmas outreach for church and met with friends last night to go over details. Afterward, one friend wrote a reminder that it isn't about us - about what we want - but what God wants to do through this event. I struggle between trying to plan in detail and fight for the supplies/help needed and realizing that this is God's work. He will provide for everything that we need. Things don't need to be perfect for God to work. I just need to step out of the way to get a front row view of what he's doing in and through us.

The same thing goes for our kids. I tend to be far more focused on doing what I think is best rather than praying for guidance on what is best. The ever present struggle of doing v. being.

On a day to day front Ryan went back to the doc today to check out his infection from last week. Looks like it is healing well but still waiting to hear from the urologist to see if further tests need to be done. I guess this infection can be a sign of other deeper problems, or it could just be a fluke. Who knows. We'll have to wait and see.

Since deductables are met, we're scheduling every appointment we can think of. Andy's got a consult to take care of family planning issues. I think we're going to do the full allergy testing on Ryan as well. His eczema keeps flaring and more frequently - so we need to take the next step for full allergy testing. I'm REALLY not looking forward to that test.

So I'm off to face the rest of the day and hopefully with better perspective.

Expect the Unexpected

This morning I woke up with plans for a pretty normal day - the library, lunch with out of town relatives, make dinner for the new pastor's family, church, etc -- Our day got significantly rearranged.

As I was getting the boys ready for a bath I noticed that Ryan had a seriously inflamed/swollen guy part. We ended up at the doctor only to be sent downtown to the hospital for an ultrasound to find out whether he would need surgery or simple antibiotics. To get downtown I ran into 1 traffic jam and 5 construction detours. The 15 minute trip took me about 45 minutes leaving me almost in tears by time we got there. In the meantime my cell phone battery dies and can't get ahold of everyone or leave half messages everywhere.

The simple painless test ends up freaking him out and I had to hold him down. The good news is that it wasn't the surgical problem so we left to get an antibiotic (and I'm sure a pretty good sized bill for the day).

My friends at church tonight laughed and said "it's just your life- these things always seem to happen to you guys." I'd be happy if they would stop. I shouldn't complain though, today's outcome was pretty good considering the other options. Never a dull moment.