Misc. November Happenings

The ballet company from the place where my girls dance has a big performance each year called The Gift. It is the Christmas story told in dance. This year Elizabeth was able to be a sheep in this performance. I had great expectations of being able to post the video but even Eric, who can usually solve all computer issues, was not able to get the video to load (sorry Nana and Grampa). We did however manage to get a picture of her backstage in costume so that will have to suffice. Maybe next year we will do better.



Thanksgiving Day began with Amy and me running the Atlanta Half Marathon. We both had a good race and I enjoy being able to run with her.


We did host Thanksgiving dinner at our house, but failed to take any pictures. It was however a lovely time with family and friends and we always look forward to everyone coming over.

Church Hiking Trip

A group from our church went hiking recently on Signal Mountain in TN. It was a beautiful place, the weather was great and we had a wonderful time of fellowship while enjoying God's incredible creation.

Life in the Clan

Matthew had a rather rough day or so recently. On Saturday morning he was standing on a stool in the kitchen watching Eric make pancakes. Somehow he managed to fall off and in the process bit his tongue badly. It bled and bled and bled....we held rags on it but the blood kept filling up his mouth. So he just starting spewing all the blood into the kitchen sink and it just kept coming. We had a childless friend over and right when Matthew was spewing blood into the sink, Eric handed her a plate of pancakes and said "here your pancakes are ready"! I am guessing she will choose in the future to eat elsewhere. Hopefully she will still have children. Matthew then spent several hours on the couch too woozy to get up. Later in the day I heard a tremendous crash upstairs. I went up to find that Matthew had somehow fallen (the story was a little convoluted) getting off the toilet and had smacked his head on the toilet seat, breaking it (the toilet seat, not his head!).
To follow all of that up when we were coming in from church the next morning Matthew straggled in last crying, his hand and his head covered in blood. He said that a scooter had fallen on his head. I know enough of the laws of physics to know that scooters do not jump up off the ground and hit someone in the head. And, no, we do not have scooters hanging from the garage ceiling on nifty little hooks - we are not that organized. Actually we do have hooks on one wall for scooters, but the kids never hang the scooters up and the hooks have long since been blocked by large containers which are there to hold outside toys. I'm guessing these containers are empty. The scooters are usually laying scattered around the garage floor and mostly in the walking path through the garage. I could say that maybe the scooters are possessed and my children actually do hang them on the hooks that Eric spent good time putting up and the scooters jump off the hooks in order to sabotage family members that walk through the garage. But I'm pretty sure possessed scooters are not something that Christians believe in, so that is not an option however much I would like to believe that my children hang up their scooters and my life is organized. So all that to say that I have no idea how a scooter hit Matthew in the head. But he survived, we weren't reported to Family and Children's Services, and all seems to be well.
As we focus on giving thanks this month (and always) these incidents remind me to be thankful that my children don't get hurt nearly as much as they could and that all days are not like this.

Elizabeth

Elizabeth turned 6 this October. She is my fearless, can do everything the older kids do child. We recently had a church weekend out at Camp Westminster and Elizabeth wanted to do the climbing wall and the zip line - and she did...fearlessly!

This is atop the 30 foot climbing wall.

Here she sits calmly waiting...when I did this several years ago I was holding onto the pole for dear life.

Off she goes!

Okay, she shows a little fear here...

But quickly recovers.

Mission accomplished!

Happy Birthday Elizabeth!

August Birthdays

We had two August birthday which I did not get to acknowledge on their day (the story of my life these days..). However, we did celebrate - Anna turned 9 and Scott turned 22!!

Beach Trip

We did get to the beach in August and had a great time. I posted most of the pictures on facebook (in a more timely manner) but here are a few which I like.

More Vancouver

With vacation and the start of school I never posted the rest of the Vancouver pictures, so here are some more.....

Vancouver

Eric had a business trip this past week to Vancouver, BC. He has taken each of the older children (when they have been around age 13) with him when he has gone to interesting places. This time it was Molly's turn. They flew into Seattle where Eric's parents picked them up and they all drove up to Vancouver to stay for the meeting. Molly was able to spend time with her grandparents which was a special time for her and she enjoyed traveling to such a neat place. One day they headed up to Whistler, which is where the 2010 Olympics held the alpine skiing. Here are some pictures. I have never been there, but it looks like a gorgeous place!

Catch-up Post

July was a very busy month for us. I was working in the kitchen at camp which while it had its benefits, much of the rest of things got put on hold. So here is a little of what we did in July.

We started July with our annual running of the Peachtree Road Race - the world's largest 10K road race. A friend from church who volunteers at the race snapped the picture above after we all finished (the guy in yellow is one of Scott's housemates). Then the picture below is in our matching Peachtree T-shirts after we cleaned up.



Scott's house, The Hot House, held a pig roast. It was quite interesting as I had never seen one before. The meat was excellent!






Molly and Emily went to camp with their friend Corrie. Peter also attended camp and Matthew attended day camp, but I did not get any pictures of them. I don't necessarily do a great job documenting the whole camp experience. In fact I think they are "out of sight, out of mind" as all my children claim that they are the only campers in their cabins who do not receive mail or care packages from home. Oh well....


Then we finished up July with Emily turning 10. All in all a busy, but fun month.

Grace Rides a Bike!

No matter how much I make sure everyone is taken care of before getting into the shower it always happens that one of the children comes and bangs on the door. They yell something unintelligible except for the word "mom" and I yell back that I can't understand them and they yell louder. How many times this goes back and forth depends on several factors, but mainly my patience. Most of the time it ends with me yelling at them to go away and praying that they were not trying to report some disaster that needs my immediate attention. So one morning this week as I'm getting into the shower it starts with Elizabeth yelling something. I do decide this time to go to the door and she tells me that Grace is riding a bike. I say something to the effect that that is great, but nothing to get me out of the shower about (Grace has a little bike with training wheels that she loves to ride). Then Elizabeth tells me that Grace is riding a bike with only two wheels and that she, Elizabeth, taught her how to do this. I tell Elizabeth that I will check it out when I'm through, but no more bike riding until I'm done. I try to finish my shower in a hurry wondering how the 5 year old is teaching the 3 year old to ride a bike and where on earth were my older children. Well imagine my surprise when I went out and found that my just turned 3 year old is indeed riding a bike with no training wheels. I did ask one of the older children where they were in this process and one of them replied that they did see what was going on and made Grace put on a helmet! At least they provided some sort of help. I do think Grace is the youngest in our family to achieve this feat! She is quite proud of herself as is her little teacher!

Easter Pictures