This One's for Mom (Nana)

The Past Six Weeks (or so)

Well, a lot has happened since I last posted. So I just posted a bunch of pictures so you could kind of see what we have been up to! The only thing is that you have to start from the bottom or it will be backwards. Sorry about that! So you want to start with the pictures of Aubrey's party and go up from there. I hope it makes sense! I'll do better next time. :)..............


Taylor had SO many great ideas for the photo shoot. One of them was that I should take pictures of her dancing. Because this is one of her favorite things to do, I thought that was a pretty good idea! So here they are.

The Bronx Zoo
Broadway, New York City!

After Mimi and Granddad's visit we randomly decided to take a road trip to New York! We saw Niagra Falls, drove through upstate NY and made our way down to NY City!...In this first picture at Niagra you can see my expanding belly as our little guy grows bigger and bigger. :)


















This is Aubrey getting ready to get into the boat to see the Falls.























And here they are! Yes we got very wet even with the raincoats. It was quite amazing!

When we got back home from Colorado, Josh's grandparents came to visit us. We had a great time with them, and the girls had fun playing with them too- and introducing our ducks to them. :)

More Colorado pictures...
I love the aspens!






















Josh's dream scenario.

My Mom came in town for Aubrey's birthday. Then a few days later we all decided to drive to Colorado where we stayed at my uncles house and also got to see some good friends from Covenant who are now living there. These are just some shots I took driving in the beautiful Colorado Rockies.

This was back in August when we came to Texas for a few days for Grandma's 90th birthday. Caitlyn and Micah came to Nana and Papa's house and everyone had a sleep over with Papa on the 3rd floor...until about 10:00pm when they got scared and decided Nana and Papa's bedroom was better.


















We celebrated Aubrey's 2nd Birthday with a teddy bear picnic at our favorite park.

School Days Have Begun

Taylor is now in her 3rd week of school. She is going three half-days a week to Central Christian School which is connected with our church. We are interested to see what the year brings. We are still seriously considering home schooling, and have actually officially begun that too. But this is somewhat of an experiment to see which kind of "setting" she works best under. Whatever we do decide about Taylor's future schooling, we are thankful to God for this great school and for Mrs. Burzinski, Taylor's amazing teacher.

This is Taylor on her first day of school....















Here is her classroom.
This is where the kids wait before they are allowed into their classrooms. We only did this the first day. Now I just drop her off straight into her room.

Do Taylor and her new friend remind anyone else of some people named Deb and Napoleon?
And here she is in her room with Mrs. B showing off one of the class hermit crabs. They also have a Guinea pig and a beta fish.

The Barnyard Olympics!

This was our attempt at having a little country fun while living in St. Louis....It wasn't quite what we were expecting. The best part about it was the laughs we got just talking about, "What are we doing here?" It was SO hot and humid, and there was just about nothing going on. Great idea Katie!! All I have to say for myself is that it was false advertisement! Oh well. What would life be if we didn't take chances!?



Josh got in the spirit and posed with the girls for this shot.
I was forced to put on the pig nose for this one after the big pig race.

















Here is the "big pig race".
















Making the most of what was available. :) Do you see Taylor riding on the back?

Our Duck Experiment

Back when I introduced you to Stanley, our cat, I said that we were about to get 10 ducks. Well, since then we have gotten them and gotten rid of them. They were fun and cute for a little while, and the girls had fun running around and catching them as they played in our back yard. But then they got too big, too fast and too stinky to be any fun.
So we set them free at this park right by our house. At first they would not go into the water unless we herded them in. Maybe they were afraid of the BIG water. But whatever the case, we weren't sure how they would do "on their own"so we brought them food and checked on them every day for a while. It was fun to see other families get to enjoy the ducks too. (Every time we heard a family talking about the ducks Taylor would go and inform them that those were our ducks. She wanted to make sure everyone knew.)
These last pictures are from our last time there which was two days ago, and they seem to have adjusted quite nicely to their new home. Aubrey and Taylor still want to catch the ducks and hold them, but I did not think it was possible at this point. But Aubrey managed to capture one as he was climbing up the ramp out of the water. I was impressed!

Few Words

I don't have much time right now, but I have to share this little story before it is gone from my memory forever- which could very well happen tomorrow.

Aubrey and Josh were home alone and Josh was in the kitchen. Aubrey walks over to him, leads him (by grabbing his leg and walking with it) to his chair in the living room and says, "sit." So he sits. Then she climbs up into his lap, snuggles up to him and then she puts his hands around her waist. Now she is very happy and content. She wants nothing else. This is what it's all about!
The End.

P.S. I think Josh got a little taste of what God feels when all we want is Him.

Boy Oh Boy!

We're having a boy!