Halloween 2013

Keith dressed up in costume for a Halloween party this year.  He dressed up as his brother. 

He got a lot of laughs!

Halloween Party 2013

Climber

Now that Elinore's mastered walking, she's also mastered climbing on and off the couches by herself!  Sure it may have made my panic the first few times in fear of her falling, but she loves it! 

He is with us every step of the way.

Almost every Sunday in church there is a children's moment session, our Pastor usually has an empty bag she sends home with a kid to put something in for the following weeks message.  Each week the message started with the Pastor discovering what's the in the bag that week and connecting it to God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit or living the Christian life. 

This Sunday, there was no bag, so one of the members of the choir shared something from her bag for the Pastor to use.  It was ones of her shoes.

Before the Pastor shares what she thinks, she asks the kids for ideas, and sometimes even the congregation, but today the kids had it.

Caleb raised his hands with a way that the shoe reminded him of living the Christian life.  He said, He is with us every step we take.  Once he finally said it loud enough everyone in the church awww'd over it and he received a round of applause.  Jesus received the round of applause.

We are teaching these kids something wonderful.  And they are learning.  Jesus is the answer to everything and our promise.  

Of course Caleb got all the attention so Caden had to pop in with a Jesus is in my shoe!

Which the Pastor kind of pushed down and moved on with Jesus is everywhere and with us always.

Then another little girl around the boys age popped up and asked why if Jesus was everywhere, why he wasn't in our shoes.  :)

A Wedding

A dear friend and co-workers of mine got married at her family farm in August in eastern PA.  It was a beautiful day for their outdoor wedding.  Keith and I went along with a co-worker of mine to the wedding for the weekend and head a great time!  We had lots of laughs in the 10+ hours we spent in the car over the weekend!  We spent less than 24 hours out there, but it was time well spent!  Keith even bought me a new joke book in a travel plaza off the Penna Turnpike on the way home.

Outside!

Elinore likes to play outside.  A few weeks ago, Elinore took my hand and walked me through the house to the front door to go outside.  It was a chilly night, and I was coming down with a cold, so we didn't go outside.  Elinore wasn't very happy about that. 

Siblings

Sesame Street was on and Caleb went to join Elinore watching.  Once Caleb at down, Elinore crawled over into his lap to watch the show.

I thought it was adorable. Caleb want Nearly as excited about it.

Spirit Day 5K

For the third year in a row, I ran the Spirit Day 5K at work. 

Two years ago at this event I set my PR for the 5K!  At the time a friend and I were training for a half marathon.

Last year at the event I had my worst every 5K time.  At the time I was a day over 14 weeks postpartum. 

This year, I improved over last year, but still MUCH slower than before!

I came in at 36 minutes and 51 seconds, or just under that actually.  Since I'm not a top finished, I don't get official times at the small employee race.  There were about 50 participants.

I ran all but one little stretch, and it was a pretty warm day here for early October.  I think it was some in the high 70s or maybe 80. 

I'm pleased considering my workout schedule has adjusted significantly since I became a parent to 3 along with everything else going on.  My workout schedule now looks like running a couple miles on the treadmill in the basement in the mornings a couple times a week.  And even that isn't too regular.  I go in phases, earlier this summer my husband and I were doing some core work a few times a week and had some other things going on, but that usually happens when classes are in session for MBA.  So right now, that's what it looks like, but it changes often!

In other good news, I wasn't dead last in the race this year!  There were two people behind me.  One of which is a friend of mine. 

Another friend of mine, who sits across the aisle from me at work (for now anyway) won the race for the third year in a row!  This year after he finished he even came back out and finished the last roughly 1/4 mile with me to bring me in. 

I'm so thankful I can run. 

The End of Breastfeeding with Elinore

When Elinore was 14 months of age, I stopped breastfeeding.

My supply was really starting to dwindle.  I may have been in denial for a bit that she was still hungry after a feeding too. 

My let down was taking longer and longer to occur, and she was becoming less and less patient.  This made for a lot of self-exposure I wasn't comfortable with, and a lot of wrestling with a wiggling growing baby/toddler!

Feeds left me feeling frustrated things weren't going nearly as smoothly anymore, and once I quit denying it, concerned she wasn't getting enough. 

For about a month, we struggled through before I admitted defeat.  Except that it didn't really feel like defeat at all.  I thought I'd be sad when I stopped nursing, and don't get me wrong, I miss snuggling and nourishing my baby, but I knew it was time to stop.  Neither one of us were having a great experience with the nursing anymore, my supply was halting quickly, and I no longer looked forward to our nursing sessions, but dreaded the fight that would ensue.  It was her way of telling me she was ready too. 

She's just over 15 months old now and just recently finished her the freezer supply I built up while I was pumping. 

If we are blessed with another child, I'll be nursing again, God willing!

We have a walker!

Yesterday was the first day Elinore walked more than she crawled.  I think she's officially a walker!  And a darn cute one too!

Playground

We found our Elinore LOVES slides while spending an afternoon at the outlet mall one afternoon. 

Drive-In

Labor day weekend I decided that it would be a good idea to try taking the kids to a drive-in.  I'd never been to one before either, and Keith was all for it!  it turns out we have one within a half hour drive of home that was awesome!  I wish we'd found this place sooner! 

The drive-in had a playground for the kids to play, it was inexpensive, and it was completely okay for us to bring the baby with us! 

We saw Planes and Despiecable Me 2 before we left, but had we stayed Monsters University was starting at midnight!  I had a hard enough time staying awake through the second one though.  Elinore went to sleep after movie #1 in her stroller and she slept through the rest of our time there. 

We plan to take advantage of the place again!

Cornhole

Elinore likes to play cornhole!

Or play on the cornhole boards anyway!

Giving Hearts

Caden and Caleb spent the weekend with Grandma Barb while Keith and I went away to a wedding in August.  While they were there they had a great idea to set up a stand.  Instead of a lemonade stand they made a sign simply asking for donations for our church's food bank.  I'm so glad we are teaching these boys something good.  They have giving hearts. 

Exodus

In September I started reading Exodus.  I've taken some notes for my own reference as I've read through this book of the Bible. 
In Exodus I learned about:

• Jacob went to Egypt with his sons and their families; their descendants stayed there, grew in number and strength
• Egyptians enslaved the Israelites and made the work very hard, but they continued to grow in number and in strength
•  Nurses were to assist the Hebrew women with child birth and kill the baby boys, but the did not and God blessed them
• The king then commanded all Hebrew baby boys be thrown in the Nile
• Moses was born, his mother hid him for 3 months, then placed him in the Nile in a basket
• The king's daughter found Moses, his mother became his nurse, and the king's daughter adopted Moses
• One day as an adult, Moses saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, so he killed the Egyptian and buried him in the sand
• Another day, Moses saw two Hebrew men fighting, they asked if he was going to kill them too
• Everyone knew what Moses had done, he ran away from the king, who wanted to kill him
• Moses helped a priest with 7 daughters who watered the flock, they were chased away from the water by the shepherd's, but Moses stood up for them
• Moses was invited to their home for dinner and one of the daughters became his wife
• God is concerned for his people
• Moses was taking care of the flock when he saw a burning bush that wasn't burning up, he came close and God spoke to him
• God told Moses to lead his people out of Egypt and his people will take the riches of Egypt with them
• Moses wondered how the people would believe him and follow him, God turned his walking stick into a snake when Moses threw it on the ground
• Moses' wife, Zipporah saved Moses by circumcising her son when they stopped to rest on their return to Egypt journey
• Aaron met Moses at Sinai and Moses told him everything
• Moses and Aaron went to the king and asked for their people
• The king denied and took away their straw material for making bricks; they now had to find their own straw and were still required to make as many bricks as when they straw was provided for them
• The Lord told Moses and Aaron to go to the king and when he didn't believe them, Aaron was to throw his walking stick on the ground
• His stick became a snake; the king called in the magicians and wise men with their tricks
• They were also able to make their walking sticks turn into snakes, but Aaron's snake ate all the other snakes
• Still the king didn't believe
• The Lord told Moses to meet the king at the Nile with his walking stick, when the King continues to disbelieve, Moses will use his stick and the water will turn to blood
• The Lord commanded Moses and Aaron to follow his directions with their walking sticks to turn all the water in Egypt into blood, in buckets, rivers, canals, pools and jars
• Blood was everywhere, they could not drink the water, the fish died
• The wise men and magicians were able to do the same thing, so the king still didn't listen
• Seven days passed after the Lord changed the Nile
• Moses and Aaron went to the king again, this time when he didn't listen the Lord sent frogs everywhere in Egypt and the magicians did the same
• The king told Moses to pray to his Lord for the removal of the frogs and then he'd listen
• So Moses did and the frogs died, but then the king refused to listen again
• This time, the dust turned to gnats
• The magicians could not make this happen, and the magicians believed in the power of God
• The Lord told Moses to meet the king at the river again
• As they met Moses told the king that if he did not let them go to worship and make sacrifices to the Lord there would be swarms of flies in his hand
• The flies came, the king said they could go and he asked Moses to pray for him
• The flies left and then the king wouldn't let the people go again
• Again the Lord sent a disease to all the farm animals of the Egyptians, but the Israelite's livestock was spared
• The king still refused to let them go worship
• The Lord sent boils to all the people in the land, but still the king refused
• The Lord sent hail on the land of Egypt and spared the Israelites, again the king said he would release them when the hail stopped, but the hail stopped and the king stubbornly refused their release
• The Lord let the king and Egyptians live to show His power, so He may be talked about on the earth
• The king agreed to let the men only go to worship God, not everyone, so the locusts came and removed the last remaining grain and greenery from the land that was left from the hail
• Again the king agreed, the locusts stopped and again the Lord made the king stubborn and refused to let them leave to worship
• The Lord brought complete darkness for 3 days
• Now the king agreed to let them leave as long as they left their livestock, Moses refused to leave them behind as they needed them to worship the Lord and sacrifice
• The king threatened Moses and made him leave
• The Lord then told Moses to gather his people and ask the Egyptian neighbors for silver and gold items, they Egyptians and king's officers had grown to respect Moses and his people
• The first passover, they were to eat a lamb (1 year old flawless male) while fully dressed and ready for a trip; they were to spread the blood of the lamb on their door frames to protect their firstborns
• That night the firstborn sons of all people in Egypt and the livestock died
• Early that day, before their bread had yeast in it, they Israelites left Egypt; they were no longer slaves
• The laws of Passover
• The Israellites now had to give their firstborn sons to the Lord and buy them back
• The Lord led them out of Egypt with a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night
• The king sent his army after the Israelites, and they were unhappy with Moses for leading them out to be challenged again
• But the Lord parted the Red Sea for the Israelites to pass, but returned the water when the Egyptians tried to pass the Sea
• Moses and Israelites sang to the Lord his praises
• The Israelites were looking for water, but what they found was bitter; the Lord directed Moses to a tree
• Once the tree was thrown in the water, it was good
• The Lord is testing their loyalty
• The Israelites began grumbling for food, they had in Egypt, were rescued and now hungry
• The Lord heard them and provided meat at night, quail, and manna in the mornings; they were to gather daily and on Saturdays double for the Sabbath
• They ate this way for 40 years
• The Israellites tested the Lord when they were thirsty, He sent Moses to use his stick on a rock for water to pour out of it
• The Israelites went to battle with the Amalekites led by Joseph, as long as Moses kept his hands raised, they would win
• With help from rocks, Aaron and Hur, Moses kept his hands up and they won
•  Jethro, Moses' father-in-law comes to visit with Moses' wife and sons
• Jethro advises Moses to find people to assist him solve disagreements so he is not overworked, they monitor groups of people and escalate larger disagreements to Moses
• Once the Israelites had prepared themselves, the Lord came down on to holy ground at Sinai
• Moses and Aaron went on the mountain to be with the Lord, but no one else was to for fear of punishment
• God spoke The Ten Commandments
• Laws of slaves
• Laws in events of injury (lots of put to deaths)
• Property laws (must repay much more than the loss)
• Relationship laws
• Fairness laws
• Sabbath laws, rest every 7th day, and don't plant or harvest every 7th year
• 3 annual feats
• God makes his promise to help Israel
• Moses meets God way up int he mountain
• Gather specific gifts for the Lord and build an Ark of the Agreement
• Make a table, a lampstand, a Holy tent, an alter and courtyard for the Lord by His specifications
• Olive oil from pressed olives is to be used to keep the lamps burning
•  God directed the making of clothes for priests, so people knew they belonged to the Lord
• The Lord appoints Aaron and his descendants as the priests
• An alter is built
• There is a tax for their lives
• There is a bowl for washing, oil for appointing and incense
• The Lord sends helpers to make all these things
• There is a reminder of the Sabbath
• I've noticed in my Bible reading keeping the Sabbath is referred to several times, and I'm only in the second book.  We as a group of people are absolutely terrible about this today, and it has been on my mind a lot lately.  It's something I'm thinking about and trying to implement in our lives, although I'm not perfect at it, not even close.
•  When Moses was on the mountain, the people were concerned he'd been gone for so long, so Aaron led them to build a gold calf as their god they worshiped and offered sacrifices too
• This angered the Lord and Moses, Moses dropped and broke the stone tables with the writing/laws of God on them
• God gets angry with people, then threatens them, I often think, he has a temper.  But I can remember that while he still may feel angry, we are all saved with Jesus.  
• No one can see God's face and live
• Moses goes to meet the Lord on the mountain again for 40 days and 40 nights, he returns with new stone tables and a shinning face to the people
• God is a jealous God
• They followed all the directions for building an erecting the Holy tent as earlier directed
• A cloud came over the tent, and when the cloud was over the tent, they did not travel

Zukes

Keith did an awesome job with the garden this year!  We had some REALLY big zucchini come out of it

Our largest zucchini this year was about 8 pounds I think!

Photos

Elinore's First Birthday Party

We had a very casual low key first birthday party for Elinore at Grandma Barb's house.  Grandma Barb was having a cookout the Saturday after Elinore's birthday for her friends and family.  We invited a few friends and family over before the cookout to celebrate Elinore's birthday.  We had some gifts, some cake and some fun. 

Opening a present!

And another present!

And another present!

The punch for the party!

The cake for the party!

The smash cake!

Some of the decorations!

Mmmm! Cake!

Elinore hugged the cake into herself to eat it!

Mmmm!

Great Aunt Laura helped Elinore walk around, and for the first time, she was really interested in it!

Friends

Elinore likes the newest addition to our family.  She really likes our kitty Barney, and she's even saying kitty!

Elinore's First Fireworks

We found a great spot to watch the fireworks this year!  We'll be back again I think.  There were other people and some traffic, not nothing terrible.  And we were close enough to see everything, but far enough away to feel completely safe and the kids weren't afraid.  Despite Elinore's face, she had a good time!  She went to bed at the normal time, and then we woke her up at the last minute to drive in.  I'm so glad we did!  It was a great experience, even if it started raining while we were there!

Second Day of First Grade

I made up for the first day of first grade with photos on the second day of first grade! 

First Grade

The day after we got back from vacation the boys started FIRST GRADE!

As usual for me, we were really running late the first day of school and nearly missed the bus on day one!

So this is all we have for photos from the first day of school.