Halloween 2016

Will was a vampire this year.  I pretty much begged him to be, and thank goodness he obliged.  I really wanted to do his makeup!  I think it ended up pretty good - you can't really see his blood streak out of the side of his mouth, but it's there.  

Dane was a ninja - you can barely see him to the right.  

Again this year, we upheld our annual tradition of having dinner with the Dunscombes and then trick or treating with them.  I love our tradition!  (the dads stayed at our house to watch football - Luke's broken leg was the perfect excuse! :)

Grand Canyon 2017

We are reserved, locked, and loaded to hike the Grand Canyon with Nana and Grandpa in October of 2017!  We will be hiking rim to rim, which is a bit different than when my mom and I hiked it when I was in college.  She and I hiked down the south rim, camped at the bottom along the Colorado River for one night, and then hiked out a different trail on the same side of the canyon.
Next year we plan to take a shuttle to the north rim, hike down that side, stay at the bottom for two nights (giving us a full day to explore and rest) and then hike out the south rim.

We took a training hike and these boys were so super cute.  They each had their packs (Dane's complete with his stopwatch around his neck) packed with supplies: water bottles, snacks, etc.

It went well!  We all had fun.  

.......Then the next weekend Luke broke his leg!  No kidding.  He was coaching Will's football team and they were warming up and running plays.  Luke planted his foot and turned, heard a snap, and it progressively got worse over the next couple of days to the point where he couldn't walk on it or bend it much at all.  Went to the Dr. who thought it was his ACL (as did I) but we were surprised to learn that he fractured the top of his tibia.  He wasn't supposed to put any weight on it for a couple of weeks (although he did) -he used his crutches mostly and was cleared JUST IN TIME to go on his annual bird hunting trip to South Dakota (where he is now) hiking about 10 miles per day.  He's hurting, but nursing it with Advil and whiskey.  haha!  

A date with my little loves.

Lost 2nd Tooth!

.....and cowlick 2016 in full effect.

Fall Break 2016

We had a great fall break this year!  I didn't plan it to be that way, but it ended up being busy!

Monday we went to AppleWorks - an orchard about 40 minutes away.  My mom and Laura and Landon and Payton came with us.  It was a perfect day!

Tuesday I took the boys to SkyZone.  They had free jumping passes so we went and used those.  Then we went to the Halloween store and they got their Halloween costumes.  We took Landon and Payton with us so the boys all got some quality cousin time. :)

Wednesday we went to the Big Cat Rescue center.  We went with Jamie, Jude, and Aslyn.  It was amazing as always and I was so happy to support such a wonderful cause.  We had packed our lunches and saw signs for a "castle" so on our way back home we stopped by this castle and ate our lunches.  It was a little bit random, but quite interesting! 

Thursday the boys hung out with Aunt Sandy.  They went to the mall to pet some doggies. :). Then Uncle TonTon took them on a tour of his office building aka: Assembly Hall.  

Then Aunt Sandy took them to WonderLab which is always so much fun.  Because Aunt Sandy hung out with the boys, that allowed me to travel to OSU with my mom and Chuck for her every 8 week scan and it all looked great!  What great news!

Friday we had a "down day" which included running many errands and things around the house.  The boys were super cute making up their own games like this one - they made obstacle courses and had to go certain places while they timed each other.  

Love these boys so much and I was so grateful to have the week off with them. 

On Saturday we decided to all go on a hike to begin our official training for our Grand Canyon hike in less than a year. The boys were super cute - Will had his pack on, Dane had his stopwatch around his neck.  They packed water bottles and snacks and were asking what else they could put in their packs. Will included a raincoat and other miscellaneous supplies.  :) 

On Sunday we had a day at home and it was SO nice.  The boys carved their pumpkins.  Luke and I helped cut off the tops and get their stencils on but they both did almost all of their carving.  

Football 2016

We sure have enjoyed watching Will play football this year.  His regular season he played on the Jets team.  They did well - made a lot of improvement throughout the season.  Will has kind of found his place where he likes to play and that's defense.  He spent his favorite time playing outside linebacker and shined when he got to chase down a ball carrier from the other team and get an awesome tackle.  

Doing his Ussain Bolt pose on top of a hay bale behind our house just before leaving for practice one afternoon.  Love this boy and all of his sweet energy!

After one of his earlier games.  I'm pretty sure PaPaw made it to every single one of his games.  He had quite a cheering section at most games- Opa and Oma came to almost every game! Aunt Terri and Uncle Mike, Nana and Grandpa, Aunt Sandy also made regular appearances.    

They're so cute - still so small :)

They even played in the POURING rain.  No thunder - they kept going! 

The Jets came in 2nd in the 3rd & 4th grade tournament and had an awesome season.  Now Will is playing on the 3rd grade All-Star travel team.  Luke is helping coach and is loving every second of it.  

2K

Dane ran in the 2K this year.  Will couldn't run because he had a football game shortly after the race. So this year it was just Dane - and he did AWESOME!  It is open to all kids K-5 in the Martinsville school district.  One boys race and one girls race.  He finished (in FIRST GRADE) 17th of all boys k-5!! There were probably 100.  Way to go Dane!!!

My mom snapped this pic of me giving him 5 as he ran by mid-race.  I absolutely love it.  :) 

Part-way through the race. 

17th!  Way to go!  Only the top 25 receive a t-shirt.  Dane proudly wore it to school the next day.  :). So proud of this boy! 

September 21

This sweet boy had a loose tooth forEVER.  We wiggled it each morning and night.  Now that I think about it, I remember when Will had his first loose tooth, when I first realized it was loose I thought it could be any day now.  Months later, he lost it.  That was the same thing with this one.  Before it fell out it literally seemed like it was hanging out of his mouth by a thread for days.  Luke and I had both given it some good yanks!  Finally the morning of Sept. 21 it happened.  6 years and 5 months old he lost his first tooth.  Little sweetie!

That night he put it in his tooth fairy pillow I made when Will lost his first tooth and she brought him $5.  He was pretty excited!

Big Dog

I've taken these pictures of Rosco in the last 6 months or so.  He's getting older (12 in February) and it breaks my heart.  He's getting more fatty deposits all over his body (the bumps - that don't bother him and we can't do much about).  He's slower to get up.  He has to be given glucosamine every day or I can tell it makes his joints sore.  He has a harder time jumping on our bed (so he can lay on my legs and hog my covers and eventually scoot me over to the edge).  He's still an asshole (truth) but we love him so much and I absolutely hate seeing him get older and it makes me get teary just even thinking about it.  

Happy Dog out in the pasture.  He doesn't do so much running around anymore when we go out to the square (the patch of land the Will mows regularly and we take the dogs to run) but he loves going, and he still loves his walks.  (Can't even say the word walk - we call it "the W word" or he gets too wild.)

I had to take him to the vet recently - we don't take him anywhere very often because he's a nervous car rider - but I put down the seat and he could pace in the back and then up to the window and he did really well.  :). What a good boy.  Love him so much.  

Movie Night With My Boys

Luke was out of town so the boys and I had a movie night.  

Bike Track

The park set up a bike track and they allowed kids to bring their bikes and ride on it.  The boys had so much fun and they stayed as long as they could until it was over.  It was funny though, almost all of the kids fell at some point or another and some of them took some big spills - but none of them cried.  It was almost like they knew nobody else was crying so you could see all these little boys with scrapes and big falls but they all were so tough.  It was pretty cute.  

3rd Grade Fun Class!

Will is pretty lucky this year - he is in the same class with literally all his friends.  Jack, Annah, Addie, Collin, Ahvay, and Fisher.  Ahvay (the girl on the right in the gray shirt) is one of his really close friends.  He told me the other day that she was tied with Fisher as his best friend.  :) 

I Never Knew!

Oh my word look at this printing!!! Some of the chicken scratch this child brings home... Now that I know he can write this nicely, the bar has been raised. 

Workout Schedule

The boys came home from school the other day and I knew they were up to something secret - whispering and all gathered up over something.  A few minutes later they came over to me and proudly presented their new workout schedule and asked to hang it on the refrigerator.  Every day after school they have decided to come home and do these exercises.  So cute!  

My Dad

My Dad had to have open heart surgery this summer. It was a big surgery - one valve replaced and another cleaned. Thank goodness, the surgery went very well and he recovered perfectly! He was having a very high heart rate- so much so that he wouldn't be able to take more than a couple of steps at a time and ended up at the emergency room (something he would avoid at all costs!) multiple times in a short period of time. After his surgery, he spent a week in the cardiac ICU at Methodist and then was transitioned to a rehab facility for three weeks. I made daily trips up to Methodist and then every couple of days to the rehab facility.  I'm so grateful that he recovered so well. 

Sitting in a chair a couple of days after surgery.  Sharon was there almost nonstop and the sitting and trips back and forth took a toll on her as well. 

At the rehab facility - which thankfully was very near their house - once he was able to walk and thought it would be fun to have a pic of him pushing the boys.  Just a week before, he was working so hard to walk on his own.❤️

He is now almost finished with his physical therapy but we went to one of his appointments and the boys got to monitor his heart rate while he was exercising which they thought was pretty fun. 

Then recently the 5 kids threw a surprise party for him and Sharon to celebrate their 25th anniversary. It was very sweet - and a lot to celebrate! 💕

2026 and 2028