Catch Up!

Wow! Seriously? Almost a month and a half? Time has flown! It's amazing that the summer is now half over and I'm counting the days until this winter...literally. But I'll save that for later.

So what has happened since my last post? Well, my vertigo took two weeks to go away. That's a big chunk of why my blog didn't get updated. I couldn't see the computer enough to do it! But I do thank you for your prayers. Between all of your prayers and the fact that my sweet Sunday School class blessed us with a week full of prepared dinners every night, my healing started...slowly but surely. Every day, it would slowly ebb away and it took a full two weeks before I felt like I was finally back to normal. First the world would stop tilting if I kept my head cocked to the side (fun to watch me drive like that). Then, I could sleep at night without trying to fall out of bed. Then I started feeling like I was fairly close to normal but couldn't bend over to get anything off the floor or to tie my shoes without suddenly feeling like I was about to fall over (which I actually did once). But now I'm well and praying hard that it never returns!

And what about the kids? Well, my daughter is now a 4th grader! Yes, they actually allowed her to promote to the next grade. It was kind of touch and go there for a while but they did finally give her a pass! :-) Around the same time she graduated from Brownies and has now bridged over to become a junior! Very strange to say that. Junior. Since when is my daughter old enough to be a Junior?!?

Anyway, her summer has been full of going to the local roller-skating rink, "jumpy places" with all the bouncy inflatables, swimming at the state park, and playing on her brand new DS with her friends at daycare. We always swore we'd never buy our kids video game stuff and then we decided the Wii might be a good idea since it actually got kids up and moving. What can I say? We're suckers. And then she went to daycare last summer and came home with a huge "But EVERYONE has ONE" after her first few days of the schoolers program there. And sure enough, every kid in the program came to daycare with their own DS's. So when we decided to send her there again this summer, we broke down and bought her her own DS. Again, we're suckers!

And what about Will? Well, he's still my monkey boy. Constantly running, jumping, yelling and flying. And within the next month or so, he'll be headed to his final room at daycare...Preschool. He only has one more year and he'll officially be off to school. So strange to think about that. So while he waits for his first real taste of school, he's just enjoying being a boy and playing with his two best friends. He now has a best friend at daycare (Hunter, the little boy he's be in the same room with since they were 8 weeks old - they're inseperable), and a new best friend at church, Garrett. And the awesome thing about his new church buddy is that his friend has a sister Ann Catherine's age and they live in the same subdivision as us, which means the boys will be headed off to the same school for Kindergarten next year. It's strange to think he's already starting to build his network of friends for school.

And Brian and I? Well, we're busy. Like normal. Staying busy with work and family and church. But we're loving life. And loving how God has blessed us over the years.

Oh, and I got a hair cut! OK, not the best picture of me (or my haircut) below but I went wild the other day and had layers put in. Guess that's not really getting wild is it? Although, for someone who has pretty much had the same haircut for the past twenty years, not too bad!

And to top it all off, we now have a countdown posted on the wall yet again. Any guesses where we're headed on Nov. 14?

Yep, we'll be there for a full week! And did you notice the timing of it? While we hate the thought of taking Ann Catherine out of school the week before Thanksgiving, we were given an incredible deal (yet again), and we're taking this opportunity to actually take a family vacation. Because of my new job, we had to give up on any summer vacation this year. So when this deal came along and we realized that I'd have a week of vacation saved up by then, we couldn't say no. And when we realized that this trip would fall upon a certain family special day, we really couldn't say no. What little girl doesn't want to celebrate her 10th birthday with a huge Christmas celebration party at Disney World, complete with a special Christmas parade, snow falling on Main Street, and free hot cocoa and cookies throughout the parks as all the characters greet you in their Christmasy-best?