Grant's Birthday!

On Monday, Dec. 22 Grant turned 5 years old! At times I can't believe he is already 5. Other times I think of how these past few years have been so hard. I love Grant to pieces and pray for God to continue to give me love for him and wisdom to Joel and I as we try to figure the right way to go with him.

Here are a couple pics of Grant and his dog from Nana that she got him when we went to see her for lunch at the hospital. He loves his dog so much!

This is pretty much how he was all the way home, holding it very closely and not letting go! You can tell how happy he is.

Tutu Cute

I made these tutu's for a friend of mine's daughters. I made them a little different than I normally do. At a craft show I went several weeks ago, I saw ones that were made on a satin ribbon instead of an elastic waist band. So I tried it and it turned out super cute. This way you can put it on and take it off much easier and you have a beautiful bow! I made them short since they will be for play. Also, they will look super cute over jeans or black leggings since they are shorter. I can't wait to make one for Kate!

More Fun with Beth

The last speech day in December we made gingerbread houses. Beth came in the afternoon that week and so Grant and Joel were both home. Kate, of course, had a lot of fun with hers. Grant actually got into it a little bit but thought it was so funny when his collapsed. At first he was concerned and I put it back. Then he knocked it over on purpose all the while laughing and eating candy. He is a stinker!

In case you were wondering...

...this is what my house has looked like every day except Tuesdays and Wednesday (when I teach lessons) for the month of December, I think, maybe longer. In fact, it looked like this 1 day before we had a Christmas party at our house. :-) Thankfully I have 2 things to be grateful for: 1. a small house and 2. a helping husband. Thank you, Joel!!!

At least it's clean laundry you're looking at.

You know it's bad when your mother says, "I've never seen it this bad before!" The last couple weeks have been better and it has helped that Joel has been home a lot. But there are days...and with NACD in full swing it's only going to get harder, I know!

Feeling Crafty

I read or saw this idea somewhere, I think on the internet, for a fun Christmas craft. I thought it would be fun for the kids to do and would be full of good language, speech-wise. This one is edible and made out of ice cream cones with frosting all over for snow. We "glued" candy pieces for the ornaments and put a sucker through a hole at the top for a star. Doesn't this sound like fun? Too bad it didn't last more than 3 minutes, hence the reason I don't do things like this ever unless Beth is around. :-)

Kate, totally into it and making sure her "ornaments" are in the right place

Grant really could care less and just wanted to eat candy. Surprise, surprise.

Lil' Helper

Kate was trying to "help" me clean up after Thanksgiving dinner. I asked her, "Are you helping Mommy?" and she nodded her head "yes". Then she said "more" after she put the silverware that she had found into the tray. Yeah! I could get used to this!

I love my crockpot(s)!

Okay, this is what happens when you don't blog until 5 weeks after the fact: you forget stuff! Or I'm just really tired. :-)

Thanks to my friend, Stephanie, we had a crockpot Thanksgiving when my family had dinner with us. We did one turkey in the oven and one on the grill that Joel did. His turned out way better than mine, although mine tasted pretty good. We're definitely going to do two again next time, one on the grill and one in the oven.

Unfortunately, I didn't think to take a picture of everything until we started to clean up but this picture turned out fine enough:

left to right: stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, and in the back pumpkin spiced lattes. Not pictured: cranberry sauce and pumpkin spice dip.

Everything turned out great! The awesomeness of it all is when my family came over we didn't have to be in the kitchen for 2-3 hours before eating because it was already cooking in the crocks. And clean-up was a breeze since I used crockpot liners so all the mess went in the trash. Everyone was impressed, to say the least, and I have a feeling that this won't be the only crockpot Thanksgiving! :-)

Thanksgiving Dinner #2

Friday after Thanksgiving we had my family over for dinner. My dad was in town so that was nice and everyone made it that could. Jonathan is still in Iraq so we all missed him.

From left to right: Shawn, Jen, David (on the sofa), Daniel, Papa Mark, Christina, and Blair. Nana and Joel were there but not in the picture.
It's been awhile since we have had either one of our families over for Thanksgiving or Christmas but this year we did both in having my family over during Thanksgiving and Joel's family over on Christmas Day. Our house is small and both of us have big families but both times it worked out alright. I'm thankful for all of my family - all 35 of them...and that's just parents, sibblings, spouses, and children (cousins)...35 between Joel's and my family. We are blessed, huh? :-)

Lifesavers!

Actually, teethsavers I should say. Grant and Kate don't like having their teeth brushed. They really don't like it. They hate it. And because they hate it so much it makes it hard for one to be consistent in getting the job done. So a few weeks ago I had coupons for battery operated spin toothbrushes and bought one for each. Look! They are doing it themselves! Even Daddy was impressed and commented, "Those things are worth every penny!" wow.

Now they love having their teeth brushed and everybody is happy again. :-)

Catching Up!

If you are just tuning in, you are probably thinking, "Whoa!" I'm back to blogging and loving it. I'm finally catching up with pictures and posts from Oct. and Nov. They aren't in exact order, but at least I am getting them posted, right? December posts coming soon! :-)
Enjoy!

Spider Cookies!

I saw a recipe for these cookies in an October magazine. We didn't end up making them until November sometime but that was okay because we love to sing "The Itsy Bitsy Spider" and the kids loved helping me make them. They loved eating them, too, as you can tell by the pictures:

"Is this really a cookie?"

eating one "leg" at a time
:-)

Fall is Here...

...although if it weren't for the fallen leaves you might think it was summer at times!

I know it might look like a pathetic pile of leaves but the kids had fun with what leaves we had from our neighbor's tree. I raked them up into a pile at the bottom of the slide and they thought it was so fun so "land" in the pile. Now this is what I call cheap entertainment! :-)

Trick or Treat!

Grant in his Sully costume from Monster's Inc.

Showing off his tail

Kate, a flower fairy.

I saw a picture of a similar tutu online for about $70 and it gave me an idea for Kate's costume. I had a lot of fun making this one and she looked so cute in it. And it actually survived two nights of wear, one night at our church's carnival and the other night trick or treating!

Pumpkin Patch with Aunt Jenni!

One Saturday in October Aunt Jenni took us to a pumpkin patch in Plano. Joel was working on my brakes that day and she was so nice to come and pick us up. The kids loved riding in her car. I'm not sure why but they think it is so fun to ride in someone else's car!

Grant was such a big boy and sat through getting a spider painted on his hand. He thought that was pretty neat.

Both kids got to decorate a bird feeder. I'm not sure if it actually fed any birds but we hung them from our tree when we got home.

And both decorated pumpkins, real and paper. All in all, we had fun! Thank you, Aunt Jenni, for a fun afternoon! We love you!

Lunch Date with Nana!

The kids and I met up with Nana for lunch one day, something we haven't done in a long, long time. Christina and Daniel were out of school that day and so they got to come, too! Yeah!

Big Hug!

Grant loves his Nana!

It must have been Friday since Grant and I were wearing our school spirit wear! Liberty Grove Rocks. :-)

Granbury, Texas!

Joel and I went away for a few days back in October. Our dear friends, Roger and Tammy, or should I say "Ro er and Mammy", watched Grant for us, and our other dear friends, Jason and Sara, watched Kate. We are so grateful to them for giving Joel and I the opportunity to get away for some much needed "us" time. To Roger and Tammy and Sara and Jason: We can't thank you guys enough! You gave us a gift that we will never forget! You guys have blessed us so much and we are forever grateful!!!

We went to a cozy little cottage in the country on private owned property. We had our own hot tub and private porch. The view was beautiful and the house was a perfect escape. We brought food and enjoyed cooking without any interruptions or time constraints. You would think I would want to eat out the whole time but it was so nice not having anyone begging to be held or fussing because they are "starving". We slept in, watched movies, biked, shopped, and truly enjoyed being together. I can't wait to go back!!!

The Neri Place

Biking at Slovaca Ranch

Biking in downtown Granbury where we ate a picnic lunch

Headed home back to Dallas!

Speech Time with Beth

Beth is Kate's speech therapist who comes to our house on Wednesday mornings while Grant is at school. Her speech therapy is through Garland ISD's program for children 0-3years. We are thankful for this opportunity for Kate and she responds really well to Beth, who she calls "Be". Kate had a lot of fun decorating her pumpkin. I am always amazed at how much she likes doing these kinds of things. Grant could totally care less and doesn't have the patience. Kate is the total opposite!

Ta-Da! It has curly hair just like Kate!

Breathing Time

When Kate gets sick it usually goes straight to her chest and so we get out the breathing machine and she does her treatments. She usually hates it until we thought of the great idea to let her ride her horse. Now she loves doing her treatments and doesn't fuss through them. Yeah!

Kate & Lulu

Kate says, "Thank you, Aunt Jenni, for Lulu and my purple purse!"

Cute!

Where's Kate?

The answer: Stuck! Joel and I were in the kitchen and Kate somehow managed to get herself stuck in the lazy susan! It was so funny that I had to take a picture. She wasn't too thrilled with me taking her picture, as you can tell by her face! I think she wanted to get out. 8-)

New Do

After Thanksgiving, I got my hair cut, and the lady who cut it did it in a way that I can straighten it if I want. With curly hair, it's hard to have a cut that works for both curly and straight and the new hairstylist I went to (thank you, Julie!) is amazing! I'm so excited to have found someone who knows both. Curly hair isn't as glamorous as one might think! Anyway, here's a pic of my new do!

Thanksgiving Dinner!

We had Thanksgiving dinner at Joel's brother and wife's house, Dan and Angela. The kids played outside a lot and this was a cute picture I snapped:

From left to right: Judah, Kate, Truth, Timothy, Phillip, Grant, Michelle, and Mike.

Thanksgiving Day!

I know Christmas was just a few days ago but I now have our computer back and I am blogging pictures! :-)

Thanksgiving Day started with the Turkey Trot in downtown Dallas. My sisters, Jennifer and Christina, and my brother Daniel went with the kids and myself. We've gone before and it's always so much fun. This time I jogged the 5k with Grant. This has taken a lot of work getting to this point of jogging and it feels great! The weather was perfect and the kids did pretty good. When I was talking to Grant and Kate about the Turkey Trot on Wednesday and Thursday morning, I forget to tell them that there would be dogs, lots and lots of dogs. They LOVE dogs and all we heard from them was "Dog!" as they pointed every stinkin' dog out to us! Literally, there was probably a couple hundred of them...and about 35,000 people!