I just posted a short personal update here: www.dinewithoutwhine.com/blog and instead of re-typing it here, I thought I would just send you there.
C-

I love listening to Christian learning to read! He just brought home 5 little story books from school that we read through. He has come a long way already in the 3 short weeks he has been in school. I am surprised how much the summer break has helped him mature. Memorizing comes much easier for him now and so far his grades have been good. I was worried he would struggle this year as the teacher is pretty tough, but so far so good! His teacher did say there are 6 1st graders (out of 10) that are on the lower side of reading and he is one of them, but I think he is going to pull through.

Ryan is doing OKAY… He seems to be rushing through some things that I am not too impressed with. We get all of his work at the end of the week stapled together for us to look at. I kind of like having it come home all in one day and all in one pack – makes it easy to look through, then we sign a sheet saying we saw it. He had three 80% papers this week (and that is a C at our school) so we told him if he has any C’s next week he will have his Nintendo DS taken away for the week. We’ll see if that motivates him at all. If I knew he was trying his best it would be one thing, but it is just sloppy mistakes because he’s in a hurry and doesn’t want to have any homework. Things like spelling words incorrectly when all he had to do is copy them. That in my book – is not okay – especially when we know he is very capable.

Matt is off at the race again today – last day of his season tickets. He snuck off as soon as possible after church. It’s nice for him to be able to get away with the guys. Some wives go and he did invite me, but being this pregnant, it didn’t sound like much fun at all. Instead the kids and I went to lunch with a friend from church whose husband was also at the race. Then we came home and I took a nap while the boys played nicely! Amazing! Then we went back to town as I found out at church that I am supposed to bring snacks to Bible Study tomorrow night – EEK! Good thing she told me as I had no clue. So we ran to Wal-Mart as Ryan wanted to spend his money on a new DS Game, and then to the grocery store for my snack supplies and a few other things. And then since we were out… Though the McDonalds drive through for dinner and the Burger King Drive through for Icees. LOL No cooking for me today (not exactly healthy – but a nice break! They boys were all really well behaved today.

Anyway, Matt should be home soon and we’re off for another busy school week. The boys are brushing their teeth and getting ready for bed. I need to go lay out their clothes for the week.

C-

Nothing too major is happening around here – it was just another busy normal week.

This week I completely gutted out Dane’s room, getting rid of old toys and GARBAGE – it looks so nice now! It took almost 3 hours and was a lot of work! Amazing what they can accumulate. I started on Ryan and Christian’s room and then I decided that they were old enough to do it themselves with a bit of supervision (and I was getting tired of bending over after Dane’s room) So we are working on that this afternoon. Now, to just keep them clean… that is the challenge. I’m always amazed at the “treasures” they “Have” to keep that accumulate so fast. Of course I’m one who doesn’t save much of anything, so I try to be a bit sympathetic to their desire to “save” but at times enough is enough!

We had our 2nd football game this morning, and got our first touchdown! Unfortunately, they lost again 7 – 26 but they did a bit better than last time! It was nice to have the game in town – we could be there an hour later and actually park right on the field. It was nice out and Matt is out of town at the race today so we stayed for the 2nd game (the middle age group) as well. We ended up being there from 9-2. I opted out of the third game, I was ready to come home. Unfortunately, I ended up being pretty sunburned, I didn’t realize it was that hot out, but I guess it doesn’t take much. All the boys look fine, but Christian and Dane played in our car and our friend’s van a lot of the time so they were kind of sheltered I guess.

We have 5 weeks and 1 day until the baby is due. I go back and forth between being totally uncomfortable and then the next day I’m fine. My hips/legs hurt for a day or two and then they recover for a few days. Other days I feel totally out of breath. Today I feel great. I’m not so sure she is head down yet, so I hope she hurries up and figures that out. Sometimes I think she is and other times not, so I’m not sure if she still changes positions frequently or what.

We have had crazy (or I guess normal?) fall weather. It was 95 Monday, over 100 Tuesday, and then it cooled down to low 70’s upper 60’s the rest of the week. Wed/Thur. we also ended up with the remains of Hurricane Gustov (who knew we could feel those effects so far north!) and we ended up with about 3 1/2″ of rain. We actually needed rain really bad, so it wasn’t a bad thing, but wow that was a lot of rain all at once but the ground seemed to happily soak most of it up. I finally pulled out my jeans the last couple days with the cooler weather, I don’t think I wore them at all during the summer. I love fall weather!

Our moms Bible Study started back up on Friday – that was fun! We are a much bigger group this year and I am looking forward to it. It is at the church where the boys go to school. We’re reading the book “Who Got Peanut Butter on My Daily Planner” and so far (1st chapter) it is really good!

Nothing too major on the calendar this week either. Bible Study Monday night (and the boys start Cub Scouts – HMMM guess I’ll take Dane to Bible Study with me!) and then Tuesday – let’s see it’s Red Day in preschool (LOL) Christian and Ryan have 911 camp at school and I have a baby apointment. Wednesday we have to pick up our veggies at the farm (like we do each week), Friday I have to have 3 dozen cookies at school for some fundraiser and Saturday is another home football game. I think that’s about all I have on my calendar.

Well, it’s 6:30 p.m. so I guess I better get something started for dinner.

C-