Monday, October 30, 2017

These Days

October was a fun, and busy month, as you can see from all the other posts in October!  

I caught a picture of Claire wearing her sunglasses upside down while we were in carline to pick up her sisters.  She only falls asleep in car line about once out of every two weeks or so now.  


One afternoon while visiting in Toccoa, Hannah was able to get SO close to this rabbit.  She was walking so slowly and carefully.  Precious! 


One night Bert went to check on the girls when we were going to bed and had me come look at Claire.  I had to run get my phone to take a picture of her cuddling all her animals.  


But then I wanted to take a picture of the other 3 girls too because aren't kids so cute when they sleep?!  They can melt my heart in a second when I watch them while they're sleeping.  



Abs woke up when the flash went off and was in the middle of putting her face in the sheet to avoid the bright light.  I ran out of her room as soon as I took it and she never really woke up, thankfully!! Close call! 


I caught Abby reading one day in this little baby bathtub that we were getting rid of.  We've used this same bathtub for all 4 of our girls.  They all 4 had their first bath in this little tub.  Sweet memories!  


Abby loves to look at books and to color.  If you give her some crayons and paper she will be occupied for a while.  

The book that she is looking at in the picture below is one that my parents recorded for her before she was even born.  It's a book just for her and she loves hearing Mimi and Papa's voice reading the pages to  her.  


One day when the older 3 kids were at school Abby and I tackled the shoes.  The girls shoes were in desperate need of organization so I dumped them all in the living room and started sorting.  We have a lot of shoes, but the picture below shows summer and winter shoes of every size (even the sizes they aren't wearing at this time).  After a couple hours I had all our shoes in boxes in the top of the closet to use for later, in a give away pile, in the trash or in their closet.  We're pretty organized, for now.  


Claire helping Daddy with a project!  


Abby and her friend Hunter!  These two have been friends since they were born and love seeing each other several times a week at church.  They really do get so excited about it!  


One afternoon Claire kept asking Abby to hold her hand and she did it every time.  They are buddies!!  


Abby enjoys dragging out my oven mitts!  


One Sunday Emily was ready for church early and Hannah was sleeping late so she asked if she could go on to church with her Daddy.  I got Hannah, Claire and Abby ready to go and then decided I wanted to quick picture since they were so cute in their pink.  Claire wasn't in the picture taking mood though and Abby wouldn't look at me.  1 for 3.  :)  


One afternoon last week it was an extra beautiful, fall Thursday and I decided that we should have our snack outside.  The girls LOVED this little activity!  After we ate a snack I read them library books while they drank their water.  I love the after school time when I get to hear about their days. So precious!  


That same day we just couldn't head inside.....it was too beautiful, so we headed to the driveway to play with their riding toys.  


I had them pose for a quick picture and it turned out super cute!  I love Claire's hand sticking out in the picture and Abby looks happy to be right in the middle of things!  


The Wednesday before Halloween the kids get to wear their Halloween costumes to Awana.  The picture below is Emily and Hannah with some friends from Church.  Sarah Catherine is beside Emily and Olivia is standing beside Hannah.  Sweet girls and we love doing life with their families.  


This past Saturday morning Bert had something to go to and Emily had a birthday party at a local park so I had to bring all three kiddos with me too.  We played on the little kid playground while Emily played with her friends at the party (and on the big kid playground).  

Hannah was SO sweet to Abby and stuck with her like glue.  She was so careful to make sure she didn't get hurt on anything and had her ride beside her down the slide every time.  Abby seemed to like playing with Hannah and didn't mind having a "second Mama."  


This cute thing played with Hannah and Abby some and played by herself some. Loved this picture of her jumping off the airplane.  She was nervous to jump at first, but once she did it she just kept jumping!  


For the last 6 weeks we've been meeting with these amazing couples and getting ready to start a small group ministry at our church. We are SO excited about this!  The Livingston and Rutledge small groups will start at the first of November.  We're so thankful for these leaders in our church and their desire to build and deepen relationships through small groups.  This past Monday was our last time meeting as a big group before the two groups start meeting on their own and we'll miss our time together so much!! Monday nights was one of my favorite times of the week over the last 6 weeks. Bert and I aren't going to be in a group right now, but will hopefully jump into a group sometime soon.  We're excited about these groups and we are praying for them!  


October has been so fun!!  We're looking forward to November and cannot believe Christmas is less than 2 months away!! 

Pumpkin Carving

October sped by us and before we knew it it was October 30th and we still hadn't carved a pumpkin.  Oops!!  

We made it happen today though (Oct. 30th) just in time!  The girls love doing this with their daddy each year!  


Getting ready to clean it out!  


Abby wasn't too sure about the slimy stuff in there.  


Emily and Hannah asked if they could wear gloves to clean it out.  Ha!  Prissy much?!  


Later Hannah ended up cleaning some of it out without her glove on, but Emily never did.  

Claire didn't want a glove and didn't understand why they did.  She told me when she got in the car after school today that they cleaned out a pumpkin at school and she wasn't scared to do it, but some of her friends wouldn't put their hands in there.  Ha! 



The finished product!!  


We were a little busy tonight.  After Bert got home from work we had to carve a pumpkin, feed the kids dinner, Emily and Hannah had to take a shower, and I had to make sausage pin wheels to bring to small group tonight, which we had to leave for by 6:00.  So, Bert kept the design simple, but I liked it!! 


Happy Halloween!

Paris Skate Night

This past Friday afternoon our School (Paris Elementary) had a skate night from 4-6.  Bert and I didn't decide that we were going until about 4:00, but we were glad we did!  The kids haven't ever skated before and we weren't sure how they were going to do with so many people being there, but they really wanted to go, so we decided to give it a try!  

After we decided we were going Emily and Claire both kept saying how much they wanted to skate.  Hannah told us over and over that she did NOT want to skate.  We bought tickets for Emily, Claire and Bert to skate and then went to put on the skates.  About 30 seconds after Emily and Bert had taken off to do their first lap Hannah decided that she did want to skate after all.  So we went back to buy her a ticket too!!  

Hannah with her friend Penny!  Both batgirls!  


Look at how little Claire looks!!  She loved it!   


Hannah had so much fun!!  She liked to skate by herself and wouldn't think of holding our hand.  She was all over that floor and did an awesome job!! 


Group shot of all the kids there.  The place is pretty big so it didn't feel like that many people at all, but if you just looked at this picture you would have thought we were packed in there!  


Our three little skaters!  


We were so proud of them for trying something new and having fun doing it!!  Roller Sports is about 3 minutes from our house so we're not sure why it's taken us this long to bring the kids there, but we'll definitely be back!

PS:  Bert is a seriously good skater. I realized that night that I'd never seen him skate in the 10 years we've been married.  Ha!  

Hannah's Halloween Party

Last Friday Hannah's class had their Halloween party and I got to go in and help with it!! I didn't do a great job taking pictures, but I enjoyed being there and helping with the different crafts that were planned.   



This past week was also Red Ribbon Week so they had a balloon release at the end of the day on Friday.  I was in the classroom helping with the party when they called everyone to the field to take a picture and see the balloon release.  


They kids were so excited to see the balloons go up.  I wish I had videoed it....so much jumping and cheering!!  


Hannah's class finished up their party with treat bags and then they all headed home for the weekend!!  The girls are so excited about Halloween this year!!  2 more days!!

The Girls Play While Mom and Dad Are Away

The girls had so much fun with their grandparents while we were on our anniversary trip!  We're SOOOOO thankful for our mom's for taking off work and keeping our kids so that we could get away.  Such a huge blessing!  

Linda was at a retreat in Myrtle Beach with her church and got to our house about dinner time on Saturday.  We had some ladies in our church (Ms. Sonja and Ms. Sherry) cover for us from about 2 until Grandmama got there so that we could make it all the way down to Panama City that night.  Grandmama kept Emily, Hannah and Claire and we dropped Abby off in Toccoa with my parents as we were on our way down.

Grandmama had a busy schedule of getting the girls ready for school, drop off, pick up, dance class, church on Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night, homework, reading, etc. Abby (19 months) is a full time job by herself so with all the running that Grandmama had to do we thought it would be best to send little Abs to Toccoa.  My mom was able to work most of Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and my Aunt Brenda and cousin Sharon kept her while mom worked.  We were so thankful for their help!  

Grandmama took the girls to a pumpkin patch on Sunday afternoon after church.  They had been asking to go on a hayride so this was super fun that she made this happen for them!  


They liked the play area and loved getting to pick 1 small pumpkin each!  


My dad sent this picture of mom reading to Abby one night.  Abby got to spend lots of one on one time with Mimi and Papa, which is so special!  


Ressie and Jacob came over on Sunday afternoon, while Katherine and Brett had something to go to and Abby enjoyed playing with them!  



We FaceTimed with the girls a couple days into the trip and it was SO fun to see them but after we had been talking a few minutes Claire got really sad.  She started crying and hugging the phone.  It just about broke our hearts in two.  I think we only FaceTimed one other time after that because we didn't want to make our baby sad.  


After we called the big girls it was Abby's turn!  She was eating dinner when we called and was as cute as ever!  


Grandmama had a "craft night" one of the nights she was there.  The girls are not blessed with the most crafty mom, so I love it when she does stuff like this with them!:) 





On Wednesday night Mimi and Papa and Abby drove over to Greenville so that Mimi could take over the babysitting duties!  The girls were SO happy to see Abby and Abby was so excited to see them.  Mom and Dad said it was the sweetest reunion.  Dad said you would have thought it had been a month since they had seen each other rather than 4 days.  


On Thursday morning Grandmama was off on another adventure.  She headed up to Kentucky to do some mission work with her church.  


Thursday morning Mimi let the girls pack their own bags (ha!) so that they could head to Toccoa.  They almost never get to pack their own bags, so it was definitely a special treat for them.  Hannah brought 15 stuffed animals and not enough pj's, but it all worked out just fine!  

Toccoa has a new ice cream place called Oscar Mike's in downtown Toccoa and Mimi and Papa took the girls once on Thursday and once on Friday.  This is a new favorite spot for them now!  


Mom sent this picture of Claire to me while we were on our trip and it made me smile.  This shopping cart was ours (mine and Kate's) when we were Abby's age.  I'd say it held up WELL!  


Mom kept Ressie on Friday while Katherine worked so they  had a full house.  Here they are watching a show while eating their lunch.  Whatever works!  


On Saturday morning Kate and Brett had another class so Jacob and Ressie came over to play again.  It was really fun that they got to spend time with their cousins while we were away too!  They sure do love each other!  


Thank you, thank you, thank you to Grandmama, Mimi, Papa, Mrs. Sherry, Mrs. Sonja, Aunt Brenda and Sharon for taking such great care of our girls!!  Our fun trip was not possible without y'all!!