Happy Halloween!

Here are the kids being groomed to be Duck Fans...
er... I mean here are the kids in their costumes!













Sawyer hasn't a clue what candy really is of course, but he found the wrapped up candy was so fun to dig in and play with!!









Savannah's favorite part of the night was the glowstick bracelets. As soon as we got home from Trick or Treating, she dropped her candy bucket and just played with the glowsticks, dancing and twirling around with them.





And one more shot of the little ducks before game time...
... note the little play fork in Sawyer's hand. He walks around with that pretty much all day (ready to eat at any time I guess?!?). Apparently he thinks it completes the costume.

Here's what we were doing last year at this time...

Savannah was getting her first kiss...


And picking pumpkins with Sydney...













And we were just a family of three waiting to meet our new little baby... (taking a nice bumpy hayride to try and bring on the "meeting" a little sooner!!)




Savannah had picked out baby pumpkins for herself
and "Baby Miah" (she was convinced at that point that her brother or sister-to-be would in fact be a sister and her name would be Miah.
No Discussion.)



Two days after Halloween, we met our little Sawyer Isaac.
What a difference a year makes!

News, Nashville, and other nonsense

Whew... what a weekend! Our trip itself was really nice and relaxing, and we were able to spend a little over two full days just hanging out with some really great friends. But I feel like the last 36 hours have just consisted of going, going, going and I haven't had a chance to unpack, let alone write or post pictures. And big surprise... I have plenty of pictures I want to share.

We had a busy day today... Porter was here this morning and we all spent some time outside in the warm fall sun. After a quick naptime, we were back outside and then came in to carve our pumpkins before dinner. Yes, tomorrow is Halloween... nothing like the last minute...









One reason our day seemed extra busy and long was that poor Sawyer was all out of sorts today. He pretty much spent the whole day with his binky in his mouth and never let his froggy blanket out of his reach. And even with the bink in his mouth, he still spent most of the day whining and/or crying. Just not the happy boy we're used to. I was pretty sure all day it was just his teeth really bothering him, but then this evening during dinner his eyes were watery and he was getting pretty stuffed up so I guess he's coming down with a cold. After he was done eating, while we were all still at the table, he just lay down on a pillow on the living room floor with his frog and his bink and waited for us to be done. Needless to say, he was in bed early this evening. Poor little guy... I hope he's better tomorrow.

So, back to the trip...
We had alot of fun and I'm really glad we went. We so enjoyed our time visiting with Dave and Amie. It was really good to spend some quality time just hanging out and talking together. We did bring Sawyer along with us so he could meet his future college roomate Benjamin. Sawyer did surprisingly well on both driving days (he slept over three hours on the way home yesterday!!!) for such a long trip. Of course we made a couple of extra stops along the way to let him get out and run around, but overall, it was a pretty easy trip.
We got into Nashville about 9:30pm on Thursday.
Friday we just spent the day relaxing around the house. Dr. Dave had to go in to work, so we spent the morning getting to know little Ben and comparing notes with Amie on life with an almost-one-year-old. Ben is just about 7 weeks younger than Sawyer, and he's a happy, busy little guy. We were so glad we decided to take Sawyer with us to get the boys together to play. I think they found each other pretty entertaining!







We adults definitely had fun watching them together.
We headed out to meet Dave for lunch early that afternoon, and then came back to the house for naptime. That evening, we all pitched in for a yummy dinner of homemade Curried Butternut Soup. (This really is a great recipe... and really easy. Try it!)

Saturday we went for a nice long walk in a park by a river. The fall weather was perfect.





















Then, Saturday evening we got a babysitter for the boys, went out to a nice dinner at a local brewery and then headed to the Bebo Norman concert. The concert was awesome. Such amazing artists... such amazing worship... such an Amazing God! As always, I was so glad we went. And so glad that Dave and Amie decided to join us. They even ended up "adopting" another child... sponsoring a little boy from the Phillipines through Compassion International. It was a great night.
By the way, I think Ryan and I have decided it would be a neat thing to do for each of our kid's birthdays we'll pick a sponsor child that is their same age (maybe even the same birthday) for them to write to, to pray for, and try to relate to as they grow up "together". If you've ever given any thought to sponsoring a child in need, Compassion is a great place to start. Check out some of their information.

We headed out pretty early Sunday morning... we felt our heads were being messed with (as well as our sleep!) with the daylight savings time change and the time zone change going back home. We did stop at an outlet mall for a bit and picked up some jeans for Savannah and winter pj's for both the kids. But we were back on the road pretty quick and made pretty good time coming home.
Evidently Sawyer missed his own bed, cuz he slept good all night and then slept in until almost 9 in the morning! That is unheard of for that kid. Maybe it should've been my first clue that he was getting sick today...


Here's one more picture of Savannah with her class last Thursday at their Halloween party. She wore her ladybug costume from last year. She was determined to either be a cow (which is what she was two years ago) or a ladybug (last year). I guess it's just becuase she remembers those costumes so when anyone would ask her what she was going to be for Halloween, those were her answers. Not too original. She and Sawyer are dressing up together for actual Halloween and pictures and trick or treating and stuff, so I let her be the ladybug for school. It was still cute!

So we have another couple of busy days coming up. Tomorrow Savannah has school and then of course it's Halloween and I'm not quite sure what we're doing yet, but I'm sure we'll trick or treat or something. Then on Wednesday morning my sister, Trish, is coming into town, and Thursday is of course the SawMan's big day! Ryan is taking Thursday and Friday off for Sawyer's birthday and to have more time to hang out with the family and find some extra fun stuff to do around here. We're having a little party for Sawyer on Saturday with his little friends (and some of our big friends too...).
Also, I'm actually going to attempt to get the dining room painted sometime in all that busy-ness this week. Sheesh... I'm going to need another vacation!!!

Pumpkins and Pictures

My mom and I took the kids out to Flavor Fruit Farms today and met up with Katie and Donnie and Nicole and Porter. This farm had a petting zoo (or at least that's what they called it), quite a pile of pumpkins, a huge corn maze, and a cute little store with fresh apple cider and donuts. The donuts were very yummy... Savannah of course had sprinkles, mine was an apple donut topped with caramel. Mmmmm.....
Definitely not the same as Lee's Farm we always went to for pumpkins back home... Annie, it made us homesick to see the pics of you guys at the farm. We missed going with you guys!
Anyway, the weather was gorge-ee-us today. Nice and sunny and not too cold. It was nice to get out of the house since it's either been too wet or too cold here lately. The kids loved running around; they were both pretty tuckered out tonight by bedtime.
Here are a bunch of pics from the day...
Sawyer found the animals pretty enthralling...










But then he found Donnie's toys a little more interesting.













Savannah with her sprinkle donut.... and apparently Sawyer decided the gourdes looked pretty appetizing.













Here's what happened when we tried to pose the boys and get a picture of them together... (once again, you can click on any of these to see the larger image)

The only way to get them all somewhat happy together was to sit them on this glider bench.

And then I couldn't get Sawyer to leave it. He just decided to hang out there... sit for awhile, rock for awhile, just take it easy...












So here are just a few more... I know, I know, will this ever end? (If you think this is alot, you should see how many pictures I actually took...)































So we're off to Nashville tomorrow. Savannah has her Halloween party at school tomorrow morning, and Ryan's going to join her class for that, since he won't usually be able to do that. So as soon as they're done partying, we'll be on our way. (And we still haven't positively decided whether the little Sawman will be joining our road trip or not. I think it's going to be a game-time decision.)
I'm excited to go! I haven't been on a trip for fun since... I don't even know when. The last trip we took was to come out her to look for houses. I don't remember the last time before that.

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

the flurries are back

It's snowing again. It's been drifting down lightly most of the morning. Nothing big, I doubt any of it will stick around long... everything's been pretty wet around here. But of course Savannah was loving it!
My dad decided to head out and rake our half-acre of leaves. It's funny, everything has dropped so fast in the last couple of weeks. We went from a green lawn to a full carpet of yellow orange and red in what seems like no more than a week. And I mean COVERED! So dad decides to get to work with the rake even though I've warned him it's A LOT of leaves and A LOT of yard. And Savannah bundled up to help him.










Sure enough, when I came out to snap a picture of Savannah with her Grandpa, he says to me (after completing one side of the driveway and just in front of our front walk), "you can't rake this whole yard, there's too many leaves! you need a blower."
Uh, yeah, I think that's why we hadn't done it before.





Then after I layed Porter down for his nap, I took Sawyer out for just a minute. I need to get him some snowpants. He has a hard time walking in the grass (especially all bundled up so he can hardly move anyway) with the uneveness, and it's wet and muddy from all the rain we've had. But he still trips too much to walk safely on the driveway or front walk, so I ended up walking around holding his hand the whole time so that he didn't get wet or muddy or crack his head on the concrete. Definitely need snow pants before it really snows and just so he can play in the yard when it's been wet. I finally brought him back in and he was content just watching from the front window.

You can't see the snow in the pictures because it was still really light flakes. It's snowing much harder now. I wish it would stick a little and make everything pretty and white.

The Perfect Pumpkin Cookie

It's been a challenge finding good recipes for breads and muffins that don't have milk or eggs in them that are still moist and yummy. I love the pumkin bread recipe I've always used, but it calls for orange juice, and Sawyer shouldn't have that either.

Well, I tried this recipe this morning (I found it on this mom blog and I think it's originally from Allrecipes.com) and it is so yummy!!! I made half without chocolate chips for Sawyer and me because I don't normally like chocolate chips in breads like pumpkin or banana. But after eating one of my cookies this morning, I tried another with the chips and it was really good! These are perfect cookies, just the slightest bit of crisp on the outside and fluffy and moist on the inside. Reminded me of muffin tops actually! If you like pumpkin, you have got to try these...

Egg Free Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Cookies
Yields: 48 servings

Ingredients:

• 2 cups white sugar
• 1 cup shortening, butter, or margarine
  
• 1 (15 ounce) can pumpkin puree
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 4 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 12 ounces semisweet chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
2. Cream the sugar, shortening, pumpkin and vanilla together. Mix until light and well combined.
3. Mix the flour, baking soda and ground cinnamon in separate bowl.
   
4. Stir the flour mixture into the creamed mixture. Mix until combined. Stir in the chocolate chips.
5. Drop by teaspoons onto an ungreased baking sheet. Bake at 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) for 12 to 15 minutes or until set. Let cookies cool on a rack.

Nutrition facts (per serving):Calories (kcal) 146 Protein 1.5g Cals from Protein 3% Total Fat 6.5g Cals from Fat 38% Carbohydrates 21.6g Cals from Carbohydrates 56% Fiber 1g Cholesterol 0mg Sodium 75mg

So, my parents are in the air, on their way here from Portland as we speak. We're just spending the morning around here tidying up a bit, getting ready for their visit. They'll be here for two weeks- till just after Sawyer's birthday. My youngest sister, Tricia, and her boyfriend are coming for a short time in there as well. So we'll have a house full for a bit.

Ryan and I are actually going to take off next weekend and go down to visit some friends in Nashville for a couple of days. Savannah's staying here with Gramma and Grandpa for sure, but we haven't decided on whether Sawyer is going to tag along with us or not. The friends we are going to see have a baby boy born last December, so he's just a tad younger than Sawyer and it would be fun to get them together to "play" and meet each other. This is one of Ryan's very best friends, so it's really neat to have boys so close in age.
But on the other hand, now that we don't live near any of our family, this is our one chance to let the kids stay with gramma and get away for a couple of nights. This will probably be our only opportunity to be childless for who knows how long... our chance to sleep in, to not have to chase around a toddler who climbs on everything , to not have to pack diapers and bottles, to have a break from the mommy/daddy job for a minute. Plus that's a long drive with a little one.
So I don't know what we'll decide. It would be fun to bring him... but it would also be nice to just relax on our own. I go back and forth.

Let's see... anything else going on around here?
Not sure how often I'll hop on here to write with the family here. Could be less if we're busy... could be more if I need to escape! We'll see!!!

I'm It

I've been tagged by Leslie, so I'm supposed to list five random things about myself. This does not, I'm afraid, vary much from my usual posts due to the fact that you can count on me being random pretty much every day. Well, let me try to come up with five random things most people probably don't know about me...

1. I have a habit of ever so slightly rubbing my foot against something when I'm trying to get really comfy or fall asleep. Usually it's just against the blanket, or whatever is touching my foot. My other leg, Ryan's leg, the couch cushion...
2. Along those same lines, I CANNOT sleep with socks on. If I do, it probably means I'm very sick. I sleep best with a bare foot sticking out of the blankets off the side of the bed.
   
3. I could live on breakfast cereals. A bowl of cereal is my go-to snack. When I was pregnant I probably ate upwards of 5 bowls a day. I coudn't get enough of it! Now, in my normal life, I average just one or two a day. One most every morning for breakfast, and then it's not at all unusual to find me with one for an afternoon snack or before bed. And it's not just one kind of cereal... I like them all, and I always like to have a variety in my house. Most families have like two or three boxes on hand to choose from. Right now we have 11 boxes of cereal in our cupboard. I'm not kidding, I just got up and counted. Plus a thing of oatmeal and a box of malt-o-meal. And Ryan doesn't even eat cereal! That's all for me. Savannah usually just eats oatmeal. Although the Cheerios are mostly for Sawyer.
4. I have a strange fear of being attacked by a random dog while out on a walk. I think it started when I had a new baby. I would take so many walks with the stroller and for some reason, I just felt so vulnerable walking around quiet, seemingly empty neighborhoods, in the middle of the day when no one else seemed to be around. I always make sure I take my cell phone with me when I go for a walk, not because I'm afraid of being abducted or anything normal people would be cautious of, but because I'm sure a dog will come running out of a yard somewhere and attack me and I will need to call for help. Isn't that crazy?
5. I am already counting down the day's till we can get our Christmas tree. (43 days till Ryan would allow it, and really probably one more week after that) That is one of my all time favorite things to do; find the perfect tree and get it decorated in our house. That really makes it Christmas time!

Okay, so there you go.
And I really don't have many others to "tag" in turn. The few readers I know I have aren't bloggers, or if they are, most of them have already been tagged recently. Annie?
How about this...
if you want to join in the game, leave one of your most random or unusual things about yourself in the comments here. It'd be nice to know I'm not the only wierd one out there!
Oooh, here's a little incentive... if you don't leave your own random thing, I could share a strange or random thing I know about each of you.... that might be fun... HAHA!!

Random thoughts, links, and moments of peace...

In light of my post yesterday, I thought it only fitting to add this to share with you all.
Ryan gave me this card a few months ago (yes, I have one of those rare husbands who gets cards for me out of the blue just to let me know he's been thinking of me) and I love it! I guess that goes without saying, seeing as I love most everyone of Brian Andreas' "stories". If you don't know who I'm talking about, you should check some of these out... you'd be hard pressed to not find one of these that speaks either directly to you or about you. Probably many of both.



Here are some other random thoughts for you today...

~Most of us have seen a bit of Dove's new Real Beauty campaign. I think it's great. Well, I came across this commercial I hadn't seen before that Dove (the soap and beauty products- not the chocolate!) put together. It's pretty amazing. I just have to say Kudos to Dove for helping to clue us in to what really goes on in the modeling world. Go here to see it.

~And along those same lines, when I watched the above clip on YouTube, I also came across some great photos. Take a look at these and these for fun. Or at least to feel a little bit better about yourself!

~Savannah has her first show and tell tomorrow. I'll let you know what she ends up sharing. She changes her mind every hour or so. Her foremost idea as of now is to bring her Lammie. Kind of boring, I know, but that is her absolute most favorite thing in the world. If you need some proof of that, this is her favorite picture in a frame in her room... her two best friends; Lammie and Sydney!
Today she told me we should paint our fingernails and toenails and then she could show her class her beautiful toes. I'm curious to see what she ends up bringing.

~Tomorrow the girls and I (Nicole, Katie, Leslie and Maria) are getting together. I'm sure everyone will just shake their heads or roll their eyes at this, but we're having a wedding rehash. We're all bringing our wedding videos and pictures and stories and ideas to help get Maria rolling on her planning. (yeah, that's the reason... we would never just do this because it's fun to see what everyone's wedding was like since most of us weren't at each other's.... or just because us moms or mom-to-be want to relive the days that we were once thin and lookin' our best... or any other ridiculous reason you might think of... no, we're doing it for Maria... yeah... that's it...)
Yes tomorrow we'll be spending the evening sitting on the couch eating ice cream sundaes and sighing about how sad it is we no longer fit in those dresses.
Exciting, aren't we?!

I'm so *tired* of this...

Warning: mom on the verge of insanity ahead. If you have never been a mom on the verge of insanity, do not have kids, or do not want to read about mine, proceed at your own risk.

Both of my kids are crying in their beds right now.
That would not be so unusual if it was perhaps the start of naptime on a day in which we had maybe a long morning. But as I sit here, it is almost 3 o'clock in the afternoon -after our usual naptime- and they are both in their beds crying, having had no nap as of yet.
Here's the scoop. Savannah has had a rough couple of days. She's been awakened pretty early each morning by Sawyer, being not so considerate of the rest of our sleeping schedules, in his room by about 5am. And it's wearing on her. I can tell she's super tired and today she has lost it over some very minor things. So on the way home from preschool today I alerted her ahead of time that I really wanted her to get some sleep during her rest time today. (and for the record, she actually agreed with me. at the time)
So we get home and have some lunch and I let them both know we can all play together for about 30 minutes and then we're all going to take naps. So we make it to naptime and I tuck Savannah in her bed and talk to her again about how tired it seems like she is today and how she will feel alot better this afternoon after a good sleep for rest time. We turn on her music and put her books away and get her settled in and I think we're good to go. She's so tired, I think to myself, she'll be asleep in five minutes.
Fast forward to 2:00; (that's the designated time that "rest time" is over and she can come out of her room) I'll skip over boring you with all the monotonous details of how many times I was in there shushing her singing, removing books from her bed, how many times she got up to go potty, etcetera, etcetera. Savannah comes out of her room at 2, having completed her required rest time. We snuggle for minute and I remind her once again of how tired she was this morning and how that makes her grumpy and whiney and not very much fun and I wonder aloud why she didn't take a little nap after all that. She said she felt much happier and her body just wanted to play. I look in her tired little eyes and I tell her that if she can be happy; fine. But if she starts to cry or to whine, that tells me that she's too tired and she will go right back to bed to get some sleep. She agrees. And guess how long it takes before the tears start? About 6 minutes. She was writing "lists" and looking out the front window sitting on the couch with me when she accidentally dropped her water bottle behind the couch.
And it landed on it's side and was spilling.
And that was the end of the world.
She literally fell apart. Before I could reach it, before she could tell me what happened, almost before it even landed I think. So I scooped her up and carried her back to bed. She was screaming and crying "I dropped my water! I want my water! I don't need to sleep! I want my daddy!" In between her hysterics, when she'd pause for a breath, I reminded her of our deal and pointed out how tired her body must be to make her feel so sad and upset and tried to just hug her for a minute, but she was absolutely hysterical. There's just no other word for it. So there she is. And has been for the last almost hour.
Now for Sawyer's part in this. Due to his quickly-becoming-the-norm sleep boycott, I've been keeping him up all morning the past week or so on the days I think he can make it, trying for just one nap a day in an effort to fix this night waking (or early morning) thing. Maybe he's just not that tired(?). So this morning he had no nap, but he fell asleep on the way to pick up Savannah from school, and slept for almost that whole half-hour trip in the car. So I thought that short nap might hold him over a little longer than having to go down right at noon like he usually does for his lone nap. But he was acting very tired anyway by about 12:30. So I lay him down. But for the next almost hour, all he did was play in there. So I actually got him up (which I NEVER do, because I don't want him thinking he gets to decide whether or not it's naptime...) because he seemed to be getting more and more awake in there and so we read some books and then I gave him a bottle and he seemed to be settling down, so I put him back in bed. Which was just in time for Savannah to get up and then start her big meltdown.
So now for this past half-hour, they're both in there crying, and even if one starts quieting down, the other gets louder and upsets the other one again. I went back and forth for awhile trying to get someone to calm down enough to fall asleep, but I gave up and came out here to vent. (can't call anyone... I can hardly hear myself think over the whining contests going on down the hall.)

*Now in the time I've typed this, I did get Sawyer up again. I figured, I could still try to put him down for a quick nap before dinner sometime, but I need to quiet him down because Savannah NEEDS to sleep. So he was out here playing at my feet while I tried to finish typing this and in the span of about 5 minutes, he has fallen and hurt himself three times. Tell me you aren't tired, little man. So I'm holding him and rocking him here on the couch and he looks so sleepy. I take him in his room to rock him in the dark and he starts whining. And then Savannah comes out of her room again.
AAAARRGGHHHHHH!!!

I don't know what the heck happened... I thought we used to have kids actually sleeping during naptime around here. HELP!

The Dazzling Weather, Some Friendly Faces, and a Couple of Fellow Oregonians

Yesterday was just gorgeous weather! I just love the sunny days in the fall with all the leaves. We took the kids outside for some leaf romping, and they had a blast. I got some great pictures... here are just a few. I went crazy with the camera yesterday; Savannah and Sawyer were just having so much fun and the colors were so pretty!


























I have many, many more pictures, and like I've promised before I will try really hard to get them uploaded to our albums soon.


We went to a new church yesterday. It was really nice because I think it's safe to say we talked to more people at this church yesterday than we have at all of the other churches we've been to combined. We had people coming up and introducing themselves and welcoming us right and left. We talked to the pastor and he introduced us to the guy who led worship because he and his wife lead the young couples group they have. It doesn't sound like they have small groups like the community groups we're looking for, but they do have groups divided up for kind of a bible study/Sunday school thing before the service on Sundays. And I was invited to join a moms group going out to breakfast this Thursday.
And get this- the pastor there went to Western Seminary in Portland, OR. His wife grew up there and he went to school there and pastored a church in Estacada (which is pretty much down the road from where Ryan's parents live) and then in LaGrande before moving here to Michigan. And yesterday was a special service kicking of this little missions workshop thing they're doing and so their pastor didn't actually give a sermon, they had a missions professor speak. And he was from Portland as well; he works at Western. So as he was speaking he was mentioning all these different spots in Portland and the surrounding areas and it was just so nice to not only know what he was talking about, but know it so well!
And the worship was even nice! They have a nice combination of traditional and contemporary worship. They sang a couple of hymns and had a choir, but they also had a worship band and sang some more contemporary songs. I actually had tears in my eyes for most of the worship because I hadn't realized how much I missed that. I mean, I have my share of christain music and I sing around the house and in the car, but to stand with a congregation and worship together... I didn't realize how much I needed that. It was awesome. I thought of you Teri, when you said the first time you visited that church across the street how you were practically crying all through the worship because you had that "inner conversation" going on but you thought people were going to think you were crazy or you had some major thing going on in your life or you were just realizing you were ready to accept Christ or something. I was trying so hard not to cry while we were singing because I was just so happy to be there in the moment, but I kept laughing too because I thought, what must people think of this newcomer over there crying?!
Anyway, we're looking forward to going back there for a regular Sunday service to hear their pastor speak and maybe go to the couple's sunday school and see what that's all about.

Game Night

We had another great game night Saturday night. Our "regulars" were all in attendance again... the two of us, Don, Katie, Ryan, Nicole, Jade, Leslie, Maria and Andrew. Can I just say how fun it is to have a house full of friends again!?! It makes us feel back to normal again (as in more like home) to have a big group of people over and to have them hang out and make themselves comfortable in our home. We are so blessed!

As part of Nicole's and my grand scheme to have the *Greatest Game Nights Ever*, this weekend's game night had a vegas/casino theme. We had a yummy nacho bar, bowls of nuts, chocolate "coins", and going all out creative, Nicole and I made a cake to look like dice as well as poker chip cookies. I forgot to get pictures before we dug in, but here's what the cookies looked like. These baking endeavours turned out to be an all day project and let's just say they were not as easy as we had planned. Not sure if we're going to be so "creative" next time!!
We played dice and card games all night. The girls actually never played anything involving wagers, but we did go a few rounds of Spoons and had a game of Egyptian Ratscrew that got pretty crazy. The men had themselves a good old fashioned poker game and we all played a bit of a dice game of Horse Race.

Us girls also had the chance to deveate away from the usual pregnancy, labor and baby conversations we end up in, and reminisce instead about our weddings and chat about bridesmaid dresses and wedding fiascos. Maria and Andrew had gotten engaged last week so we all ga-ga-ed over her ring and talked wedding talk. Congrats again guys!!!
All in all, it was a great night of games, laughs and friends!

Ladies and Gentlemen; WE HAVE SNOW

So three days ago it was warm and sunny and 76 degrees outside.
Today it is 34 degrees and snowing.
Any guesses on what weather will turn up this weekend?

It's been snowing off and on all day. It'll snow really hard and crazy all blowing around with the cold wind, cover everything with just the thinnest blanket of white, and then it'll stop and the sun will come out and melt everything away. It's completed this cycle at least five times since we've been home from preschool this morning.
Savannah loves it! She has spent probably 90% of her time at a window somewhere in our house today. If she's not watching the snow (because it stopped for the moment), she's watching FOR the snow. I know this isn't the greateest picture... you really can't see it, but it is snowing really hard.

I'm glad for the little dusting because ever since we told her the summer's over and the weather is getting colder, she asks me almost everyday if it's going to snow yet. I wonder why she's so excited about the snow this year. I don't think she remembers actually being in any snow because it barely snowed back home last year, and the years before I'm sure she was too young to remember. Anyway, I'm glad it's snowed early because now maybe that'll tide her over till we get some real snow later this winter and she won't ask me about it every day.
And I'm glad it snowed just because I love the snow. Ask me about that at the end of this winter of snow and really really cold temperatures and we'll see what I say. Anytime I say I'm excited to be here and experience a "real" winter, rather than Portland's usually mild winters, people always ask if I've ever experienced a midwest winter. Like if I had, I wouldn't be so excited about it. Well no, I've never spent the whole season in the midwest, but I don't think I'll mind it. I really don't mind the cold... and if there's snow along with it, all the better!
But like I said, ask me again in March, right?!?

Our Day with a Monkey

I've decided that a day in our life with Sawyer is about as close to living with a monkey as I ever want to get. This kid will not stay on the floor. Seriously.
Take a look...



He was over here









And up here
(he probably spent half his day up here at the top of the slide, just hangin' out, watching tv, singing to himself, watching over Savannah and Porter playing, whatever)








And up here, even though he knows he's not supposed to be up on the table.










I guess he's trying to teach Porter all the no-no's.
Here's the little P-man trying to follow in the Sawman's footsteps.




And that's just a sampling of the places I found him today. I mean it, he is all over the place! I can hardly keep up with him.
Savannah had her snack downstairs today and I put her up at the bar to eat it because Sawyer had just had finished his and was bugging her. But even up on the stool, he wouldn't leave her alone... he was trying to climb the barstool -or her leg- whatever would work. So then I put her on a stool INSIDE the bar and closed the door just so she could eat in peace. She thought that was pretty special. I thought that was pretty ridiculous. There's no escaping that little monkey!!