Asphalt--+1, Minivan -2

What an eventful week we have had so far--and not necessarily in a good way. To clarify my title I must first give a little background. We live about 2 miles from Caleb and Emma's school, and you don't have to get on any major roads to get there, so it takes only a few minutes--they get out of school at 2:50, so I usually don't leave the house until about 2:54 to get there to where I don't have to sit in line a long time at the school. I also have Jake with me, and he has usually just woken up from his nap--which means he is cranky and does not like to put his clothes back on--so he goes a lot of times in his top and his underwear:-) Well, on Wednesday Jake didn't take a nap because we had a lot of errands to run and didn't get home until around 1pm--so no time for a nap. He was dressed except for his shoes because I told him it was too cold to go in his normal attire. So we finally headed out and it was 2:56-- a few minutes later but I figured we would still get there in plenty of time to pick the kids up. Once you get onto 54th street, it is pretty narrow in a few spots--not much more room than for 2 normal-sized cars to squeak by one another. Right after turning onto the road I noticed a car coming so I slowed down--however the car decided not to scoot over much. I went off the road and while attempting to come back on-apparently hit something that took out both tires on the right side of the van.

So I stopped on the curve ahead to assess the damage and was pretty upset at that point. Shon was out-of-town, I knew no one who lived close to me, and my kids were still at the school. After a panicked call to the school, I told them I would call them back after I figured something out. So I called Megan, and she graciously agreed to come pick them up (love you girl!) Then I needed to figure out how to get the car fixed. I called my dad and he didn't answer, so I tried mom next-she suggested calling the Honda place, so that was my next call. They gave me a towing company recommendation and so that was the next place to call ( I was so thankful that I had remembered my phone!). The woman said she would put the call in and asked me my address:-) I told her I was on 54th street--no address:-) Then I called Sam's, which is where we bought the tires in June. We added the Roadside Hazard protection for $15 a tire, which I later found out was the smartest thing we could have done. I asked if there was any chance that the tires would be covered, not thinking they would be, and the guy said they should be covered. So, at this point, Jake has fallen asleep in the car, I had a plan, and my kids were being picked up:)

Megan and John arrived shortly after I got off the phone with Sam's, and John stayed with me while Megan picked up Caleb and Emma. We all waited on the tow truck, which showed up after about 40 minutes. ( he was on the other side of Springdale when he received the call). We all piled in their car after the van was on the truck, and headed to Sam's. Once there, I was in for a fun hour plus wait with my kids while they fixed the tires. Thankfully, our service plan covered the tires, so I only had to pay around $36 for the instillation.

All in all, it was a very exhausting day. We left Sam's a little after 6 pm, and ran through the drive-through at Sonic for supper. I went to bed early that night, ready for a better day the next day!

Sickness is here:-(

Well, I was just thinking on Friday that we had avoided any of the sickness that has been going around--looks like I thought that way too soon! Emma started off the weekend with diarrhea all day on Saturday (sorry if there are any squeamish who read this, but I am assuming it is my mommy friends:-) She ran fever of 101 after her nap, and I just kept waiting for her to start throwing up as well. Thankfully, she woke up Sunday am starving and had no more symptoms of any kind. However, last night Caleb came downstairs 3 different times to tell me he couldn't sleep--all between 11 and 12 am. Finally, the last time he ran to the bathroom and threw up everywhere (thankfully he made it in the toilet, though). So, we are home today and I am making sure he eats bland food-no more throw up as of right now, but I am weary and wondering when Jake is going to catch something. I also feel really bad because my co-teacher at Kid's Day Out is out today with her daughter (the flu) and so our sweet 3 year old class will have 2 subs today instead of 1-I hope they don't freak out too much!

I may have forgotten something...

So, I was so proud of myself for remembering everything that happened that was major over the summer-then I realized I forgot a pretty important event (actually a few of them:-) The big one I forgot is that Shon and I celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary in August. Of course, we have no pictures, but we had a great time--our church has a ministry for couples called Friday Night Out. If you are in Sunday school, you will get a voucher for the next Friday night's childcare. You email the coordinator by Wednesday to get your kids on the list. Then on Friday, you bring said children to the church, drop them off, and go have fun! The wonderful workers keep the kids from 6-9:30pm--and it is FREE! What a blessing! So, Shon and I dropped off our kids, and headed to Ruth's Chris steak house in Rogers--it was fabulous! We had eaten there (sort of) on our honeymoon, but I ended up feeling ill and we had to leave--and the steak we got on our honeymoon was wonderful even though it was cold by the time I was able to eat it. So, I knew the warm version would be even better:-) We were at the restaurant for about 2 1/2 hours, and it was perfect. We each had a wonderful steak, salad, side, and then our waiter brought us out a free dessert for our anniversary, complete with candle:-) The manager brought us a gift certificate for $25 off our next visit. Then we closed out the night by going to Wal-Mart:-) where I got a wireless speaker for my ipod.

I also forgot to mention that Shon and I both celebrated birthdays over the summer--mine in June and his in July. I don't really think we did anything to special--other that wish one another happy birthday:-) So, sorry for the double post, but I did want to remember such a memorable evening!

Long time no blog!

SO,epic fail on my part to blog over the summer at all--and also the start of school, and our Disney vacations, and Halloween--so this will be a pretty long post. Sorry the pics are out of order--can't seem to figure that out on here:-) So we will start with Halloween and work our way backwards through the summer:-) Here are the kids with mom on Halloween--she and dad came up for the Razorback game and she got the pleasure of trick or treating with us. The kids had a lot of fun and we were able to keep it short since we had to get mom back to pick up dad. I was also very thankful for an extra hour of sleep that night:-)
Caleb was Duke from GI Joe, Emma was Pocahontas, and Jake was Woody from Toy Story.

He had to try his costume on as soon as it came in the mail-hence the single shot of him above.

Here is the start of our Disney pictures--which is actually the end of our vacation. Here is my sister Christy and her husband Josh with the kids--they really enjoyed being around them all week--and I think Josh and Christy had fun as well:-)

Caleb and the other boys (adults) went on to Star Wars, so mom and the kids and I took a detour to see Lightening McQueen and Mater--Jake was a little tired of smiling at that point.

I think this was probably the highlight of Jake's trip--I love the look on his face as he sees Woody "in person". We only had to wait 10 minutes in line--it worked out great. We went on the new Toy Story ride right after this, and that was our longest wait at the park--1 hour from start to finish.

We waited to see Mickey and the rest of the gang about 30 minutes-this was towards the end of the afternoon at Epcot and they are getting a little bit tired. We stayed at Epcot all day long--through the fireworks that night, and they were such troopers! I can tell you my legs hurt something fierce by the time that night was over-I'm surprised I could walk the next day.

Here's the gang getting pictures with Captain Hook and Mr. Smee--they were all really into getting the characters autographs.

Emma, Jake, Shon and I waited in line to meet the princesses--mom, dad and Caleb went and rode go karts:-)

I love this picture of Jake--he really seemed to like Belle:)

Here we are at the first afternoon in Downtown Disney--Emma had a princess makeover at the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique--she loved it! They fixed her hair, put makeup on here, and painted her nails. Plus she was able to keep the makeup and nail polish.

The boys got "cool dude" makeovers--Jake wasn't thrilled while it was being done, but seemed to enjoy it after he got down from the chair. They both have "pirate dust" (confetti) in their hair and Mickey Mouse painted on the back of their hair.

Christy with Caleb and Jake

Mom and Emma

1st day of school--Caleb started 3rd grade with Mrs. Huddleston, and Emma started 1st grade with Mrs. Hill.

We also had swim lessons at the end of the summer at Swim Ranch--they loved it, as did I. They made such strides from the beginning of the week to the end. Caleb and Emma both swam the entire length of the pool by the end of the week without any help-I was so proud! It was very warm that week, so we made good use of Sonic's happy hour!

For 4th of July we enjoyed the fireworks at the crosses at Pinnacle Hills campus--it was so pretty and let me try out some night shots with my new camera. The kids enjoyed it as well.

Summer vacation started out with swim lessons at Wilson Pool. Caleb and Emma were in the same class and really seemed to enjoy being in the water. Jake and I hung out and waited at the pool--he had fun playing with cars and eating snacks:-)

We also visited my sister-in-law Renessa and her husband Greg and our nephew Clayton this summer, but of course I forgot my camera and so I have no pictures of that. The kids were able to swim everyday in their pool and we had a great time.

They also got to visit my parents and Shon's parents at different times this summer--they enjoyed both visits.

So I think I am caught up for now--we are looking forward to Thanksgiving with my parents and getting ready for Christmas. I can't wait!