the end of a chapter

We are off this week to Brighton, England! We have been busily packing, sorting, and doing daily routine stuff and a little extra.  We enjoyed T-man's work party Friday and Letty got to miss school. :) After the party we headed up to see the tree at Rockefeller Center, it was bigger than I thought it would be (74ft). All in all a great day! 

We have enjoyed our time here. We will miss our little corner of NJ, our great friends, and our ward. You all are invited to come and stay with us in England, we love visitors! Our plan is to return here after we finish this assignment. Wish us luck finishing everything this week. Wishing you a Merry Christmas!

Enjoying the ferry on the way to the World Financial Center

                                            

A funny story about Letty's Rudolf antlers.  She and I were leaving the building and her nose blew off, I couldn't grab it fast enough so it drifted into the road and got ran over by a car.  I couldn't help but laugh at the odds of a car hitting that small nose but there were some tears involved.  I dislike balloons for that reason, it always ends sadly.

                                           

Rockefeller Center

a little party I organized so that the girls could have a goodbye party and a mini birthday party for Kendra.  I have awesome friends (thanks for your house Erica, the food that was brought, and all the company)

                               

Santa at our ward party.  Baby can't resist that thick white hair!

Family Pictures

My awesome friend Randi came out and took our photos and enjoyed a weekend get away with her hubby in the city. We were delighted to have them stay with us for a couple of days. You guys are amazing! Thanks for capturing us during this phase of our lives.

Pumpkin

Since Halloween was "rescheduled", yes in New Jersey apparently when you have an emergency you can reschedule Halloween for the following Friday and Sunday, weird I know. We finally got around to carving. Instead of doing all of the pumpkins we did just this one so we could put our own little pumpkin inside.

It was a dark and cold night...

and it stayed that way for three days while our power was out. Although we found out at church today some were without it for six and seven days, yikes! A crazy snow storm came to visit us on October 29th and dumped about 6 inches of heavy, heavy snow on still fully leafed trees. This broke all kinds of tree limbs, knocking out the power all over New Jersey and much of the northeast. I'm not positive what the final number was but I know at least 600,000 people were without power in our state alone. It looked like a tree war happened outside with branches everywhere and trees in the street (not to mention the power and phone lines they took down with them), it was crazy and clean up is still happening. Lets just say it was an interesting experience, the kids were not too fond of the cold house and dark nights but they fared pretty well. The baby was the most miserable :( lucky girl got to sleep with mom and dad. We were very grateful for our awesome friends and ward.

My friend Randi and her husband came to stay with us this weekend and take our family pictures, they are super nice and a pleasure to have as our guests. They are off to finish the rest of their weekend in NYC.

All in all a very interesting week as we have spent most of it replenishing food and cleaning up after the outage.

Isaac

Five! How can that be? Letty has been so excited about Isaac's birthday. I love her seven year old perspective, it makes me happy. My heart is always a bit sad this time of year remembering... I suppose it always will be. I think it would be worse if I wasn't sad because it would feel like I had forgotten. I always want Isaac to be alive in our home so our girls know he was here, even if for such a short time. Letty always says she has a brother and it gets a bit awkward when people clearly don't see him and ask where he is? Oh well, I'm glad she is not as hindered or worried about what others think.

I feel like this experience has changed me and I hope made me better. After his death was a time we all felt like the Lord was carrying us and helped me to know more deeply how much the savior cares for us. I'm grateful for that.

Although loss is such an individual thing I feel like I can relate to those individuals in a way that I don't think I could have otherwise, it's given me some purpose in my experience and I'm thankful. We love you Isaac! We'll miss you always.

Fall is in the air

We have had some beautiful weather here. Now if the mosquitoes would just die and stop torturing my kids it would be perfect.


This is our first apple picking outing. Gracie and Linc.



Cowgirls
Aunt K came to visit last weekend :) it was so fun, as always. We went to a farm that has been here since the 1800's. The kids loved the horse drawn wagon.



This was their second favorite thing there, washing and hanging clothes out to dry. It's too bad we don't do it by hand at home or they would be all over it.
This is what we lovingly call A's "scrunchy" face. I LOVE this face! She makes it when she is overwhelmed with happiness. A is such a smiley happy baby. She amazes me with her contentedness.

I am sad these green boots are too small, this may have been the last time wearing them. Gracie has loved them as well. I wish I could wear a leotard and rain boots.

These girls love each other. They enjoy taking gymnastics together.

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and so it begins

The beginning of the school year feels more like a time I should set "New Years" resolutions than it does in January. One thing on my list is starting a new praise system for the kids, which I still need to finalize. I have had a terrible itch to decorate or something around here but since we are moving soon that doesn't make much sense. Perhaps it's the fall weather we are having that is making me feel like a change. I guess I'll have to settle on purging and cleaning.

We had a short Sunday again (30 min.) and then T-man headed off to clean out some flood damaged houses. It is very cool to have the ward come together in such a physical and spiritual way all in the name of service. He came home dirty and smelling rotten from the slimy mud he was shoveling. He enjoyed helping out.

Little A just had a check up and came in weighing 17.7 lbs putting her in the 25-50% and measuring 30 1/4 inches and in the 95-97%


First day of 2nd grade
First day of preschool. Gracie is attending preschool twice a week run by four other ladies and myself (mommy preschool).
This is their cute attendance sign. She is so happy and excited to be going to "school."

Gracie was pretty worn out last week with her new school schedule. She and Letty also started gymnastics once a week, they love it! Especially since two of their friends are in it also. Gracie has always been my sleeper. She was the weird baby who would go to her crib and say "nigh nigh" as she would peer in. This little girls just crashes wherever and whenever its convenient.
The girls had a special treat on Friday when they got to go with Dad on a Father/Daughter camp out, good times!

Restoration

Palmyra, New York-

We enjoyed a fabulous Labor Day weekend in upstate New York joined by K-Rae, visiting church history sites and witnessing the raw and mighty power of Niagara Falls. Completely by Chance Pika and Pato were headed there as well so it made for a mini family reunion.


We visited Sis. Lovell while there and found her to be her wonderful personable and lovable self. True to her calling and in a very thoughtful way she issued challenges to each of us to teach, invite, fellowship and share the message of the Savior. We love our sister and aunt.



Niagra Falls (Canadian side which is by far the nicer side)

Beautiful, Awesome and inspiring Niagara Falls, taken on the Maid of the Mist
It turned out to be a rather hot afternoon, so the mist was refreshing.

Just outside the Sacred Grove, such a beautiful place.

PS. A is now crawling. Watch out world!

Earthquakes, Hurricanes, Giant catipillars! Oh my!

Irene passed through today and fortunately we weathered it very well. While we were dumped on with rain, we have seen very little damage due to the winds.

At about 2am we saw that the canals near our home have overflown and were flowing through our yard. Some of that carried on into the morning as you can get the feeling for in these pictures. However at night, the view from the back yard was a lake that only ended half way up our neighbor's driveway.



Backyard view of the lake and Giles home.

Lovell home premier of the The Little Red Hen.

It's amazing the things you'll find under your couch. Little A is getting ready to crawl. She needs to so that she stops scooting herself backward into tight spots. :)

I'm not sure what allure a gigantic hungry caterpillar has to a child, but despite the odd sight of it, Letty seemed to like it and Gracie at least tolerated the visitor to the Pottery Barn Kids story hour.

She did it!

She conquered her fears and finally rode on her own! We are very proud of the hard work Letty has put in to be able to ride without training wheels. She was VERY happy!

An afternoon at the community pool. Baby LOVES the water.
An interesting expression in the middle of a happy squirm
My babysitter while I was making dinner
A lovely and very talented seamstress in our ward is teaching a Mom and daughter sewing class. Letty really enjoys it. She very frequently asks me, "when do we have sewing class?" We have only had one class because our teacher got sick but she should have three more. I thought she was too young to use the machine, but what do I know?