Feeling Like Fall

We have had some beautiful weather around here lately and we love it. We spend a lot of time outside. Jackson had his first soccer practice and I was going to take some pictures but my memory card wasn't in my camera. And there ended up being a miscommunication about practice anyways. Only a few of us showed up and that didn't include our coach. So Andrew stepped in and did a few drills with the kids. That night I got an email forwarded from Leah from the boys coach saying that their first practice would be this week. Oh well. Then Andrew and I celebrated our 9th anniversary on Wednesday. We have now been married for longer than we dated. I gave him some collage pictures from the pics Lissy took of us for his desk and he gave me some roses. Then my parents treated us to dinner at their house that night. Thursday night was the first Little K of the year and Jackson had a blast. He had more of his friends go this year and they all loved it. And little Lincoln just tags along for it all. Isn't he sweet with Tadbit?I was supposed to have a girls' night Friday night that ended up not working out so Andrew got a sitter for us last minute (a girl that is in our small group who also works at his office) and we went to see "The American". It was a pretty bad movie, but it was nice to go on a quick date with Andrew.

Saturday morning, he took Jackson and Ellie out to the ranch. They were out there most of the day and had a great time. Jackson got to ride Bob some more (Andrew sends me pictures of their activities during the day).
Ellie found a sunflower and had fun running on the hay bales.Lincoln and I enjoyed playing outside and just relaxing.I also worked on these "job jars" for Jackson and Ellie. They now know what their chores are, it is just getting them to do them in a timely manner. So they get to put beads in their jars when they get ready on time, when they do a good job on their chores, are being nice to each other, etc. But they can also get beads taken away for fighting, whining, not listening, etc. It has been going well so far so hopefully it will last for awhile.Saturday afternoon and evening we just hung out around the house and ate dinner outside.Ellie feels like she needs to be in every picture. The kids got out a paper plane book Jackson got a few years ago and Andrew made some different planes for them to fly. It kept them busy for awhile and topped off a nice eveningLissy got into town on Sunday so she came over and ate dinner with us that night and Kaitlin and Zane stopped by for a little bit too. Then Monday was my mom's birthday. Happy Birthday Mom! We decided to have a little party for her so I headed to Wal-Mart while Andrew watched the kids. He sent me this picture saying, "I'm not sure what was about to happen but I'm pretty sure I just saved Lincoln's life." Jackson and Ellie have decided lately that it is fun to carry Lincoln around. He thinks it is fun for a little bit, then he has had enough. After my Wal-Mart trip we tried to do a little swimming but we didn't get the heaters turned on in enough time that the kids were ready to get out before it warmed up too much. The main source of entertainment though was a big, fat, green caterpillar. We think it fell out of a tree by the pool because it was so windy.We had to have everyone come out to look at it.Ellie was also very excited about the butterfly she caught. Then it was time to head home and get dinner ready. We put up a birthday banner and made some cupcake toppers. Lissy made German Chocolate cupcakes for mom and Amanda sent a cake home with her. Lincoln is always good about finding random pieces of cake/cupcakes laying around to snatch.

So today we are back at school. We have a short week this week because we head down to the Lake of the Ozarks on Thursday for vacation with Andrew's family. The rest of them are already down there but we are waiting until Thursday because Ellie has his first dance class and we have our first small group tomorrow.