Happy Belated Thanksgiving

We drove the broken van home. The seal between the doors was broken (as the door was bent) so it was a little cold driving home. I know it doesn't look all that bad, it could have been a lot worse! It just stinks knowing that we've only had this van for 6 months and it is a 2007! Let me tell you, while we were driving home, we continued to observe each ditch we drove by. God really was in charge as we drove down the embankment....it was so shallow and easy to take at the speed we were driving. How much difference a second can make in life. I know I already said that, but truly, it means a lot to me right now. Even the cries from my kids seem so much sweeter.

We did find time the next day to build a snowman. If we are going to live in this cold weather, at least we can enjoy the benefits of the cold. It was Emerald's first real snowman and true "playing" in the snow. She had such a good time. Calvin napped through our snow time, and when he woke up, most of the snow had melted. Unfortunatly, we didn't get a picture of him with this snowman, but I have a feeling there will be more to come in the near future.

We hope you all had a Happy Thanksgiving. We feel like we ate too much and now feel like we need to eat nothing for a week.

On our plates for the upcoming week....take care of the car, start looking for a house with our new real estate agent, continue Christmas shopping, unpack from our 2 weekends of travel, and start decorating our house for Christmas. That should be a fun, calm week for us!

Thank You God!!

Well, as if we didn't have enough going on in our busy lives...............we were in a car accident this evening. Most importantly, everyone is OK!! It is times like this that you realize how much difference 1 second can mean!! We were driving back from Wichita where we had dinner with Steph's parents and Aunt & Uncle from Florida. We were heading toward Skip's parents house. We got about 12 miles south of McPherson, and were crossing a bridge. The snow was coming down pretty good. The car in front of us slowed down and began to fish-tale in front of us, heading toward the left. We went onto the right shoulder and they "slammed on their brakes" (something they told the police) and whipped 300 degrees around to slam into the side of us, pushing us 100 yards into the ditch where, thank God, it was a gradual decline to the access road. Everyone was fine, but I lost it because the car slammed into the side near Skip and Emerald. Calvin slept through the entire thing (yes, my son that never sleeps :) ). We are away from our home computer, so we aren't able to dump pictures to show the damage. It doesn't look all that bad, but we can't open either driver door. We were able to drive back to McPherson. I guess we will call tomorrow and see what to do next. Wish us luck with this new event and please say a special Thanksgiving (appropriate) prayer to God for keeping us safe this evening.

Our First Kansas Snow!

Yep, that's snow you see, and on Calvin's 10 month b-day! It was 75 degrees yesterday and snowing with 30 mph north winds. The actual temp right now at 3:15 pm is 32, and wind chill is 20. Let me say again, it was 75 yesterday! What were we thinking :) Emerald kept asking "where is the snow" this morning. We didn't bring Calvin out yet, as he is just getting over a 2 weeks illness.

We went to Wichita/Belle Plaine last weekend to celebrate with Steph's family. Her 2 cousins flew in from Chicago and brought 8 month old Ben. It was nice to meet him. Her aunt was there from Florida. We had a nice visit, too bad it was so short.

This weekend we are headed to McPherson to see Skip's family and our Laney girl. We miss her lots and can't wait to cuddle up with her in this cold weather.

Calvin is looking forward to his first Thanksgiving. Emerald just wants to eat all the pie!

Happy Thanksgiving! We are thankful for our family and friends, our health, new job, and most importantly for the 2 little angels in our life that keep us smiling every day. May God bless you with as many things to be thankful for, also.

Calvin is SOOOOO Big!

It amazes me how these sweet angels continue to learn something new every day. We have been SICK, SICK, SICK at our house this weekend. Even through feeling like crud, Calvin made us smile by showing us he was "Soooo Big" all weekend. Now he will raise those hands on command every 20 seconds if you ask (and Emerald does, often). I even got one picture of him trying to say it while crawling.

It was so sad to watch both kids as sick as they were and not be able to help them. Luckily, Nana was here and she and Daddy took good care of the kids. Sad to say, they both got sick later, as did Uncle Jeff (how nice of us all to share). For Skip to take a day off work, that is saying a lot. Hopefully we will all be feeling better soon.

Since the last post, we have had Steph's friend Stephanie Lindsay and her family, Kyle, Keegan, and Gavin visit. It was tons of fun. We visited a kid's play space that was perfect for our little munchkins. It was a little busy trying to keep 4 kids under age 4 entertained, fed, and napped on a sane schedule. The best part of the week for me, though, was going to the opening night of the Garth Brooks concert! Talk about a blast! I wish Skip could have gone, maybe next time. I miss Garth.

We started to look at houses and did see 7 houses the first weekend of the month. At one of the housese Emerald was offered her favorite, a sucker, from a very sweet lady. As you can see, she thoroughly enjoyed every last lick. Maybe we should call her Smurfette. We plan to get back into house hunting once the family feels better. For now, it is lots of rest and liquids. Oh, and many, many diaper changes. I can't imagine how any single parents do this job!

We're Kansans Now!!

Here we are in front of our Texas house for the last time.

We made it....finally. It took an extra U-Haul and lots of help from family and friends, but we are here now. We have been crazy busy the last couple of weeks unpacking, taking turns getting sick, Skip getting adjusted to his new job (that he really likes a lot), and celebrating Halloween. Our rental house turned out very nice, considering we never saw it before we moved in. It has been an adjustment having to fight Calvin with the stairs. Emerald tells us several times a day that "I like my new house." It confused her a little as we began a new search for our next home (the permanent home). She keeps pointing to every house we pass and says, "That's my new house??" She misses Laney, as do we all. She is staying with Walt & Cheryl and "chasing Maggie" as Emerald thinks. Now we are just focusing on selling our Texas house, finding the right area to raise the kids, and beginning to shuffle plans around the holidays. Wish us lots of luck in our endeavors. We really need to sell the house in Texas to make Skip feel comfortable.

Emerald was so worn out from the move that she fell asleep in her cow. We searched all over the room for her, and finally looked inside the cow to see her curled up with Mango.

Calvin likes the stairs. He loves to pull up on them and laugh at the happenings below.

Calvin as the golf ball in Daddy's arms. We got to trick-or-treat at Daddy's work (Garmin). Skip is really enjoying his new job. If any of you need a GPS system, let us know!

I had witnesses for the photo session. Jeff & Heidi can agree that trying to get a happy, smiling picture of both kids is near impossible. It was a long day. As you can tell, Calvin made it thru 2 costumes. The golf ball only last an hour, then we had to change clothes and he became "brother bear." Emerald helped pick out this costume.