Laurel is 11!

This week Laurel turned 11.  She celebrated by doing all the things that would make her "perfect day".  Essentially this involved a lot of eating out, trips to thrift stores, cake and presents with family, and a trip to New Life Christian Bookstore for new webkinz with her friend.  She had a fun day.

One year ago...

We headed home from Germany one year ago (exactly in 7 hours, but I don't plan to get up in the middle of the night to celebrate).  Katey remembers watching TV on the plane and being excited about coming home.  Laurel remembers sleeping in the airport after being up for 20+ hours.  Matthew remembers being ready to come home.  Carter remembers having fun watching TV and playing with his toys on the plane and having his nerf gun confiscated in security!  The kids all enjoyed the flight and are ready to go again anytime!  It seems like just yesterday.  It makes me realize how quick the time passed for people here even though it felt to us like we were gone a really long time!  I also am more aware of what we did.  We went on 13 trips outside the city- two long train rides outside of Bavaria - one all the way to the Baltic Sea.  This fall we went camping in LBL.  Quite the change.  We have enjoyed being home and lots of things have happened this fall that would have been very difficult to handle from a continent away so its good that things worked out they way they have.  We are truly blessed and are very thankful for the opportunities we have had and for the memories of our trip.  We love that they are now aware of life outside the USA and have an appreciation for other cultures.  All of us want to go back, but two of our children want to go back to Germany, to the same apartment, because they love that we all slept in one room and that we got to spend lots of time together.  It makes me a happy Momma to know that being together is what they value the most.  Not sure how that would work with a group of teenagers, but we'd all still like to do it all again someday!  A new adventure, a new day, more memories....

Mary turns 94

Cake, presents, and a trip to the doctor what else could one ask for when turning 94 right? Seriously, we are blessed to have Mary with us and in such good health. Family is so precious and we enjoyed seeing her happy today.

Clearance Costumes

Tim used to make an annual run to Walmart on November 1 to restock our costume collection with clearance costumes.  After not finding much the last few years I hadn't thought to have him check.  Tonight while shopping we happened by the aisle and saw the 75% off signs.  The kids were thrilled. They all found ones they liked (although Matthew's is big and requires some modification tomorrow). They came home and dressed up. Carter had found an Iron Man helmet at Angel's Attic months ago and was super happy to find the costume to go with it.  He may wear it for days.  It took me a while tonight to convince him not to sleep in it.  I am excited we can now purge a few from our collection that have seen better days....Some of you know which ones I am talking about :)!

Before and After

We've been pondering how to fix our patio and yard for a couple of years.  No one seemed to know exactly how to fix it, they just all agreed it was done wrong in the first place (yes, that is really helpful).  This year we put all our info together and embarked on a plan.  It took 5 months.  We are so glad its done.  Final pics are taken.  Here are before and after shots of the "Summer of the Yard" project. We had hoped to have a big party with a patio movie theme, but now that its done its pretty cold in the evenings.  Perhaps we'll get some more warm days, if not there will be fun in the yard next spring for one and all.

Before:

no slope patio, higher than the basement floor (not good), yard slopes toward patio

wall steps down, front yard water flows directly to wall and house, steep grade to walk to side yard

After:

front yard grade is leveled off

water flows to side yard via a berm created in front of flower bed

fire ring (or oval depending on who you ask) made from pieces of the old patio and extended side yard - it used to end at the tree line, now extends to our property line.

wall is now level at approx. 6.5 ft height and we have stairs from the front to the side yard- waiting on plants on backorder at Rolling Hills to landscape beside the stairs...

new lowered and sloped patio

Fall Family Pic

The construction is done, more pictures to come- just waiting for our grass to grow a few more days before taking the "finished" shots.  Family pic on the new stairs:

We enjoyed cooking out in our fire pit made from pieces of the old patio on Friday night - our ode to recycling.  Looking forward to what is left of fall in our new outdoor spaces.

Apple Orchard

Made a trip to Mathis Orchard with the homeschool group.  Bought a bushel and a half of apples and some yummy cider.  Here's the crew by a huge tree in front of the barn.