5 Days and Counting....

Remember when my little Christmas tree said there were like 100 and some days until Christmas? How time flies! Kayla is perking up quite a bit tonight! She is back and speaking with a new lisp!

Kayla's Surgery

Kayla's surgery was successful this a.m. She had a rough time and wanted to leave as soon as she woke up from the anesthetic. Two hours later, we finally were able to leave. They took out her tonsils and adenoids and also did a frenulectomy (clipped her tongue). Her frenulum (under her tongue) has always been tight and when she sticks out her tongue it looks like a little heart. It was so tight it was pulling the gums off the back of her teeth. So....they went ahead and did that too. She finally stopped fighting sleep and took a small nap today and then hopped on the floor to start coloring. She kept getting upset that she was drooling on her artwork! Hopefully we will get some sleep tonight. If you are trying to call us, my phone line is messed up somehow inside the house. I tested it outside and there was a dial tone. I will keep working on it, I don't want to pay AT&T $25 per fifteen minutes to fix it! Call our cell phones if you need us. Thanks!

Kayla

Please say a little prayer for Kayla. Tomorrow she is having her adenoids and possibly tonsils removed. She's been snoring like freight train, had frequent cold and ear infections. She will have her surgery in the a.m. and will come home afterwards. I know that she will be in the good hands of my coworkers. Hopefully she will be bopping around singing and dancing by Christmas!

Baby, it's cold outside!

Wow! What a great snow! I LOVE it! Chris is out snow blowing out our driveway. The snow is still coming down too. My friend Tricia measured the snow and she thinks we are up to a foot of snow. I have to agree. This is a great day to relax, bake some cookies, and get my Christmas cards started and hopefully finished! The kids were out just for a bit. Ryan decided to do somersaults in the snow. Chris and I saw "I am Legend" last night at the Strand. It was good, but a little too intense for me! Have a great day!

First Snow

Can you tell how happy these two were to get into the snow yesterday? Ryan forced himself into boots from last year that are 3 sizes too small just so he could go out!

Bloggity, Blog, Blog

I wanted to share some a picture and some video from Ryan's Elk Hoop Shoot contest. Kayla and I enjoyed our annual trip to the Nutcracker with Hannah and Tricia. It is one of my favorite things that we do together each year. Kayla was just mesmerized again watching the ballet dancers. We were lucky and got to hear the Fort Wayne Philharmonic perform the concert vs. listening to recorded music. The video is Ryan warming up for the Hoop Shoot contest. After warming up for over 1/2 hour he had no legs left for the contest and didn't get to move on. He had a great time and we were so proud of him for representing his school!

Happy 5th Birthday Kayla!!!!

Wow! My baby is now five! Today we celebrated Kayla's birthday. She had a princess party with 12 of her little gal friends. What a crew! I am exhausted!

Happy Turkey Week!

We just want to wish all our family and friends a Happy Thanksgiving!

Elk's Hoop Shoot Contest

Ryan has great news! He won the Elk Shoot Contest for his age group (8-9 year olds) at his school. He will represent Wayne Center at the next contest at Kendallville Middle School on Dec 1st. We are so proud of him! He is so pumped up!

Kelley's Wedding

Wow! What a fun weekend we had. Chris' cousin Kelley got married in Indy. Kayla and my niece Mya were the flower girls. Kayla only waved at us 3 times during the ceremony. I'm so relieved we made it through! Kelley's dad passed away 2 years ago and I know he was looking down on her during the wedding. Here are some pictures from our weekend.

Don't Leave Fall!

Time flies too quickly. Especially this time of year. I just wanted to share this pretty picture of our lake. Have a great weekend!

Save those Pop Tabs!

A dear little 5 year old girl at Ryan's school was diagnosed with a benign brain tumor. Benign is good, however, this little girl is going to undergo 70 weeks of chemotherapy. Yes, I did type 70 weeks! Ryan's school is trying to collect 1,000,000 pop tabs to donate to Riley Hospital where she is getting her treatments. Please start saving your pop tabs for us and we will turn them in to help this little girl. Thanks!

Happy Halloween!

Here are our two goblins this Halloween!

Perm Solution Memories

Isn't it funny how smells bring back memories?? Today I had my hair chemically straightened. It's like getting a perm in reverse. Remember the 80's when women always had a perm? I think I had one from 1975 to 1997 constantly. I haven't had a perm for years. I remember sitting in the chair at Grandma Redding's beauty shop time and time again while she wrapped my hair tightly around the perm rods. Watching her pull the rubber band to hold the rod each time. I remember her tucking a long strip of cotton all around my head under the rods so that the perm solution wouldn't run in my eyes. Then came the smell of the solution followed by time under the hair dryer with air so warm it made my cheeks rosy. Then with a warm head the feeling of the cold neutralizing solution running through the perm rods on my head. Next followed thorough rinsing of the rods and then finally - removal of those darn perm rods! What followed next was the best - soft, silky, curly hair. Today all those memories came to me as I sat in the salon. Things have changed a bit....Grandma is now 87, and no perm rods or dryer was used. I'm sure Grandma would still give me a perm if I dared. :) That's okay...I'll stick with my good memories!

Check out this swing!

We were outside today and Kayla went into the garage by herself and grabbed a tee and ball from her bag. She came out and started swinging like a pro. I'm sure she will be beating me too by the end of next summer!

Pumpkin Carving

Can you tell by these pictures who didn't like cleaning out the guts from the pumpkins? :) Last night we spent the evening carving these elaborate designs. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. Chris is the master pumpkin carver! Hope they last 'til next week! Have a great day!

Freckles

Ryan: "Mom, I need some of that to get rid of my freckles (as an ad for proactive plays on the TV)."

Mom: "Ryan, that stuff is to get rid of pimples."

Ryan: "Oh, I guess I have to keep them then?"

IU vs. MSU

Wow! Michigan State knows how to fill up a football stadium! Despite the fact that IU forgot to show up at game, it was a neat experience to be at the game. You can say that MSU is a "football school." It was so neat to see all the fans so much into the game. I did have nightmares of the MSU fight song since they played it so many times. Other than that, it was a great day of tailgating and football! Thanks Ron and Kim!

GO I.U.!!!!!!!!!!!!

Go I.U.!!! Heading up to Michigan State today for the IU vs. MSU game. Important game for IU for bowl purposes. MSU is coming off three losses in a row and it is homecoming. Hopefully Chris and I won't be killed as we sit in the MSU section with our friends!

Happy Birthday Tristan!

Today we celebrated my nephew Tristan's 6th birthday. He wanted a "Duck Hunting" birthday party - didn't my sister-in-law do an awesome job with his cake? My niece Mya is in the picture sitting next to Kayla. Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Pumpkin Time

The kids and I headed over to Ligonier tonight to pick up some pumpkins at the Fashion Farm Pumpkin Fantasy Land. A short while later, we were leaving with a car full of pumpkins and had enjoyed a hayride through the 27 acre pumpkin field. I LOVE this time of year!

Apple Festival This Weekend!

Just wanted to remind everyone about the famous Apple Festival this weekend in Kendallville. Remember that it is in two locations. The main part of the festival is at the 4-H Grounds. The smaller part of the festival is on Main St. downtown. It is a wonderful little festival with the BEST food!

Signs of Fall

There are a few signs around the house that fall is here! I LOVE FALL! Warm breezes, spiced apple cider, Apple Festival, fall colors, jeans and sweatshirts, caramel apples, mums, Halloween...

Light the Night Pics

What a beautiful night for a walk! The turnout looked great! Thank you to all who supported me with donations or by walking! The picture is a group shot of my coworkers and their families that walked on our team. The other shot is what it looked like walking up main street. I wore my Team in Training T-shirt and had previous TNT members come up to me asking me what events I had completed. I appreciate all the Leukemia and Lymphoma fund raising efforts! Not many cancers have such organized groups raising money for their causes.

Light the Night

Sorry for the late notice...but tomorrow night is Kendallville's "Light the Night" walk to benefit the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. We are meeting at the high school at 6:45 with the walk starting at 7:30 p.m. Come join us celebrate survivors and honor the memories of those we have lost to leukemia and lymphoma! Please pray that the mosquitoes don't come and carry us away!

What golf does to a person...

Today was a fun day. Chris and I played in his Uncle Terry's Memorial Golf Outing for the Lakeland Athletic Boosters. It was a bit chilly this a.m., but a good time! I golfed with my mother-in-law Sandy, her friend Jody, and Terry's wife, Michelle. It had been since mid-summer that I had golfed and it took me a little bit to get back into it. I have found since I started playing golf, that it is something that it can turn you into a different person. I actually found myself nearly driving my club into the ground when things did not go my way. That folks, is what golf can do to you!

No Phone Service...

If you need to call Chris or I, please use our cell phones. Our phone has been out since last night and isn't likely to get fixed until the 15th!!! Sigh. Apparently something happened near the wonderful road construction near our house and something big was cut. We are also unable to access our sbcglobal.net email account. I can deal with the phone...but email???

Remembering September 11th

Just wanted to take a moment today to remember all of those who lost their lives on September 11th, 2001 and also all the people who's lives were touched by that event. God Bless.

Kayla's First Day of School

Kayla started at her new preschool today! She woke me up already dressed in sweatpants from last school year wanting to know where the shirt was that matched them (she long ago outgrew it - as well as the sweatpants!). She was very happy to finally be starting school. She had a fun day at school and was chattering nonstop about school on the way home. I really cherish these days because next year she will be in Kindergarten all day, everyday (sniff, sniff).

Late this afternoon the poor bug came to me and told me that her ear was hurting her. She slept though dance class and was devastated that I didn't wake her up for class, but instead took her to the after hours clinic to get her ears checked. Hopefully she will be feeling better for the next day of school on Friday.

Fish Fry

This is the first time I'm uploading video...so I hope it works! We spent today recuperating from entertaining 80 friends and family at our annual fish fry. Each year we find ways to become more efficient with the food preparation. I took a picture of all the fish - Chris always thinks we don't have enough! He does so much work throughout the year catching and cleaning all of them. Chad Ihrie and Jon DeWitt helped him this year. We had a lot of help this year from the Denton's, Ihrie's and DeWitt's getting ready for the big day. Thank you so much!

The weather and company were absolutely perfect. We couldn't have asked for a better day, except for one thing.... MOSQUITOS! We haven't had any at our house the entire summer due to lack of rain. I swear some of them were so big they were mutants! Nonetheless, we had a great time. We are so blessed to have such wonderful family and friends to share in fun times!

A long weekend!

Wahooo! It's a 3-day weekend! I LOVE holiday weekends! I spent the evening thawing out 500 fish filets for our annual fish fry. Thank goodness my sister-in-law Amy came over and helped me! Thanks Amy!

I heard on the news that Northeast Indiana is the nicest place to be in the country this weekend as far as the weather goes! Sunny skies and high in the 70's. Only one downside to that rain we got last week - MOSQUITOS. I thought the kids might have been lifted in the air tonight! Have a good weekend everyone! :)

All eyeballs!

Storm Damage

Well...I think we are getting all the rain from the entire summer that we are due in a period of about 2 weeks. We had a quick storm fly through last night about 5 p.m. Look at all the sticks and leaves in our yard and we don't even have any trees! My in-laws took the brunt of the damage. A huge part of one of their trees fell into the lake, they lost one of their pine trees, and the top of another pine tree fell off and landed on top of their neighbors car (ouch!). I think I'll just take the twigs in the yard!

Ryan's First Day of School

It's been a week since Ryan had his first day of school! I am so messed up this year with school starting so early. What a short summer! I really don't believe we could have packed any more activities in this summer. Ryan has Mrs. Jackson as his 3rd grade teacher. I'm trying really hard to remember who I had...Mrs. Caley? Do any of you remember your third grade teacher? I do remember the most significant thing that happened to me in 3rd grade was that I had the chicken pox. As you can see, Ry wore camo for the first day - he works it into his wardrobe each day.

Little Lake Friends

Chris came to the door tonight with two presents for Kayla. One was to touch a huge catfish that he had caught last night. The other little present was this tiny little leatherback turtle. We are always welcoming little creatures into our house for temporary stays. Right now I'm trying to get Kayla to keep the lid on the container and convince her that the turtle's mommy is missing her and she needs to return back to the lake.

Prayer Request

I would like to send out a prayer request for my good friend and fellow speech pathologist Amy Krahn's father. Please keep him and her family in your thoughts. He recently was diagnosed with a grade 3 brain tumor and started chemo/radiation this week. On Wednesday he suffered seizures and is in an intensive care unit. He is demonstrating speech and language difficulties due to the tumor being in the left hemisphere of his brain. These deficits are new. Please pray for this family as they are going through a difficult time.

Our Little Dancer

Kayla started dance classes for the first time tonight. She was very patient with me as I attempted to put her hair into a bun. As you can see from the smile on her face she was very happy to be heading to dance. Parents were not allowed into the dance studio, however, there was a 2 foot by 4 foot window that about 15 of us crowded around to try to watch the girls. She has 15 minutes of tap, 15 minutes of ballet, and 15 minutes of tumbling. After we left Kayla said, "That was really, really great!"

Missouri Vacation Highlights

We just returned from one of my favorite places in this world - southwest Missouri! We had such a great time visiting with my family. We stayed at my aunt Coralee and uncle Ed's house near Nixa, MO. We visited with my cousins Mike, Jeni, and Scott and I also got to visit with my aunt Debbie and uncle Phil.

IT WAS SO HOT! We spent our time either indoors in air conditioning or outside at the pool. We visited the Wildlife Museum next to Bass Pro, spent a ton of time in Bass Pro, went through Fantastic Caverns, ate at my favorite place the Mexican Villa, went to the Nixa community pool, played miniature golf, went to my cousin's show in Branson, and drove go-karts multiple times. Ryan's favorite activity was definitely the go-karts. Kayla absolutely loved my cousin Mike's show in Branson and has watched the DVD of it multiple times daily. I want to post a plug for Mike's show "Grand Jubilee" at the Grand Country Theatre in Branson. This is a GREAT show that all ages of people will enjoy no matter what your musical tastes are. I have always loved to watch Mike perform. He is so incredibly talented and makes me laugh like no other! Needless to say - we had a GREAT time!