How It All Began...

December 6th, 1997

I will never forget that day.  A sweet, handsome, sixteen year old tuba player who took me out to a movie and dinner at Hardees in Harrisonville the night before, called to ask me if I would be his girlfriend.  Not once in the last 15 years have I ever regretted answering with an emphatic, "YES!"  

Not too many people find the love of their life when they are just 15 years old.  It's not lost on me how incredibly blessed I am.

Homecoming 1998...I think?

Tonight thousands of miles away from any babysitter, this is how we celebrate...

After 15 years of "togetherness", as I call it, he knows me so well.  A Starbucks skinny vanilla latte and chocolate cake...perfection!

We will get our date night very soon.  I have a feeling there will be no shortage of loved ones wanting to steal our babies from us when we get back home.  Until then I shall eat my cake and dream of dressing up for a night on the town with my man who has been by my side for 15 years now.  Geez, the more I say that the older I feel.

Anyway, Happy Togetherness Anniversary Nathan.  Life with you has been better than I ever dreamed it would be.  Here's to many more years of "togetherness."

Phew, now that all that sappy lovey dovey stuff is out of the way, here is what has been going on this week.  

Dylan is on the mend.  Poor guy had a rough few days.

I believe this was Monday morning that I found him with his "puke bucket" (no worries it was clean) slung over his shoulder while he slept.  I had no idea just how handy that Halloween bucket, turned cookie mixing bowl, turned puke bucket would be when I paid a whole pound for it several months ago.  By Tuesday evening he was back to his old self.

Grant is about to hit double digits (he turns 10 months old on Sunday...eeesh!) and he has become quite the mover and shaker.

Here he is after Dylan, unbeknownst to Mommy, shared his Capri Sun with Grant.  It was mostly empty, but Grant was going to town on that straw like he's been drinking from one his whole life.  I have a feeling that once he gets back home and is crawling on more carpeted surfaces he will no doubt be crawling on all 4's in no time instead of the army crawl he has perfected here on the hardwood.  He is FAST and sneaky.  It's definitely time to get back home to a more baby proof environment.

I made some pumpkin muffins on Wednesday.  I am determined to use all of the canned pumpkin before we leave.

Fairy Max the Elf has been continuing his mischief.  

Pillow fort

Marshmallow snowmen that look like each of the kids.

He turned our milk green.  Elves LOVE the color green, in case you didn't know.  Dylan had some green milk and Cheerios.

Then another night he got into a little trouble for having too much fun with the toilet paper.  Silly Elf.

We are down to one week left on our adventure.  I have begun throwing stuff out, and packing up bags of clothes to donate.  Today I was able to enroll Dylan in preschool for the spring semester and found out he is going to have Ms. McCalla.  She was one of Leah's preschool teachers, and Dylan just ADORES her!  The smile on his face was priceless today when I told him the good news.  Leah's teacher emailed me today as well.  Her class really enjoyed the postcard Leah wrote to them a while back, and she was so thrilled when I told her that the kids were excited for her to return to school after Christmas break.

I'm sure I'll post a few more times before we begin our journey home.  I hope everyone has a fun and safe weekend!