HALLOWEEN

Well, the decorations are out, the candy is bought, the costumes are decided on, the weather is great, time to go!

Sara's 4 year anniversary

Four years ago today we took Sara as our daughter and have been running full speed ever since. She has flurished and progressed so much faster than we ever thought she would, and is fully breaking us in as parents to a teenager with full force!!!!!!

This is when we first got Sara...look how small she was! Then she wore size 4 toddler-at the age of 9!

Charlene McKinzey

Very early this morning a special angel went home. Ms. Charlene was instrumental in the youth program at our church and a much sought after Pre A/P 8th grade Language Arts Teacher. She had the patience of the angels and directed all of our youth programs. She was also the wonderful cook at our mission trips. Sara was so hoping to get Ms. Charlene this year, but about one year ago, she found out that she had pancreatic cancer and they suspected that she had 3 months to live, but God had other plans. Ms Charlene did make it to her last class of confirmation kids that she had started.

Ms. Charlene (aka Mrs. McKenzey) will be so missed by her husband Art, two grown kids, and everyone who knew her.

Cross Country is finished

Yesterday was the district meet for Cross Country. It involved all the runners from 9 school in the 7th and 8th grade. Each grade has a boy/girl and A/B team, making 8 teams.

The first race is A/B 7th grade girls-Ruth's team. Then A/B 7th Boys, A/B 8th grade girls-Sara's team, finished with A/B 8th grade boys. The A team is the top 10 runners from the school and they wear a penny over their uniform to keep them together with the scoring.

The team Ruth was on came in first, along with 4 other teams.....making our school taking 5 of the 8 top teams. She really ran fast and pushed until the end, but she is totally glad this was the last race, since it is still hot here. After the race Ruth likes to hang out with her friends who are all really nice girls, and a few boys. If you know Ruth, she is very shy and this is a good time for her to open up some. We do stay until all teams run, since the girls like to cheer on the boys.



UNFORTUNATELY, Sara's team did not come in first.







Sara is still the fastest runner on her A team for her grade and came in 10th, but I think considering the circumstances, she should have come in first for toughness.There are not any others on her team that come close to her time, so we did not get enough points to come in first.





ALSO, this time the course was in a beautiful park that included one HUGE hill and many others, but the problem was the gravel at the beginning of the race in which they were all grouped together still, and had to make a sharp left hand turn, then narrow out to a very thin section of the course. In the gravel, Sara got tripped and went down hard. YES, this tough girl did finish the race as best as she could and still came in 10th, but was unable to give her best and finished with blood running down her leg. Luckily there is a trainer at the finish line who took her right away and clean and bandaged her leg which now does NOT include quite a bit of flesh. Good thing I did not see it because I do NOT do blood well.

Look in the background of Sara's pic and you see some girls in blue uniform-this is Ruth and her friends cheering on her sister.....how sweet!


BEEN SWAMPED, but this puts an end to 2 of the car pools-YEA MOM!!!!

new teeth for Sara

Today Sara took the trip to the dentist to repair the two front teeth that she got as a child. She has a beautiful smile, and I told her that she had better take good care of them because I only buy her teeth once. Since there is such a small bonding surface, she can never again bite into an apple, it must be sliced.

Sister love

Sometimes these girls are so silly. No one was hurt in this take down. You can tell who won.

Butterflies

It has finally cooled down and like us, there is once again action outside......I am speaking of the butterflies. The beautiful yellow one is on our lantana.

The brown butterfly was inside the dog's bowl reaching down for a sip. Luckily no one else was thirsty at the time. You can see that the butterfly is missing part of one of his wings, but he could still fly.

Volleyball & cross country

Sara is in the red penny-meaning she is on the top 8th grade team....and still the fastest girl in 8th grade in her school. This is Ruth's first year and, as she says, she loaths cross country, but it is mandatory for the volleyball team. I guess you get the good with the bad. This is the two of them after running~~~~WORN OUT! After this first meet, then Sara went to soccer practice, and Ruth went home for homework. They both slept very well!!!!!

This is an action shot of Ruth during one of her games. They have won all they games but one. She is a front line setter, probably because she is so tall. She really loves playing and gets up better than I do at 5:15 AM

RUNNING FAST

Still here.....this year is crazy. I have from 3-5 carpools/day depending on what day it is. Ruth's volleyball team has won all but 1 game.....Sara placed first in her school on their first cross country 2 mile run last week and Ruth managed to run her complete 1 1/2 mile cross country meet.....not bad. Grades are good. Jeff and the girls and I spend alllllllll weekend working in the yard, taking down the Halloween decorations and getting them started. Weather is cooler YEA! Sara's soccer team is doing terrible. I hate getting up at 5:15 every morning with Ruth to begin her carpool....and she is so tired too. Bedtime has gotten very early for ALL of us. Will do pics very soon.