37 weeks

Three weeks to go and not much to report except I think I am finally getting anxious to meet this baby girl! I have no real physical complaints - I'm about as comfortable as a nine months pregnant lady can be, but I am starting to dream about wearing "real" clothes and being able to drink a margarita :) We've been trying to get things taken care of around here - we're stocked up on TP, just took the kids to the dentist, had their year pictures taken, and I'm trying to clean/organize as much as possible since it might be months before I have the time/energy to take care of any of this stuff. We have two more busy weeks of doctor's appointments and birthday parties (whose idea was it to have all the babies in November anyway??) and then after all that is done, Baby Girl is welcome to show up :)

pumpkin party!

We had our (kind of) annual small group pumpkin party tonight. This first photo is from the party 3 years ago - six kiddos, including three tiny ones (Ella was still a month away from making her appearance into this world). The second photo is from tonight - we're up to 12 kiddos now and they are still as cute as ever. Dylan is the monkey in the first shot and Ella is the monkey in the second :)

good stuff

"First and literally the beatitudes are Jesus' surprisingly countercultural God-bless-you's to people in God-awful situations."

-Frederick Dale Bruner

We started a series on the Beatitudes a few weeks ago at church. Good stuff. Listen in here.


The moment we look down upon
somebody because they aren't as
disciplined, hard working, upright,
smart, responsible, moral,
God fearing, Bible believing, or
Jesus trusting as we are

because they've made idiotic, stupid, immoral
choices again and again and again—
at that moment we are in fact rich in spirit and
Jesus isn't announcing anything to us

before it's a theology or a system or a doctrine
or a church
or a movement or an institution or a worldview
or a way or a perspective
it's an announcement

[from "Blessed are the poor in Spirit", Rob Bell, 9/13/09]

cookies!

My parents love me. They brought me back this tin of cookies from Hawaii filled with yummy shortbread cookies shaped like pineapples. 12 flavors. 32 cookies. I'm in heaven.

apples!

We picked honeycrisp apples last week at Crane's with the kids. At 75 cents a pound it was hard to go wrong. We have been happily munching away ever since!

a boy and his cars

Dylan has been in love with cars pretty much from the beginning. It seems to be in his DNA (playing cars was one of Matt's favorite pastimes as a kid too) and he loves playing cars, talking about cars, looking at cars, etc. And he is crazy good at making engine sounds with his throat. We laugh because he has a daddy who works at a car dealership - what could be cooler than that for a kid who loves cars? His favorite TV channel is the Speed channel (featuring Nascar and other fine car related races almost 24/7) and he spends hours every day lining up and racing his Matchbox cars and "movie cars" (from Cars). I have gotten so used to stepping over little cities and racetracks he's put together all over our house that I don't even bother to have him put them away at night - they have just become part of the permanent landscape around here. We sure do love this little boy...and his cars :)

the last bit of summer (*sigh*)

Could this really have been only two weekends ago? A glorious Saturday spent with friends on the shore of Lake Michigan.

Until next year, Summer...

we're getting a sister!

Matt's brother Chad proposed to his girlfriend Katie on Monday - we're not sure who's more excited, them or us. We absolutely love each of them and love them even more together :)

Matt claims he knew from the very first time he ever met Katie that she was meant for Chad. He met her at church one Sunday last January and at the time Chad and her were really only acquaintances - the three of them talked for a few minutes and after Matt and Chad walked away, Matt said, "Chad, that is the girl you need to be dating!" It didn't take Chad long to figure out that his big brother was right, and the rest is history.

Congratulations, Chad & Katie!