Little Performers

Sabbath the girls school had the service, both 1st & 2nd service in fact.


Joelle and her 2nd grade classmates said a number of memory verses and did quite well.

















Natalie and her kindergarten class played the bells.



Awwww - aren't they precious! :)

Natalie Lost Something

Since Joelle has lost a tooth, Natalie has been itchin' to lose one of hers. Not too long ago a tooth began to wiggle. Oh was she excited. She worked it and worked it.

Recently we noticed that the new tooth to replace the loose one one had started to grow in behind it. I called her my own little shark!

Well - yesterday when Doreen went to the school to pick them up, Natalie was runnin' a bit slower than the rest - cuz she finally worked that tooth loose. She had the biggest grin.

If you can't tell from the picture it's a bottom one just left of center. (The new one is already poked up far enough it's kinda hard to tell.)

My girls keep growing up! :(

Pigskin Pick'em Perfection

So my family and some friends each year pick the winners of NFL games. It's a fun contest. So far this year my precious wife is in the lead. I missed a week so I'm lagging behind.

However this week I had reached perfection - the first time in all the years we've been playing - I picked all the games correctly. I'm pretty stoked about it - I got all 14 games right.

Cool beans!!!

Daddy & Daughter Day

Tomorrow Doreen's got a series of exams. So I got the kids and myself out of the house to have it quiet so she could study.

It started with a shopping trip to the store so Natalie could buy whatever she wanted with a gift card she received for her birthday from Grammy. We had a quite a trip up and down the isles till she found two different things she wanted and had the money for - so that was good!

Then we headed to Burger King for supper. A few weeks ago Joelle filled out a fire escape plan for our house and turned it in and got a coupon for BK - so that's where we ate and the girls played for a while in the playplace.


After supper we headed to the mall, no not for shopping but for the Christmas parade. Can you believe it, before Thanksgiving? They justify it by making a 'show' of bringing Santa to the mall for the holidays. Oh well - maybe they'll have the Christmas Parade before the 4th of July next year. Ha, ha, ha!

Either way - we had lots of fun enjoying the floats.

It was a good afternoon!

Biker Chicks

Not long ago, Natalie learned to ride a bicycle without training wheels. Since learning, she's ridden a couple of times, but their have been other kids around and not a lot of room so she hasn't got much practice. This past weekend the weather was so beautiful we took the kids to a parking lot and just let them ride. It was very good for Natalie. She got some much needed practice, especially at using the bike brakes!




Here they are playing follow the leader!












Here's my little X-games biker chick, Joelle, showin' off a stunt.












... and another one!

Stuffing

For Natalie's birthday, she was given a Lil' Loveables Fluffy Factory. Basically it's a Build-a-Bear miniature take home deally-bop. It had bear-skins and stuffing for 3 bears.










They had a ball. It didn't take all that long - but they were intrigued. We made sure to get the stuffing into the arms and legs.

















Here's Joelle (L) with her adoptee 'Snowy' and Natalie with 'Cutie.'


PRECIOUS!!!

Chattanooga State - Octoberfest

Every fall at Chattanooga State, Doreen's school for Dental Hygiene, they have Octoberfest. It's a chance for all the classes, groups & clubs to set up 'booths' and sell stuff to raise money for whatever they need it for. The Dental Hygiene group decided to sell chili and raffel off some items they got donated. (They're raising money to help with bringing back-up patients to the national boards.) So we went along about halfway through to man the booth and to help cleanup.
The two ladies that made the chili did an AWESOME job! Yummy! It was a ton of fun standing around talking with classmates and families and wandering the booths and getting yummy food! (Doreen -L- with classmate Cindy)



Doreen's downing a deep fat fried Oreo cookie. Yeah - I know, who would have thought of that. Kinda icky if you think about it, but buddy if you bite into one - Oh My Word - DELICIOUS!








Course I had to get a pic of Doreen interacting with some of the decorations!

What a fun afternoon!

Party Hat Family

We had a ball at Natalie's birthday party. (Even though it was a LOT of work. Sorry Mom & Dad, never realized how much work birthday parties took before now! Thanks for the ones you threw for me!!!) This is a series of pics of our family with a HUGE party hat. It was actually the pinata Natalie picked out for the party. One of the kids hit it just right and it didn't bust, but the bottom just fell out with all the candy. So we took it and used it for a family photo op! :)
Enjoy!

Here's the birthday girl, Natalie.






Joelle


















Doreen &...



















...me! :)

19 Without, 19 With

19 years ago today, Doreen and I officially became a couple. That means that as of today, I have broke even. I was 19 when we met and became a couple and it is now 19 years later. So I had 19 years of life without Doreen and just completed 19 years of life with her. I'll take the latter any day! :)

I got to thinking about all this on my most recent trip and really enjoyed the memories. Now we met at Southwestern Adventist College the first week of school, and didn't talk for two weeks which basically brings us to near the 1st of September.

Our first date was a racquetball game at the gym there at SAC. We played an hour of racquetball then drove into Cleburne to the Dairy Queen for soda's and to chat. In the middle of our conversation, her drink slipped out of her hand and got Dr Pepper everywhere. I jump up and rush to the counter to get a rag to get things cleaned up. She tells me to go ahead and laugh - but I didn't because I was too nervous about making her feel bad and I didn't want to do that because I liked her.

Well - our time together for the next few weeks was spotty at best. I was a village student, and knew maybe 3 or 4 people at the school, plus working lots to pay for my time there. She had all her friends from Academy right there. We'd get together - then it'd be a week or two. Which brings us into the middle of October - or so. We started hanging out a little more regularly, and on Halloween 1989 we had a date. I was trying to remember if we ate somewhere or not, but can't recall. What I do remember is we went to a non-Halloween movie in the lobby of the Boy's dorm there on campus. After the movie was over, we went with some friends, and her sister Shelly, I believe, to a Haunted House nearby. After that I walked her back to our cars, parked next to each other in a parking lot just across campus. We strolled hand in hand chatting - but I was feeling a bit nervous because I was waiting for the perfect moment to 'pop' the question - would she be willing to be exclusive and be my girlfriend.

We arrived at our vehicles and I hadn't asked yet, and really, REALLY wanted to before we separated for the evening. So as we stood there I finally got the courage in a lull to 'pop' the girlfriend question. I waited expectantly - she looked at me - and LAUGHED! Out loud.!

That was NOT a response I had even considered or expected. But their it was. She finally regained her composure and said she kinda figured we were already exclusive, and so I told her I didn't want to take her for granted and just wanted communicate what I was thinking. She said that was very sweet, with a slight undercurrent of a chuckle.

Now, 19 years later she still laughs at me occasionally - but I know that she' mine!!! No doubts now, and so she can laugh all she wants! I've got a wedding license with both our names on it.

I tell ya - it was worth it all then and is even more so now. I love her very much and look forward to the next 19+ years we have headed our way.

Happy Dating Anniversary sweetie!!!

Birthday Party

Today we had a birthday party for Natalie (turning 6) and her friend Jannah. (turning 8) Jannah's birthday was actually today and Natalie's is tomorrow, Halloween. So we had a combined birthday party, that was a lot of fun!







Natalie received a lot of cool gifts. Her favorite one was the light up hoola hoop. I loved this little chair!











Here's Joelle taking a some serious wacks at the pinata.













A friend of ours owns a cake bakery here in town. He did Joelle's soccerball cupcake cake last April and so Natalie wanted a pumpkin - so here it is for ya to see. Awesome! Not to mention, EXTREMELY yummy!

Happy Birthday Pumpkin!

Facebook Fun

As most of you know, Facebook has some fun 'activities', besides catching up with old friends, viewing pictures and finding out what everyone's up to, to do to fill time quickly - Scramble, Word Twist, Mob Wars, Texas Hold'em, Parking Wars and I could go on and on and on and on and on.



Well recently in Knight Hood, I made high enough to be a Vicount of my own kingdom.


I have built a castle and upgraded my walls, towers, marketplace, workshop. I even have vassals, at one point, quite a few.






My precious wife is a Baroness. I am at peace and life is good. Feeling restless though, as of today I'm resigning my realm and moving on to something else. (Basically it's taking up too much time. Trying to streamline life a bit more!)









I just finished the top level in a game called Fighter Jets. You have air-battles against others with 5 levels to complete. This morning I made "Top Gun!" So now that I have 42 planes in my hangar with 1210 victories, I'll retire while I'm ahead! :) Here are some of my favorite planes in each level.



Level 1 is a WW1 Pilot. I had the most success with the Sopwith Camel bi-wing plane.







Level 2 was a WW2 Pilot and I did very well with the most awesome P-51 Mustang, although the Spitfire Mk XIV came through in a couple of pinches.







I never really liked Level 3 - the Jet Powered Pilot. Those early jet planes are flat out ugly! The Hawker Hunter though did the best for me.







Level 4, Modern Jet Pilot, was my most favorite. I loved fighting with the F-16 Fighting Falcon, but also used the F-14 Tomcat and the F-15 Eagle regularly. The SR-71 Blackbird also fared well. (Shhhh, don't tell anyone but I'd even use a MIG-29 occassionally.)



Finally I made it to Level 5 - a Super Jet Pilot. Here I always would use the F-22 Raptor. don't think this plane is beatable. It rocks. I'd fly a B-2 Spirit occassionally just to throw a curve at my opponents.

Lots of fun!

Camping at Harrison Bay

Our Sabbath School group went camping this weekend. The weather on Friday was scheduled to be rainy - and it was. Sabbath and Sunday were predicted to be beautiful and they were!

On the way to camp Friday morning though, I stopped to take a pic of the loaded pickup, one canoe, 4 paddles, 4 bikes, 2 tents, 1 container of camping gear, 2 roasting sticks and a 1/4 cord of woood. It was a good start!





The Girls loved playing in the rain.














Joelle did great riding a 4.5 mi trail.



















Natalie was so cute preparing her own pancake for breakfast.












Dessert for Sabbath lunch was home-made carmel covered apples. Joelle did pretty good considering she's missing 3 of her front teeth!














Snapped a pic of my 3 favorite girls one morning before we got ready and headed out of the tent for the day.

It was a GOOD camping trip.

Artsy Fartsy - Camping

We just got back from a campout at Harrison Bay, just North of Chattanooga. It's a great place to spend a weekend in nature. It has a 4.5 mile loop that runs along the lake, so Sabbath afternoon Joelle, Doreen and I, along with some friends went for a ride. Natalie wanted to stay back at camp with her best friend.

We came around a point and I saw this view and just had to snap a photo!










On the way to the campground early Friday morning, I saw this scene. It was a rainy day, but right then the rain had stopped to allow this perfect glassy looking lake photo. Love the fall colors on the tree in the background and the 'smoke' just above the lake.






Then just before we left we made sure to put the fire out and I just loved the smoke/steam rising from the firepit.

Splitting - Wood that Is

I did something today I haven't done in YEARS! I split some wood with a maul for our camping trip this weekend. Boy was it fun. I think the last time I did that was when I was living in Colorado - umpteen years ago. Got a nice little pile to burn and enjoy this weekend.













Got Joelle to pose for a pic for me, and immediately after I clicked she trying to split this one on her own. CUTE!













I got Natalie to pose - but you can tell she wasn't into it at all!

What fun!

Another set of Bubbie Box Outfits

For church today my girls got dressed in these get'ups. Once we saw them, we remembered they were from Bubbie boxes.

In fact, the week we got the box Natalie had been asking for a blouse/skirt outfit. Amazingly enough in the very next Bubbie box was a set the perfect size for her - the set she's wearing in this picture.

I am just amazed at how precious my little girls are.

3 Years OR 1 of 6

Hey y'all,

Can you believe as of last Friday I've been at my "new" job for 3 years? Man, it feels like I just started driving for LD a couple of months ago. It's unbelieveable how time FLIES! Dude - it has gotten on a rocket ship recently! :)

Well, I have really enjoyed having a regular partner and a regular run. I tell ya, that makes all the difference. I know where all the drops are and places to eat and go potty. That info sure help to make a run easier.

Here's to another wonderful year of work! :)

In other news...

Last week Doreen had 3 exams at school. One of them was pretty tough. Only 6 Dental Hygiene students of 16 passed. Thankfully, Doreen - my beautifully brilliant wife was one of them. It IS truly amazing how good she does at keeping up with things at home, church, Adventurers and add school on top of all of it.

Another month and then she'll have one semester to go!

Fireside Sabbath Entrance

Last night the four of us brought in Sabbath but sitting around the fire. What a pleasant time that was!

The quirky thing about this situation was, we've had that portable fire pit for a couple of years and just hadn't used it yet. We INTENDED to, but hadn't.








So tonight after supper Doreen was going to have girls get ready for bed - but we talked and the four of us went out and built the inaugural fire in that pit this evening and enjoyed it immensely.

Here's Joelle making marshmallow taffy!









It was a very cool evening and Joelle, Natalie and Mocha ran wild in the yard for a bit - we still had some good quality time just enjoying each other's company and toasting marshmallow and trying to make Marshmallow taffy like my sis Cindi did for us when we were on our CO vacation a while back.

What a great way to bring in the Sabbath. I'm still enjoying the smell of smoke on my t-shirt! Hummmmmmmmm!

Happy Sabbath all!