Playing in the Leaves

Audrey has been asking for weeks to rake the leaves in the front yard so she and Lila could slide and jump into them. So today we did, and both girls had a great time. They even cooperated for a few pictures...

A little rain, a little cold, a little pumpkin pickin'...

and lots of good memories made with my best friend.

With Fred out of town this past weekend, the girls and I packed up and headed to McDonough, GA to visit with Jessica, Matt and their little girl Reese (or "Baby Reese," as Audrey calls her, despite the fact that she is 2 1/2). Jessica and I took our 3 girls to a nearby farm to do a little pumpkin picking and hay-riding. Suffice it to say the outing didn't go quite as smoothly as we had planned, but we made the best of it nonetheless.


Audrey and "Baby" Reese


If you know Lila Kate, you'll find this determined expression quite fitting of her personality. :)


Looking for a warm, dry spot

Rolling in the corn

I think it's time to call it a day...

And a few more from August

Little pianists


Fun at Monkey Park


Happy girl

Did you see me slide, Mommy?

Whoa, this is a big ship

Exploring

I can brush my teeth just like my big sister... so what if I have to hang on for dear life to the edge of this sink here to keep from falling off.

I did it, Mommy!

A few recent photos

Fashion diva


My best friend Jessica and our girls


Audrey and Jessica's daughter Reese


Beautiful ballerina



Co-conspirators, although what they were conspiring to do remains a mystery. Oh, and that stool was Lila's constant companion for about a week...couldn't leave home without it.

I'm giving up

Not the blog, just the attempt at continuing with pictures from where I left off in May. Given the hundreds of photos that have been taken over the last 3-4 months, I am far too overwhelmed and constrained by time to try to post pictorial evidence of all our summer activities! Suffice it to say we had fun times. We enjoyed a trip to Kentucky in May, where we camped with Fred's family, visited Shaker Town in Harrodsburg, KY and a few other central Kentucky hot spots, and just generally had a wonderful time with the family up there. We see them far too seldom, so we relish what time we do get to spend with them.

Summer also saw the completion of our storage building project, which has morphed into something far more detailed and customized than we originally intended. Rather than just a space in which to store yard items, our new structure looks like a guest house, complete with flower boxes on the windows and mini-blinds. (the flower boxes were my idea. the mini-blinds were not). :) Fred has enjoyed tinkering around with tools and woodworking projects, but thankfully the lure of the man-cave has not sucked him away from the family for excessive amounts of time. Not yet anyway. I may have to retract that statement whenever we get electricity up there.

June brought with it the sadness of losing my grandfather, who lived a long life of 88 1/2 years. He was a very talented craftsman who could build anything out of wood. Beautiful things. I hope he would be happy to know that Fred feels so honored to have inherited many of his woodworking tools and machines. Although our own workshop is new and without its own history yet, whenever I enter, I feel the presence of my grandfather and all the years of love and labor that went into the work he created using the very tools that we now possess. Let the legacy continue...

In July, we packed up and headed to Destin, FL, for our annual family beach trip. Had we been down there any longer than a week, I believe Audrey truly would have transformed into a fish. She pretty much left the water only to eat and sleep, and only when forced to do so. Lila Kate enjoyed the trip as well, and it was considerably easier to manage a toddler at the beach than a 4-month-old infant, which was her age at last year's beach trip. That's right, Miss LK decided to try out that nifty little thing we call walking at nearly 15 months of age! Finally.

So, now we are back in the swing of school, which is going well. Audrey is also taking ballet once a week, which she absolutely loves. I have been eager to start spending time around horses again, and fortunately I've gotten that opportunity through our friend Dena at Storybook Farm. Once a week, the girls and I head over there to do "horsey" things. Well, Lila takes her nap, Audrey plays with Dena's daughters, and I do the horse stuff. Love it. Can't wait to start taking riding lessons again, which I had to abandon 2 years ago when I learned of Lila's impending arrival.
So that's pretty much the gist of our daily lives up until now. I will work on putting up a few recent photos of the girls in another entry. Take care.

I'm baaaaack....briefly.

Just wanted to say that I will be back to update this blog! Admittedly, I have been lazy about keeping on top of things. I have oodles of photos to share from our summer days, and I suppose I'm just a tad overwhelmed by them all. Just keep the faith that I'll get around to filling y'all in on things and check back soon!

Audrey's Violin Recital

Audrey's preschool class had its end-of-the-year violin recital this evening. While the sound of 8 children under the age of 5 screeching away on their violins can certainly induce a massive migraine attack, it's really pretty darn cute to see them proudly performing for an audience. She had a really good time with her friends, and I think I got a few good photos to share. The warm wood tones and stained glass windows in the chapel where the recital was held created a beautiful setting for pictures.


A little out of focus, but I love her expression. A little too grown up, perhaps?

Pensive

Waiting for the recital to begin

More violin recital...

Lila Kate enjoyed scurrying up and down the pews.


Did ya see me go up and down up and down up and down??

Just catching sight of her sister and Daddy in the balcony.

Grinning at Lila who's dancing to the music.

Lazy afternoons

The warm days of May have led to lots of time spent outdoors. Some of the best moments in our (sometimes very long) days seem to happen when we spread a big blanket in the backyard and just flop down in the sun. Yesterday, for fun, I took the dinner preparations outside and had the girls help me shuck corn. Who would have thought I'd get 30 good minutes of play out of corn?

The Strawberry Patch

Today we took a trip to the strawberry patch with Audrey's class. Had a great time, but now what do I do with 5 pounds of strawberries???

Just a few new pictures

Lila pushing Audrey on the "rocket." She would do it only on her knees, for some reason.


Shaving cream painting in the tub. Gotta get creative on those rainy days!


Playing in the baby pool

The end is in sight, finally.

The 6+ month long storage building/workshop project is finally nearing to an end. It has been a long, arduous process, but the effort has paid off. I think it might actually be nicer than our house. We've got one more coat of paint to throw on the trim and a few other minor details to take care of (like landscaping and window boxes), and then we can cross this project off the list!

Love this picture. Fred probably won't love the fact that I posted a pic of him without a shirt, but oh well.

Almost done

We employ help wherever we can.

Considering my very real fear of heights, I did quite well perched atop a ladder with nothing to hold on to! Face your fears, people!

Just one more

Had to add this one. Even the cat recognized Belle's gentle spirit and loved her for it.

Belle

On April 17th, just three months shy of her 14th birthday, we put down our sweet black lab, Belle. She had been Fred's faithful companion well before I ever entered the picture, accompanying him from Kentucky to Alabama at the tender age of 8 weeks as he began veterinary school. She was by far the sweetest, gentlest canine soul in the world. We had lost her son, Beau, just a year-and-a-half earlier after a long battle against bone cancer. We were saddened beyond words when he left us and dreaded the day that Belle would follow her boy.

The early days of Fred's and my relationship are inextricably linked to Belle, Beau and (my dog) Mickey. Our first dates revolved around watching our furry friends cavort, swim, dig and fetch. We spent hours walking with them in the pastures outside our little garage apartment in Watkinsville. They went hiking, camping, and traveling with us. They were our babies. As it usually goes, though, those "babies" eventually had to take a back seat to the human ones who soon entered our lives. As with most dogs, however, they never seemed to harbor an ounce of resentment over dropping down a few lines on our list of priorities. They were happy enough that we remembered to feed them and managed to pat them on their smelly heads a couple times a day.

Today, two of our three beloved dogs are now gone. Mickey, at the age of 10, is still pretty energetic and spunky, although gray hairs are starting to replace the black, brown and white ones on his once vibrant coat. I am content that we allowed Belle and Beau to go peacefully and without anxiety or prolonged suffering, but I am saddened that those links to the early days of our relationship are disappearing. I realize more and more every day that although our pets' positions within the family have shifted over the years, the spots they hold in our hearts will never change.