Happy October! This is my favorite month, and I'm so looking forward to all our traditional fall activities. But first, here's an overview of our September :-).
The sunrises we see from our living room windows never cease to wow me. I hope I will always appreciate their beauty!
Grandparents Day was this month, and Brenson had some special guests at school for the occasion. The first grade teachers plan a little event for the grandparents every year, so this is the second time Meme and Papa have participated in Grandparents Day activities.
Meme, Papa, and Brenson
Bren thought it was pretty special to have his grandparents at school.
The kids love to be clowns when Meme tries to take their photos :-).
Always horsing around with Papa!
Grandparents Day 2018!
The second week of September is our annual Gospel Meeting at church every year. This year, the speaker brought his wife and three year old daughter to stay the week with him in Oologah. We had Hannah over for a play date one day, and of course the little girls all enjoyed each other every evening of the meeting.
Sweet girls - Brecklyn, Brooke, Hannah, and Sadie
The big girls all enjoyed each other as well!
Chelley, Lisa, Rebekah, Tia, and Katja
September also brings the Rogers County Fair to our town. We've never been to the fair because we're not really fair people, but we made an exception this year. One of the primary reasons we went is because we had just finished reading the book Charlotte's Web as a family. A good part of the book takes places at the county fair, and my kids had no idea what that was. Chris and I decided maybe it was time for them to experience the fair!
My kids hate the sun!
Haha!
We spent a good bit of time watching barrel races, and that was actually really fun. I think the animals were everyone's favorite part.
One reason we don't particularly like the fair is because it costs so much money to do anything. We all split one dessert (fried oreos!), and then we let each of the children choose one ride to do. Brianna and Brenson chose a spinny ride, and Daddy decided to go with them. They were all smiles before the ride began, but about half-way through poor Daddy got sick. I thought he was going to throw up! Thankfully, he didn't, but his body's reaction to the ride was a harsh reminder that we're not as young as we used to be. He's never had that issue before.
The tickets for these rides were $1 apiece, and each ride cost 4-6 tickets. So ridiculous! Before we purchased our tickets, a mom of a big family walked up to us and gave us 8 tickets that her family wasn't going to use. We tried to pay her for them, but she wouldn't have it. This meant Brecklyn and Brooke got to ride their ride for free! I guess it was our lucky day :-).
The girls were SO cute on their little ride. I could tell they felt so big riding by themselves, and they kept switching seats with each other the whole time the ride was going. It would *almost* have been worth $8 just to see how cute they were . . . *almost* :-).
Brecklyn and Brooke
Of course, I get to see how cute these girls are every day. I love that they love dress-up so much!
One night this month was McDonald's night for our school, which is when a certain percentage of all the proceeds from that night are given to our school. We try to support the school when we can, so McDonald's for dinner it was!
The kids love seeing their teachers and friends there!
Abby, Mrs. R, Sydney, and Brianna
Momma and Bren
Speaking of school, both of the kids have been rocking it this year! They are both thriving, and have both received awards for being helpful, kind, and good listeners. They have also both received reading awards.
I'm so thankful for my good little readers. I hope Brooke and Brecklyn will follow in their footsteps.
Brianna reading to Brooke and Brecklyn while Bren was having his guitar lesson
Even though it was September, we were still having a few days that were warm enough for the kids to play in the water. UGH . . . give me cooler temps, please!
Brianna eventually joined in on the water fun, but she was busy reading a book when I was taking these photos.
One evening, Chris was out of town for work so I took the kids to the park to run off some energy. We had a picnic, then they played until it was time to go home and go to bed.
On the third weekend in September, Amy, Angie, and I went to visit Kendall at her new home in Kansas. We left Tulsa Friday evening after Amy got off work, and got to Kendall's town around 9:30pm.
We had reserved a hotel room for the night, and after getting settled a bit we went on a tour of the town and church building with Kendall. Then, we decided to go to a local diner to visit and have a late night snack.
Unfortunately, it was homecoming weekend and the diner was packed out with high school kids who were being exceptionally obnoxious. We all decided to split a plate of food (which wasn't that good) since the portions were huge.
I mean, really.
The next morning, we got a tour of Kendall's new place and saw the rest of her family, then headed to a local coffee shop for breakfast. The food there was delicious!
After breakfast, we spent some time downtown shopping and browsing some booths that were set up for a little festival the town was having.
It didn't take long to explore all the shops and booths, so then we headed to another town for lunch and to do a bit of shopping.
We spent the remainder of the afternoon hanging out at Kendall's house, playing with her kids, and visiting. Kendall fixed a yummy dinner, and we started for home soon after that. It was SO good to see Kendall's new home and just be together. I love theses gals so much!!!
I'm very grateful for a husband who's willing to solo parent for a night and a day while I have some much needed girl time. When I got home, I was greeted by this adorable banner they made for me. It's always so nice to go, but it's even better to come home!
Chris and I have both dealt with some allergies this month, which is not uncommon for us this time of year. You can see in the photo below that Chris has bloodshot eyes and I have puffy eyes. However, the weather was GORGEOUS this night so we couldn't resist hitting up Food Truck Thursday downtown. Also, you can see in the photo that the kids are eating burritos. The food trucks aren't cheap, and the kids don't usually eat the food well. This month, we decided to save our money by getting them 99 cent burritos from Taco Bueno before heading downtown!
This past Saturday, our neighborhood had a neighborhood wide garage sale. Chris and I had talked a few times about having a sale to purge some toys (especially things the kids have outgrown), baby things, clothes, etc., so we were happy to join in the neighborhood sale. I've never had a garage sale before, and let me just say IT WAS A LOT OF WORK!!! We ended up with a lot to sell, and I put quite a few hours into organizing and pricing everything. The sale was Saturday only, so I spent the entire day on Friday working on stuff. When I went out into the garage Friday morning to start working, the one table I had all ready to go was sitting in the way of Brooke's bike that she wanted out. I told her to let me put down the stuff I was carrying and I'd help her. Well, she couldn't wait and ended up dumping the entire table within the first 30 seconds we were outside. ARGH! I was so frustrated! I texted the pic below to Chris and said, "This is why I can't get anything done in a timely manner!!!"
In addition to trying to get everything ready for the sale, Brianna decided she wanted to sell cookies and drinks. Of course, the cookies had to be home made, so the night before the sale we baked and bagged several batches of chocolate chip cookies. They were a huge hit (especially with the old men!), and she sold all but two bags of her cookies. I love her little entrepreneurial spirit, even if it did mean extra work for me :-). We ended up making about $500 at our sale, so I'd say we did ok!
Finally, we ended the month with Brenson attending a birthday party for one of his little school buddies. The party was yesterday (Sunday) afternoon, so Chris took him while I stayed home for rest time with the other kids. This is the first time Brenson has had a party invite that was just for him, and Brianna wasn't too sure what to think of that. She's had that opportunity several times, though, so I felt like it was about time for him to have a turn to attend a party solo. The party was at the skating rink in town, and Bren had a great time!
Bren and several of his classmates at the party
Brenson loved choosing a small gift for his friend, and had to be right there when he opened it.
Bren is a naturally good skater, so Chris had it pretty easy. I remember the first time I took Brianna to a skating party, she ran over my feet and fell on me so many times I was all bruised up, haha.
I hope your start to the month and the week has been good so far!
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