Fall Catch-up

Wow, has time flied!  I can't believe I went this long without posting, but we've been busy!  September was filled with Cougar games in Pullman and one in Vegas!  Marcus and I got to spend a few days there while his sister came and stayed with the kids.  It is not our favorite town, but was fun to see it flooded with Cougs!

My mom made Ryn a princess dress for Halloween, so naturally, we had to have a tea party in our gowns!

We had the pleasure of my friend, Kara, and her kids stay with us a few days.  Sierra and Ryn did great together and Ryn was very sad to have her friend leave.

 Life got very busy at the end of October when Kara came...to help me pack up our house.  We were looking for a house to rent in order to let our new worship pastor rent our house from us.  We found a house we liked and had a verbal "ok" about 2 weeks prior to moving day.  The actual contract was not signed until 2 days before.  November 1 is not a good moving day!  With Halloween the night before, I had to be very organized and wanted the kids to still have a good night!

 With help from our wonderful friends and my mom, we were all moved in by Nov. 3.  I then had to have our other house washed and scrub by Nov. 6.  This wasn't too bad, until we also learned that we would have a showing in our new rental (it is on the market) on Nov. 7!  Needless to say, it was a VERY busy and stressful 2 weeks!

 We are enjoying our rental house.  It is completely different from our 85 year old home and even the new city (only 2 miles away) has a different feel.  I do miss our cute old house, but having fun trying out new things.  We are hoping the house won't sell until Spring so we have time to decided what/where we want to live more permanently.

Except for keeping our rental fairly clean 24/7 and the excitement and activities of the holidays, life is almost back to normal.  2nd grade does a large feast for Thanksgiving and Jacob got to dress up to sing a song at the all-school chapel.

We spent Thanksgiving in Pullman and it was a small crowd (18 people) with 2 of Marcus' siblings and families not there.  We missed them!  The kids had fun playing with cousins and Marcus' highlight of the weekend was going to the Apple Cup, which the Cougs won in an incredible overtime.

We are now looking forward to Christmas, celebrating Christ's birth, and spending an exciting time with my side of the family. Let's just say I have a lot to do again in a short amount of time!  Hope you all have a great holiday season!

Off to Second Grade and Kindergarten!

Can't believe school is here already, but I think my kiddos were ready.  Jackson started 2nd and Jacob is in Kindergarten

Jackson seems to be loving Mrs. Allen's class!

 

 After dropping Jackson in the morning, Ryn, Jacob and I accomplished many errands and had lunch at Burger King with another pm kinder.  Do you like their socks with sandals look?  We had to run into Target to get socks for playland and they did not want to take them off!  We got to school to show Jacob his class, where to put his backpack and play at recess for a bit.

A new buddy!

Love that quirky smile!  When his teacher politely excused the parents, Ryn and I gave him a kiss and headed out.  The minute we left his room, Ryn started crying very loudly about wanting "her Jacob"!  Precious.

He had a great time and loves getting his "Super Behavior" card everyday!

My Sweet and Sassy Girl

Oh, Kathryn!  Let's talk about her 3 yr old pictures first.  My sis, Jen, did an amazing job with her "official" picture.  We took this on a hundred degree day, her hair was curled 20 minutes before shoot time and fell flat before one click, and there was a pool waiting to be swam in! What Trouble!

 

I took her out another time, also with her hair curled (though you'd never know) and all I got was sass!  This pic pretty much sums up her attitude about photo shoots.

And then, sometimes she will surprise us.  She had been upstairs by herself for a bit.  I had even mentioned to Marcus that she was being awfully quiet and I wondered what she was up to.  When I went up to check on her, she had moved EVERYTHING from her bed to ours because she was waiting for us to come to bed and wanted to snuggle.  Too cute!

 It is amazing how many emotions one little girl can bring out of me in a 12 hour time period! 

Closing Out Summer

The kids spent a few days at Grandma and Grandpa Fry's, and our trip to go get them got extended due to Marcus' work.  We ended up having to stay a night in Spokane, that turned out to be a blessing as we got to spend time with our friends, the Duggans.  Jen was a fabulous host with a few hours notice!  The kids did great together, again, and it was nice to spend a few hours kid free in the evening.  Thanks for such a great time!

 Her kids are all about 3 months or so younger than mine respectively.  Everyone had a playmate!

 The two 5 year olds were hilarious.  We never quite figured out what they were patiently waiting for with "guns" loaded!  They stayed like this for at least 5 minutes.

 

Our city puts on movies in the park during the summer, but we never made it to one this year.  So, we decided to do it in our backyard.  It was a lot of fun, even though some of the kids got restless towards the end.  Definitely a yearly event!

 

This is not a great pic, but I had to document that Ryn decided she could swim without help (except her lifejacket) this year.  Oh, what freedom I now have at a pool!

An Unexpected Visitor

Last night I was working on the computer and thought I heard a bird near our basement door...today when I checked to see if anything was down there, this is what I found!

 Gross (Mom's words)!

Cool (Jackson's words)!

Feeling Blessed This Morning

I am feeling very blessed this morning.  My mom and dad took the kids to Seattle with them for a few days to give me time to work on my teaching clock hours (Which I am doing, Mom!)  But...I must say what a wonderful morning it has been.  Thanks to the generousity of the Sunquist family and my friend, Erin, we went blueberry picking bright and early.  What a great way to start a day!

I came home and cooked a delicious breakfast that I ate while doing my Bible study, delivered some blueberries to neighbors and plan to swim after working on my clock hours a bit more.

Thank, Mom, for watching the kids!

Ryn's Birthday Party

We had a small birthday party for Ryn, which was princess/ballerina themed...of course!  Her friends all made a tutu (well, their moms' did!), except for her one boy buddy!

 The kids were pretty happy playing in the yard and the pool!

 My boys are such posers!

 Ryn LOVES her new hippo chair from Aunt Jen!

Being silly with Papa

 Playing with a few new toys from the Fry side.

Happy Birthday, Rynny Roo!

We started Ryn's birthday by heading to the store to pick out our traditional birthday doughnuts.  Knowing her party would be in a few day, we had a fairly calm day.  We had lunch at a park and finished the day at our church's VBS. 

Our crazy, wild, sweet, sassy, monkey girl...

Loves her brothers

Loves princesses and ballerinas

Loves to dance

Loves to "fight" with brothers

Loves "Nastics"

Loves to be bossy

Loves Dora and Diego

Likes candy

Can't sit still through a meal

Know most of her ABC's

Wears big girl panties

Wants to be with her family, but wants to go to school

Has a personality bigger than her little body!

Love you!

Cole's Birthday

We all made it to Cousin Cole's birthday.  These 3 cousins love hanging out together!



Pinata Time  (most of these kids are 1st cousins...some not even in the picture!)

Wonder what they're thinkin'?

Trying to get a picture of these crazy 3 is very hard!

Fourth of July in Pullman

We spent quite a few day in Pullman during the fourth.  It was a wonderful time with almost all of the family.

 We went to see how the new stadium box seats were coming along.  The field was open to walk on and the boys played some catch, the kids ran through the tunnel were the football players run out.

I almost 3!

 Cousins and Sugar...what more could a kid want!

Ryn is not the baby anymore!  Eli's first fourth!

Crafts and body paints

 Brandon is wondering what Jacob did to his arm.

We discovered a pyro in our family!

Thanks, Frys, for a wonderful celebration!