Back to School, and NEW stuff!

Well as the summer wraps up and the kids get ready to go back to school, I feel like I need to wrap up some recent highlights!

Here's this little cutie who wanted to bird watch on one of our night walks.


I like to get {or try to get} pictures of the kids in the morning before they head off for their first day, and this year was EXACTLY like last year. Nikelle was all excited for school and wide awake and happy. Then there was Donavan who was ULTRA grumpy, and even told me he's NOT a morning person. (Um...really???) And Nikelle is just trying to cooperate and get a good picture. I'll put one up, but just know that the whole series will be a layout....ya, the pictures are THAT funny!


Then I got to go out the other night with my friend Jen and her cute little sister Cynthia for a quick photo shoot! Isn't she adorable?




We decided to get Carissa a new bike, when her friend Kassidy got a bike and we realized that she was indeed big enough to ride a 2 wheeler with training wheels. Then the girls began fighting over it, and we knew we'd have to get something for her soon. I took her to the store to pick out a bike, and was surprised that she picked a Barbie one instead of the Disney Princess one. So it was a good thing that I took her with me to pick it out. She really enjoys it, but still has a tough time turning around, but she's getting the hang of it!


We were at the park for a friends party the other night, and I just had to take advantage of some yummy afternoon light in the park. Isn't Kelle just looking so grown up? I can't believe how big she's gotten these past couple of years!





And the last part of my VERY random post is about something that was LONG overdue, but I just wasn't ready to do it until now.

Over the past couple of months, I've found a couple of friends on facebook that I went to school with. This one in particular, we were very close but she was younger than me, so we lost each other after high school. Turns out she lives right here, and is in the process of fostering kids. She's been able to adopt 2 others through the program, and has been fostering another for the past 8 months. She got a call a couple of weeks ago asking if she would be interested in taking in a 17 month old boy. Well of course she jumped at the chance, even though it would mean that the little boys were only 2 months apart. And over the next week alot of things happened that allowed her to adopt this little guy right off the bat. And because she needed a crib to put him in, I offered her Carissa's crib. Which of course meant that I needed to admit that my "baby" was no longer a baby and was capable of sleeping in a big girl bed!

So when we got home from church, we started to disassemble the crib. And suddenly Carissa got EXTREMELY attached to it, and I started to panic! But once we got the new bed opened up and assembled, she was BEYOND excited to have a new bed!

See the excitement on her face!!!

When it was time to get ready for bed, she put on her jammies and climbed into bed even before finishing the rest of her nightime routine! But look how tired she looks here! AND it was 30 minutes BEFORE her bedtime!

And here's what it looks like all finished in the morning light! Now I just need to finish the room by putting up her shelf and curtains, and then it will be DONE!


That's it for right now. Carissa will go back to preschool in 2 weeks, so we are gearing up for that! Hopefully she will be independent enough to not need me to stay at school with her. Seriously....I hope she has outgrown that!