ELEVEN!!!

Last week we celebrated another birthday! I can't believe we only have one more year until she is in YW! This has been a year of growth and maturing for Anna. She has changed so much and become such a great help to me. I don't know what I would do without her.

Halloween continues to be her favorite holiday!

Some of Annas favorite things are reading, reading, reading, riding her bike, playing with her sister and little brothers, and cooking. She is full of life and has an infectious personality! We are so blessed to have her in our family!

We took her to Medieval Times for her special day and we all had a great time! And with the web coupon it was well worth the money! Unfortunately, I didn't take a single picture!

A looooong time

I realized today that it is coming up on a month since my last post.  I have been waiting for a chance to get the pictures from the camera to the computer. It may never happen at this rate....this is why I am no longer doing pictures for others. Keeping up with my own is hard enough right now.

But don't confuse lack of posts with lack of activity....we have been pretty busy. Some activities over the last few weeks include, meeting "Paul Revere", Marching thru History (where we watched several battle reenactments and visited military camps throughout the ages, including our favorite, the Romans, where we had a chance to practice our Latin and watch a gladiator fight!), soccer games, the girls have started going to book club, and we have started Latin with another family (and yes, I know it's a "dead" language...although it's really not...do some research!), building and erupting Mt. Vesuvius and other school projects.

As far as my health goes....well not much has changed. I wish I could say I was all better. I have had some more tests done and still no answers. I have another apt in a couple of weeks and hopefully something good will come from it. I manage to get everything done that needs to be done but there is little left for much else. (like pictures!) As David says, "the cake is getting baked but there's no frosting." I miss the frosting things, like shopping, running, photography, and cooking yummy food rather than whatever is easy, but I am trying to be grateful for the cake, after all it's a pretty good cake.

Speaking of Dr. apt's, because of some symptoms Robert has started experiencing with increasing frequency he will probably be having that surgery sooner that we had hoped. More on that later...

Hopefully I will get to work on pics soon!

Just because I love his eyes!

Just a cute pic because I have a cute kid!

Soccer Practice!

Robert's playing soccer this year and loving it! He might not have a big future in soccer, but he does supply some great comic relief! Here's some pics from his first practice.

William loves to "run in his runnin' shoes" while Robert practices soccer.

Opening day and Roman fighting

Finally, pictures from opening day...

I don't have good pictures of the kids in their costumes, but at least you can get the idea. The dads in our group built this Greek temple and some of the moms painted it. Zeus and Hera attended the event along with some of the other gods and goddesses (including Nike, the goddess of victory....a.k.a me). The kids each got a chance to tell everyone about their demi-god character that they created and it was fun finally meeting everyone in our group. This is going to be such a great year! We will be studying ancient Greece and Rome and also the founding of America. The amazing moms that planned the year have done such an incredible job of making the three go together beautifully.

Monday we were able to see a Roman fighting demonstration and then the kids got a chance to practice some of their moves. They LOVED it!

  

School is still going very well. Mornings are a little bit of drudgery as we get through math, piano, and such, but the afternoons we do Epic Adventure stuff and it is well worth it!

Not the news we wanted

Today we got the results from Robert's MRI. That poor kid just can't seem to get a break. The syrinx is still there and from my untrained eye it looks bigger. (We will be getting his previous MRI's so the new Dr. can compare.) The chord is retethered or tightened or thickened or whatever the correct terminology is. He will eventually need surgery to fix it again. We could have it done now, but think we will wait until his symptoms start to get worse.  He also has a mild case of chiari malformation. (ch pronounces as a k) I don't feel like explaining, so if you are interested, Google away. Right now he is asymptomatic so nothing will be done about it. We will keep an eye on it and someday he may need surgery for that as well.

It has been a long emotional day.

Oh, and other news... David's car died right before our trip to FL. $1800 to fix. Hopefully it will be done by Friday...this one car shuffle is no fun. Thank goodness for an emergency fund though!