Dinners with friends...

Last weekend we had the Lohrs and the Graaffs (our new-ish neighbors) over for a dinner I've been meaning to have for a while. Life gets so busy! As you know, we always love having the Lohrs (and it had been too long!), and we thoroughly enjoyed getting to know the Graaffs better. They are such sweet people. We are so blessed with great friends and neighbors! What a fun, fun evening we had!



The girls


Me and Handsome


Julia and Allen


Nathan and Heather


We finished off the evening with Chocolate Malt Cake - Will's new favorite. It's more like three layers of brownies, stuffed with chocolate malt sauce, homemade malted milk crumbs, and toasted marshmallows. It's salty-sweet and rich and really amazing. It's in September's Bon Apetit! I think everyone liked it.


On 9/11 we had 8 people over for a really fun dinner where everyone brought something - a dish of some sort and a bottle of wine to share. What a blast we had! I couldn't comfortably fit 10 in our dining room (this is one of my short-term goals: to buy a long and fabulous dining room table!), so 6 sat there: the Woods, the Whitakers and the Parsons. My plan was for us to play musical chairs before dessert so we would get to visit with different people... but at Kristy's request, we all crammed into the dining room for dessert. It was super-fun!



Will and I enjoyed the Romans at our table for four. We had such a wonderful time catching up with them... and we really need to do that more often!

Her first ballet class!

Our little dancer finally got to dance! We enrolled her at Dunamix Dance, which everyone raves about because it's Christ-centered dance. I hear that every recital brings you to tears. We can't wait! Sullivan has so been looking forward to her "dancing cwass," and she was wonderful. I was afraid she would just be silly and dance around like she does at home, but she wasn't. She paid close attention to her instructor, Nicole, and tried her best to do every move. It was, hands-down, the sweetest thing I've ever seen. The class was behind glass, so I couldn't get pictures, but I did snap this one afterwards, with Sulli outside, in front of a picture of her instructor. Sweet.

Just stuff...

A sweet moment I captured between Zane and his lil' sis.


This was Labor Day and the best fried chicken I've ever made! Will's favorite is the kind I pound, stuff, roll and fry, served with Vidalia onion gravy, but for plain fried chicken, this is the best. Thanks, Chris Kimball! I LOVE Cook's Illustrated.



Here is Sullivan, all ready last week for her first ballet class... which she never made it to because I didn't bother to check the directions (because I had been there before)... and they had moved across town! Well, now I know and we will make it next week! Ha!

Science club...

... at least that's what I call it. Four families get together once every 2 weeks to go over the wonderful science lesson we've been studying at home from Apologia's "Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology." Now, this is my kind of co-op. It's kick back, stress-free and super fun. We rotate homes to meet in, with that mom teaching the lesson and providing experiments for the kids. It was my turn a couple of weeks ago, and our lesson was on the skeletal system. Wow, was it fascinating and fun! We did several small experiments, one being creating play-doh people without - then with - toothpick skeletons. Obviously, the ones without couldn't stand up or support themselves well. The kids had so much fun with that. We were missing one family this week, but at least we could all fit around our kitchen table.

A Brand New School Year!

On August 23rd, 2010, we had our first day of school for the new year. The boys were very ready to start; in fact, I've never seen them so enthusiastic about school! That makes it much easier on Mom. I can't believe I have THREE students this year! And I really can't believe my Levi is in kindergarten!!!


The boys stuck with the same seats they had last year. They're such creatures of habit!


It appears that Sullivan is getting a head-start on her phonics. She's really wonderful during school and entertains herself well.


Levi is soooo excited about learning to read. He can't learn fast enough, as far as he is concerned. But you have to start somewhere, so he's starting with learning his letters and the sounds they make.