Brae's expressions!

Brae was goofing off when we were putting up Christmas decos, he kept saying take my picture take my picture while holding up my card holder wreath. So I did. It was the day before Thanksgiving and so he knew he was suppose to be off school the next day. Just as I was clicking the picture I said "Oh by the way I decided we would do extra school tommorow"...Isnt that look precious. Oh my boy he is very expressive!

Time to Sing

Tonight was the first of three choir concerts for Brittney. This is her first semester in this choir and she has really enjoyed it and has done well. She has another concert tommorow night, and then her final recital on the 11th. I still haven't figured out why I had to purchase a white dress shirt and black skirt when they just covered them with their choir robes but oh well. She loved it all.

Anything to get out of coloring

This morning we were doing school time, and one thing we are doing is making a page for each state as we learn the capitals. Well today was Washington and it had an apple on it. I told the kids they could color it red, yellow or green.
Braden says "Mine is going to be a white apple"....(so he wouldn't have to color). I told him there are no white apples. His reply "There are if they are left on the trees and snow falls and covers them"...well yes I guess then there are, oh that boy is going to so give me gray hair.

It's Beginning to Look a lot like Christmas

The house is decorated, the lights are around the roof and most of all the blog now has a Christmas theme...thanks Matt!

I have one more rubbermaid container to go through of Christmas decorations. Britt and I did some wrapping this evening and now presents are under the tree.

Busy times, but I love Christmas time!

Catching Up

So behind on blogging as I am with everything else in life right now. Busy busy. These next two weeks are beyond crazy, it will be busier now than right before Christmas.

We had a good Thanksgiving. My aunt, uncle, counsin, his wife and baby came down from Texas. My cousin started talking to hubby about sales at Best Buy. Well both him and my husband are officially crazy now. They arrived at Best Buy at 4PM on Thanksgiving Day and spent the entire night in the parking lot. Hubby didn't even need anything for us, he did end up getting a few things, but he stood in line for my aunt, and my cousin stood in line for him a lap top. They both got what they needed and Matt did get a few great things for the kiddos. I am almost done Christmas shopping mostly just filling stuff here and there. But I think the fact that my husband spent 13 hours camping in a parking lot officially marks his insanity. I of course had my own insanity and was up at 3:00 am and at JCPennys by 4:00 am, but at least I didnt spend the night so that makes me not as crazy as hubby. I always have to go to JCPennys because Brittney has one of those free snowglobes from there for every year since she was born.

This week is choir rehersal and more choir rehersal, only a few more weeks and choir will be over. Britt has decided not to do it in the Spring, and I am actually glad. She wants to go back to art lessons and I am fine with that. I thought her teacher was a little spacey but Britt loved her and she did learn a lot in the short time she took lessons before choir.

Braden has a new shirt that he wants washed daily. He picked it out himself it is bright green with red letters that say "Dear Santa Please Take My Sister". I usually don't let him have shirts like that but he really wanted it and I can tell I am going to have to put it in the back of the closet every once in a while so it is not worn daily from now to Christmas.

I think he missed the point...

Kids were having a little tiff so I told them to sit by each other and say something really nice about the other:

Britt: You have a good attitude

Braden: hmmm (thinking, thinking) I know what you have a really good collection of shoes.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today I will give thanks for so many things. I am so grateful and I need to take the time more often to be thankful instead of woo is me kinda thing. Sometimes I get so down and concentrate on what is stressful instead of being grateful. How wonderful that I have those things to be stressed over because it could be so terribly worse so today I am thankful for all the craziness, all the busy times, all the doctor appointments, all the tiffs, everything.

Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!

It was Enchanting

Hubby only had to work half a day today so we took the kids to see Enchanted. We had won some tickets awhile back on Blingo so we had been waiting for this to come out.

I wasn't sure that Brae would like it. We all did. So glad that they are coming out with some movies we can all see and enjoy together. We enjoyed Game Plan a month or so go and today we all enjoyed Enchanted.

It is a cute movie, no cuss words, has some funny parts, cute ending. I would recommend it and it wasn't so girly that the guys didn't like it. Of course the songs are now stuck in my head and I will be singing them for days!

Couldn't wait

Yesterday I was down in the dumps so hubby got all the Christmas decorations down. We put up the tree. The earliest we have ever done it but it cheered me up. None of the other decorations are up just the tree. The others will probably wait till next week. Having friends over Tuesday to decorate Turkey cookies so they will have to ignore the tree in the living room. Going to be a busy week and that is okay it should have lots of fun mixed in with the busy times.

More of Braden's view of drinking lots of water..

Braden is still having to drink the 60 plus ounces of water daily due to the treatment plan we are following. Brittney was trying to be nice and said "I wont drink any soda either Braden only water". His response "Go ahead Senna drink a Dr. Pepper no need for us to both suffer".

Bless his heart, we are cheating here and there with a little to drink that isn't water as long as he has already drank the required water for the day.

Good news is I think I can see a little difference in things, not a lot and sometimes I wonder am I imagining the subtle change or are things improving. Won't know officially for several more weeks.

He is prone to a little overdramatization

We have had to make several changes since coming back from Austin. Not the least of which is more healthy things. We already did mostly organics but now Brae much drink 65 ounces of water and some things like that.

My mom was watching him for a few hours on a very busy Monday night and asked him how he was after getting in the car.

He looks around after getting in the car: "Nana get me to a Sonic quick I need a cherry limeade a dr pepper something they are trying to kill me with all that healthy water."

Of course since it was Nana and that means no rules he got his cherry limeade. It wont hurt him and I will let him cheat every once and awhile but still funny that he thinks we are trying to kill him with healthiness.

Okay so I am impatient

Shannon had let me know why we were in Texas that my pics were in. So of course she already knows me well and knew I couldn't wait so she had them already for me on Saturday. I met her and picked them up at 3:00 and was at hobby lobby picking out frames by 3:30. Good thing I am impatient because yesterday was the last day that the frames were 50% off, I had them cut the mat, frame them, and put the hanger on them. It was SO much cheaper than I had planned...which is a very good thing. Of course we had to come home and get them hung up right away. Good thing my hubby is indulgent on how impatient I am. Now the huge wall in my living room looks like this, the pics below the big pics weren't there before either it was all light house stuff but I thought it would look better with different pics.

This and that update

As most of you know we have been in Austin this week. Check up time for Brae. The news wasn't good, but wasn't terrible. Lots more questions than answers as seems to be the norm for us and doctors as they pertain to Brae. We have some new things we are going to try and will know in a few weeks. Basically if things don't improve we could be in for some really difficult times but right now we are being thankful that the news wasn't worse and being thankful that Brae has such a wonderful attitude and spirit.

Thinking about it and Christmas will be here before we know it. Time is going to be crazy from now till Christmas, more doc appts out of town, a trip to meet up with family, Thanksgiving (company coming to our house), taking Britt to the Hannah Montana concert, lots and lots of stuff. I am making a list of what I still need to do and getting it all planned out. That is the only way I will make it till Christmas with any sanity.

We had fun before we got to Austin with shopping, dinner at Rain Forest Cafe and the Nascar race. Most of the week has been consumed with doctors, research etc but today I got to take the kids to see the Bee movie. They loved it, it wasn't as bad as some animated movies I have had to sit through. Brae said it was "AWESOME". Britt really liked it as well and they each have favorite parts. All in all good movie but I think it is probably better to wait for dvd but that is because I am so cheap when it comes to movie. One thing I do love about the bigger cities is the movies during the day, at home you can't go to a movie until public school is over. Here they start at 11:00 am during the week. That would be so nice to do sometimes after school was finished or meeting up with other homeschool friends.

We plan on heading home tommorow. Yeah ready to be home. We were able to do laundry here so won't have quite as much when we get home but will still be a lot of catching up to do and looking ahead at next week...yikes..busy as usual.

Nascar

 

American Girl Boutique & Bistro

I have been trying to load pics but can't get them to post on the blog so I will just have to link to flickr

Today we got to go to the grand opening of the American Girl Boutique & Bistro in Dallas. It was fun. Well most of us thought it was fun. Braden said "there are 6 boys here and 3 million girls". This pic sums up his thoughts on the
experience
Regardless of him trying to strangle himself he did live through it.

Here is Brittney at lunch with her doll. Yes they seat dolls with you and give them their own menus

Another random rambling insomnia post

Apparently my insomnia is not limited just to when I am home, hotels are apparently worse.

We started out yesterday, we didn't make it as far as we had planned but we stopped to eat and I think it was the slowest reteraunt ever.

Anyway it has been a busy week. We had an impromptu little Halloween lunch on Wednesday, and just getting ready for the week. I am looking forward to a little bit of fun before we have a zillion doctors appointments next week. Braden has the hours counted down until the Nascar race. He is so ready. Last night the hotel we first tried to stop at had someone staying there that drove the trailer and everything for Matt's driver that he roots for so Matt stood out in the middle of the road and I snapped his picture in front of it. I think him and Braden will have such a great time and it will be so good to have fun before the check up appointments of next week. The only damper so far is Brae's arthritis seems to be flaring up. I am sure we will manage to have fun. Today we are getting to check out the grand opening of the American Girl Bistro/Cafe in Dallas. Brittney is looking forward to it this was Braden's comment "I will need a guy race on Sunday after being surrounded by girl stuff tommorow". He is not too keen on eating lunch at anywhere called the American Girl.

I am off to take a very hot shower, long story but basically our hot water heater is a lukewarm heater at our house right now so I am looking forward to hot hot water.