Fall Festival

While in Dallas for the wedding we got to attend church with my brother, sister and brother-in-law. After worship and service, the church held a Fall Festival. So, the kids got to dress up in their costumes, eat some good food, play games for candy, and play on all the inflatables.

Ariel (aka Aaris), Flounder (aka Titus) and me eating our lunch.

Me helping Aaris catch a fish for candy
Uncle Jeremy helping Titus play a beanbag toss game.
Aaris climbing a big inflatable obstacle course...insisting to do it all by herself.
The first big slide did scare her, so this is the one time I got to help her. It was fun!


Aaris still in the obstacle course. She had to hike up her dress and her wig flew off coming down the slide.
Aaris now brave enough to do the second slide all by herself.
Aaris jumping in the moonwalk.
Uncle Jeremy, Titus, and Uncle Mark
Titus was so tired he fell asleep sitting up on the table. (Of course he had partied all night at the wedding reception and got up early for first service).

Aunt Hattie getting her baby fix.

Lauren and TK's Wedding

Aaron's sweet, sweet cousin, Lauren got married this last weekend in Dallas to an equally sweet guy named TK. It was the most beautiful rehearsal dinner, wedding, and reception. And, Lauren was absolutely breath-taking. Aaron was back home taking his engineering licensing exam (8 hours long...YUCK) so it was just the kids and I. Aaron's brothers, niece and parents got to go as well. I was lucky enough to get to spend some time with my brother, sister and brother-in-law. And, I must send out a huge "Thank you" to my brother, Jeremy for watching the kids for me while I was attending the wedding events. And also thanks so much Albert for watching Titus during the wedding.

Rehearsal dinner. I'm sitting with Aaron's brothers and cousins and their sweet girlfriends.

Lauren and TK and their first dance. Her dress was covered in beautiful jewels.

Aaris doesn't even know Lauren's real name. She just thought she was Cinderella. She even asked Lauren (aka - Cinderella) if she had glass slippers.
Vicki (aka - Mamaw) and Titus at the reception
Mamaw with two of her grand kids. Titus is 6 months older than his cousin Cosette.
Aaris NEVER got off the dance floor. She LOVED it!!! She got to dance with the bridesmaids, Janea, Albert (aka - Poppy), Uncle Alan, Mommy, a handful of people we didn't know, and she asked several times to dance with Titus.


Poppy and Mamaw
Aaris and Janea dancing
Three sisters: Vicki dancing with her sister Pat, and her sister Julia (mother of the bride).
Aaris dancing with Uncle Alan

Titus and Mommy

Jack-O-Lantern

We ended up having to take the kids to an after-hours clinic on Sunday. Aaris has a double ear infection and Titus had a very yucky sounding cough, but only has a cold thank goodness. So the rest of the day was devoted to napping and nursing my babies back to good health. Titus went to bed early, so Aaris and I decided to carve a jack-o-lantern. She had a blast and was a very good supervisor. She would have nothing to do with helping me gut the pumpkin. She is very proud of her happy jack-0-lantern that still looks "just a little bit scary". :)

Pumpkin Patch

On Thursday evening the kids and I meet up with some of our favorite friends to go to a pumpkin patch. Karen and I went to high school together and her husband was the quarterback of our football team. We only reunited a couple of years ago but have since discovered that we have had very parallel lives. We both got married on the exact same day, both lived in Abilene at the same time. Our husband both went to UT at the same time. There son, Luke, and Aaris are only 3 days apart in age, and Titus and their daughter, Drew, are only a few months apart. Now we live 15 minutes from each other and our kids go to the same preschool. Luke and Aaris are in the same class and their teachers inform us that they are inseparable. Drew and Titus are also in class together. We have always enjoyed hanging out together, but have come to rely on each other a little more these days. Aaron is gone most of the time working his two jobs, and Ryan, Karen's husband, has to be gone a lot traveling for his job. Therefore, we get together to hold each other up every couple of days. Anyway, the weather was perfect, the pumpkins perfectly picked, and the kids were a delight. It was a fun memory.

ZOO

On Monday of this week, a few moms and kids from our church's young families class went down to the San Antonio Zoo for a fun day trip. It was really hot, but the kids didn't seem to notice (I on the other hand will wear shorts next time). Aaris got an opportunity to play with another 3 year old girl outside of our church building...that doesn't happen very often. And, one of the ladies brought her sweet neighbor to join us. Her name was Kim and she had a 7 month old boy, Dave, and a 3 year old named Paul who had a great time with Aaris and Meredith as well. Titus really enjoyed watching all the animals. He really likes to point at all of them and grin. After awhile he got tired of being left out of the action down in his stroller, so I had to carry him in my chest baby carrier. Aaris's favorite part was the reptile house and seeing all of the snakes. She practically begged me to go back to the bug house that we missed, but we really did run out of time. I guess we might have to go back just for that next time. It really is an amazing zoo and I hope to return many times with the kids for even more great memories. Thanks to all of you that came. It's always more fun to enjoy things with our friends.

A few of my favorite things

Some of my favorite things Aaris has done lately:

1. Learned to make her life a musical. The other day she came in and asked if we would like to come see her "stuff". I do need to let you know that she was wearing her Ariel red hair wig at the time. So Titus and I followed her into our game room where she then proceeded to break out in song "Look at this stuff. Isn't it neat? Wouldn't you think my collection's complete?..." I'm sure most of you recognize this is a song from the Little Mermaid movie. She sang the whole thing and acted it out. I love that she loves to sing.

2. Actually uses the bible verses she memorizes. She had learned a new Bible verse a couple of weeks ago from 1 Corinthians 13:4: Love is patient. Then, about a week later the kids and I were playing at the Southpark Meadows playground and Aaris had found another little girl to play with. But, Aaris kept getting stuff in her shoes and stopping to get the stuff out before she continued playing. Well at one point Aaris set down on the bouncy bridge and the other little girl started jumping on it. The next thing I hear is this: "My bible verse says, "Love is patient". Did you hear me? I said my verse says "Love is patient." Stop jumping please."" I was both so proud and so humored at the same time. I love that she knows her verses and even knows how to apply them in different situations. Now, if I could just get her to apply them to herself, that would be great. :)

3. Always prays. At the park today, she hit her head, and well, pretty much her whole body, pretty hard falling off a table. She cried for while while we assessed her and made sure that the bleeding from her head was not serious. After a while, I put her down and asked if she wanted to go play. She said no. But, then she told me what she did want to do. She wanted to pray. So we did pray to ask for her "hurts" to go away. Before we left the park she had asked me at least 2 other times to pray with her. I love that her natural first response in almost any situation is to pray.

4. Always wanting to learn and truly understand. Anyone who is around Aaris for any amount of time knows what her favorite question is: Why? She asks it all day long. But, she really, truly wants to understand everything that is said or going on. Some of the big ones she's asked me lately are: why did Jesus have to die on the cross, why don't girls marry girls or boys marry boys, do you love me no matter what? I must admit that I can get very very weary of answering questions all day, but for the most part, I'm very proud that she is thinking about things so much.

5. She talks about Jesus all the time and truly loves him. She brings up Jesus in conversation at least once every day. And she really loves to talk about heaven as well. Just a couple of days ago she was with me when I was getting ready for the day and she said, "Mommy, I just miss Jesus so much. I wish he would come and get us soon." I responded with an agreeing, "I really do, too, Aaris."

6. Likes to think that she is really strong. If you ever want Aaris to eat her meat, you just remind her that meat is what makes your muscles get bigger and that makes her stronger. She will then start to eat her meat and after every bite "show" you her muscles and make you feel how that bite of meat made them stronger. Also, yesterday we passed my new gym that just opened and I told her that we need to go to mommy's new gym since it just opened. She asked if she could go with me. I said that there were too many heavy weights for her to exercise with me. She then said, "Oh, but Mommy, I wish that I could get healthy, too." I know that was probably just her way of saying she wishes she could be with me, but it made me giggle that she said she wanted to get healthy.

7. And finally, about 2 weeks ago I went into Aaris's room at night expecting to just watch her sleep for a minute, but she woke when the light from the hall hit her face. So, I talked to her and she just got the giggle bug, and then of course I caught the giggle bug, and we just sat there and truly, deeply just laughed for about 5 minutes. She then started telling me over and over again, in one of the most sincere voices that I've ever heard, that she loved me. I of course responded with how much I loved her. All together I spent about 15 minutes in her bed with her that night doing all of this and it will always be one of the most precious memories I will ever have of Aaris and I together.

Where could she be?

I went to Aaris's room at the end of nap-time today to get her up as usual. I opened up the door and looked at her bed expecting to find her there asleep since I hadn't heard any sounds for a long time. Well, she wasn't there so I looked straight at her reading chair which is where she can sit for hours so quietly just "reading" her books, but no, she wasn't there either. So, then I walked around to the other side of the bed expecting to find her asleep on the floor, but she was nowhere to be found. I had fallen asleep at nap-time as well, and fear ran through me for a second thinking about all the possible scary, incomprehensible things that could have happened to her, and then, thank goodness, some logic set in I calmed down. Aaris loves to play hide-n-seek and she loves to hide under her bed, so I bent down, pulled up the bed skirt, and there she was sound asleep on the floor under her bed. I was so relieved and so humored at the same time.