hard day - please pray

It was a hard day at school.

One of our 3rd grade teachers has been battling cancer for over a year. Over the weekend, she experienced a seizure and more lesions were discovered around her brain. Her doctors have given her only a few days to live.

I don't know her REAL well, as I work mainly with the Kindergarten and 1st grade teachers. But I can't stop thinking about the fact Josh, the kids, and I bumped into her on Saturday night at Disney on Ice at Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines. She was with her family and she looked great. A few hours later, this seizure occurred...and now this.

Please add DeeAnn and her family to your prayers tonight (http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/deeannjohnson/journal). And please pray for the students at my school, the students in her class, and all the staff I work with. I just feel so sad for her, her family, and all the students who love her as their teacher.

tis the season!

Josh decided that we needed to put Christmas decorations up yesterday. I felt like it was a bit early...but we went with it. :) Our HUGE tree is in storage this year...which is fine...we still have our littler one and it works just perfect! We let the kids do all the ornaments...all the nice, breakable ones didn't even come out of the box. It was really fun to watch them work on the tree...I don't think Will probably did any decorating last year, so it was all new to him. He has since spent a lot of time taking ornaments off the tree...but like I said, they are all non-breakable and he eventually puts them back on. :)

My 2 tree decorators...love them. :)

This is how a lot of the branches looked when Keatin and Will were "done" hanging the ornaments...3 ornaments on one branch!

Will got this as a gift, I think from my cousin...and I just love it. :) When he was born, Keatin called him her "baby whale (aka - Will)"...and this is his "whale" ornament.

Keatin putting the star on the top of the tree...

...and Will watching. :)

And really - what better use for stockings than using them as mittens? :)

Happy Monday!

[happy sunday]

Happy Sunday! We (ok, AKA - me???) are ready for Thanksgiving break! Only a few days away!

 Here is our house as of Friday afternoon... Keatin was so excited to see all that "pink stuff" inside. :)

At the elementary school where I work (and where Keatin attends preschool), we have a PBIS program called Bondurant's BEST. For those of you not in education (like my husband, who wondered why Keatin kept talking about "bus" tickets...AKA - BEST tickets), this is a way to reward kids for the positive choices they make and positive behaviors they show at school. Staff members give kiddos BEST tickets, the tickets are collected by grade level all week long, and at the end of each week...a couple kids per grade level are drawn out. Those kids get their name announced at the end of the day on Friday, get a certificate, and get a prize off the prize cart. I hand BEST tickets out on a daily basis and working with the Bondurant's BEST program is a big part of my job. Well...guess who got their BEST ticket drawn on Friday??? Keatin Barber. :) She was SO excited to hear her name on the intercom...and I was a proud mama. :) It is kind of fun to be on the "other side" of things at school. We hung up her certificate as soon as we got home...and she has spent all weekend walking up to it and reading all the letters/words.

Other things we have done this weekend?

Played in our jammies and princess slippers. :)

Played "dress-ups." :)

Played mom & dad (as Keatin told me: I am the mom and Will is the dad. Our babies are asleep and we are relaxing.) Hmmm... :)

And just a little Gangnam Style, Barber style. :)

dancing queen

We had a really nice weekend...and discovered we apparently have a dancing queen in the family! :)

Saturday afternoon, after Aunt Jen rolled into town, we headed to downtown Des Moines for a wedding. A good family friend from Storm Lake was getting married...so G & G Petersen were there too! Both kids did great during the ceremony...and then it was time for the reception. The facility was SO nice, not too crowded (which equaled lots of space for the kids to play around), awesome food - we had a lot of fun! And as the reception carried on and the dancing started...oh my...Miss Keatin stole the show. :)

A pic of the "Petersen" family...

...and with Josh. :) (Picture makes me laugh...Keatin has her eyes closed and Will has a pretzel sticking out of his mouth.) :)

This is Keatin with her BFF of the night...the flower girl.

Will played for a little while...

...but then spent most of the night playing games on Josh's phone and getting tired/cranky.

Hey! Just the 2 of us!

As the wedding party entered, Will did a little clapping...

...and then got tired. :(

And the dancing began...

(Might be my favorite action shot - ha ha!)

Thank you to the Rust family for inviting us to the wedding/reception!

On Sunday, G & G Petersen came over and stayed overnight at a hotel in Des Moines to do some early Christmas shopping today...which meant we had the chance to take K & W swimming at the hotel. Keatin LOVED it...Will liked sitting on the top stair of the hot tub. :) It was a fun activity to do on a COLD afternoon!

(Sunday morning...Will found that stinking phone by himself and just laid himself out on the chair...stinker.)

Hope everyone has a great week!

deck & shingles

More house pictures...for those who care. :) You can see in the matter of 2 days how we went from no deck or shingles...to having a deck and shingles!

11.7.12

11.9.12