Elyse took a sick day today. She had a bit of an upset stomach so we stayed in. ALL DAY. While it POURED outside. ALL DAY. From about noon (when Harry woke up from his nap which by the way is 2 hours EARLIER than he usually wakes up) on, I think I have looked at the clock 15 times. Try to think of a game that is good for a 1 1/2 yr old, a 7 1/2 year old, and a 35 yr old. Does Hungry Hungry Hippos come to mind? Well, that’s just what we did. In addition to pretending to be dogs and cats and crawling around on all fours, and of course, destroying any sense of order in the house. The good news is that she is feeling better now. Hopefully she’ll be back at school tomorrow. And hopefully Daddy will be home early from work so that I can escape for a sanity break.
We have practically a non-existant social life here, with the exception being this past weekend. We signed up for a church group called Tables for 8 which is basically just 4 families getting together for dinner 4 times throughout the year. Our group met on Sat. night. It had been planned for at least a month, maybe longer. Unfortunately, we also got 2 other party invitations for that night, which we had to decline. Chris also got an invitation for a guys night of cards. If only we could have spread all of this out over the course of a month or 2. But we had a nice evening with the other 2 families (one cancelled at the last minute). Our salad was the hit of the party.
But the real highlight of the weekend was earlier on Saturday. Elyse had her final soccer game. True to her nature she is a very passive soccer player. Somehow though, at the last practice a couple of weeks ago, she happened to get a goal. On Friday she mentioned that since she made a goal at her last practice, it would be perfect if she also made a goal at her last game. I encouraged her to get in there, be aggressive, and make a goal, but meanwhile thought it was going to take a miracle since she usually steps aside and lets the others take the ball whenever possible. But somehow, the girl didn’t just make one goal, but 2! And the best thing is that hopefully I’ll be able to post a video of one of the goals (taken by her friend Hannah’s grandmother–let’s hope she’s tech savy). Chris hadn’t arrived at the game yet and missed her first one, and I was so glad he got to see the second. I was, unfortunately, in the bathroom with Camille and missed the second goal. There is no video of that one, that I know of, but at least I got to see one.
After the game, the girls and the families got together for an end of season celebration at a mexican restaurant. The girls got medals and some nice compliments from their coach, and invitations to join the team again next year. Elyse was so proud of her medal that she wore it to dinner at the Tables for 8 that night. She was extremely proud of her goals and I think it’s fantastic that she ended the season on such a positive note. And I got to enjoy a margarita with Hannah’s mom, and have adult conversation….always a plus.
Last night we went to a Thanksgiving feast at our church. It was a decent crowd of 180 people. The tables were set beautifully and we had the honor of getting to sit with the pastor and his wife. He asked us to save him a seat as we sat at a table. The girls and I were fighting over who got to sit by him:) As it turned out, he barely got to sit for very long, but we were still pretty psyched, of all the tables and people, he asked us. There was a representitive from an organization called Our Family Adoptions (www.ourfamilyadoptions.org) This is a completely volunteer non-profit organization, staffed by adoptee families and passionate others, seeking to find homes for a few of the 5 million orphans in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Anyway, the stories that were told about these poor orphans were heartbreaking. The man’s wife was at an orphanage in DRC while the husband was speaking to us and she said she was holding an 8 lb. 12 month old. Our babies are that big at birth. Anyway, it made it very difficult to eat, as you could imagine. Our church is trying to raise 20,000 to bring 4 orphaned girls to their grandparents who have recently become US citizens and are living in Arizona. Anyway, if anyone is interested in checking out international adoptions, there is a lot of opportunity in DRC. Check out the website.
Here he is in his apron, I mean art smock, at the Children’s Musuem in Seattle. Chris said it looks like he’s wearing hoop earrings. I’m just glad that this morning when I painted Camille’s nails that I only used the pretend nail polish on Harry. Otherwise people might give him funny looks in his “Daddy’s little hot rod” t-shirt. 


We had a blast trick or treating this year. Harry was totally into walking from house to house and putting candy into his bag. He even said thank you before they loaded him up. Bits Zack and Andy were here again for the festivities, and as you can see from the picture, Andy was our expert pumpkin carver. It took him all afternoon, but the results were great. Bits had the classic mom problem of mis-guessing her own child’s size and so Zack’s cheetah costume was a little too small to put the hood on, but luckily he’s hansome and people still gave him candy:)
There are lots more pictures in our picasa site. 

We spent Sat. afternoon and evening at the beach celebrating the birthday of one of Chris’ co-workers. It was beautiful…more pictures here: 

I am told that the results of the fund raising way exceeded their expectations. 2 annonymous doners gave a total of $16000. That was how much they were hoping to raise all together from the kids!




