&t The Taylor Family: August 2008

Monday, August 25

First day of Kindergarten

Finally, after being canceled for the last three week days, Bresa got to start Kindergarten today. Grandma took Abbi last night so Daddy and I took Bresa to school for her first day at the Big Kid School. She picked out what she wanted to wear and after a good breakfast of oatmeal with bananas and blueberries mixed into it, we were off to school. We took her the Cafeteria where we waited at her class table for her teacher to come and get her. I had her sit down next to a girl to wait and immediately she hugged the girl next to her (complete stranger) and showed the girl her lunch box and pointed out all the princesses and asked which one she was. The teacher came and the kids lined up to go to their new classroom and the parents kind of wandered behind them. Bresa did actually look back once or twice but she was perfectly content staying in line with the other kids. There lots of tears from other children but Bresa never stopped smiling. They got to the classroom and sat down at their desks. Some parents wouldn't let go and I wanted to watch through the windows for a little longer but Peter said it was time to get going. I knew she would have no problem and I counted the minutes down through the day until I knew she would be off so I could find out all the things she did in school. She said she had a great day and really enjoyed it but that she "got a little whiney in the end because she missed Mommy and Daddy." I thought that was really sweet because she usually doesn't even notice we are gone. What a big girl she is!! Thanks Grandma for the new school clothes, Bresa loves her Ballerina dress that she has talked about for a week now!!

posted by We are the Taylors @ 9:31 PM   0 comments

Saturday, August 23

Sunshine, what's that?

Today was the first day in almost a week that we got the privilege of seeing a somewhat blue sky with a bit of sunlight shining through. It didn't last out the morning but we enjoyed while we could. Tropical Storm Fay took a pretty good beating on us up here in Orange City. There are neighborhoods in Debary (about 2 miles south) that are under four feet of water and had evacuations and rescue teams going door to door. I was pretty sure that our house and road would be flooded as we accumulate large puddles just from strong rain storms. Peter said the water level in the yard was pretty high but by the time I got home each day, even though it was still raining, the water had completed receded and there weren't even puddles. We will see what happens in the next few days though. With the flood waters from Brevard expected to empty into the, already full, St. Johns River (about a mile from our house) we may be looking at taking boat from the front door instead of our cars. We continue to pray for drier weather and of course for those already suffering the aftermath of Fay. There are several streets in Orange City that are completely flooded and one of the music stores that Peter frequents is about a 1.5' underwater across the entire strip mall and parking lot, that's only about a mile East of us. We have had to take alternate routes out of our neighborhood to avoid the very large, but passable, standing puddles that have been growing with each rain fall. Hopefully in the next few days, we will see a decrease in the depth of water and dryer streets and houses.

posted by We are the Taylors @ 7:50 PM   0 comments

Tuesday, August 19

Update on Donna

In spite of the bad weather in the state it is a sunshine day here. Donna just received word from the doctor in Tampa that Donna has had a 50 percent response to the treatment. Translated it means that 50% of the tumors are shrunken or gone . All honor and Glory belongs to the Father,Son and Spirit for the answer to all prayers offered in her behalf. As I said many times. "Ask and you shall receive." We asked and we received ...the good news. Ah, the power of prayer.

The doctor wants her to be totally healed from her recent surgery, then round 2 will begin in 10-14 days.

From a mother's heart , I thank you all and I will have my private moments with the LORD to thank HIM. Praise the Lord

Claire

posted by We are the Taylors @ 5:08 PM   0 comments

Sunday, August 17

Back to the Books

Most of you know that I put together pretty elaborate scrapbooks for the girls, starting on the day we found out we were pregnant up to the their first year birthdays. They were pretty detailed with lots of journaling and photos of course. I am the fourth one out of five children in my family and my baby book isn't really filled out all that well, so I always swore that all my children would have the same attention when it came to recording their first year. Easier said than done for sure. There is one good thing about having other children before starting this scrapbook, I have a layout. Bresa's probably took me the longest to put together and then Abbi's was much easier, when I could find time, because I knew which pages were the most important and I didn't leave anything out that I had to put in later for Bresa's. Since I had this week off, I got out a scrapbook that I received when I was pregnant with Abbi after I had already started the book that would be hers. I got out all my scrapbooking supplies, which was a surprisingly decent amount, to get started. I have been journaling as events have happened (finding out, first hearing heartbeat, first ultrasound, end of first trimester) so I just need to print those out and then get some pictures of my growing belly printed out before I can start putting everything together. Michael's was having a great sale so I visited them and bought a few more pages and baby stickers for decorations. It's really hard to put subsequent books together when there are so many other things that need to get done, but if I do this little by little it shouldn't be too hard to make this one just as great as the last two.

posted by We are the Taylors @ 7:51 PM   0 comments

Saturday, August 16

A new pad to splash

This morning I was going to take the girls out to the zoo and let them splash around a bit. The clouds looked threatening though so I decided to hold off for the rain. Well, I guess the rain didn't feel like falling so we pretty much just had an overcast day. After the girls took a nap Peter needed to get some paperwork done so I took the girls to a park that is just right across from our neighborhood. Not long ago the city put in a splash pad in the park near the play ground for the kids to play in. I hadn't taken the girls there yet but every time we drove by you could tell the kids there were having fun. Since it is closer to our house and it was almost 5:00 we just went to the park today. The girls had a great time, until Abbi hurt herself (that's usually how it ends). After that we packed up and went home to get bandaged and fed. Now it's almost bedtime and I am exhausted and I didn't even play. The rain must have been waiting for us to have our fun because it is about to pour right now and the thunder is really loud.

posted by We are the Taylors @ 6:38 PM   0 comments

Thursday, August 14

Congrats Graduate!!

Tonight was Bresa's preschool graduation. I know, she got out of school in May but they had a summer program so they did the graduation after that ended. We all got dressed up and went to the church in Debary for the ceremony and we were so happy that we got there a little early because the place was packed. We got really good seats but there were people standing up all lined up in the back and even some in the foyer that probably couldn't see anything. There were a few different classes so there were a lot of families there. When it was Bresa's classes turn they sang "Jesus loves me" and did hand gestures to emphasize the song. I am so proud of Bresa. She did so well and seeing her up there made me cry. I wasn't expecting that since she is usually so independent that she doesn't usually give me time to cry before she is ready to let go. She was easily the smallest one in all of the classes. At first I was wondering why they put her in between the two tallest kids but then quickly realized that they didn't, that Bresa was just that short. She is so cute. After graduation we went out to dinner to celebrate after taking a few quick pictures outside. The graduation was actually good timing because tomorrow we have to go the elementary school to meet her new Kindergarten teacher and see her classroom. Congratulations Bresa!! We are so proud and love you so much!!!

posted by We are the Taylors @ 10:19 PM   2 comments

Wednesday, August 13

Ice Ice Baby

About two months ago our ice maker decided to make terrible noises when you tried to get ice out of it using the mechanism on the door. Since I am off for the week I don't mind taking on a couple projects. Today we emptied out the kitchen freezer into the freezer in the garage and turned off the cooler inside. We let the ice that had built up behind the maker defrost and finally we were able to pull the tray out. Since everything was out of it anyway I decided to go ahead and clean it all out. It actually wasn't bad considering we have lived here for 5 years now, just a few crumbs here and there. There is still some ice in the motor that needs to melt but hopefully once all of that is clear the maker will work without complaining again.

A very Happy Birthday to Heather today!! We love you Heather and wish we could have spent your special day with you. Hope you enjoyed!!!

posted by We are the Taylors @ 8:53 PM   1 comments

Tuesday, August 12

Happy 8th Anniversary...To Us!!

posted by We are the Taylors @ 7:56 PM   1 comments

Monday, August 11

It's A...

That's right, it's a baby!! Come on, you should know from our first two children that Peter and I like surprises. We had our ultrasound last week and got to see for the first time our newest member of the family. Sitting happy in his/her little home developing along just perfectly. The ultrasound tech, Laurie, asked us if we wanted to know the sex of the baby and Peter and I had discussed finding out but ultimately decided we would let it be a surprise. I must say, I was tempted but now that the ultrasound is over I have missed my opportunity but don't regret it at all. Laurie took all the measurements and everything looks good, she said I may be due a little later but I am not concerned and would actually prefer a date a bit further from Christmas. At our next Dr. appointment we will discuss what date she thinks we should go by and perhaps a few month later on we may have another ultrasound to confirm it. The baby was busy in there waving hands and feet. We counted out 10 perfect fingers and toes and enjoyed watching the baby yoga show going on. After all the formal stuff we got to play around with the 3D doppler which was great because we never got to do that with our girls. The baby is still little so the form is still a bit alien and skeletal but you can see the basic form of a baby in there. We got a DVD of the video of the whole scan and we got a CD with a bunch of pictures taken during the scan.

posted by We are the Taylors @ 1:10 PM   0 comments

Saturday, August 9

Tumbling Fun

Today Abbi had a birthday party to go to that was held at the Gym that Bresa use to take Gymnastic class at. Abbi was just a baby when Bresa attended so she didn't remember anything about the place. At first Abbi was shy and didn't want to play too much but once they moved on to the obstacle course she decided to give it a try. She did some tumbling on a ramp and then went on to the balance beams. She had a great time with that and did really well without any of my help. Than Abbi saw some of the other kids in the pit and we went over to watch them. They were jumping in from way up high (they were all older kids), she didn't really want to do that so we watched for a while and then I helped her slide in from the edge. She got right out and watched some more. After another tumble or two on the mat Abbi looked like she wanted to go back in the pit. I helped her slide in from the side again and then one of the employees told me that Abbi could use the kids slide if I moved it to the side. Once I did that Abbi went in over and over again and laughed the whole time. It was pretty funny how it took Bresa about 2 months to get into the pit when she took classes but it only took Abbi about 20 seconds before she attempted it. They are so different, I can't wait to see how the new baby will be.

posted by We are the Taylors @ 8:52 PM   1 comments

Sunday, August 3

Puzzling

I am happy to say that I am finally feeling better. I worked a long 65 hour week last week and then put in additional 7.5 hours on Saturday, good overtime money that is all going towards my maternity leave. I only have about 85 more hours of OT to work before my entire 12 week leave will be paid for. Since I worked yesterday, today was really my only day off. After church and lunch and naps we decided to put a couple puzzles together. The girls did a great job and did really well. Abbi put her puzzle together probably 6 times, she kept completing it and then taking it apart. As soon as it was apart she would say she needed to fix it. Later they pretended the puzzles were pies and put them in "the oven" when they were cooked they would take a piece of the puzzle off and offer Daddy and I pieces of pie. It was cute but Bresa said her pie was horse pie so I wasn't real excited about trying it :) Now it's time for dinner and bed, sounds great to me, especially the bed part. This week will be busy with Life Group on Monday, Tuesday I have a Dr's appointment followed by a Pampered Chef Party, Wednesday is our first ultrasound, Thursday I am taking Hospice care training classes, and of course I have to work which this week I am scheduled for about 62 hours (better than last week).

posted by We are the Taylors @ 8:08 PM   0 comments