Yesterday was a busy day at our house. Even busier than our usual busy.In the morning we had a showing of our house. This involves me loading up all 6 kids, the dog, and the cat and driving in circles until my head spins. It seems such a waste to spend 3 hours driving around so someone can spend 10 minutes looking at our house. I am really not looking forward to moving at the moment.
After the showing we had lunch and I ran to the store. I wanted to get the rest of my brother's Christmas gift. I always have to finish my shopping early because when we go home in November I bring the gifts with me to hand out to our family.
I've been so excited since finding out that my brother finally has a job! After all, he's almost 25 years old. Isn't it about time he got a job? He's also moving out and getting his own apartment. At least this is the plan. In honor of him getting his first place I decided to make his Christmas gifts something useful. He doesn't read my blog so it's safe to share that he's getting some nice pots, pans, towels, and other household necessities. I can't believe he's really moving out. My parents are (obviously) thrilled!
Yesterday afternoon Jason and I took the kids to get pumpkins. Every year our church sets up a pumpkin patch and we have always taken the kids there to get their own pumpkins. This year we braved the heat and the kids had a great time. If it had been cooler we would have stayed longer. We just can't handle this weather in the south. Fall is supposed to be cool & crisp-not hot & humid. 
My kids are actually melting in these pictures. Matthew starts to drip with sweat. Then the boys cover their eyes because of the blinding sun. That's actually a familiar scene. Look at Joshua in the pictures above and then look at the picture from 2 years ago, below. I'm going to have a collection of pictures with my kids' hands on their foreheads as they suffer from heat exhaustion.
Despite the fact that they were wearing jeans and surely were feeling like they were stuffed in an oven, the girls were having a great time. They loved looking at the mums and playing with gourds. They pointed out each color and found "Mommy's favorite" which was a beautiful shade of purple. I've learned my lesson about buying the flowers though. For as far back as I can remember, I've managed to kill every pot of mums I've ever bought. Not one survivor. This year I resisted the temptation and instead got the kids some pumpkin stickers.
Each of them selected a pumpkin and it was cute how they gravitated to the biggest pumpkin they could lift on their own. The boys had some pretty big pumpkins and the girls chose the round, softball-sized ones. The babies each got their own tiny pumpkin that the girls chose for them.
The babies seemed to enjoy the outing. They mostly stared at me as I chased children and saved the little pumpkins from the destructive forces of Hurricane Leila. That child was determined to smash pumpkins. She just isn't really the gentle type I suppose. Just ask the babies.
If you look closely at the picture above the babies are showing their birth order. Nathan is on the left holding up 1 finger. Ryan is on the right holding up 2 fingers.We finished up the day with a nice walk around the neighborhood. My mind was distracted though. Last night was my 10-year class reunion. I had been looking forward to attending the reunion for years. However, the Class of '98 was a class of slackers. The reunion planners did not announce the date or details of the reunion until September 8th. This left less than 1 month for people to make plans and of course my plans already included taking care of 2 new babies! Sadly, I sent my regrets and hopefully I'll see everyone in a few more years. I was really looking forward to seeing the shock on my former classmates' faces when they heard I have 6 children. It's ok, maybe I'll have a few more by the time the next reunion rolls around...
