Pumpkin Fun

This year we actually did something with our pumpkins! Last year we bought the pumpkins and set out one Sunday afternoon to carve them, but Ally was grossed out by the innards and Drew just wanted to run through the gunk.

This year - Drew didn't feel like participating and watched Backyardigans instead. That was okay - knives and Drew aren't a good combo!


Ally was excited. It did take awhile to convince her to stick her hand in the pumpkins, but finally she bravely pulled some stuff out. Wiped her hand off with a rag and plunged back in for another scoop. We wanted to put "Willis" on one pumpkin, but Ally kept saying - "That's not how you spell my name. You spell it A-L-L-Y." Then she wiped it off the pumpkin. We finally gave in and made some cool faces.


Drew decided that he could go outside and enjoy the glowing pumpkins. Someone (or something) else enjoyed the pumpkins last night. The candles were on the side walk - actually we know that a racoon was on the patio and was messing with the pumpkins. Guess they weren't scary enough.

My Favorite Part

I have been looking forward to when the railing for the stairs would be finished! It looks awesome. I am sure the kids will have a blast throwing things down.

The deck is getting the final touches on as I type. The house inspection is on Tuesday afternoon which means it has to have everything done TONIGHT!!! It isn't great trying to do it in the middle of the night, but we have tooooo many things on our plate at this time. I went to help finish screwing the deck boards on tonight and some stair treads. The kids ran around and then climbed into the truck to watch a movie.

It was beautiful all day. After we got home a COLD FRONT came in. I think the temperature dropped a good 25 degrees since I left North Liberty. Jason said that it was getting hard to hold onto things. It will be so nice when we are in the house - sitting by the fireplace - with nothing to do????

Birthday Boy!

My little guy had quite a memorable birthday. I am not sure the memories are good - except for the Cardinals winning. I picked him up from Sherry's at about 3:45 and no more than 15 minutes on the road came our first surprise - PUKE...

My kids are known for their untimely puking in the car, but really on his birthday. I think God has a sense of humor to see what I would do. We were on our way to the house to see the weekly update - then to Grandma Rhonda's for pizza. I had his PJs from the morning so he was styling with the dinosaurs. I was hoping for a car sick boy, but come to find out - we got a 3 day plus more of yucky sick all for Drew. This made him want his mommy (not daddy) more than ever. I am so exhausted and frustrated of trying to figure out what he wanted make him comfortable.

We didn't cancel his party, and I hope no one gets sick out of the deal. We had fun at Great Grandpa Melvin's house. The kids wore their costumes. I love to go Grandpa's and cheer him up. He loves to watch the kids play. I know he enjoys the company.

Back to birthdays....Presents, cake, candles, we had the typical party. Drew is in tractor heaven and "farms" daily. He even has a "Gandpa" for the combine. Thanks everyone for the special weekend!

Cardinals WIN!!!

If you haven't heard or don't really care - I am going to tell you anyway! Cardinals beat the Detroit Tigers 4 games to 1 in the World Series. OH how I wish I could have been in STL with people who really care, but instead I laid on the couch exhausted with my honey. I fell asleep somewhere in the 7th inning, but my loving husband woke me up for the top of the ninth. It was great. I was bummed for the rainout - but hey now Drew has a win on his birthday too!

Remember When...

Two years ago - Where were you in history???


Many remember this to be the day the Cardinals were swept by the Boston Red Soxs in the World Series! That is hard to forget and a memory close to our hearts, but most importantly we remember that Drew came to our family and hasn't left! I wanted to put the scale pictures up to remind people that he was a womping 9 pounds 2 oz, but they were inappropriate!

I remember that I was on my way to the grocery store to get party supplies for our World Series get together. Let's just say that Jason suggested that I go home when my water broke in the parking lot. At the hospital I was getting an epidural during game 3 and we had to turn off the t.v. We lost that game and Drew was born several hours later in the middle of the night.

The next day we had lots of visitors. The pictures are of our World Series Game 4 party. Jason & Julie (& Austin kind of) and Chuck, Amy & Trip. I remember Trip sitting with me on my bed so still watching the game. The boys went out to get real food instead of hospital stuff. On Drew's first birthday the Cardinals failed to redeem themselves, but this year they have a chance to win it again. There is NO CHANCE that they can lose it on his birthday this time - so who knows what will happen tonight - A victory hopefully!

We Got Numbers!

Well we might not be in the house yet! BUT we finally have brick. Supposedly he was suppose to come 5 weeks ago, but the way this contractor goes it is amazing anything is getting done.



Supposedly (I say that a lot!) he told Jason that he was going to do the inspection early next week. Which means we might be in by middle to late next week. I will believe it when the last piece of siding is put on. Oh 2 guys finally showed up to work on that again. They do have the carpet, lighting, heat registers and stuff, and plumbing stuff finished up. We are waiting on the guys to finish up the stair case and the appliances and tape and paint the garage and landscaping - and of course the siding....

If you ever move to Iowa and want to build a house, we definitely have one man that we will recommend not using - even though he has done a beautiful job!

Little Brenda

When I was little I used to play school all the time. You can get my mom going on all the silly things that my imagination would come up with when I was young. I was telling Grandpa about it and he said - "I think that sounds familiar." I responded - "Don't think it sounds familiar - it was familiar!"



I loved to play school and gather all my dolls and read or teach to them. I guess school has rubbed off on our little Ally. She puts all the dolls down for naps (using my dish towels as blankets). Drew helps put Ernie down. As you can see in the background, she has the beds made. She rubs their back like Terry does for her at school!

The sometimes reads to them. The story she is getting ready to read was about the puppy sitting on the other bed. Also you can notice the backpackets hanging on the dresser.

I guess Ms. Joanna and the other teachers at school have touched my darling little girlie's life. Role models start early in life!

Change Me!

I usually change Drew when he is wet, but Rachel noticed that he was getting a little droopy. He didn't really care and kept running from me when I had the diaper. "No No Mommy!" It made for some cute pictures at least. They will be quality for his wedding someday!

King of the Hill

Okay Anderson - I get the point. Oh I have been so lazy about downloading the pictures on my camera. My camera told me I ran out of room on my memory card. Yikes that hasn't happened ever!



We went with Jason a few weeks ago to work on the deck. Ally and Drew played in the dirt in the back yard. They had fun climbing, but it was COLD!!!! The wind was blowing from the North Pole! The ground was hard and Jason had quite fun trying to dig the holes. When he tried to pour the concrete into the holes, Drew had to help making a mess which sent us home!

JR...

I don't know if you read my comments, but read the update on the one about JR is still fighting. There has been some great news this weekend!

Let it Snow.....

Oh what a day! The cold has hit! This morning I went downstairs in search of coats. Ally didn't understand why she had to wear a coat in the car. I couldn't find Drew's even though I know that we have one - so I decided that we needed to get to Iowa City to get him a coat before it gets much colder than mid 40s.

The afternoon didn't go quite as planned though - God seems to have a good sense of humor. I got out of my really exciting meeting and noticed that one tire was low. I was in Oxford which is a town of no more than 500. I thought there was a gas station, but would it have air for my sad tire?? They did have air, but it didn't seem like my tire was filling very quickly. I stopped the air and listened and heard someone whispering..pssssssss. Then I felt the air pouring out of my tire. Great! Jason had put his phone on vibrate in his coat pocket during his meeting. I have very little signal in the middle of nowhere.

I headed into the gas station which was nice. The clerk said there was a tire shop across the street. She walked me to the back door and said that he was still open. I walked over in hope that he wasn't busy and would fix the leak in my tire. He could do it, but he had to finish the job he was on and go get his son outside of town who ran out of gas. He was pretty old too. He got it fixed and I was on my way to get the kids.

We made it to the interstate. When I was getting on, a man was pointing to my poor tire. Great - now what. I was talking to Jason at the time heading to the house and get Drew's coat. Jason had to head up to change the tire. I think that I probably could have changed it, but I am deathly afriad of big semis on the interstate. Also did I mention that it was flurring????? That is what the white blurry specs are on the pictures.

The rest of the night was unadventurous. Jason was working on digging five 48 inch deep holes by 16 inches wide holes in the hard clay for a deck. Not to mention that it was freezing. We got our stuff and headed home with McD's to make everyone happy.

Momma's Boy

Well my little guy has become a momma's boy. He doesn't want much to do with Daddy. We went to the park the other day and I could only push him. He is precious in his upside down sunglasses and "john eere" sweatshirt! He still loves to farm with Grandpa, but deep inside I think that he likes mommy to lay with him singing in bed at night more!

Josh is Still Fighting!

Many of you have asked about JR (Josh). He is still hanging on, but today he had his first purposeful reaction. He frowned and scrunched his eyebrows when the nurse tried to wipe his face. It is going to be a slow and painful recovery, but it seems that he has made leaps since the accident a week ago.

We are still in need of much prayer. He still has not woken up and still has brain swelling, but no one seems to know the extent of the damage except for God.

His family has been awesome about posting updates on his carepage. You care welcome to visit Josh's Carepage using my login and password - bwillis and ally1234. The page should automatically be on my home page, but if not his page if JRLucky16.

I have been reminded that we don't receive because we don't ask and we need to expect God to do immeasurably more than we ask. God is working miracles right now even though we can't seem to see them.

What Would You Say??

If you were in the emergency room, would you say...

We were pushing our kids down a hill with gravel at the end in their wagon? They were going fast and all there was to stop them at the bottom of the hill was a gas barrel and a metal machine shed.

If that had happened I told Jason that he would be the one telling the doctor what he was doing with the kids. They love to ride in the wagon fast - who wouldn't? Drew pulls our hand over to the wagon til we come, but he has learned that I won't do pull them down the hill.

Stupidity????

I am not sure how we got roped into this project at Grandma's house, but I am going to blame it on Jason. As we were playing with Ally, Drew, and Kaylee, Jason said that it would be a perfect day to empty the pool. Dad went inside and about 15 mintues later Mom came out to sit on the poolside.

Ally and Drew immediately wanted to help so we took off their pants and they jumped on in to the FREEZING water! Finally I asked Drew if he wanted the sagging diaper off - he said with deperation in his eye - please mommy it doesn't feel so good.

Back in July you can see the pictures of us surfing in the pool, but Drew was riding the waves outside the pool. I think that they had so much fun. It wore them out to take a nap when we got home.


When they finished they put it on a hayrack to dry. Until next summer!

House Update

It has been quite a few weeks since you have seen or heard about the house update. It is slowly coming along. Last week they finished painting (almost), put in the wood floor, and started on the cermic tiles. The siders got a couple more pieces on. Six wks and they are about half done. Pretty good timing???? Jason and I painted Ally's room. She is VERY excited and is willing to give anyone a tour!

This week they are starting the cabinets and trim on Monday. The tile should be finishing up this week also. Who knows when we are moving in, but we got authorization from the city today to move in even though the development company hasn't passed all of their requirements!!! YEAH!

Grandma's Video

My mom uploaded the video that I made for Grandma's funeral. You must have a PC to view it. The songs were "No More Nights" and "I Can Only Imagine."

Enjoy the celebration of Grandma's like....

Grandma's Slide Show

Lake Iowa

A lot has happened since last week and continues to go on. Our 7th graders took a field trip to Lake Iowa which is a small pond 20 minutes from the school. We participated in activities such as hunter's safety, water fowl, archary, shelter building, and firepit clean up. The highlight of the day was fishing! We only caught 3 fish for 100 plus kids, but they had a blast. My only rule was that I don't touch worms or hooks or untangle finishing lines!



This is a picture of the group traveling with me and Mrs. Wengerd. The are a little crazy once and awhile, but they are a lot of fun. It started off really cold and raining - I had a stocking hat on most of the morning, but it ended up being very humid and hot.

Trials and Suffering

God is really testing my trust and faith these past couple weeks. It seems that a trial comes and I work through it and then something else flies in my face. Trusting God is hard when he keeps throwing in the curve balls.

We celebrated Grandma Arlene's life on Saturday. There might have been lots of tears, but at the same time it was awesome to praise God for a woman that feared and loved him so much. I need to get the letter that my brother wrote about his memories of her - I will post it later. We also have a video that I will post soon also.

My tears for this blog come from a phone call from my principal about an hour ago. It seems that one of my students Josh (JR) was in a head on collision. He said that the doctors have said that it doesn't look good. JR was a kid that was popular and an athelete. I never saw him frown and was always in a good mood. Many of you know that I am not a crier, but death seems to be surrounding me.

One hard thing will be that my kiddos have grown up together since kindergarten and many before that. We are in a small community that knows everything and is everyone's friends. Please pray for these kids as they come to understanding that they might lose their good friend. Pray for me as I comfort them and think about how JR even affected me in the few short weeks that I have gotten to know him.

In the above picture, Josh is the boy orange Broncos sweatshirt. Please pray for the boys surrounding him. They are the ones struggling with understanding what is going on around them.

Have a good night and may you trust God that He is the one true comforter.