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A Huge Step and Yet Another Birthday

Weekly Happenings: This past week was pretty great. On Monday, Joseph got to have a friend over to play, which was tons of fun. Tuesday we went to Story Time at the library, Wednesday we went grocery shopping, Thursday (which was Paul’s birthday) we had a relaxing day at home and then went out for dinner (Paul’s choice was Bobby J’s, a hole-in-the-wall burger place that has really good burgers), Friday Joseph had another play date (lucky kid, lol), and yesterday we had a lazy day at home followed by going out for frozen yogurt. More about the reason for frozen yogurt later. πŸ˜‰

The Weekly Weather: While it hasn’t been quite as mild as it was earlier this month, it still is cooler than it was the last bit of August. I’m REALLY hoping that the cooler weather shows up soon(ish). I’m kind of over summer. πŸ˜›

What Paul’s Been Up To: His first quarter as an online student for BYU-I has started. He’s also keeping busy at work. He’s getting ready to switch from being in the library to being in the IT department and he’s also training the person who will be taking his place. Plus, the poor guy has been fighting either a really severe allergy attack, or cold…or SOMETHING. I think he’s finally starting to feel a bit better, but there were quite a few days last week that he was just feeling miserable.

What Sarah’s Been Up To: I haven’t been doing too much out of the ordinary. I received both good news and bad news this past week. The bad news is that Kevin and Rita’s house in Northern California was unfortunately destroyed by the wildfires that have been raging in the area. They were both at work, but luckily a friend was able to get their dogs out for them. They haven’t been allowed back to see what’s left yet. They are staying at a house that was an empty rental home owned by one of their friends right now. Kevin hasn’t been able to go back to work because some of the buildings at the power plant were also destroyed by fires. We’re continually praying that they will be comforted at this time and that they will have their needs met. The good news that I received this past week has to do with some genetic testing that I took part in. It was discovered that many members of my family have a gene mutation that has been linked to chronic heart problems. There is a study that is being done by Yale University to see if more can be found out about the mutation. I submitted a saliva sample several months ago and received the results in the mail yesterday: I do not have the gene mutation, which means that Joseph and any other children we have will also not have the mutation. That is a seriously huge relief.

What Joseph’s Been Up To: He has been a ROCK STAR about potty training. He hasn’t had an accident in any way, shape, or form since Monday (and even then, I think it was because he got too distracted playing) and he’s even been waking up with a dry Pull-Up every morning. That is the reason we went out for frozen yogurt yesterday. πŸ™‚ He completed the chart we made and got (at his request) an Army action figure that came with a helicopter that he had seen at HEB. Since it was only about $7.00, I okayed the purchase. After that, he stopped asking for a sticker every time he went to the bathroom, so I haven’t made a new chart…and he’s still doing really well. He will come up and tell me or Paul that he needs to go, even. It’s glorious! Also, he got a “prayer rock” along with a poem about what the rock is supposed to do (put it on your pillow to remind you every night to say your prayers, it will fall on the ground and then in the morning you’ll see it on the ground and remember to say your morning prayers) from his Primary teacher today. He’s been carrying it around with him everywhere today. He has told me several times that his teacher (who he calls “MacKenzie’s mom” because she is, in fact, the mom to a little girl named MacKenzie) gave him a prayer rock and a love card. πŸ™‚

This Week in Pictures:

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Joseph has a journal for Story Time (which he calls his homework). We were supposed to work on the letter “C”, so the library gave us a sentence page to work on (cut out the words, mix them up, read the sentence, and put the words back in the correct order). Joseph’s car is the blue one (he also drew the road with a tree by it). He added “exhausted pipes” (exhaust pipes) to both our cars since they were missing. πŸ™‚ Finally, heΒ drew a couple of cookies (a chocolate one and a chocolate chip one) and a cat. πŸ™‚
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Sunglasses off?
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Nah, let’s leave them on!
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Joseph is more than a little interested in Halloween…any time of the year. Paul has been finding him Halloween library books now since he knew it would be harder to find them once October actually hit. This one seriously made me laugh out loud. I kind of felt like I ought to be watching out for a creepy black bird lurking outside ofΒ one of our windows. πŸ˜‰
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Joseph holding his completed chart as well as his reward. πŸ™‚
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I have to admit, it’s pretty cool (especially for $7.00). It’s a helicopter that came with an action figure that sits in it. The action figure also came with some binoculars, a pack, and a weapon.
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Cheesin’ it up while waiting for Daddy’s birthday meal to arrive.