- Darr Family Blog - https://darr.org -

Another Birthday in the Books

Weekly Happenings: This past week was a pretty normal one: work and online classes for Paul, piano teaching for me, and school for Joseph. We ended the week with Paul’s birthday. After doing some normal Saturday stuff, we doused ourselves in bug repellent and went for a hike in Government Canyon (the state park/natural area that is about a five minute drive from our house). It’s a pretty sizable park, with hiking trails and campgrounds all over the place (the Scouts go camping there quite often). We chose a trail that was a little over a mile out and back, which was perfect for little legs and a pregnant momma. Joseph did great and walked the entire way. After our hike, we came home to clean up and then went out for a special lunch. We then came home, relaxed for a bit, and then had friends over to play games and had homemade cheesecake with strawberry topping for dessert. It was a pretty great way to end the week.

The Weekly Weather: It’s been warm and humid (typical for September down here). Not much change, really.

What Paul’s Been Up To: He started back with his online courses. Since it was the first week, the workload was rather light. It will probably pick up soon, though. He also mowed both lawns (seriously, that is such a huge job…I’m grateful I don’t have to do that), and made sure Joseph had a lot of “Daddy-Joseph time”. He’s such a good daddy!

What Sarah’s Been Up To: Aside from piano and shuttling Joseph back and forth to school, I did accomplish one huge project that I’ve been putting off for way too long: I went through all of Joseph’s old clothes and separated it into stuff that was totally boy and stuff that was gender neutral (read: stuff that Abigail will be able to wear). I then passed all the boy stuff on to a friend who is having her first boy. It was a huge job (he had quite a few clothes because I had received quite a few hand-me-downs for him on top of anything we bought) and I’m so glad it’s done! I also had a doctor’s appointment to see little miss’s progress. Everything is going great, and she’s currently one pound, eleven ounces…still cooking away in there.

What Joseph’s Been Up To: This past week was Spirit Week at school, so there were a couple of dress-up days (which he loved), as well as picture day and an early release day (so he went in earlier and came home earlier). He still loves school and doing homework (for the days he doesn’t have homework, he wants me to make up homework for him, haha). He also had his annual check-up: he’s currently forty pounds and forty-two inches (3’6″) tall. He had to get a flu shot, which he was not happy about, but we got shakes on the way home, which made it a little better. He really liked going on the hike yesterday (he has wanted to go on “an adventure” for a while, now). He’s also had fun playing with his toys and LEGOS. It really is a joy to have him around. 🙂

This Week in Pictures:

img_20160913_112228 [1]
All ready for “Camouflage Day” at school.
img_20160914_111243 [2]
For “Crazy Hair Day” we did spiky hair. I didn’t want to do anything too crazy since the very next day was picture day.
img_20160916_093147 [3]
I came down to check on him after I finished showering and found him like this: watching a show, munching on leftover popcorn, and sipping his juice.
img_20160917_103822 [4]
Heading out to the trail for the hike. Paul bought a park pass a while back (since the Scouts camp here often), so we don’t have to pay a fee to get in.
img_20160917_104035 [5]
On the trail.
img_20160917_104209 [6]
Family picture!
img_20160917_105008 [7]
When I say “hike”, it was purely distance. There was not really any elevation change (that’s the best type of hike for my asthma, so I was rather relieved). It was so beautiful, peaceful, and quiet!
img_20160917_105218 [8]
Some pretty purple wildflowers.
img_20160917_112114 [9]
Towards the end of the hike, we stumbled upon this tree trunk arch. It was so cool!