Darr Family Blog

Weekly Happenings: This past week was quite the interesting one. Monday, I felt awful, so as soon as Paul got home from work, I went to bed. Literally. Paul was awesome enough to take care of Joseph so that I could just sleep off whatever it was that was attacking me (in the form of a fever, aches, and waves of nausea). I felt better on Tuesday, so I went ahead and took Joseph to the costume parade at the library. He had SO much fun! Wednesday was rather uneventful, but then Thursday Joseph woke up saying that his stomach hurt and he had a fever. Then he threw up. 🙁 Luckily, he showed enough signs prior to the event, that I almost got him to the bathroom fast enough. There was a bit of clean-up to do, but not as much as in times past. He spent all of Thursday on the couch (missing the ward trunk-or-treat, but shhhh, don’t tell him…he luckily forgot about it) and all of Friday on the couch, too. He went on a food strike and we barely got him to drink any fluids (I think he was afraid he would throw up again). His fever finally broke Friday night and his appetite is slowly coming back. Saturday we ran some errands (and took a spontaneous trip to the mall) and then got home just in time for Paul to take Joseph trick-or-treating and for me to hand out candy. Whew!

Weekly Weather: The beginning of the week was mild, but the weekend brought crazy weather. A couple of storms came through that each dropped a LOT of water. It was tricky for Paul to get to work on Friday because a lot of the roads were washed out. Craziness!

What Paul’s Been Up To: Not too much out of the ordinary. Mainly just work and school. He’s still maintaining excellent grades in his classes, which is impressive since they are quite challenging.

What Sarah’s Been Up To: Not much on this front, either…mainly due to needing to take care of Joseph. Piano teaching is going well, as is choir and visiting teaching stuff. 🙂

What Joseph’s Been Up To: The funny thing he’s been doing is he’s picked up the phrase, “I’m thinking of…” and then inserting something that he wants to do. For instance, when we were running our errands on Saturday, we hear from the backseat, “I’m thinking of us going to the mall so that I can do stuff.” He apparently recognized the fact that we were really close to the mall…hence our spontaneous trip out there. Little smarty-pants.

This Week in Pictures:

Weekly Happenings: This past week was pretty standard. We went to the park (quite a bit during the beginning of the week since we knew it would be stormy the rest of the week), played with Legos, Mega Bloks, and Duplos, and hung around the house when it was stormy. It was a pretty low-key week.

The Weekly Weather: As I eluded to earlier, it was nice during the first part of the week. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday were sort of wet days. It would rain a bit and then stop. Late Friday night it started to rain and it just didn’t stop. It continued to rain through most of Saturday, not really letting up until the late afternoon. After that, the wind picked up and blew all night. It’s still kind of breezy, but other than the smattering of sprinkles we had this morning, it’s pretty much dried out. I’m glad it wasn’t too bad. We were basically getting the very edge Hurricane Patricia which hit Mexico this weekend. I haven’t read up on the news how Mexico faired. It was supposed to be a very strong storm.

What Paul’s Been Up To: He’s been keeping really busy with school and work. It’s hard for me to remember that he needs to have time to do some homework every night. We’re super proud of him for working so hard to do this. I know it’s not easy to go to work all day and then get home just to do more work of a different kind (I remember doing that while completing my student teaching). I know that he can make it, though, because I know how hard of a worker he is.

What Sarah’s Been Up To: I’ve mainly been trying to find ways to keep Joseph entertained. We’ve had quite a few play dates this past week, along with normal stuff like story time at the library and playing around the house. I’ve also been continuing with my piano teaching and working on stuff for visiting teaching and choir. It’s hard to believe that Christmas is literally two months from today. I did get to go out on my own a couple of times, for book club and a baby shower. It was nice to get out with friends and have a bit of a brain break from the stresses of the day.

What Joseph’s Been Up To: He’s enjoyed playing with friends (pretending to be superheroes, having play dates, etc.), playing with me (there was one time he walked up to me with his protective goggles on, carrying his plastic hammer and saw, and asked if I “needed anything hammered or sawed”), and just having fun in general. Today was the Primary Program at church (the kids each had a part to say in front of the congregation and also sung songs as a group that they have been practicing all year). Joseph did a really good job (he had a short, one-line part: “I love Jesus because he gave me my family.”; basically the Primary president asked him why he loved Jesus and that was his answer, so that was his part). He had his part memorized and he said it in the microphone without yelling, which is good. 🙂 He sung the parts of each of the songs that he knew and kept Paul and me in stitches with his antics in between songs (most of the kids his age were done sitting still after about 10 minutes, so their awesome teachers had quite the job trying to keep them all still). He wasn’t particularly disruptive, but he would occasionally hang over the stand while singing and sometimes sang the songs using what we could tell were silly voices because he had silly looks on his face. Typical 4YO behavior. 🙂

This Week in Pictures:

Weekly Happenings: Since the weather was actually cooperative, we spent quite a bit of this last week outdoors. Basically, if we didn’t have any other commitments (bread baking, story time, grocery shopping, cleaning, etc.), we were either in the back yard or at the park in or subdivision. I’m one lucky momma in that Joseph is just as appeased to have me as a playmate as he is having playmates closer to his own age. Monday we did go to the zoo since Paul had the day off.

The Weekly Weather: It has been quite pleasant as of late. It’s actually been cooling down a bit at night (a phenomenon that is not typical of Texas) so that the mornings have been cooler before heating up in the afternoon. Plus, when it did heat up, it was in the low 90s, so that was not too bad, either. Today, however, has been the best of the days…I don’t think it’s even 80 yet. 🙂

What Paul’s Been Up To: He’s been keeping busy at work and has been up to his elbows in homework. One neat thing about his new job is that they allow him to take some time during the week to do PT. It’s good that he’ll get some time to work out during the week, because I know it’s something that he’s been missing due to going to school, working, church callings, etc.

What Sarah’s Been Up To: I’ve mainly just been plugging along, doing my normal stuff. I did rejoice in the fact that on Thursday I decided to weed the yard and made it through both yards with about half the normal weeds (which means they might be slowing down for the year finally) and the weather was cool enough that I didn’t even break a sweat (as opposed to breaking into a sweat by simply walking outside).

What Joseph’s Been Up To: Joseph really loved going to the zoo last Monday, especially since we rode the carousel. He had a really great time at story time (and is really looking forward to the costume parade that will be happening towards the end of the month), and is super-excited about Halloween. He asks just about everyone he sees what they are going to dress up as for Halloween. 🙂 He also loved all of the outdoor time that we’ve been enjoying. There was one funny thing that happened while he was helping me water the plants in the back. I was having him move the hose around to the different planters/raised beds, etc. After the last one, I turned the water off. He was fascinated with the fact that there was still a bit of water that was trying to escape from the hose after I turned off the spigot. I looked over just in time to see him, with lips firmly planted, trying to slurp the last bit of water out of the hose, hahaha. So now I can say that he’s drunk out of the garden hose and survived. 😉 It’s kind of funny the way his mind works, too. Today he noticed that the baby girl in the bench in front of us at church had painted toenails. He asked me if all girls’ toenails came “that way”. I asked him in what way and he answered “Purple…is that what happens to all baby girl toes?” He seemed relieved when I told him that her momma painted her toenails, just like I paint my toenails, and not that they just randomly changed colors. 🙂

This Week in Pictures: