must be a vacation

Hello folks. We must be having a vacation because I have time to update the blog! I look back and see the last time I posted was the beginning of the summer. That’s pretty pathetic. So it’s time for a mid-year’s resolution: if you’ll put up with fewer pictures, I’ll try to update more often. As it is, it’s been so long that this post is going to be pretty much all photos and David says he will post other photos later tonight. I know that really, no one wants to hear about our boring day-to-day blahs and you want photos of cool stuff so I’ll just give you some highlights of what’s been happening since I last posted and then get to the photos.

Since last time which was in June we have survived an extra long summer-school schedule and Jan made a new friend with his summer-time day-care lady, Sandy. He thinks she is the greatest probably because she spoils him rotten. We said goodbye to two couples/families from our Bible study and two of Jan’s good friends which was sad. We still haven’t added anyone else to the study because no one else sees as good. But it is good for those families that they are in excellent situations. We had a really nice visit from David’s mother and his sister’s family. Lots of beach time and ice cream and the zoo. We were able to get away in August to a really nice cottage which is I think what David will be posting later. It was a great couple of days. Lots of boating.

Then school started and it’s been full blast ahead since then. I’m teaching several new classes and a new grade level so all my time has been taken up planning for these things. I’ve discovered that seventh graders are incredibly slow at everything and so I don’t have to plan as frantically as I had thought. Maybe it’s this particular class, I don’t know. Still, I do have to stay ahead. One of these days I’ll take those courses for professional development/sheer heck of it like I’ve been planning for, oh, ten years. If it isn’t a cut in salary, it’s new classes which isn’t really complaining, it’s just the way it’s been this little while. In any case, maybe things will level out and I still have a job, so that’s great!

David is loving his job if being frustrated from time to time, but aren’t we all? So really, it’s all good. He has had some success starting this concert series and has even gotten a fairly substantial congregational grant to keep it going, so that’s good too! We could go on and on about this, but I’ll let him post about that since it’s his project.

Jan has been going to a new day-care situation: a friend from church who has a new baby. She went from none to two in less than a month. But I think he is doing fine there. She makes sure to get him out and playing pretty regularly. He hates the potty, and he hates diapers so we’re at a bit of an impasse, but he continues to sleep like a champ so we can’t complain too loudly. I’m sure he won’t be wearing diapers to prom. And while we’re on the subject of the little guy, here are the photos. Enough talk, more pictures!

A serious musician at work. Playing b minor, it would appear, and having a blast doing it!

These are from a visit to a pumpkin patch that obviously had more than just pumpkins. Pretty fun!

Jan got his own Jan-sized pumpkin which he calls a “pumpkin patch.”

These are a few from a pumpkin carving party our small group had. First is Joel’s, then David’s.

Oh yeah, and I forgot to mention that David has nearly finished transforming the fireplace. But I don’t have any photos of that so you’ll have to live in suspense.

These last are the sunrise we saw this morning. Really lovely.