September 16-30

Here's my husband holding my sister's son during his first birthday party.

In September it was my birthday, too -- my thirtieth! That morning the kids slept in, which is always nice. I picked up my brother from the clinic where he has his blood drawn regularly. He has bipolar disorder and doesn't drive; my mom drops him off on her way to work. The girls were happy to have him watch a Rugrats episode with them (see photo). He really loves his nieces and nephews. He had asked me to take him to F.Y.E., so I did that and then drove him home to our mom's house. 

 

The other good things were my spur-of-the-moment decision to explore the big downtown library with the girls, my workout some time after that, and hearing Shboogoo tell people it was her mommy's birthday..In the evening my mom babysat while my husband and I had a delicious dinner at a Mexican restaurant he had not been to before (I went there once, ten or eleven years ago). A few days later my family went to a buffet restaurant with my sister's family and our mom and brother. It was to celebrate two birthdays: mine and my brother-in-law's are a day apart. My mom gave me a CD I wanted, my sister gave me a cute maternity shirt, my dad and step-mom gave me money, and my husband gave me new scriptures (the others were the only set I had ever had and they were actually falling apart!).

The man who offered to take our picture was kind of impatient, so we didn't have him take another. :)

 

Shboogoo made this tower and wanted me to take a picture of it -- a picture without people. In the background you can see part of the organizer we got at Costco; I love it.

At the park. The little one did NOT want to swing because she hated sand getting her shoes. Luckily she had a sucker from the bank.

There was an event at the library to teach about owls. I'm really glad we went. I was proud of Shboogoo for going up to one of the ladies afterward, like a few other children did, to ask a question about owls. I'm happy that she isn't shy like I was at that age.

That creation on the table was a birthday cake because we were having a party for the two bears.

Two sisters (the older one hid from the camera) were at our place along with my friend who is their mom. Then the girl in stripes knocked on our door and wanted to play. After I took this picture yet another friend from the neighborhood came over. They had not all played together at the same time before.

On September 30th we really enjoyed my husband's LDS mission reunion (the first one we had been to in seven years), while our kids enjoyed sleeping over at Grandma's house. Life is good!