Hmmmm....

Therese drew this picture for us. She says it is Jesus on the cross....

Old Ladies...

Therese "hiding" in paper....

Well, there hasn't been a whole lot going on here lately. I've been working a lot which means there aren't a lot of stories to tell. Therese caught a bit of a cold and sat around watching Blue's Clues for a few days. She now refers to Steve as though he is one of the family ("Steve says that," "Steve has the sniffles," etc.). Of course she also told me today that she lives in the water :-). Reese did decide to use the potty another time which prompted me to buy her a special seat. We'll see how this goes...

I meant to include this story in my last post:

In the final days when Brian was living with us, he was having a chat with Therese over breakfast when he asked her what was on her pajamas. She responded,"Ladybugs!....Ladybugs...ladies....old ladies....little chair for old lady...Reese no sit on chair, little chair for old lady...bus 32B." Blank stare from Brian. Therese nodds emphatically. Todd starts laughing. Somehow Therese got from her ladybug pajamas to the ONE bus we took in Ireland - bus 32B - on which there was a handicapped seat (a little chair) on which Therese wanted to sit. We told her she couldn't sit there because it was for the old ladies who needed help getting up. We've not mentioned the bus since we left Ireland...

A trip home and oh the week that has followed...

Our family!

We spent our Labor Day weekend in Cincinnati with our families. The trip was fun but EXHAUSTING. My brother's surprise 30th birthday party was on Saturday with 45 friends and family members. We were all surprised that he was surprised - he's usually too curious and sneaky to keep any secrets from!

While we enjoyed our time with family, the weekend flew by. Tired and on little sleep, we drove home Monday afternoon with hopes that Therese (who had much less sleep than normal) would sleep most of the way home. Wrong. She slept for 40 minutes. When we finally dragged ourselves through the door, we expected to find an empty house (Brian moved out on Friday). Wrong again. We were greeted by about 50 flies buzzing and bumping into the windows. so along came the Great Fly Massacre of 2009 as Todd and I rolled up magazines and went to work. We still don't have any idea where the flies came from. Todd talked to Brian to see if he noticed any flies when he moved out. He said he had found a few and "shooed them out the door." A slightly different approach than ours. Todd responded, "You're such a Mennonite," which of course Brian is.

Once we cleared away some of the flies, we found that one of our two DHL shipments from Germany had arrived. Due to weight restrictions for our luggage, we sent some books home via DHL. As soon as we saw the box, it was abundantly clear that it had been tampered with. It had been torn open and was missing a few of the books. The expensive ones. At least the theif has good taste - who would want Grapes of Wrath when you could have the fifth Harry Potter in German?

While our arrival home was frustrating, we were still happy to be home. We all slept well that night. We awoke the next morning to get an email letting us know that our babysitter had the flu. No babysitting Wednesday. Great. I have loads of work to do this week in order to prepare for a retreat this weekend so Todd had to stay home with Therese Wednesday. Tuesday night I thought I would stop by the library with Therese on the way home from school. I made a wrong turn and ended up at home. No problem - I handed Therese to Todd and headed for the library. I parked in the parking lot, reached in my bag, and realized I didn't have my wallet. A short drive home and back to the library later, I carried my wallet inside with Todd's library card because I couldn't find mine. I can always use the self check-out so I thought it wouldn't be a big deal. Of course the self check-out wouldn't work because Todd's card had expired. Ugh! I just wanted to rent Transformers!!!

Todd was gracious enough to let me work all day Wednesday and all day today (Thursday) to try to catch up on my work. I sat in Starbucks to do some work this morning, finished, and tried to start my car only to find that my battery was dead. A call to AAA and an hour later I learned that I had left my parking lights on :-). I couldn't help but laugh. I've been so pressed for time this week, so busy for work, and I cost myself an hour by leaving my lights on. Ugh.

Of course, the babysitter let us know that she is still sick and can't come tomorrow. Thank goodness Todd's sister-in-law is willing to watch Therese tomorrow! It's so nice having family around.

On a brighter note, I went to pick Therese up from school today and the teacher was excited to talk to me. Once we caught up with Therese (that's right, she runs away from me as soon as she sees me at school while the other children press their faces to the window and jump up and down when they see their parents coming to pick them up) she asked Reese to tell me what she did today in school. Therese said, "I went pee pee in the potty." We haven't tried to potty train her. We don't even have a little seat for her to sit on...

I don't know who was more surprised, Adam or Baby Joey

Reese and Papa playing with markers

Watching the bubbles