Currently

Cheering Grey on at his karate belt test last week where he moved up into the next belt color (white with an orange stripe).  He even axe chopped a board in half!  Who is this kid!?  Pappy takes him every week, so it was Brandon and my chance to see his cumulative understanding and application of everything he's been practicing weekly.  So proud of that boy!

Running in the Que Classic 5K with my parents and sisters on Saturday.  We all signed up to run together and I even had the kids signed up to run in the kiddie race too.  The kids did a great job and then Brandon hung back with the girls in the stroller (Grey went to a hockey clinic with Heather & Caleb - thank you!!) while my sisters, and parents, and I took off on the 5K course.  We all stuck together and finished together too (more pictures to share soon!) but it was a great day and so fun to do all of us together! 

Celebrating our one year old!  Our Violet Mary turned one last Friday and we had a big big celebration for her on Sunday evening with so many of our friends and family.  The weather held out for the party (thank goodness!) and we all had a great time.  She wasn't thrilled about sticky icing hands, but she got in a few good bites of her cake.  Still not walking (kind of happy about that, hah!) but she's so close, I know it's a matter of days.  My baby big girl! 

Reading The Winter of Our Disconnect with the Inspired Readers book club which is really inspiring me to think about how we use technology and for what purpose.  Granted, our kids are pretty small so technology hasn't completely taken over their minds yet (although, they sure do love them some Netflix), but it's a really pushing me to think about my own overuse of technology and for no good reason really.  The chapter on boredom and technology was mind blowing.  Also making my way (slowly) through I Know This Much Is True .  It's such fantastic writing, just unbelievable how seamlessly he gets everything in there - I'm both in awe of the writing and very interested in the story.  Bravo Wally Lamb! 

Volunteering with the Johnstown Backpack Project this week as a family.  We spent Monday evening loading up bags of weekend snacks for local kids in need.  The snacks are delivered to local schools that have kids that have requested assistance for food items on the weekend.  The Johnstown Backpack Project also collects small hygiene products for distribution too.  This is a cause near and dear to my heart as a former educator and I saw firsthand how many of my students would come in Monday ravenous for breakfast and lunch, as school was the only place they were able to get a complete meal.  The kids loved loading the bags up (Gemma was like a little machine!) and it was a good lesson and chat about how we are blessed to be able to have plenty of food to eat ourselves.

Switching out winter clothes with summer ones.  Yeesh, it's been rainy and chilly all week, especially today, and my last dwindling thoughts of hot fall have been squashed out.  It's time to get the full blown sweat pants and winter jammies out (hah).  I'm also going through the insanely ardous task of switching kids' clothes sizes in and out of boxes from the attic.  It's such a pain in the behind, but I refuse to forgo hand-me-downs.  I pulled out Gemma's old jean & pink hooded jacket today for Violet and instinctively brought it to my face for a hug.  Gemma was watching and laughed at me.  I don't care, hand-me-downs get me in the feels and also the environment (fist bump, Momma Earth).

Loving how much the kids are into reading by themselves these days.  Gemma is always my biggest self-reader and is hysterical when she mashes together the bits she has memorized with her own little made-up words for the books.  My favorite is her self-reading of The Dot when she says, "And then she was so rude to the teacher with that bang of her marker!" Violet has found her own love of books, her favorite being Little Blue Truck (her birthday party theme!) and she will sit and flip pages in her little board books contentedly the whole time it takes me to fold a load of her laundry!  And Grey loves listening to books, but this week he lost his mind over Ed Emberly's Go Away, Big Green Monster! I have found him reading it multiple times to himself or his sisters and he's requested it at bedtime every night this week.  And I just discovered there are a whole bunch of these Green Monster books...so I'm tucking that away to add to Santa's list for a surprise for him :)

Helping at Grey's school this week for Marathon Fun Day which was an afternoon of fun games and stations for the kids.  He was so happy to have me there and the kids in his class are too sweet.  Gah, it had me really missing teaching.  Just waiting on my fingerprints cert to return so I can volunteer weekly in his classroom and the girls can get a weekly afternoon to hang with my mom (thank you!)

Blowing all the noses.  well, everyone except Brandon's.  hah.  All three kids have had runny noses this week and I'm just getting over one myself now.  Violet's sporting a fever today (I think she has some teeth coming in though) and Gem is taking a much needed nap after I made her get a how shower to break up that congestion! Cranky, sick babies = tired momma.

Doing really poorly at working out. Like, none this week.  The weather?  yeah, let's blame that.  Also the dark in the morning and the dark so early in the evening.  Actually, it's really just me making excuses, but I'm hoping to get back into jogging with Bully asap.  We both need it and soon it will be too snowy to go!  Make the most of this season, Tabitha!

Cooking in my pantry digging mode as we have yet to go grocery shopping for the month of October.  Even though it's a tad stressful, it's feels so good to use something that has been hiding out in the pantry or the bottom of the deep freezer when other yummier things were options.  It's pushing me to be creative and I made Chicken & Loaded Potato last night (with jalapenos added for Brandon and I, obviously still heavy on our jalapeno addiction) and it was awesome.  We were both sad when it was all eaten up.  And October starts our no dining out month too!