Living in Munchkinland

We drove down to Port A last weekend with my mom, dad, sister and nephew. We had such a wonderful, relaxing weekend. It was as good as it can be these days. I went on a long walk with mom and Tiffany and the boys played with rockets on the beach and Michael and dad stayed upstairs. We had a lovely lunch at Shell's. Tiffany hung with dad while Mom went to the owner's meeting (the reason we all went down) and Michael and I took the kids to the sandbelt races. I cooked dinner and we all had happy hour and laughed and ate and went to bed early. I love being with my family. They fill me up with joy and love.

Our elementary school sponsored various Veteran's day themed contests for each grade over the last month and yesterday hosted an assembly honoring Veterans. Davis spent hours working on a poster and an essay about my Grandfather Lane Davis. It was so fun to watch him interview my grandparents and Uncle and Mom and learn about his great-grandfather. It was a wonderful project to participate in. Samuel also participated by drawing a greeting card picture in honor of Veteran's day. He won second place in his grade for his project and was given an award and recognition at the assembly. I wasn't able to be there as I was on a whirlwind 24 hour trip to Denver for our house inspection, but Michael and his parents were there and took pictures for me. They said it was a very impressive assembly with a choir and speeches and adorable children.

Samuel is going to have a birthday month. We started with his friend birthday party last weekend. Pictures are above. It was supposed to be an outdoor family movie night, but it was cold and the wind was really strong and the screen would not have been able to stay standing. We changed the party to a drop off your kids and we'll screen the movie inside kind of party. But then I realized as the RSVPs rolled in that we would have 25 kids. We decided to pick up ten large pizzas and Samuel and I ran to Target to get party favors and cupcake mixes. I made three dozen cupcakes while Samuel sat on the floor bagging favors. Michael and I pushed the furniture against the walls and Michael figured out how to aim the movie projector at the ceiling so we could project the Empire Strikes Back above our heads. We raided the camping bin and laid out lots of sleeping bags, blankets and pillows and a party was made. We even had time for Michael to build a rocket in the garage with Davi...

On Halloween we celebrated my mom's birthday. We took her out for lunch at Cody's and then went back to the house for cupcakes. I really wanted to make the day good for her. That evening we got in costume, trick or treated on the ranch, and then went over to our friends Alex and Kyle's house for our annual Halloween Potluck Party. We love this tradition and are grateful that we are included. We ate, the kids played baseball in the backyard, and we trick or treated down San Antonio street. It was really fun. It was nice to have some normal enjoyment after the crazy flood day.

We flooded again. We are lucky. Our houses are all high out of the flood plain. It was still a crazy day. The kids were excited that morning. They got to dress up in costumes and were going to have champs day at school. We loaded into the car in the dark around 7:15AM in a torrential downpour. It was scary. Before we got off the ranch I called the kids elementary school. "Is it okay there?", I asked. "Sure! It's barely raining here.", I was told. So we drove a bit more. By the time we got to the corner of the ranch I was terrified to drive any more. At that moment the alarm went off on my phone. I glanced at it and it said there was a tornado warning and to seek shelter immediately. I pulled over, turned around and white knuckled it home. We ran straight for the kids closets with flashlights, kindles and my phone. We had no internet, but though the power flickered, we kept it on most of time. I saw on my phone that the tornado was headed di...