Fall Fun

Ella Stitches!
Ella climbed up on one of our kitchen chairs, stood up, turned around backwards, flipped over the back, broke the chair, broke the fall with her face, and then there was much blood and tears. For 4 hours I just kept wiping blood and slobber from her chin, fat lip, and bloody teeth/ gums (YUCK!). I finally decided to take her to Urgent Care since I couldn't seem to hold her chin together with regular bandades. After a 4 hour wait there we finally got her stitched up. The stitching process was pretty intense. You'd think after 7 hours of no nap and not much food Ella would have surrendered in exhastion, but she had plenty of fight in her. They strapped her in a "papoose" contraption, but since she's such a big girl the velcro wouldn't stay together very well, so it still took several nurses to hold her still. I was in charge of the head which of course had to be held completely still. I would say if I were that up close and personal to someone else being stitched up that it was pretty cool and I enjoyed watching the stitching, but since it was my own little Ella I'll just say it was very interesting. So, now a little over a week later the stitches are out and her chin looks pretty good. Ella still tries to climb the kitchen chairs and anything else that she can. The chairs are of course off limits now, but unlike some of you mom's from previous generations I don't think I have eyes in the back of my head. (I'll never let my kids know that though!) We only have 3 kitchen chairs left so we can't afford anymore broken chairs! - or faces I guess. :)

Daddy time!
Jason's 4, going on 5 years of schooling have been hard and long. Anyone out there going through this can relate. On rare occassions when the kids see daddy this is what the "daddy time" is often like. The past 5 days since Jason started full-time as youth pastor at Fourth has been AMAZING! We've had dinner together every night and have spent lots of family time in the evenings. We're so thankful to finally be on the ministry end of our training. God has been faithful in meeting our needs and good in every step of this journey. Oh, let me insert that Ella is our "cuddle bug". Even now as I write this Ella looks the same on my lap!

Beth and Ella
Sarah, this is for you! I was getting Ella dressed one morning and Jason said, you really like green and brown. You dress Ella just like you dress yourself! Guilty as charged. This is one of those RARE occassions when he grabbed the camera and took a picture. Her shirt is green, but it's hard to tell.

Minnesota State Fair

Boys and Frogs!

I don't know if you can tell, but Jonas is studying a frog. There was a lot of rain around here at the end of September and the frogs were everywhere. It was great! Jonas and Ella had fun chasing them all.

I put Ella's hair in rags overnight and she had the frizziest little tight curls! It was hilarious. I wish I would have gotten a picture of it down, but I worked hard for 10 minutes and finally got her hair into these two little balls of curls. I have so much fun trying new things with her hair!

These are pumpkins we grew in our garden. The kids have had so much fun watching them grow and finally being allowed to pick them!

Jonas is being scolded and Ella is so happy it's not her- this time!

CAMPING

We went camping about 3 or 4 times in August and September. It was the perfect time to do it up here and it was so much fun! Here we are with uncle Mark just enjoying the fire. The kids slept great which surprised me. We can't wait till next summer and the opportunity to make more camping memories!

We stink at captions so I hope you enjoy the picture of our kids. This is just one of those wonderful moments when no parental guidance is needed. We just sit back and watch the fun!

It's Official!
After long meetings with the pastoral staff, deacons, parents of the teens, and finally any concerned church members Jason is officially on the pastoral staff at Fourth Baptist Church. Tonight especially we miss Josh and Anna in a huge way and never know how we will fill the void they have left, but we're very excited about the opportunity to do ministry on a larger scale here. It's been a long hard 4 years of seminary and anywhere from 40-60 hour work weeks for Jason. We are anxious to begin a new phase of our ministry that will help prepare us for our long term goal of foreign missions. Gaining some years of practical pastoral experience here in the states will give us a greater opportunity someday to train nationals to become pastors in their own country. More than that however, we finally get the chance to do what we have been preparing for for so long.