10 things to do...

I'm wondering how I will do if I post my to-do list for the week and then update the blog on it when it's done. I'm going to try it anyways. In no order of importance :

1. buy things to finish making Julia Grace's chipboard letters (J-U-L-I-A) for her side of the bedroom.
2. finish knitting my scarf.
3. convert the entertainment center in our bedroom to an entertainment area/craft storage WITHOUT it looking junky!
4. finish sorting Julia Grace's clothes for donation - already done with Mallory's clothes and donated too! :)
5. start weeding out clothes from mine & Tracy's closet to store or donate.
6. make the cupcakes I promised the kids and husband! (new recipe I'm trying - have all ingredients!)
7. finish updating Bob's website with current listings and
8. finish updating file folders in the office (I don't get paid any extra to do these and I'm dragging on getting those done sometimes -part of the money we make when the property sells is for maintaining the website listing and file folder as we go along).
9. pick out a color for the bathroom paint and buy it.
10. buy flowers to plant this weekend!

Do you think I can do it? We'll see!!

the Anchor Bonfire

Yes, that is a man on top of a tractor. That would be one Richard Smith - our pastor! He stood on top of the tractor pulling us on the hayride and then stood on top of this to take photos of our hayride entourage. Don't try this at home!

Mallory is roasting a hotdog or two on our bonfire as it's getting started.

They had a cookie-making station at our bonfire - Tracy wasn't feeling well so he stayed home with Julia Grace. Since he couldn't come, Mallory made him a cookie surprise to take home to him.



Mallory loses her hat during the Anchor version of the Crazy Crab walk - the Crazy Spider - complete with extra spider legs provided by Ms. Merissa. Look close at Mallory's waist!



Mallory and Buddy getting read to spit their pumpkin seeds in the pumpkin-seed-spitting contest. All the kids thought this was great - there was a dad competition after the kids got through spitting! A girl won the boys vs. girls spitting though - hahaha to all the boys!



Everyone ended the hayride/bonfire time by roasting some marshmallows before heading back to the store area.

Mallory and I had a great time - this is the first time we've gotten to go to the Anchor bonfire when it was held at Nivens' Apple Farm. We have been when it was at the Wolfe's house in previous years. We had to miss a couple of years because of our Asheville cousins getting married in late October (not once but twice!). We are blessed with a wonderful church that provides many great children's activities and a wonderful planner of our children's time, Merissa. Merissa is so creative and I would never think of some of the wonderful activities and mission projects she engages our children with each week. Thank you Hope Point and Merissa! :)

updates...

My mom had her first chemotherapy treatment on this past Monday and goes for week 2 tomorrow. She will be going every Monday for the next 18 weeks. So far this past week she just felt tired, but not really any different than normal. She is still having pain in her neck and some days are better than others. Her throat is still sore from the radiation treatments but she assures me she's still eating all kinds of healthy fattening things. :) I'm just concerned she'll lose weight and she doesn't really have any extra to spare. She assured me today that she's eating lots of peanut butter, drinking milk, eating ice cream and drinking chocolate Boost. She even ate a double cheeseburger from McDonald's last night. Julia Grace and Grandma really like fast food - burgers and fries. :)

My mom and dad came to town this weekend to spend time with family and especially to see my Aunt Kay and my sister's Granny. Neither of them are able to travel and my mom really wanted to see them before she doesn't feel up to traveling herself. My Aunt Kay also has cancer (this is my mom's sister) and hers is inoperable. She has multiple tumors across her body At one point the doctors told my aunt there was nothing they could do and she probably wouldn't be alive past her birthday. Well.... that was mid-2007 and she's about to see her 2nd birthday come since they said that. Aunt Kay is taking some medicine designed to slow the tumor growth but it actually shrunk some of hers! This is a good thing!
My sister's Granny is in a nursing home and while she isn't sick, she isn't well enough to travel 3 1/2 hours to see my parents. This is my sister's dad's mother but I've always known her as Granny too.

I wish we'd had more time to visit but I understand it's hard for them to squeeze in visiting everyone. Mallory came over for about an hour or so before church with her mom to see my mom and dad. I wish we could have visited longer.

I think Tracy and I are going to try to make a trip down to Hilton Head again in a few weeks. I know the plan right now is to possibly do an early Thanksgiving dinner at my mom and dad's house the weekend before Thanksgiving. We've just got to take things day by day and see how the week is going. I'll keep you posted and we appreciate all of your prayers and happy thoughts! :)

Wordless Wednesday

5minutesformom.com's Wordless Wednesday

Mallory's surprise was...

I had purchased tickets for us to go see Ballet Spartanburg's presentation of Snow White! I was so excited because I had never been to a ballet before either aside from Miss Marion's dance recitals in May. That does not count compared to this by any stretch of the imagination!

I was good - I had the tickets in hand for 2 weeks prior to the performance and managed NOT to spill the beans to Mallory! :) I was hoping to have our tickets for the Nutcracker performance in hand to give her on Friday as well, but that didn't work out - they were so busy with the Snow White performance, they didn't send over their paid list to Twichell's box office (at Converse College) for those performances. But it's okay - Mallory knows if I tell her we're doing it that it will happen or there will be a very good reason I am not able to follow through on my promises to her. AND - as of today, I have tickets for that too - picking them up in the morning! And I must say we have awesome seats and I just can't wait to go. So super excited to see this - I've never been to the Nutcracker before either - just seen a videotaped version in the 4th and 5th grade at Christmas with my music class. I can't wait - did I mention that yet?

Mallory and I ran into her good friend Elizabeth and her mom, Melissa. It was good to see them - I've been out of the dance class and soccer loop a good bit this season. Elizabeth and Mallory aren't on the same soccer team this year but Tracy's still seen them in passing. I saw Elizabeth on the field as we were leaving Saturday morning and then we saw them Sunday at the show. Mallory ran around with her program getting autographs of all the cast members in the lobby. She humored me and allowed 2 pics and that was it! She even smiled for one - haha! Mallory thinks she's beyond photographing all that she does - I try to tell her years from now she'll appreciate it. She asks me constantly is this going on your blog - but it's not just for that. I love to scrapbook and keep up pictures through the years. I've really appreciated in recent times how many pictures my mom has of things and that she's kept them in good condition through the years - I know Mallory's enjoyed pouring through my mom's box of photos and albums on more than one occasion.

So here they are... Mallory's whopping two photos from Snow White to humor me! :) I have more to write about our weekend - it was action packed I tell ya! I even went to bed at 9.45 p.m. last night (Monday) to recuperate from it and you guys know I'm not in bed before 1 a.m. most nights! Julia Grace and I slept right on through to 9.05 a.m. this morning. Thank goodness Bob lets us work from home! It was Tracy's day to go to the office anyways! Hahaha! It turned out to be a good day for him too! More on that later...

Quick update...

Mom finished 15 treatments of radiation yesterday. She had been going every day Monday through Friday for a few weeks. She will start chemotherapy next week. Please continue to keep her in your prayers.

She's still doing well. She has a sore throat which is making it difficult to eat and swallow. They told her this should get better now that she's done with radiation.

The radiology group gave her a certificate of completion yesterday. :) I look at it as one milestone down on the way to beating this.

Gotta go - getting a few things done before we leave to come back to Sparkle City.

A surprise for Mallory...

I have a surprise for Mallory. I'm not telling you what it is until it happens. I'm super excited because it's something we've never done. But I can't tell you what it is. Mallory CAN read and who knows who reads this that would tell her.

I can't wait for this weekend. It's going to be busy that's for sure! It's starting to look like we may only be home for sleep!

Okay... enough about that. I'll ruin surprises if I go on and on about it.

Have a good day you guys!