Picking up where I left off...October!!!

October 2008

I had 6 weeks of maternity leave this fall and I made the most of it. Although living in a residence hall made it both wonderful to stay connected to our community, it was also challenging for me to part with my "day job". I came to a realization about 2 weeks in that I better take the time to rest, play and spend quality time with Nolan and family!

I started going to MOPS and met some great women from my own church and community. Here's Nolan and I at our first MOPS play date. We've continued this time every other Tuesday morning and Daniel stays home Tuesday afternoons, so we've made it a great family day enjoying our lunch time overlap.

Julie had Carson Charles on September 13th, so we enjoyed sharing the early joys and challenges of motherhood. We took a walk at Greenlake and it only took us about twice as long!

We celebrated Leta's 1 year birthday with Matt & Mandy and the polka dot kingdom! It's amazing how fast a year seemed to go by watching Leta grow up! We have plans for Nolan and Leta if all of her other boyfriends don't get in the way! Mandy- you set the bar high for birthday parties!

Back to work...or play! My first day back to work was a weekend retreat series, starting with Intercultural Retreat and finishing with Emerson Hall Retreat at Camp Casey. I feel pretty fortunate to have such a great job and to get to bring Nolan along for the ride! My mom came and helped me on my first real trip...we rode the ferry to Whidbey Island and enjoyed 2 nights of festivities with college students. My mom said she got more sleep with Nolan than with the students who stayed up until 4am! I knew that I had been training for something...

I've had the distinct pleasure to continue my work with ABOLITION as their staff advisor. We attended a fundraiser event at the space needle this fall for the Tronie Foundation.
The weekend of Halloween wrapped things up. At the last minute, I remembered having been given a cow costume, and lo and behold, it was the perfect size! So, against our earlier agreement to not dress up our child in silly costumes...I fell in love with this little cow.

Our family also had a day in the park! I had wanted to get a group picture of the kids, but they were never all in the same place at once. We enjoyed having my cousin and his wife visit from Texas. I also got a chance to catch up with Emily and Luella, born this summer right before Nolan.

Let's hope I make it to the November update...you can see life has kept us busy!