THE BRYNER REPORT

Well, since school started not much has happened. Except:

It was my birthday! I am officially 34 and my body is falling a little more apart every day. :) Our summer was good but a little stressful at times but now that we're back on a schedule, I think things will be a little easier for me and I can get back into a groove. My official birthday was the pits (Stake Conference, which I really do love, took my hubby away most of the day and the kids weren't in their best form!) but the next day was great and my family made me feel loved. :) We ate cake after church and one of my girls snapped this photo of me being old now. :)

Miranda lost her first tooth FINALLY! And then her second the next day! They have been loose, wiggly, TRYING to come out for four months! Finally I asked my dentist for a good way to grab on to the tooth so I could pull it. She suggested a damp paper towel. Worked like a charm! I pulled one out and seeing the blood about made her throw up on me! But the next day she was brave enough to let me pull the other one out. So no bottom middle teeth. Correction. She has adult bottom middle teeth. They were coming up behind the baby ones for all these months, so she never really had a gap! ;)

Labor Day! The first school holiday after the rigorous first 10 days! :) On Saturday we were invited to dinner with some friends, which was nice but Lucas was in his usual crazy mood, so I was chasing him most of the time. On Monday, we had some more friends come over for a BBQ. We had a lot of fun eating out on the back porch (yes, it was pleasant weather unbelievably!) and playing outside. Such a change from those four long months of horrid heat! I took all kinds of fun pictures of everybody and... I can't find them. BUT we had so much fun. :)

Jill & Miranda are involved with a community children's choir and I'm the Attendance Taker this year, which means I take roll and a whole lot of other stuff (from taking kids to the bathroom whose cousins taught them about Bloody Mary and now they can't go alone to filling in as accompanist when the real one is out of the room to awarding points to those who brought their music/got in position quickly/listened to the teacher/sang their part well, etc.) It's actually fun but really busy. I take one of Jill's friends to rehearsals too and it fills up a lot of our after school time on Thursdays but we all enjoy it. The girls got to sing with their group on a float in the West Texas Fair Parade last month. The first concert is Saturday!

The West Texas Fair came to town. We NEVER go and Ben never wants to, so I don't go by myself. Well, this year I was determined... and Ben got sick. Seriously! Anyway, he stayed home with Lucas and I took the girls. It was hot, they got tired of walking around (I didn't know where stuff was because it was my first time and I didn't have a map or anything), and they wanted to ride the rides. And they only accept cash in the whole place! I pretty much never carry cash. Woodburys to the rescue! Luckily our great friends found us floundering in the fairgrounds and took pity on my poor, pitiful girlies. They lent me some cash and the girls rode some rides. I will be more prepared next year!!!

Jill turned 9!!! Man, that makes me feel old! She is such a joyful, kind, and loving girl! I'm so happy that girl came to me in Grapevine, Texas through C-section on a wonderful September afternoon! Surgery never felt so good! :) Hee hee. She is a HUGE help to me and I don't know what I'd do without her wonderful friendship too. As she's getting older, we have more fun conversations and love just hanging out together. I wonder how long that will last! She got her EARS PIERCED as a birthday gift and she was thrilled. No screaming or drama and she's taking great care of them! Her adorable friend Courtney came along and explained how to do everything because she's had earrings for 4 whole months! ;)

She had 8 friends over for a party and her Grandpa from Kansas showed up 10 minutes before the party with pizza! He surprised us all! He called me and asked how I was. I had been sick and wasn't feeling great. I told him that I just had to frost the cake and pick up the pizzas and he said he'd take care of the pizzas. I laughed it off and he said, "No really, I'm in Abilene!" Such a great grandpa (and dad!). He brought my uncle Sam (his big brother) along for the ride and it was fun to see them. They went to church with us the next day and then drove back the 7 hours. They must really love us! Sadly, because I wasn't feeling well I totally didn't remember to take pictures!!! I snapped one on my phone and it's not great quality at all but enough to capture who was there. :)

The next weekend was the Ward Campout and for some reason... NO PICTURES! Man, I'm doing horribly. Anyway... we had an ok evening. I got everything all packed up and ready to go and... left a grocery bag full of our dinner and snack things. Luckily the state park was only 20 minutes away. I came back for it and the drive home and back was the best part of the evening for me! ;) Ha ha! Ben had all the kids, so I got to blare MY music and enjoy the drive with NO interruptions. I didn't realize how much I missed that! We ate our dinner but since there was a burn ban, we couldn't do s'mores. We brought graham crackers, chocolate frosting, and marshmallow creme to make an easy version of them. I enjoyed them more than anyone else. :) Some of the Scouts took the younger kids on a hike. Jill & Miranda went. About 1 1/2 hours later... they were STILL gone and it was dark! We were getting worried and some parents went to look for them and found them. None of the kids seemed too concerned about how long they were gone! They saw some neat wildlife and flowers and were fine. Jill did say to the Scouts that she thought they should let the parents know where they were at one point but they just kept going. I don't think I'll let my kids go off on a hike like that again. I'll just go with them! That night we tried to all bed down but I knew Lucas wouldn't go for it. People were running around and screaming and flashing their flashlights through our tent as they went by and that's all well and good for older kids but mine were exhausted and wanted to go to sleep at 9:30. So I packed Lucas up and went home. He went right to sleep in his crib and then woke up every hour on the hour screaming. He was fine the next day, so I have NO idea why but I got less sleep than the campers did! Oh well, maybe next year he'll be camping age. :) We did go back to pick them up and went on a family hike with some of the others. That was quite nice even though I was holding Lucas, Natalie, or Miranda most of the time. My little girls are NOT hikers apparently. :) Lucas really loved it though.

The next weekend was General Conference and we went to Dallas to hang out with family. We saw Ben's two brothers and their families, plus old friends from Abilene and Roanoke and it was really fun and relaxing. The last 45 minutes of the drive home was the usual madness of weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth, of course. Unfortunately, no pictures again, so... I will challenge myself to bring my camera more often! I almost always have my phone, which takes pictures, so I really have no excuse except forgetfulness!

Yesterday Jill was in her 3rd grade program. I went to watch it with the rest of the school at 9:30 and went back at 6:45 to watch with the family at the PTA meeting. The theme was US History and they did a great job. Jill sang with a few other girls the 2nd verse to "America the Beautiful" and did a great job. I actually teared up when the curtains opened (I know, I know) and then was openly crying when they sang a song about 9/11. I was so proud of my girl and all of her sweet friends that were up there.

Lucas is getting to be big stuff already. He is saying his sisters' names (clearly to us but probably not to anyone else). He crawled out of his pack and play while visiting relatives, opened the door, and went down a flight of stairs to go play with cousins, all while not waking me up in the next room! He stands up on his changing table after I change him and pull up his pants and he JUMPS at me! I can be 2 feet away and he'll leap towards me! The kid has no fear! Well, he always waits until I'm watching him and I know he's going to jump. :) He is extremely coordinated and physical and wears me OUT! We have a futon mattress up against our fireplace bricks, like an extra couch and he'll jump off the fireplace bricks on to the futon and he jumps high and lands hard and loves it! :) He can totally do a somersault off of the bricks on to the futon but also just flat on any floor. That amazes me! He's also clearly adorable. This pic is perfect because you can see how handsome he is AND also see that glint in his eye. We were at the zoo and he was ready... to... RUN!!! :) I LOVE THAT BOY!

So I guess we HAVE been pretty busy just like normal for us. Ben is at a work conference in Austin this week, so I'm just sitting around wishing he was here, or rather that I was there! But alas, no sitter. :) Another busy weekend ahead of us... stay tuned. :)