Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Sorry I haven't posted more this month. It's been crazy. Last week, for example, we didn't have a single evening when both Rob and I were home. Monday I was out with Beca because JC Penney's had a really good sale and I was able to pick up dress shirts for Rob to wear to work for $7 each (yay!). Tuesday Rob had boxing, then I had book club. Wednesday was YW in Excellence and even though I got released the previous Sunday, they didn't have a replacement for me, so I got to go :) On the way home from YW, Christy called and was sick and needed gatorade, so I stopped by the store to pick some up for her. While at the store, Beca called and said Macy's was having a one day sale and the store was open until midnight, so I ran home and went with her. I was really glad I went because I got some incredible deals, including a nice knife set, which we've been planning on getting for a while, for the same price I would have paid for a cheap set at Walmart! Both Beca and ended up saving about 70% total! Thursday Rob had a priesthood meeting and Friday I went to Beca's house to help put together laundry baskets of supplies to donate to the Lena Pope Home (which helps families that are going through hard times). Saturday Britney babysat for us and we finally got to spend some time together :) We went out dinner (Mexican at Christina's) and a movie (Twilight).

This week has been busy too, but at least I've gotten to see Rob much more :) He got off work early on Tuesday and only worked a half day on Wednesday (I LOVE this new salary thing versus hourly! - although I know that there will also be weeks that he has to stay late every day). He worked yesterday at the country club, but only had to work for a few hours, so we just waited for him to get home to have dinner.

We just had our family here for dinner. There were a couple other families that were originally going to come, but other things came up. It was kind of odd to just have us, but it was really nice :) Christy stopped by for a few minutes during dinner - she ate lunch with Ron's family then she and Ron stayed to watch the game (TX won) - then Christy and Ron came over after the game for leftovers (since they ate at 11am) and dessert. After dinner, before Christy and Ron got here, Rob and I relaxed on the couch in the playroom and enjoyed watching the kids play and climb all over us. Seven years ago, I would never have guessed that yesterday I would have been able to enjoy Beth pretending to eat me and then giving me huge wet kisses while Jack climbed back and forth between me and Rob, grinning, and Megan and Kylie ran in and out of the room playing. I am so incredibly blessed! I honestly can't think of anything I would change (except being out of debt, but we're working on that) in my life. I'm so grateful for Rob and all he does for me and our family. I'm so grateful for each of my children and the joy they bring to my life. I'm so thankful that we have a house and cars and food to eat - especially in today's economy. I'm so grateful for our friends and family. Heavenly Father has blessed us so much! I hope each of you had a wonderful Thanksgiving as well!

Two of our friends that have recently been in our prayers are Mandee and Travis Nelson. Mandee lived in the apartments we managed in Rexburg and we have stayed friends with her since then. She and Travis married sevenyears ago. Travis served in the 1st Marine Expeditionary Unit (hope I'm getting this right) during the Iraq War, so they spent most of the first three years of their marriage apart. Travis has been home for several years now and six months ago found a lump in his neck. He has been diagnosed with Stage 4 lymphoma. He's going through chemo right now and they are retesting to see if the chemo worked next week. Could you guys keep them in your prayers and for those of you who are LDS and are fasting next weekend include them in your fast please?

Nothing all that exciting . . .

Not all that much has happened to us lately. About two and a half weeks ago my back got really messed up and so I haven't been doing much except going to the chiropractor every other day. He thinks it is a result of my car accident 8 years ago - that my back never got completely fixed from that and finally the pressure from being slightly twisted got to be too much. I assume carrying 4 children in 5 years didn't help matters :) Oh, well :) It's getting fixed now. I'm just having a hard time not being able to do the things I normally do. I don't think I make a very good invalid. Rob is being great; he helps out with the housework and puts up with my rotten moods when I get frustrated :) I am going to the chiropractor every other day this week and next and then I get to drop down to only twice a week for the rest of the year. Thank heavens for health insurance! Thank heavens also for my incredible group of friends that are there for me every time I need them!

Rob started his new position on Monday. I think he's really going to like it. He had been told there would be 13 openings, but found out that the department was told they could only hire one person and they offered the job to him! He also thought that he would start out taking care of the really small, easy plans - the ones that are only online because they have so few participants. Usually new hires start off working with those plans. He found out yesterday that he isn't starting off there - his "Book of Business" (the companies that are assigned to him) is actually about in the middle of the group according to size and difficulty. He will probably have to travel more because of that (we were expecting him to have to travel only a few days a year, if that), but it's a great opportunity!

In other news, Megan graduated from her speech classes. She has been in speech since before she turned 3 and has been working with Miss Brit (otherwise known as Mrs. Conrick) for the last 3 years. Miss Brit has done an amazing job of helping Megan and we are so grateful for all her work!

Following are a few pictures of the kids ~

Jack (taken by Kylie)

What I found after leaving the room for a minute . . .

Jack is now getting into EVERYTHING!!! He has figured out (at 14 months) how to pull chairs over to things so he can climb up on them and he will climb up and grab stuff out of the sink and dump water on the floor, or climb on the table, or open weird windows on the computer and turn it off. He is so curious about everything and is constantly getting stuck in places that he's tried to crawl into or falling off things. If it didn't give me a heart attack every time he fell, it would be funny to watch as his falls are usually very cartoonish - for example, he doesn't just fall, he cartwheels over the side of a chair into a basket (something he's actually done) or something like that. The other day we heard him squawking and went running into the playroom to find his head and arms sticking out from under the cradle where he had somehow gotten lodged. He keeps me running! :)

Jack (taken by Beth - I am quite impressed that a 2 year old took this) - he looks so old in this picture :(

We made paper turkeys to decorate the front windows last night. Even Jack got to make one this year. The kids each got a body and they glued the head, two feet and then 5 feathers to their turkey body. Jack kept pulling all his glued pieces off and dropping them on the floor, until he decided the feet were the best part and he crumpled them and then tried to eat them. He also somehow managed to get glue all up his arm and all over his face. He had fun though!

Beth, my little neat freak, not happy because she got glue on her finger

Jack with the feet

Kylie took several pictures. These are my favorites ~


I didn't know where they got the apparently unavoidable desire to make weird faces every time a camera comes anywhere near them until I was looking through the old pictures of the Knowlton kids (as in Rob and his siblings). Yeah, it's definately from Rob's side of the family!

Halloween

Some random pics of the kids from another photo shoot (Rob mentioned the other day that he's really glad we have a digital camera because otherswise we would be spending a fortune on developing pictures the kids take :) )














Sorry it's been so long since I updated this! I've had back problems this week and haven't really felt up to doing anything. I had a disk that slipped out of place and even when I got it back in, the nerves and muscles were pretty messed up. I called around and found a chiropractor that got me in on Wed and he took x-rays and then had me come back Fri and he showed me the problem, then popped everything back into place :) He had me do an electric treatment as well to help the muscles and I'm going back Monday.

Other than that, we haven't done all that much this week. We fed the elders twice since their meals had to cancel (we don't usually sign up to feed them; we just have them call us when anyone cancels), made dinner for a friend, and went over to another friend's house for lunch and to frost cupcakes. Last night was the ward's Trunk-or-treat, so we spent yesterday (other than the chiropractor visit) finishing up the costumes. Kylie, Beth and I had made the ears and noses for the pigs two weeks ago, but we had to make the piggy tails and the hat for the wolf. We didn't want to ruin one of our baseball hats, so I used double-sided sticky stuff to cover a baseball hat with brown and white felt and we hot glued more felt and some pipe cleaners to the felt to make Jack's costume. We went with easy costumes this year. They still turned out pretty cute though! We started what we've decided will become a tradition this year. We came home from trunk or treat and went through the mounds of candy we accumulated and picked out just our favorites. Everything else we handed out to trink or treaters :) We still have a huge bowl of candy.







Tonight I'm having a Girl's Night at my house (so we can play with the new mineral powder Mary Kay eyeshadows and blushes :) ) and Rob is working. Brittney is coming over to be with the kids since Rob will be gone (she makes life so much easier!). Tomorrow I get to teach all the YW (we combine once a month) and I'm really looking forward to that! On Monday, Rob starts his new job. He just found out that he is the ONLY new hire (we thought there were going to be 13 others, but apparently they were told they could only hire one person) and so will not be going through a formal training class. I'm so glad he got this job - it seems to be the perfect fit for him and to play off all his experience :) He will be travelling a little bit and he will even travel a bit in the DFW area - he found out that he will be working at the Lewisville site at least twice over the next month. That will take a bit of getting used to since his last position was only here and was very set hours.

Oh, I don't think I mentioned Megan's testing results. She took the TAKS test (I think I'm getting the name right) last month and maxed out the test! They test 1st graders three times a year so they can measure their progress, but Megan scored off the charts the first time. The test maxes out at a 4th grade level. Her teacher said in 22 years of teaching, she had never seen a student score at the level Megan did! Megan is reading at a 4th grade level. Her teacher is wonderful and is putting Meg and one other little girl who scored higher than average in a separate group within the class and they will work on different work that is at their level. We're so glad that will work out as we really didn't want to have her skip a grade since she's already one of the youngest in her grade (her birthday is July 31st and the cut off is Sept 1st), but we didn't want to have her held back either. We are having her tested to get into the Gifted and Talented Program. I talked to another mom who has a daughter in the program and it sounds great :) I guess they pull the kids out for an hour a day and work with them on more advanced material. Her daughter (who is in 4th grade) learned Newton's Laws last month and is now building a model roller coaster to learn about g-forces. It seems like we are in a wonderful school system and I'm so glad! I really would prefer to keep Megan in public school and around kids her age and it seems like that will work out perfectly here!