Happy Thanksgiving!

It never ceases to amaze me how quickly the week can fly by but still feel like it is the longest week ever!  It's been almost a week since I last posted and quite a bit has been going on.  First of all, we finally finished our flood claim on Sunday.  What a mess!  In the end the replacement value, by our estimate, is a little over $6000 which is less than original cost.  We lost almost all of Andy's text books, a freezer, a lawn mower, a desk and countless other items that are not too hard to replace.  However, I lost all of my high school and junior high memorabilia which I'm extremely sad about.  I never realized how quickly mold can develop.  It took less than a week to ruin just about everything down there.  On the bright side, the basement is now clean and organized.  Upward and onward right?

Samantha continues to do well with her potty training and rarely has accidents - even at night.  It has been two and a half weeks so I think that is a huge feat for a little kid.  I'm very proud, of course.  Her behavior the last 3-4 days has not been so great and she has even been acting up in school.  That has led to many 'talks' about what appropriate behavior is at school and nice ways to talk to adults.  Trying to make her understand that the emphatic "NO!" is unacceptable behavior has been difficult.  But I am happy to say that her behavior today was better and I think I may have found some of the cause of her obnoxiousness.  She now has TWO bottom molars.  Well, they aren't completely in, but the teeth have broken the skin finally.  So, I'm fairly certain that that has led to some of our behavior issues.  The rest is driven by the fact that she is two and thinks that she is about 14 and can do whatever she wants. 

Grandma and Grandpa arrived at the 'hairport' on Tuesday and are now 'biziting' us.  For those of you that don't speak toddler, she said that Grandma and Grandpa were at the airport and they are visiting us.  She is so excited to have them here!  She is very interested in Grandpa's work (composing on the piano) and when he gets up she sits down on the piano bench and starts pressing keys.  Then she tells everyone that she is 'working' and that she will be done in a minute.  She has also been Grandma's shadow and they spent most of the day going on walks and playing tea-party with the stuffed animals.  She also helped make tonight's dessert and it involved quite a bit of cool whip.  I hear that she helped herself while Grandma answered the phone!

Tomorrow of course is Thanksgiving and there are so many things to be thankful for.  I am most thankful that my family is together and that we are healthy.  We are thankful that we get to spend this time together when many families are separated.  We are blessed to have wonderful friends and we look forward to seeing the rest of our family during the Christmas holiday.  I will ask that you keep my little cousin Samuel and his family in your thoughts and prayers as he is battling a nasty central line infection and is in the hospital.  He and his family will spend Thanksgiving at the hospital but they are surrounded by caring and dedicated medical staff and for them I am thankful.  My heart is with the family I will not see this Thanksgiving but I will see you soon.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!