Back on Track . . .

This was the first week of school for Big. She's off to Pre K.

This was also the first week of 2 year old preschool for Little. She's growing too fast.

It was the first week for me and my newest endeavor: the neighborhood tennis team.

No firsts for Jim this week. His first 4 day traveling week since the 3rd week of July, but that's about it.

Anyway, since we are back on track with schedules and routine, I thought I'd try and get myself back on track with the blog. There are so many things I am constantly wanting to write about . . . our life, our experiences, our troubles and our successes . . . I think I'll see if I can get back into the swing of this blogging thing. And I like that it keeps a record of my life. A journal. I've missed that.

We will see. I can't promise myself that I'll be daily as I once was, but I can't promise I won't be, either. I'm just going to see how it goes.

So . . . to start off . . . our summer . . .

I'm happy to report that for the first time since the summer of 2005, we had a crisis-free, non-life-changing summer. Hallelujah! Five summers in a row of chaos . . . Big's birth the summer of 2006, a new house and a miscarriage the summer of 2007, Little's arrival in 2008, my mom's death and my dad's illness in 2009 . . . and then -- FINALLY -- nothing of importance to report in 2010.

I prayed for that. We did have a little health scare with my dad that turned out to be nothing as May turned into June . . . and all the while I was thinking, "Nope. He's fine. There is no way that God will give me another summer like this." Thank goodness I was right. We made it through the summer unscathed. Hooray for that.

We did our awesome Disney trip, then celebrated the girls' 2nd and 4th birthdays a month later. We made it through the anniversary of my mom's death mid summer, which was by far the hardest part of the summer season. We had a very nice 4th of July, and we enjoyed a nearly 2 week trip to the midwest and the Dahlby home at the Lake of the Ozarks in the days before going back to school.

Now were home, and all the usual stuff that comes with the fall is starting to happen. The girls are both in preschool this year -- Big goes M-Th, Little just T & Th. I am starting to play tennis with the neighborhood ladies . . . a game I played in high school and for a few seasons back in the early 2000s. It's been a looooong time since I played, and this week's first lesson totally showed that. Hopefully I will get better in time -- and if not, it's going to be a looooong season. Jim is back to his normal routine of traveling, though I can tell he is trying very hard to be around as much as he can. The end of summer is always, always so busy around here. I can tell that Jim is trying to be around for as much of it as he can, even with his hectic, never ending, overplanned work schedule.

I'm room mom for Little's preschool class. Jim is the soccer coach for Big's team. We've planned a little beach vacation for our clan of 4 in mid-September. Big has already picked out her Halloween costume. Fall is upon us (though it's still mid-August), and we are hoping to hit it full force, coming of a fairly event-free summer.

And now I'm back to blogging. At least for now I am. Like I said, we will see how it goes. I missed you all -- and if you missed me, then welcome back :)