The Nutcracker was an incredible experience! All those weeks of practice paid off. The girls were able to dance on stage with professional dancers in front of a packed audience. And they all danced beautifully!

My Mom came for the performance, and we'll buy the DVD to show my sister and our friends. (Since this is a professional performance, the ticket prices reflect that!) Even Hope enjoyed watching her sisters dance.

The days leading up to the performance were full of practices and last minute adjustments. The day of the performance, the girls had costume fittings, pictures, practice with the Russians, and the actual performance. They got to wear some make-up, which they all thought was fun. Faith did a great job doing her makeup herself.

I was a little concerned that Joy and Grace might get nervous being on stage with the Russian dancers, but they did great. ( I did do some serious praying in the audience!) They were snowflakes, which is the youngest group of dancers. They remembered their dance, even the part that was changed the afternoon of the performance!

Faith was a party guest. Since she is tall, she had to wear a boy costume (which no modern boy I know would ever wear, and which is fancier than what most of her girlfriends wear to church on Sunday!). The children were on stage for a long time and danced well.

Faith also was a butterfly. Her costume was gorgeous! This was a much harder dance than the party guest dance, and she was great! The girls danced on pointe and were beautiful. She was the youngest girl in this part, but she definitely held her own! I was so proud of her. She had to work hard to learn the dance, but she persevered. Since she's only been taking pointe since January, I was really impressed with her dancing.

At the end of the show, all the performers, adults and children, came out for the bow. After the first bow, the dancer playing Masha (Clara in the American version) took Grace's hand and the dancer playing Drosselmeyer (the toymaker uncle) took Joy's hand and the group bowed again. That was so cool! I wish I could have taken a picture, but that wasn't allowed, so I'll just have to imprint the image on my mind and make sure that they remember it.

The girls and I hope they have the opportunity to dance in the Nutcracker again next year!

This year we seem to go from one season of activity to another! Our church does a Trunk or Treat on October 31, so I spent several days that month sewing Hope's costume. She wanted to dress up as Susan from the second Narnia movie, which is not a costume you're likely to find at your local Stuffmart. Fortunately, I have used this pattern twice before - for American Girls Felicity and Elizabeth, so I knew how to make it. Unfortunately I forgot that the amount of fabric that the pattern states you will need is not enough to actually make the dress! The fabric store took back the insufficient fabric, so we weren't out any extra money. The dress looks great, and Hope enjoyed wearing it. Joy and Grace dressed as fairies using some wings we bought and old ballet costumes. Faith and her friends had their own "Pajama Party" trunk, and dressed in their PJs. Paul and I were the Pirates Who Don't Do Anything. We used some 90% off inflatables from the dollar store, a dollar eyepatch, and were able to put together pretty decent costumes from our closet!

October also saw the beginning of Nutcracker practices for Faith, Joy, and Grace. All three were cast in children's parts for the Moscow Ballet tour. The little ones had practice on a weekday, and we were able to carpool with a friend. Faith had Sunday practices, so we were hurrying to get home from church, eat lunch, and get to practice on time. But this is an amazing opportunity and so worth it!

So November has been full of ballet! (And piano for Hope, who chose piano over dance this year.)

I've often wished I could go beyond the template suggestions in Blogger without having to pay a lot of money. But since I'm not all that computer-savvy and have really no idea how to do it myself, I contented myself with the Blogger options. Until now.

Sarah has a beautiful new blog design. And when she mentioned it was free, I headed right over to The Cutest Blog on the Block and got my own free blog background. It was so easy! Thanks, Sarah. And, thanks, Ashley.

I was even able to customize my font colors!

Sometimes we have a flood of activities. In the last five days I have :

*Made cute doll t-shirts and purses at Michaels (for free!)

*Brought Faith, Joy, and Grace to a total of four Nutcracker practices

*Attended a birthday party

*Attended a college ministry swim party in which the only people swimming were my girls

*Went to church

*Hosted our small group at our house

*Quickly cleaned up (as best we could) for small group

*Watched a friend's children

*Taken the girls to a total of three dance classes

*Eaten out with Paul and the girls

*Stood in line for 30 MINUTES at Stuffmart!!! (With all four girls!)

*Went to and helped at our first 4-H meeting

*Helped Paul lead a class for engaged couples in our home (and cleaned up and made a dessert for that)

*Homeschooled the girls

*Went to Wednesday night church

*Witnessed this last night on the way home



The picture doesn't do God's creation justice. And there was a second, fainter rainbow above it that disappeared by the time we got home. As I was thinking about the rainbow today and what it means, I realized that not only does God promise never to flood the earth with water, but He also promises never to allow my life to become flooded with more than I am able to bear in Him. Psalm 142:3 says, "When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, You knew my path."

God does know my path, and when I am following Him, He will lead me beside still waters and restore my soul, even in the midst of what may seem overwhelming.

Like many others, we kept a very obsessive close eye on Ike as it entered the Gulf. The track varied widely before finally seeming to be headed for Galveston. That was only somewhat of a relief for us. Since Ike was such a big storm, our area was still forecast to have strong winds and flooding from the storm.

We knew the evacuees from the Galveston/Houston area would make an evacuation to my mom's house a very long journey. And since we would have to bring our pets anywhere we went, we decided to ride out the moderately bad weather we were likely to experience. And if the power was out for too long, we could always go later.

We spent Thursday and Friday making our preparations. Paul boarded up our businesses and our home (a task made far easier because we saved the wood he had cut in preparation for Gustav). We purchased food, water, flashlights, and batteries. I filled the tubs with water and gathered our candles. Then we waited. The wind blew. It rained some. Just as I was thinking that we would probably not lose electricity, the power went out. We had no power from about 12:30 am on Saturday morning until about 2:30 pm on Saturday afternoon. It wasn't the heat that was so bad, it was the humidity. Everything felt sticky! We were so thankful when the power came back on!

Other than the relatively brief loss of power and a few small limbs down, we had no damage. I feel extremely blessed, and I am praying for those in Galveston, Houston, and the other areas that had severe damage from Ike.

We've definitely had some exciting times as of late. I got to go to Living Proof Live in San Antonio in August. I had had my ticket for months, but the friends I had planned to go with were both unable to go. God provided another sweet group of ladies to ride to San Antonio with, and He totally blessed me! I loved hearing God speak through Beth that I am His heiress!!

I came home to a really painful throat infection. As I tried to recuperate, I had to get our family ready for Family Camp the following weekend. And in case that wasn't enough, it appeared that Gustav might be coming our way, so I had to prepare for a potential hurricane! Thankfully, the Z pack worked quickly, and I was able to pack for our trip and pack up for the hurricane without too much trouble. As we left for Family Camp on Friday, we still didn't know if the hurricane would come to our town, so we really looked like the Beverly Hillbillies - a Suburban packed FULL of stuff including 12 American Girl dolls, a box of pictures, a few momentos, a dog, a cat, and a gerbil! (The folks who ran the camp were nice enough to make an exception to the no pets rule!!)

We kept abreast of the hurricane via our laptop at camp, and shared the news with others who worried about being in Gustav's path. On Monday, we went to stay with friends who live about an hour away from the camp before heading home on Tuesday. The storm had not struck us, so we had no damage. However, as we settled back into our normal routines, it appeared that Ike might cause us some trouble. More about that next time!

It's summer time! We're on vacation! Life around here has been a great balance of activity and rest this summer.

We started our summer at the end of May with a family vacation to a nearby big city. We visited museums and the zoo and had a great time. My girls really enjoyed the space exhibit since we have studied space this year. Another favorite was the jewels and gems exhibit. All but Joy enjoyed the interactive butterfly exhibit. She was scared of the butterflies landing on her. The butterflies liked Paul best.

We brought home some yummy snacks, too!