Fall is here!

I think it's a pretty good indication that I need to post more often when my post titles are the season that we're in. It's been a while and I have a ton of pics, so here goes.....

These past few months have flown. I don't think I realized how much the house-building was going to take up our time. It's been tougher than I thought keeping up with the gin, a toddler, the house, and being pregnant. On top of the project of the house itself, I have about a dozen projects going trying to get ready for the new house. The tiny house we're in now is just about to bust. One of the projects I am currently working on is my baby bedding, which will be..... PINK! Yes, Tac is going to have a little sister!

Taegan is just a couple months away from turning 2! He's talking a lot and is never still. Tac is in the "I do it" stage, which is sometimes cute, sometimes frusterating, and sometimes hurts my feelings a little. I'm not ready for him to not need me anymore!

Ainsley Grayce

 Crista took family pics and some of just Tac back in August. I thought they turned out just precious. There are so many good ones I wish I could post them all. We keep saying that we're not going to encourage the bull riding and that we're going to put up all of Al's old pictures so Tac won't want to "be like Daddy", but at this age it's just so cute to see him get into it. Maybe next year we'll put up the bull riding stuff....

 I think my favorite part of toddler-hood is that there is no shame. Things that would normally make you or I blush don't even phase him. He's completely uninhibited. For example, being a little gassy or having food smeared all over his face doesn't bother him a bit. He waves at every stranger we see in the parking lot of a store and if he sees someone using a cane to walk with he goes and takes it from them so he can try it. And my favorite is when we're in a church service after a prayer or a song and it's deadly silent when Tac busts out clapping and saying "Yay!" I think it's refreshing that he doesn't care how he looks, how he smells, or how he pronounces words like "football" and "elephant". I saw him get embarrassed for the first time the other day when a pretty girl caught him dancing to the music playing over the intercom at the grocery store. It made my heart sad to know that this stage won't last long. Who tells kids to get embarrassed or worry over what people think? If only we could all be as innocently oblivious as they are....

Baby bump! Just starting my last trimester.

September 1st is nearly a holiday around here. (That's the opening of dove season for those of you who don't hunt.) This year was really fun since Tac was "hunting" with the guys. It's amazing to watch him because he can actually pick the birds out in the sky and he gets his little toy guy up and aims right at them. He's a little hard on the guys, though, because if they miss he sure lets them know about it. (I didn't tell you that they actually miss, though.) Tac even helped clean the birds and eat them, too.

 

We started up the gin toward the end of September. Starting up is always exciting- the guys work so hard all year long, but until they have cotton to run through it, it's hard to see the fruits of their labor. Al made so many changes to the gin this year that, unfortunately, startup was a little rocky. We only had a little bit to gin, so thankfully we got it done and got all the kinks worked out of the gin. Now we're just waiting for more cotton. I'm afraid this season is going to be like that--- what little cotton there is will be a lot of hurry up and wait.

Tac and Josh playing in the cotton. Tac thought that the cotton coming in from the overflow was about the coolest thing ever. You may notice the splint on Josh's right hand-- he badly cut his hand while changing a starter on a fork lift. The bummer of it was that the cut is right over his trigger finger. I'm not sure he really cares about learning to write left-handed, but shooting his bow left-handed is definately at the top of his list.

Summer days at Mom and Dad's. What a life....underwear and flip-flops.

Tac is absolutely enamored by tractors. Papa lets him drive and he thinks he's soooo big.

We've learned to say "cheese" and this is the result.

Out celebrating Al's birthday

This is the new barn cat, or what Al calls, "the mouser." This is probably the most patient and laid back tom cat I've ever seen. The way Tac handles him, you'd think the cat had no bones or joints. I'm sure the cat wishes he didn't.

My little stud at homecoming

At the rodeo

This is the latest picture of the progress of the house. I hate to even say how much we lack because I just seem to jinx us everytime I do, but we are definately in the last stretch now. I'm soooo ready.

The past several weeks we asked our friends and everyone from the community to come bless our home by writng their favorite scriptures on the walls of our unpainted house. We left a bag of markers on the fireplace and invited everyone to stop by on their way through. I cannot even begin to tell you how blessed we were through this. We are so humbled to be getting our dream house to start with, but to walk in and see the word of God written all over the walls by people that care about us was absolutely breathtaking. It was also neat to see which scriptures people chose. If Al or I were ever gone for the day, the first thing we did when we got home was go look to see if there were more verses and who they were written by. When it was all said and done, there were close to 200 scriptures written all throughout our home. Thank you, thank you to everyone who participated. We are so honored and dedicate the gift of our home to the Lord. Here are just a handful of what was written in the house....

I wish you could read this- It's Deuteronomy 6:6-9 and it's the verse that inspired this little project. It talks about having the commands of God impressed upon you and woven into every aspect of your life. It ends by saying, "Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates."

Al and I both worked Walk to Emmaus's this fall, and so both of our lay directors wrote the theme verse of our Walks', which was really special to us. Thanks Mike and Penny!!

This verse showed up in our bedroom, but the culprit didn't sign it. I think we all can take a pretty good guess at who was responsible. :)

Thank goodness, Josh got his splint off just a couple of days before going to the ranch for the weekend. Right off the bat, he got this monster pig with his bow. Woohoo!

We all had a great time at the ranch the weekend before, especially Tac, who stayed covered in dirt the entire weekend.

How wonderful to be completely content to dig in the dirt all day long with no apparent purpose at all.

Oh, the treasures we find at the ranch. Tac and Cotton fighting over a deer leg. Cotton won out with the deer leg, so Tac had to settle for a rotten old turtle shell. Maybe we'll get him his very own deer leg for Christmas. If he's good.

It may already be too late to put up the bull riding paraphanalia. This was completely unprovoked, and anytime Cotton is still long enough, Tac climbs on and begins spurring. Maybe you should all start praying now.

This is how you know if Tac is really serious about what he's doing--- the more crack that shows, the harder he's working. It's like having a built-in meter.

My two favorite boys in their matching pj's. It just makes me swoon.