October FLEW by!

ok, the month flew by and with only one post by me! Just know it was BUSY! Between vacation to Disney, Training at work, and Halloween party's this month was packed! Update coming soon!

JP's Lunch

At home JP is an excellent eater. The boy will pretty much down anything we’re eating. So WHY is it he wasn’t eating at school? The teachers kept telling me, “he seems to be interested in XXX lunch so maybe you should try this.” OK, so I’d try. NOPE! He’d come home STARVING! I vented to mom and she gave me a great idea… Mom says, “why don’t you cut his meat into dinosaurs?” (JP is obsessed with dinosaurs) HUH? Well I’ll give a shot.

I found a great box of cookie cutters with every shape, letter, number, and animal you can imagine! And yes it includes dinosaurs!!!

It's pretty safe to say JP is now very excited about his lunch! Not only does JP now eat everything in his lunch box he helps me make his lunch and we correspond our cut outs with the letter of the week. This week the letter was D. JP cut out the letter D, Dinosaurs, and Doggies! Thanks Grandma for the GREAT suggestion!

Update on Bethesda Elementary Families

I just received an email from the counselor for the school who works very closely with the social worker and directly with the families in need. She said in addition to the items I listed before they also need underwear. These poor families I can't even imagine! Most of the families in need lived in a trailer park that appears is going to be condemned. If you're still getting items together Wal-Mart and Kroger gift cards are very helpful as well... this way the school can distribute appropriately. I've been asked several time where the school is located... It's in the Berkmar High school district and is Title 1 if you're not familiar with that term it essentially means a school with high percentage of low income families.

It's amazing to me to see the out pour of help among the community. Sunday many church pew's sat empty as members of congregations (mine as well as many others) fled to Austell and various other hard hit area's to assist in flood clean up. If you or your family were among those volunteers Thank you! I read story after story in the papers that the volunteers not only cleaned but inspired the flood victims. One lady I remember specifically said, "if they were not here I would still be sitting in my garage crying, but instead we're getting this done so we can all move on." Despite times being bad for so many people in so many ways there is one thing nobody can deny when people come together so much is accomplished and miracles transpire.

Hey Local Friends...

Hey all you locals! I feel blessed and very grateful that my home suffered no more then some yard clean up in the recent flood. As we all know many citizens have been inconvenienced with no power, flooded basements, stranded in homes, no school bus service until further notice, while others suffered much more losing everything in their home and in some cases their entire house. The City of Grayson and the Greater Grayson Chamber of Commerce is sponsoring a community recovery drive for Bethesda Elementary collecting needed items for families whose homes were severely damaged or lost. We’re collecting anything you and I use everyday that these families no longer have. The items will be delivered THIS Friday October 2nd.

Items needed for these families are:
- Blankets
- Towels
- Sleeping Bags
- Paper Products (toilet paper, paper plates, paper towels, plastic ware)
- Microwaveable food
- Toys for toddlers & elementary students
- Wal-Mart or Grocery Store Gift Cards

If you are able to contribute any items you can bring them to me and I’ll make sure they make it to the drop locations or you can take items directly to the drop locations below.

These items can be delivered to Grayson City Hall or the GGCC Chamber Office, Monday thru Thursday, September 28th through October 1st.

Deliver Items to:Grayson City Hall475 Grayson Parkway (Main Street) - Grayson, GA 30017Monday-Thursday10am-3pm
Deliver Items to:Gtr. Grayson Chamber of CommerceGrayson Professional Building (3 drives past Essex Bank)2047 Grayson Hwy 20 - Grayson, GA 30017Sunday-Thursday9am-7pmItems can be left in the large white crate located on our front porch. It will be checked several times daily.

Thank you in advance for anything you can contribute. If you’re not sure where my house or office is give me a call at 678-386-7036.

Rain Rain go AWAY!

I shouldn't say that... for over a year it's become a part of our regular prayer dialogue to pray for rain. In fact even JP prays for it in his evening prayers. Well it's taken a minute but the rain has come! I took some pictures of my flooded backyard with outdoor toys floating to the top but honestly when I saw these pictures mine became very insignificant. All of you non-locals that tune in here at my blog are very well aware I reside Gwinnett County based on previous posts so to show what's going down now in Gwinnett County have a looky at these....

This morning when I heard school was cancelled I was a little mad that school never got cancelled for Rain when I was a kid... then I saw and heard what was REALLY going on!!

And yep, it's cancelled tomorrow too which will no doubt make for a stir crazy JP and even more stir crazy mommy. It's probably a true sign of A.D.D. when your three year old toddler has bigger attention span then his mother. Oh well!

To bring this closer to home for some of you those of you that don't live in Gwinnett but have in the past (or visited) this school bus depot is located on Cole Road in Lilburn (city east of Stone Mountain) which is also next to Parkview High School and for those LDS folks out there right next to my stake center. I'm assuming no damage to the church as I haven't heard anything as of yet and I'm pretty sure that would have hit the email and facebook circulation by now.

So I guess it's a good thing I turned off the irrigation system yesterday?

Everyone went private

Apparently in my lack of blog surfing many of my favorite blogging friends went private on me. And I didn't get an invite... I'm sure you all requested emails and I was a slacker. If you're reading this then I want to read yours. heather@enchantedjourneys.info

Hugs,

All My ex’s live in Texas

That was our theme song Labor day weekend. My cousin Travis (who was Byron’s best man at our wedding) got hitched! The wedding took place in Austin, Texas. To me Austin, Texas is known for only one thing…. MTV’s Real World Austin! And lucky for me our hotel was only two blocks from the “7 Strangers picked to live together, work together and start getting REAL! The Real World, Austin!” House! So our first night Byron and I took a Pedicab downtown (first time in a pedicab). The pedicab driver was testing me to see if I knew which house was THE house and of course I knew are you kidding me? I’ve only watched every season since it started over 15 years ago.

My cousins have managed to spread themselves all over the country; Paige is now living in South Dakota, Mike in Denver, and Travis is Austin. It’s fun when we actually get a chance to be together but the visits have become pretty rare and only on an annual visit at best.

Allow me to introduce the fam…

This is Mike, Travis, and Paige. Their parents are Beth & Ron (both deceased while my cousins were in high school). Beth is Mom’s Sister. Mike is married to super cool Nancy (that I just LOVE she is so much fun!), Travis just married super sweet and way out of control (just like Trav) Lauren, and Paige is married to Jeremy another great addition to the family. In fact I think Jeremy actually brought us all closer together when he married Paige. There’s a few kids in the mix too. Nancy & Mike have Truitt and Paige & Jeremy have Bethany and Charston. All the kids played very important roles in the wedding. Bethany was the flower girl, I’m not sure Truitt’s role other then super cute as he rolled in wagon down the aisle. And then Charston played to me the most important role… sleeping in my arms through the entire wedding. I was missing JP a lot so having the other kids to entertain was the most fun of all!

We started off with a fun, emotional, and yeppers a tear jerker rehearsal dinner at Salt Lick BBQ. We were encouraged to dress up and all of the natives of Texas looked best… apparently it’s law if you live in Texas you must own boots and cute little cowgirl dresses. And as it turns out hats are not necessary as I was the ONLY one with a hat on!

Then on to the big day.