I have two speeds these days...

Busy or tired. =)

It seems there isn't really room for anything in between those two. I chalk it up to several things, one being the amount of sleep I get {or the lack of sleep I am getting at night} due to late-stage pregnancy. Another is due to the early morning routine of getting kids off to school each day. Yet another is based on the extra "running around" that I have been doing each day- much more than I had done all summer.

I see that the busier I am, the less I blog too. My apologies for that to all of you who check in here so frequently or faithfully each day or two. I figure you can always browse the archives if you start going through Nitty.Gritty. withdrawal symptoms. =) Or you can email me and there's always a chance I'll write you back in a day or two or month or so later. {wink}

I've been surprised at how a schedule can fill up so quickly just by adding school to the mix. Our mornings are a rush for an hour or so and then suddenly it's just Ava and me for a couple of hours before it's time to pick Wyndham up from school or drop her off at therapy. During that quiet time I have found myself either cat-napping while Ava watches a cartoon or does puzzles {her new favorite activity is doing puzzles...she would spend half the day doing the same 4 over and over, so I plan to get her a few more as soon as the baby is born}, otherwise we get dressed and run errands and do stuff I know I won't be doing in a very short time.

Like a lunch date/icecream/window shopping outing with Chip. Ava and I were lucky to be able to squeeze that into our afternoon one day this week. (I snapped that photo of me above just as we were headed out the door...it's starting to be jacket weather around here!) It was such a treat for Chip to take a mid-day break (he worked late that night to make up for his afternoon, so for him it wasn't really "time off" at all...oh well) and it was an extra special treat for Ava to be an only child for a few hours. She soaked up every minute of it. She also helped me eat half of my Oatmeal Cookie Dough icecream too. =)

The other kids are doing well in school and seem to be enjoying their classes and friends. Brock came home with a 100% on his first spelling test, which I promptly hung on the fridge door. I snapped a few pictures of him yesterday too, because it seems like he's always with friends or just keeping himself busy around here too. I love that he still likes to 'hang out' with me and that he is so open and willing to talk about his days and his thoughts on so many different subjects. He is very excited to have a new baby in our family and I just know he is going to be a big help to me- he already has shown that by helping out with things like reading bedtime stories to the girls as I help them get their jammies on each night. He is so patient and tolerant with his sisters that I think I should give him an award for it. At least on certain days he is...and I don't blame him most of the time when the girls do get on his nerves...they have a way of pushing buttons at just the right (or wrong) time. =)

Thus goes our weeks as we continue to countdown to the arrival date of our baby. It's a busy, tiring time in life. One that I know will be just a distant memory all too soon.

As for memories, I hope you all had a chance yesterday to pause and reflect and pray for the families who were changed so dramatically as a result of Sept. 11, 2001, as we marked 7 years as a nation that will always remember that day. I will never forget it and, just as many of you, I have a hard time accepting how 7 years passed so quickly. It seems like it wasn't nearly that long, and yet I understand grief and loss far too well, to know that it also feels like an eternity. Time is an interesting thing... always moving, yet somehow captured in our memories forever.