november already?

A beautiful day on Lake Superior in Duluth, MN

All I can say is that we have dear family and friends. Many of you have chimed in recently to ask, "Where in the world have you been?"  I figured I had better update the blog. :)

The fall has disappeared before my very eyes. I still have lots of pictures to post from our summer vacation! Maybe I'll get to that someday, but for now, here's a quick recap of what we've been up to:

August

After our stop in D.C., we drove up to the Finger Lakes region of Upstate New York to spend a few days on Keuka Lake with Phil's parents.

We stopped by Niagara Falls on the way home.

September

School, our weekly Friday homeschool group, AWANA and piano lessons began.

October

A trip to Iowa

A wonderful visit from 2 of my former second grade students (who just turned 20!)

A trip up to Duluth to see the North Shore, the Aerial Lift Bridge and the beautiful fall leaves. I must say, Duluth is now one of my favorite cities. It's up there with Seattle.

Both of my sisters flew out to visit from Alabama and California. We spent a few days exploring Minneapolis and spent the longest time walking around in the cold trying to locate the Mary Tyler Moore statue. Fun!

A surprise visit from friends from Oregon with lunch and a meet-up at the Mall of America

Phil's sister flew out from California to join our family on our road trip down to Kentucky to visit the Creation Museum. This place was amazing! Even more so--our kids were AWESOME, enduring 15 hour days in the car.

A fun day touring our State Capitol building and seeing the giant Lego display of the Capitol there in the lobby.

So that's what we've been up to! We look forward to celebrating a few birthdays this month. Half of us have November birthdays. The girls will turn 8 on the 18th (this I CANNOT believe!) and Phil will be 40 something on the 27th. :)