344 Thanks Georgia,

but it's time for us to "leave".

Today was our last Sunday in the Flat Rock Ward. It has been a lot of hard work, but we have loved our time here. The girls and I all had new dresses on so I wanted to take a family photo. I was looking for a place and the LT suggested lots of leaves in the background because we are so ready to "leave" Georgia.

I sure wish he would've thought of that two weeks ago when I was trying to come up with a cute Christmas card theme!!

343 Beautiful Girl!

I took family photos for a fabulously talented photographer friend back in July, and we agreed on a services swap. I just had to get the girls in to her studio. I had been trying and things kept falling through. Finally today we were able to stop in. She has such a great space! I was absolutely jealous! 

I can't wait to see how they turn out!!! 

I had to sneak though, and take a quick one of the DQ with my camera.

341 Looking Good!

We finally made it to the doctor for the DQ's six month post-op x-ray. The doc said her back looks great! We were pretty sure that is what we would hear, but it is fabulous to get confirmation of that.

What a blessing!

338 Leaves!!

I really don't like leaves. I think I may have mentioned that before...

Anyway, this is what we came home to. The entire neighborhood was blanketed in leaves. It is really quite a sight!

310 Love

The leaves seem to have changed overnight. 

They are really quite breathtaking. 

I prefer them on the trees however... they are not as magical to me when they are blowing all over the ground.

308 Temple Trip

Now that the DQ is 12, she is able to do work in the LDS Temple. 

Today was a youth temple trip and so the LT volunteered to drive up to Atlanta and help out.

It was a great day for them to spend some time together, and a beautiful and spiritual experience for the DQ!

295 Me and Nature. We Don't Really Get Along...

We had dinner tonight with some friends. As per usual with the army, just a day after seeing a family reunited early, this family got the surprise "you're deploying in 2 weeks" notice just a few days ago. Such is life...but I digress...

We were enjoying a lovely meal outside when I looked down at my phone to find this:

I had to use the LT's phone for this screen shot

Gross!!!

On the plus side... I am thankful it was my phone and not my head...or my food!!

293 Green Surprise

I was sweeping out some dead leaves from our driveway and a bright green tiny thing came flying out! Upon closer examination, I realized it was an itty bitty frog! It's hard to judge the size by this photo, and the thing was so darn fast I couldn't get a great shot, but this is in concrete, and those pebbles in the concrete are pretty tiny! 

This was the cutest critter that I could have been surprised by while sweeping leaves. (Other things found - black widows, roaches, giant brown spiders, worms...)

282 SOOTC

As in Straight Out Of The Camera. No photoshop necessary.

We went up to Callaway Gardens today with friends and I managed to snap this gem. It was so gorgeous up there and the weather was perfect! We've been spoiled by this 4 day weekend for sure!!

276 Road Trip!!

We took a field trip today to Providence Canyon in Lumpkin, GA. 

It was SO much fun!! We brought a good friend along and ended up hiking 5 miles around and through the canyon.

Bean brought along her notebook and took some notes, but was just too busy looking around to take many.

My favorite was when we found some mushroom looking things, that I finally just said were some kind of fungus. She got out her notebook and said, "How do you spell haggis?" 

"Haggis!? What are you writing about?" 

"The stuff here on the tree!"

"Oh! Fungus!!"

274 Danger

A boy scout came by last year selling caramel corn. I bought a bag to be supportive and promptly ate the whole thing.

Not at once mind you, but I did leave it in my car so I could snack on it while running errands. (and maybe so no one else would find it.)

The LT answered the door when a different boy scout and his dad came by this year. He chatted with them for a while and then told me he'd ordered a bag.

They came back tonight and I was surprised to see that he had ordered 2 bags.

I may or may not have eaten half of one bag while typing this post...

I did.

266 Temple Day

Five of the six kids...the DQ didn't really want to sit on the curb with them.
Also, I gave up hope of trying to get them to look and smile. This picture makes me laugh!

We planned a Temple day with friends today. We took turns watching the kids, so we were able to attend services. There were six kids total and they had a blast running around in the grass and blowing bubbles. It was fun too, for the adults to hang out!

We all grabbed lunch at Chipotle afterward, and of course, that was a perfect end to a great morning.

262 My Monet

I snapped this with my phone today.

 It has been threatening rain, but sometimes it just looks dark. Well a cloud exploded and poured down on us while we were in line at McDonald's. It was crazy. 

We pulled into the parking lot to eat and wait for the rain to slow and it stopped with in a few minutes. 

I love the way the tree looked through the windshield.

259 Worth It

We ventured up to Atlanta today for some birthday shopping. I was delighted to learn that Atlanta has a Nothing Bundt Cakes there and it was imperative that we procure a cake from there. (I can't bake my own birthday cake, right?)

It was delicious. Perfection.

It honestly made it feel like home was a little closer.

257 Thanks Georgia!

The state of Georgia thought it would be a great reminder to people to have their license plate tags expire on their birthday. I nearly forgot until today. Since my b-day is on Saturday, and we have a lot to do tomorrow, I was able to get to the office in Cusseta before it closed. The town is the epitome of small southern town. I just love their tiny post office!

252 Nature Walk

The LT lead us on a hike down the nature trail nearby. While I enjoyed it, I was on guard the whole time for creepy crawlies.

We spotted this ginormous web. It didn't show well in the picture, but there is a huge spider lying in wait at the bottom of that funnel!

247 Happy Birthday!

We celebrated with the girls' favorite non-family babysitter and church teacher today. Her birthday was last week, but Labor Day made for a fun BBQ/gathering day.

244 Good Ol' Rocky Top

Months ago, the LT saw that his favorite college team, the Tennessee Volunteers would be playing in the Chick-fil-a college kickoff bowl in Atlanta. He really wanted to buy tickets. At the time, we didn't know if we would even still be here, so I told him to wait and see.

Well, we are still here...

And the Fort Benning MWR had free tickets they were giving out!

He was SO excited to score some. It made for a long night, driving up to Atlanta for the game and then coming home, but we had a great time. The girls really enjoyed it and we had great seats. We left just before half time, but were able to follow the game on the way home through the internet on my phone.

242 Catch That Salt!

We've needed some real salt and pepper shakers for a while.

Imagine my delight when I found these gems at Target today!

We have so enjoyed watching the squirrels here in GA and these will always remind us of our time here! (which hopefully won't be much longer...but you know, if I say that, we'll never leave!)

234 Yuck

I raked up this pile of leaves this morning.

Yuck.

I never thought I would complain so much about trees!! 

I really don't like the look of fall leaves.

Nor do I like them stuck to my car or tracked into my house.

I am probably complained about this before, but I'm complaining again today.

If the next place we move to has so many trees, I will make sure we find a house where there are not too many around our house.

The leaves are obnoxious, the shade blocks my beloved sun, and when we have a lightning storm, I am so nervous that one of the gigantic ones in the back yard will fall on our house!

Ok, thanks for letting me get that off my chest.

I know I'm a horrible person for not liking trees, and for complaining about something so trivial.

I'm done now.