S is for September

We kicked off September with a visit to see our family.  We celebrated Mimi's birthday, & we took Grandpa his 10 lb bass!  It turned out awesome, & he loved it.  Crossed that one off his bucket list!

David was going around giving everybody kisses when we asked him.  He had never done this before! He was the sweetest his little Nora; kissed her right on the mouth!

Mimi set up a painting craft for the boys in her art room, and they painted Van Gogh's Sunflowers.  Calvin & David couldn't quite catch the vision, so Calvin painted a dinosaur in a storm.  David just painted green.  James & Hayden worked so hard on theirs!  Hayden's details were so impressive & surprising, and James bright colors & focus on 'completion' was fun to watch.

It always amazes me when we have so many little boys in one space, all playing separately.

All the Prose grandkids!

Prose grandkids + some of the Lyon grandkids!

The whole Prose crew went to Grandpa's church, all together.  We took up the whole church pew & all the kids got to go up to see Grandpa.  These boys did great, & they LOVED seeing Grandpa in his element.  They are so proud of him!

The Prose Family!

Baby at the breakfast table.

September brought us Hurricane Irma, which was the worst storm we've seen in our years in Florida. It flooded Jacksonville & the tributaries, which included Doctors' Lake where we live & all the way down the Black Creek.  The flooding was unbelievable, and Matt helped rescue 4 of our elderly neighbors who had not evacuated from the flood zone.  Their houses ended up 3-4 feet under water!

Even more surprising, we never lost power!  We bought a generator & prepped 5-7 days worth of water & emergency food.  So we invited over friends who lost their power & helped our neighbors & gave out water to those working on flooded homes & loaned out anything we could to help.  It was an incredible storm.

James, my big boy who gets taller every day.  Watching over his little bro & brought home that gem from school: What kind of scientist do you want to be? Marine Biologist baby.  I want to learn about fish.  Yay!

Poor little Calvin lost a toenail!  He ended up with an infection the weekend we were away for YL training, and he never complained.  I was impressed because I get those kind of infections in my cuticle & they keep me up at night!  So by the time I checked on it again, it was really nasty.  Thank the Lord the infection didn't spread; so we took good care of it from that day on.  The nail did fall off, and the older boys told Calvin maybe the 'toenail fairy' would come bring him a dollar!?! hahahah!!  But what could I do?  The Toenail fairy was born!

When the sun finally came out again after Irma, we played in the driveway till the mosquitos came out.  And they were BAD after that storm y'all.  Yiikes!  These gems were created in that afternoon sunlight.

This was all the clean up crew our house needed.  Picking up moss & sticks in the front yard & raking.  It was hard work, but they stepped up!

After clean up at our house, it looked so normal.  It was really odd in real life; we spent some time helping our back neighbors clean up their yard.  The boys absolutely love them, so they worked hard. I hope they remember these days of doing what we can to help our neighbors.

Matt had a work meeting to attend up in Myrtle Beach, so the boys & I tagged along!  What a view, and who doesn't love a chance to play in the ocean?

Calvin fell asleep at the dinner meeting & slept in Daddy's lap for nearly an hour as we finished dinner.  When we got home, my buddy was the Student of the Week!  He is looking so grown up to me these days.  Love my boy!

David & sweet Hattie.  What a lucky little boy!  His face: priceless.

Some of my favorites from OPHS at our YL football tailgate!  Love spending time with these girls.

We took our boys to see the new Lego Ninjago movie when it came out.  They had been waiting on it & hoping to see it for months, so when we went, it was with bells on!

I participated again this year in the Write 31 Days blogging challenge, and I posted them on my writing blog.  Check them out... this year was called Wake-up Call.  I challenged myself to get up and have my quiet time first thing everyday, and I wrote about what I learned.  It was harder than I expected, and I learned more than I would have anticipated.  I'm still trying to put this into practice!

Tball and Baseball boys at practice & at their first game day! Calvin was ready- nothing to dampen his spirit!  He's been waiting for this day for years.

Oh.My.  I got the boys' Halloween costumes in the mail, and we HAD to try them on to see how they fit.  This year's costumes?  So stinkin' cool.

Thank you Lord.  We have so much to be grateful for.  These little glimpses of a life so full of failure & mistakes, but looks so beautiful.  I'm so glad to focus on the good, because it helps me remember it.  I count these moments as gifts to me, gifts to my sons, and gifts from my loving Heavenly Father. "Every good & perfect gift comes from above, from the Father or Heavenly lights, who doesn't change like the shifting shadows." James 1:17.  This mess of a momma dwells in the grace of these good gifts.

A is for August

The beach vacation I've dreamed of taking!  Nothing fancy; simple is what I wanted.  Hayden made an awesome sea shell necklace & James found a horseshoe crab shell that was super cool.  We took the boys on a Pirate Cruise at sunset in St. Augustine one evening, and they loved it!  It was not what I would call a 'good' show, but the sunset couldn't be beat.  Their favorite part was probably getting their faces painted, but oh the tears at bedtime when Calvin had to wash his off!  The dolphin!!  We all floated away in his river of tears that night.

We were so close to St. Augustine that we went in for dinner a couple of times over our week.  I found a new favorite, The Floridian!  Yumm! The best.  Our kids always love riding the cannons in the square, so I always take their picture.  It's been fun to see them growing up as I look back at my insta hashtag #proseboysridestaugustinecannon.  Love seeing them so little!

I finally got to send Matt to the Surf Shop to pick out a new surf board for his birthday!  It was a blast seeing him go out for the first time in a long time.  He had an instant fan club, and these boys were all about jumping into the waves as they crashed on the shore.  They had one day where it was so rough in the surf that we called it 'jumping into the washing machine' as the waves ate away a cliff off the old 'gentle' slope of the sand.

The sound of the ocean & the sunsets.  And my baby crawling up into his big brother's lap? Crazy lovely.  James found a new love in life: River Monsters.  He started school saying he wanted to be a marine biologist so he could be like Jeremy Wade on that show.  Made my heart so happy! I would LOVE to see my boy fall in love with fishing or biology or both!

The boys wanted to take Mimi&Grandpa over to their favorite restaurant where they could eat & show them the crabs too.  We were so excited to have them come stay with us for a day or so.  We got to celebrate Matt's birthday & Hayden lost his second tooth!  It fell out right there at dinner.  I was lucky enough to get a before because he was showing me how loose it was, ha!

My sweet little squishy babies.

My sweet husband gave me the best gift.  This vacation was magical for me.

Our end of summer days... the countdown to school!

The older David gets, the bigger of a ham he becomes.  He surprises me everyday!

I finally took the boys to ride these animals at the mall.  It was a blast & they loved it!  Wish granted.

I got some rather sad/happy news.  We learned our Compassion child had officially moved out of her program!  I was expecting her to stay in until she turned 18, but I was wrong!  It was sad for me to write her a final letter & say goodbye.  We had been in this sponsorship since she was 4 years old, & I was in college as a single girl.  I shed some tears unexpectedly & felt a little weird about being sad.  But I arrived at the place where I realized I was grieving the loss of what little connection I had ending.  And that's ok.  I'm so thankful to have been a small part of her story!

The boys wanted to make banana pudding, so I set them up!  Ironically, they didn't really like it.  Especially the whip cream! I had a good laugh.

The Cummings boys got to throw out the first pitch of the last baseball game of the season for Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp!  So we jumped in the car & made it to the game to watch.  It was an absolute blast, and set us up for an exciting baseball season.

David wants to do EVERYTHING the other boys do!

We jumped at the chance to go float down the Ichetucknee River! We've never done it before, and got to go with our dear friends the Wests.  What a blast it was! Great way to end our summer break.

Here we go!  Back to School!  James started 2nd Grade in Mrs. Gullet's class; Hayden started 1st Grade in Mrs. Pounds' class (round two)!  Who gets to keep their teacher from K to 1st grade?  Hayden Prose! What a lucky guy.

There they go!

Daddy got to come walk the boys into their first day with us.  Magical light & Daddy made it sweeter.

These boys have my heart.

Trying to catch a river monster!

Right after school began, we had the solar eclipse roll just north of us!  Unfortunately we didn't get to see much of it because of cloud cover, but we caught some glimpses!  What a treat, no matter what!

And the solar eclipse donut was a treat too!  Not what I expected a 'chocolate glaze' donut to be, but nevertheless: awesome.  Matt disagreed. Haha!

Time for VPK!  Calvin's last year of preschool; I cannot believe it!

David Scott hit 18 months old! I've started calling him my baby, just for the sake of soaking it in.  I've decided to call all my boys 'baby' for a little while.  My momma heart just loves these little men of mine.

Throwing out the old use up bibs from when David was littler was harder than you would think.  So I immortalized them in the frame instead.  We have sang him the song 'baby beluga' since he was tiny because James learned that song for his Kindergarten show.  And we adapted it to 'davey beluga' for fun of course.  I'll always love the memory of singing to him & these little white whales remind me.

Our neighbors' tree fell across the street onto our suburban.  Thus began the months of repair shop & break downs.  What terrible luck, but so thankful to have all we need!

Tball, here we go!  Calvin is coming for ya!!

Matt&I went away for the YL volunteer leader retreat, and it was a wonderful time of setting our focus on something outside of our family & our home.  We are so excited to be involved in leading our local YL club for Orange Park, and we cannot wait to see how God uses this ministry to impact the lives of teens in our city.  We love the vision & we love the local staff & we couldn't be happier to find a calling to come join ourselves!!  Here we go...!

Thank you Lord for vacation, for new beginnings, for renewal in time away.  Thank you for ours boys, for all they get to see & do in their life.  Thank you for your provision & safety for us in our everyday life.  Thank you for the beauty in the sunlight & all you transform before my eyes.  Thank you for refreshing these memories so that I can capture them for my boys to enjoy years from now.  Thank you for all you do Lord; there is so much I don't see.