Appendicitis

Well, Miss Leila has had a tough few days, as we discovered on Thursday night that she was likely suffering from appendicitis. She has severe stomach pain and continual vomiting, which led to an ER visit that turned into a 2 night stay at VCU Children's Hospital. Yesterday, they removed her appendix and said it had a laceration on it, so it likely would have burst. Thank you, Lord, that it didn't! We were incredibly thankful for the wonderful care we received and 2 nice patients and families that we shared the room with. So many people offered to bring food, take the other 2 kids and even her teacher came by to visit with 30 plus letters and cards from classmates. We are blessed and grateful for community. Even her principal emailed me to tell me she was praying. Love it. Keep praying she recovers quickly. Her sweet spirit is starting to come back, and we're seeing her smile again!

A Charleston Wedding

The first weekend in November we enjoyed a beautiful, memory-making weekend in Charleston, SC where we celebrated my brother (Zach) and new sister-in-law's (Christina) wedding. Fourteen of us stayed in a beautiful house in Mt. Pleasant that was on a marsh with lovely ibises and cranes among other birds. It was so special! We enjoyed amazing food all weekend, the girls made it down the aisle as flower girls and we had 5 days together. Happy momma! Here's some pictures from the weekend.

We celebrated Christina's bachelorette with a Hollywood themed gathering that her college friends put together. It was complete with life size celebrity cutouts, but I was most impressed by the popcorn  and array of seasonings. That was the only picture I took!

This is rehearsal day at Boone Hall Plantation. We walked around a bit before practicing. These were the slave quarters, and I visited these with a new perspective and a deeper sorrow as we walked with Leila through these. We shuffled the kids along through some parts knowing it wasn't the time to talk about this hard part of American history and how Africans were treated.

The plantation drive is lined with beautiful, old Live Oaks that are covered in the iconic Spanish moss that is such a part of Charleston.

The plantation home that was used in the movie, The Notebook.

Our awesome kiddos before the rehearsal. 

On the dock for the rehearsal. 

We visited the Mt. Pleasant pier and marine-based playground, which the kids really loved. This is pure joy right here.

Crazy kiddos! We enjoyed watching fisherman bring in some fish and seeing porpoises swimming nearby.

The trees (I was mildly obsessed with their beauty) on wedding day. 

Our two beauties.

With the gorgeous bride who loves her nieces so much. The feeling is very mutual. Christina is a wonderful, doting aunt. 

The wedding ceremony took place on the Cotton Dock at sunset. It was beautiful. 

The girls were dancing queens, and Leila was able to meet many family and friends of our family for the first time. She's the blur behind Mary-Michael. She hasn't lost her African rhythm one bit! 

We loved having Uncle Drew with us all the way from Arizona. He had the "pleasure" of staying with our wild bunch in the house, too! 

And then we're done. 

We were so grateful that Geoff's parents also came to the wedding. Their help was invaluable, so that we could visit with people we rarely get to see and just have the extra hands. The Sunday after the wedding we hosted an after-wedding brunch at the house with my Aunt Sharon and Uncle Charlie. And really everyone in the house made it happen. It was a group effort that was enjoyed by many before heading back home. We are excited to have Aunt Christina officially in the family and thankful for a memorable weekend to mark their marriage. 

Halloween Weekend

Halloween is not my favorite holiday and one we've talked about quite a bit. There's some dark, haunted stuff and a lot of candy that gets eaten by me! Do we do it or not? In the Christian world there are lots of opinions on this (and many other issues for that matter!), but like many things that aren't explicitly spoken of in the Bible, we pray and seek God's wisdom for our family. So, we have fun with it and let the kids focus on fun/positive costumes. The girls picked the same thing - yay! And Frazier was Spider-Man early in the week and the day before actual Halloween, he switched to a knight - thankfully, we already had the gear. 

On our way to Northern Va we crashed a Christmas party (because that's normal in October), and enjoyed being with many of our Niger friends at the home of Zalika and family. They own 100+ Christmas inflateables and a whole bunch of other decorations that they somehow tastefully set up at their beautiful home. It's a lot of work and December is super busy, so why not celebrate early? The kids were a bit wild from the end of the school week perhaps, so we were thankful to get them contained in the car and get on the road. 

After getting to Geoff's parents late Friday night, we woke up and met Keesha and family at the pumpkin patch Geoff had been going to since he was a kid. Then we met up with Matt and Ash, one of my very favorite gals from the good ol' days of UVA.  

Our 2 peacocks and knight in shining armor enjoyed running around Aunt Keesha and Uncle Brian's neighborhood in Arlington. A mini James Bond (aka cousin Eddie) joined them. He was so cute! We decided every Halloween should be on a Saturday! And if you're wondering, we still have a ton of candy. Now I'm trying to come up with as many cookie/brownie ideas to throw all that chocolate goodness in. Then I can share it and not eat it all myself!