Tuesday, day 4

Yah, it was so 'iced' in today that the courts were closed, so we still don't have a confirmed date/time for our adoption finalization. Ah! But really, who wouldn't want to do an adoption the day before Christmas break? It is the ONE really happy thing you get to do as a judge! Anyway, we'll keep you posted.

Today we lounged around. Seriously, we won't know what to do when we have more than 250 square feet to play in. We went to pick up Gwynn and I knocked and knocked on her door - but she was totally alseep. A couple of hours later she called and we went and picked her up. She and I took the plunkos to the mall while Josh programmed something. We had cookies, played on the playland, got the girls some more clothes, etc. I bought her a pic of Cheryl and her, one of those sketch-picture things and she was so touched. It is great we can do small things to make her happy. We tried to go see Santa, but both girls though he was too scary - so no Santa pic.

Then we dropped Gwynn off at her house and came home for nap/lay down time. After a while the girls and I went to the pool and they played and I read. Then we got our jammies on and Josh went and got my FAVORITE - Long John Silver's fish and crunchies for dinner. Yum! I went to throw the trash away (so our 250 s.q. wasn't stinky) and ran the girls up and down the hallways a bit. Let's just say the Cheryl was pratically BEGGING to get into bed and go to sleep! And Ellie - she was out like a light 15 minutes later. Ah, silence!

Yes, I did get ONE matchie-thing - these jammies:

As we were doing laps in the hallways, a woman was going into her room and looked over at me, and in a nice way, commented to her hubby - 'man, I bet she is twice as tired as I am!' Cute! Good thing I have such a WONDERFUL, completely helpful and totally nuturing hubby to help me out - it wouldn't be possible without him. I think he really likes the 'girls' - makes him a complete daddy.

My brothers John and David said they would come visit us this weekend - so that will be very nice. Here are some pictures from our days of rest, leisure and child-chasing.

Monday, day 3

Guess what! I went a WHOLE day without saying "hurry up" once! It is nice to be on vacation and seriously have NO time worries.

We went down to the Crater of Diamonds - the only open-to-the-public diamond mine!
http://www.craterofdiamondsstatepark.com/

Since it was raining and COLD we didn't actually DIG for diamonds, but we checked out the park and bought a bag of dirt that COULD have a diamond in it. When we get back we are going to have a "Diamond" party and introduce our new diamond, Cheryl, and give all our friends a chance to hunt for their own diamond - fun! Who wants to come?

Girls at the diamond mine (very cold and muddy this day) - the diamond fields are just visible in the background:

OK, so it WAS 70 on Monday and it dropped 50 degrees by Tuesday and it iced all day. People here were FREAKING out. Really - we were driving back to the hotel and the four cars in front of us were driving - seriously - 15 mph on the highway. Josh was going crazy! It wasn't even snowing, just like one thin layer of ice. Apparently it never does that here and only snows like 1 inch, once a year. Schools were cancelled all over. We saw several slide offs and two cars flipped over, on the various roads when we got back to Ft. Smith - crazy!

Here is the ice that froze on our car on the way home:

This where we got lunch:

We went to see Gwynn at work and have a waffle last night. It is so tough for her - she is such a good person! Please pray for her heart to be comforted.

Today Josh is going to do some work and the girls and I are going to the mall. Also to buy more clothes for them. Two kids the same size means either LOTS of laundry or LOTS of clothes. Hum. Pictures coming when I find the camera.