Hello Again....

Been a long while since my last post, but really not a whole lot has been happening in this Smith Family world. The Boys are starting their third week of school tomorrow. So far Justin is the only one to hit a little bump in the road but all seems to be getting better. The Boys seem to have adjusted to Daycare good. Now that school has started they are only there for less than two hours. It also helps that Dawson's friend from school Grandma is the Boys care giver. Last week was open house and book fair at school. That was fun to go see where Dawson's classroom was this year with Mrs. George. Justin's class is having a private open house this week. Justin's teacher Mrs. Robertson (Dawson had her last year) is battling cancer and wasn't able to attend the open house last week because it was on her chemo treatment day. May everyone pray that Mrs. Robertson will continue to have the strength and courage to fight this battle. She is too young to have something like this happen.

We are thinking about getting Dawson and maybe Justin too started into Boy Scouts. There isn't a troop at their school but one just began last week at South Baker School. It meets on Wednesday nights at 6:30 and don't know when the Tiger Scouts meet (that would be what Justin would be into).

Tomorrow will be my first full day being the teller at the drive-up window at the bank and already having scary dreams about it. This is where I will stay until I become a CSR III. I am now at CSR II.

Aaron is starting to get excited about hunting. Roger and him will hunt for branch antler bull elk October 24-28. Their hunt includes a lot of land which actually includes our property.....just never had elk out our back door yet. A friend of ours, Zack, has been bow hunting for almost a month now in the same areas that Aaron would like to go to with absolutely no luck in even seeing an elk.

One sign that winter is almost upon us is when Aaron comes home from work talking about the "winter meeting." This is when the bosses and workers start talking about who will be on the day and night crew of plowing snow and they start making lists of what plows and such need repaired and serviced. They had this meeting last Tuesday. Sounds like there is a 95% chance that Aaron will be working on the night shift. So if we have a easy winter like we did last year this coming year Aaron will be bored to tears on the night shift as there wasn't hardly any snow to plow or work around the shops to do. Day care issue maybe interesting if he goes to the night shift but like Aaron says "we'll deal with it when the time comes."

We are on the down ward slop of the count down to when Aaron and I will be Auntie and Uncle again. We have Josiah that is 3-3/4 years old and in less than a month Josiah will be having a little sister to play with. They live in Portland which seems like thousands of miles away sometimes. We are hoping to go visit them come the first part of November for a weekend. Its nice to have a job where it is okay to take time off.

The weather has finally decided to cool. Even the fire danger has dropped from extreme to high. Today the wind has blown so darn hard. Tonight Aaron went out to the garden and brought in a sack full of tomatoes and a couple of cucumbers. I have made several batches of salsa now. The last batch was the best one as far as comments from Aaron. It is HOT HOT HOT!! Now I am making pizza sauce and marinara sauce with the tomatoes. My parents garden there in North Powder froze out last weekend and even some in Baker too. Ours just won't die! Can't give enough of the tomatoes away right now.

We maybe getting new neighbors soon. The family that live above us and that we share the pond with have decided that they are moving back to Baker. So that's a bit of a bummer. Craig, Sheila and their two kids will be missed once they move. Maybe once our boys are in high school like theirs are and into everything maybe Aaron and I will be thinking the same way too.