I travelled to Louisville today with a fellow colleague to participate in the second session of my first graduate class. We got the syllabus and rubric for our hallmark assessment for this class- a 10-12 page paper. The assignment is action research where I am to formuate a hypothesis, change a variable of instruction and make observations and record data on the results. I concluded that I'm a nerd, but I embrace my nerdity because the prospect of writing the paper really excites me. I love having the accountability and feedback on research and learning that I would like to do on my own anyway. I think my hypothesis is going to be: "To what degree does giving students authentic audience for their reading and writing change their attitudes about the assignment and the quality of the finished product. Riveting huh.

Matt and Ethan are here for a few days, students from our youth group for those of you who don't know them, and I've rarely seen the boys so excited. All three of them stood in the front window for 15 minutes waiting for them to arrive tonight. Elijah was literally jumping up and down waiting to see them. He kept saying, "Matt and Ethan are so funny." Ahhh that the boys can always have such mature young men as role models. Matt, Ethan and Eric are all playing PS2 right now, and I'm sure they won't go to bed until the weee hours of the morning. As for me, I'm off to bed.

More pumpkin patch pics

That's Micah sliding down a tunnel, and Elijah and Micah in the giant chair at the orchard.

Pumpkin Patch

We made our annual trek to the pumpkin patch last Friday. It was a beautiful sunny evening, but pretty chilly as you can tell from the boys' coats and hats. Since then we've had days in the 70's then back down to the 40's again. I think this was our favorite pumpkin patch yet. It had a huge hay mountain with a slide that was the highlight of the trip for them I think. We think this trip is our most consistent family tradition aside from the usual stuff at Christmas and Easter.

Babysitting Co-op

One of the advantages of living in this area is the number of other families who are in our exact stage of life. Some of the other seminary wives and I have created a babysitting co-op together. We trade babysitting with each other so that we don't have to pay someone to watch our kids. We keep track with tickets, and charge each other 2 tickets per hour for 1 child, and 1 ticket per hour for each child thereafter. So, for our blessed family of 3, it's 4 tickets an hour. We all start out with a number of tickets, and so far it has been terrific! We get to go out a lot more often, and it's not so much of a favor to ask a friend to watch the kids because they're earning tickets that they can use later.

Another major advantage is that so far, the other families in the co-op all have girls, so I get to look after some girls occasionally- a nice change. The pic is Morgan playing our piano. This was her favorite activity while she was with us.