Little of this, little of that

Sorry for those of you who've seen 28 different new blog templates. I think I've officially decided on this one. For now. I think. Like it?

Alright, where were we? September 15, okay. What has happened since September 15? It's funny, I'm completely thankful I haven't been in a baby/potty training toddler fog for a long time, but I feel like I'm starting a new fog. A Fall Fog if you will. A Furiously Fast Fall Fog. Does anyone else love alliteration as much as I? Maybe not. ANYway. Busy bees we are. Oh the urge to start alliterating again...

On the 19th the boys and I went to the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus. Dan was at the Huskies game in Seattle watching them beat USC which was certainly more entertaining for him than watching elephants stand on each other. But for the kids...oh, HEAVEN on earth. They just had the greatest time. And I had the greatest time too, because we went with friends who got hooked up with a suite at the Rose Garden. Our very own personal bathroom, which in itself is probably worth the cost of renting the suite for an entire year. Free popcorn and pop and a waitress who brought us our hearts desire for a small fee. Or a ridiculous fee, whatever. The fact that an Oscar Mayer wiener costs about as much as my grocery budget for the week didn't even phase me we were having so much fun. And since we didn't have to pay for anything else...bring it on Oscar.I "borrowed" some of these pictures from our friend Hannah who is an amazing photographer. Hopefully if I tell you how awesome she is she won't care that I stole her pictures off Facebook and didn't tell her. Now of course she didn't have her great camera and wasn't actually doing a photo shoot, so don't judge her on the fact that you can't clearly see the drops of drool coming out of Ty's mouth as he fell asleep on me 10 minutes before the show ended. If you live in the Portland area, and ever need some seriously incredible pictures, check out Hannah's website.

What else?

Ty started to stick his head under the trunk of the car as Dan was closing it the other day. Good thing he hadn't gotten his entire neck in there, because Dan doesn't do anything daintily. He's got a humongous goose egg on his scalp, but no broken skin, so we saved another trip to the ER. He's had goose eggs a-plenty, but I'm actually thankful for the terror in his eyes as the trunk bounced off his head and he burst into tears. Nothing like the good healthy fear of decapitation to make a mother proud. Or at least a little less worried that he'll be wearing a full body cast before age 4.

I know I've only covered 2 of the last 15 days, but this FFFF is really getting to me. I'll let you know if I remember anything else noteworthy. I'll just leave you this quote from yesterday.

While driving home from running errands, Ty states: "Hey Mama, that was pre-tty doggone awesome at the craft store."

I guess I really am depriving you of some amazing stories. Picking out ribbon for another diaper cake at the craft store. Epic. Oh, if Ty could only capture his adventures on his own blog. Now that would be a good read.

A creative title isn't happening for me

Two weeks between posts really isn't too bad, is it? Okay, sorry. It's September people...the storm right after the 3 month calm here at the Stump household. Dan's back at school teaching and coaching football and coming home thoroughly exhausted. Jake's back to preschool (for those of you who didn't see my Facebook status, he reminded me on his "first" day of preschool that it was not really his first day because he went to preschool last year. He's a professional preschooler. My bad.) But he's got a new teacher this year, and is in a class with his cuz Matt and friend Julia. He's loving every second of it. Except for the academic part, but we'll get there. Let's see, what else has been happening? Oh, I forgot to mention a few weeks ago that I've been quite the little baby shower hostess lately. Actually, this last one I threw had nothing to do with the word little. (Not you, Kels, you know I'm not referring to you.) A few other ladies and I threw a shower at my house last Sunday after church for our pastor's wife Kelsey. And I never got the official count but I believe there were about 934 women in my living room at one point. This picture does not even show the standing room only in the kitchen. Y.I.K.E.S. But it was really a lot of fun, and since I had nothing to do with the food, it didn't stress me to the point of needing medication.
And I got to practice on my one and only creative baby shower decoration/gift, the diaper cake. Each one I've made makes me feel a little bit more like a crafty genius. I should have my own show on HGTV. Alright, diaper-caking is the limit of my creativity, and once again has been ripped off from someone else. Just let me have my moment, okay?
I love our church. Love our pastor, and LOVE his wife. And love the awesome friends that we've made at Gresham Bible. Goooooo, GBC! I also love this picture. Friend and fellow youth group leader Rachel on the left, and Kelsey on the right.

What else? Oh, Jake has started playing soccer this year. And soccer is pretty much the greatest thing a 5 year old boy with endless energy could possibly imagine. His coach goes to our church as well, and deserves lots and lots of crowns in heaven for his patience with my son and his 1 second attention span. Jake had a game last night and scored his first goal. It was kind of an accident, and he didn't even realize the ball had hit his foot and went through the goal until his entire cheering section started hooting and hollering. I've never been so proud...and neither had he once he realized what had happened. I don't really have a clever segue into the next topic, except for using the word segue which makes me feel pretty brilliant. Anyway, here's a few quotes I don't want to forget so I'm inserting them here:

I told Ty to find his shoes before we were about to go somewhere. I was around the corner and I heard him saying, "Where's my shoes? Where's my shoes? Where's my...OOOOH, here they are. I got them Mama. I got 'em. Don't worry, here they are." I come around the corner and he's staring at me, completely serious look on his face with Dan's size 12 shoes flopping around on his feet. It wasn't until I burst out laughing that a huge grin broke out on his face. 3 1/2 year old deadpan comic. Cracks me up.

Next quote happened when we were walking across the grocery store parking lot yesterday, and Jake pulls on my arm and starts dancing around grabbing his foot. We're in the middle of traffic that's waiting for us to cross, and I'm starting to get irritated and dragging him faster.
Me: "Jake, come on. We need to hurry up."
Jake: "Mom, wait, I'm having issues."

I also don't think I have a clever ending in me, so I'll just wrap things up by saying...life is good here at the Stump household. Busy, but good.

Except for a few moments here and there, we're pretty issue-free.

"Hey Mr. DJ...

...put a record on." Evidently I've decided to begin all my blog posts with song lyrics. And songs I don't even like. Oh well. The Mr. DJ I'm referring to is actually my very own personal DJ. Daniel John that is. He never did go by DJ, but I'm thinking it's about time. After all, he is 29. Today. Happy birthday Deej! Today is not only his birthday, it is also unfortunately his first day back to work after having the summer off. The unfortunately is for the back to work part, not the having the summer off part. Just clarifying.

I am so incredibly blessed to be married to this man. Let me brag about him for a few minutes. I love him. I love hanging out with him. I love discussing the past, present and future with him. I love parenting by his side. I love his high pitched laugh and the tears that roll down his face when he really gets going. I love watching him wrestle with our boys. I love how much Jake and Ty clearly adore him. I love that he is way more sensitive than people think. I love how watching a football game can ease all his sorrows. I love that he can do 12 sports-related things at one time, but that I know he'd drop all of them in a second if his family needed him to. I love that he is never afraid to speak up for what is right. I love that he is a faithful and encouraging friend.

I love that for all his manly man-ness his favorite thing in the world to do is cuddle with his boys. (Side note--Ty is a complete Mama's boy and usually only wants to be on my lap. Dan asked him to come cuddle with him earlier this summer and Ty replied, "No Dad, it's not Father's Day." So today, Dan's birthday, is one of 2 days we've convinced him are Daddy Cuddle Days. I'm quite sure it's not the birthday rib-eye Dan will be rushing home for at the end of the day today.)
But the thing I love the most about him is his love for God. As in most homes, the husband and father really does set the tone. Because Dan is focused not on himself, but on what God is calling him to do and to be, life is really good around here. I'm so proud of who God has made him. And so excited to see what the future holds for our family as we follow his lead.

Happy birthday, dude! I love you.