The end of August...

We have had a roller coaster of a week. I'll just start at the beginning...
Jacob started his preschool back up last Wednesday. He did great! His teachers are just too precious and Jacob comes home with wonderful artwork and great stories to tell of his adventures on the playground, in music class and eating lunch with his friends. This is his last year of preschool and although we are holding him back from starting Kindergarten next year (because of his August birthday) he will go to some sort of bridge class for 5 year olds. Yikes! 5! Ok, let's just not go there yet...

Then Thursday came and thats when we got the news. Justin's dad, Jim, has renal cell carcinoma (kidney cancer). This was obviously a shock to everyone. We don't know very much now, but he has an appointment at MD Anderson tomorrow at 2 (praise God that he got in that quickly!!!). I am thankful that we are all very close and can lean on each other to make it through all of this. We all went to church together on Sunday and it was wonderful to all be able to worship together. Every song seemed to take on another meaning. Every prayer seemed to hit home. Rebecca will be able to set up a website through MD Anderson soon and she has started a Facebook group for specific prayer requests and updates "Praying for Jim - the best husband, Daddy and Pops in the world". I will give updates as they come. Please pray for/with our family. I believe in miracles.

Ok, now it may seem weird that I'm putting other "normal" things in this post along with such sadness, but that is how our life has been in the last 7 days - normal and then earth-shattering. So, please bear with me...

Sunday afternoon, after visiting Champion Forest with the Pattersons, we came back home and had a cookout for Labor day. Justin smokes an AWESOME pork butt (I know, sounds gross...) and we had ribs, sausage, and everyone brought a side or two. I made Twice Baked Potatoes from The Pioneer Woman website on the left of this blog. They...were...delicous!! Try them!! I think I just munched and snacked for 2 hours. Ugh. I was SOOOO full! We stayed out late while all of the kids ran around in their swimsuits, I even pulled out Julianne's little pool! She was more interested in playing with baby Evan from down the street, though. He's her new toy :) He just turned 7 months and can sit really well and she will just plop herself down right beside him (sometimes ON him) and just giggle! He loves it!

Now, onto Monday...We didn't really have anything planned but Sunday afternoon Ryan and Laura (also, neighbors) invited us to her mom's 50th birthday/Labor Day party. They live up in Montgomery and have lots of land for the bigger kids to run around on, so we packed a little bag, threw Jacob's jeep in the back of the truck and headed out for the day! Sadly, it was so spur-of-the-moment that I forgot to grab my camera, so we don't have any pictures :(
Jacob had a ton of kids to play with and at one point there were at least 7 power wheels and 3 golf carts running around with various groups of kids/adults on them. It was madness! Both kids fell asleep on the way home so at least we were successful in wearing them out!
We had a great Labor Day weekend!!

Sorry again for the strange compilation of topics in this post, I'm sure the next few months will be filled with ups and downs. I'm just thankful for great friends and family that will be right beside us through it all.

Jacob was being too silly and this is the only picture I got of him on the first day of school:

Julianne and Even in his new wagon. She decided to help herself into it and play with his toys: