Fall Flowers

It was a very pleasant morning outside, so much so that Mommy and Nana went out there to do some gardening.  Above you can see the flowers that the Edges gave us, planted in the pot there at the front entrance.

Nana sat and trimmed the mums a bit in the sunshine, as things were just right temperature-wise.  She and Mommy spent a good deal of time in the front yard, decorating things for fall.  It feels like fall now, and it's actually a little cool for someone from Florida, but Nana is enjoying it. 

She's doing so much better today.  It's obviously not a moment where just like that everything will be fine, but the hope is that the trend will be more of these sorts of days than anything.  This picture above shows her smiling with Mommy, joking around, and almost completely normal.

Earlier, a kind neighbor brought a dog with him to the front yard, and that brightened up her day immensely.  She had a good day.

Madison did too.  You can see her here as a member of the Candy Corn Club, one of the founding members.  She had that Spanish quiz, and she thinks she did okay on it.  Meanwhile, the other grades are pouring in, and she's gotten A's in ELA and other classes, really doing well.  One thing she did in school was watch certain parts of the Presidential debate.  We did not watch it last night, as we were in a high-stress sort of day as it was, and given the sense of peace we had later on, it just made sense to keep that peace as best we could.  Presidential debates are not a place to find any semblance of peace.  This one was especially contentious.  The conventional wisdom is that it was in fact "a mess."  Much of the media is recommending that there be no debates, and as inclined as I am to agree, when you step back and remember their motive, you begin to realize why they want to stop having the debate:  they feel as if their candidate did not do well.  Madison enjoys the roasting.  Like one candidate reminding the other he doesn't remember what college he went to.  But it's a contentious time we're living in.  We're so focused on our own family crisis that it's not possible to look to events like this anyway, and it's probably not helpful for our sense of peace we're trying to create within the house.  No, its best to keep the news off right now, at least as much as we can.

Tonight, Madison had her small group online with Camille and some friends, and it was nice to get together once more.  This has been going on since March or so, and it's just great to see it still going.  We may be shifting gears with the topics next week, moving to some areas that Camille is wanting to speak about.  I'm good with that, as she's been such a great mentor and friend.  We trust her completely.

The Hunter family made us dinner tonight, some rice and beans and grilled chicken, flavored with something a little spicy from the Caribbean.  It was delicious!  And dessert was spectacular.  Shobie made this gluten-free cake that was just wonderful.  It was a family effort, as their son Bailey grilled the chicken, and her husband Kevin put the spices on.  The end result was a lot of really, really good food, so much that I'm afraid I ate too much tonight!

Mommy wanted to wash "Hotel Transylvania" tonight, so that's what we did, even if it was until a little later.  So late, in fact, we passed on reading tonight, and just said our prayers before all going to sleep.  Again, we slept through the night, although Mommy was on the couch, just in case we had a "Forky."  That's our code for someone going out the door and walking down the street again.  We're still playing the part of Woody, from "Toy Story 4," trying to keep Forty from escaping and throwing himself away somewhere.  The end result is Mommy sleeping on the couch.  I'll join her there tomorrow night - the living room might become our new bedroom.

We said our prayers, and fell asleep very quickly.  We're all still so exhausted each day.