Oh, hi there.

Buenas dias! I'm rusty on my Spanish, so I hope that's appropriate. Man, it's been a really long time since I've posted. Very poor form, I know. So what's been going on?

Well, Anna has almost completed her first year of school. She has only two weeks left. She started the year at Speegleville Elementary with Mrs. DeHay. I must say, I totally loved that school. Small, friendly, and probably has the best principal ever. It's such a small school that Mr. Eberlein had Anna's name memorized by the end of the second week. He was very personable with the students. And her teacher was a 30 year veteran and super cool. I just can't gush enough about Speegleville Elementary.

We moved just before Christmas break, so Anna began Gatesville Primary after the New Year. The transition wasn't as hard as I thought it would be for her. Mrs. DeHay had indicated that Anna was painfully shy, so I worried a little that she would fall apart having to leave the school she began the year in. That wasn't the case at all. I'm sure her new teacher, Mrs. Smith, was a big factor in her quick adjustment to new surroundings. Mrs. Smith is one of the 5 nicest people on the planet, to be sure. Soft spoken and super sweet, her style connects well with Anna's "school self." "School self" differs a bit from "home self." Ha.

So, yes, we moved back to Gatesville. We decided it'd best to live a little closer to Justin's job and actually become part of the community in which he works. It's been nice to be so close to family and friends that we hadn't seen as much as we'd like since marrying and moving off to the big towns of Oakalla and Waco. We miss Waco, certainly (I think I miss it more than anyone else in the family), but I think we've adjusted to the move just as nicely as Anna has adjusted to school. We've rented a nice little house for the time being. It's on a game ranch, so we have to live behind a high game fence. It annoyed me a bit at first, but I've since gotten used to the idea. It's certainly nice to let the girls go out and play without fear of them getting into the road.

What else? Hmm. Well, let me just post a few pics and you'll get the general idea of how our year has gone.

We celebrated the Mitchell July birthdays at the Shop.

We enjoyed Independence Day fireworks @ Speegleville Elementary

The girls dressed like the Chick-fil-A cow and got free chicken!

Splash park and a special visit from the Leutwylers!

We visited the Dr. Pepper Museum. The horse was made from Dr. Pepper bottle caps!
We visited the Waco suspension bridge and fed ducks by the river
Anna's first day of kindergarten!

Laura Kate and Kolby visited the Baylor Bear mascots

We took a trip to Kaska Family Farm

Anna lost her first tooth!

We had snow!

Mommy went with some friends to see NEEDTOBREATHE. Mommy likey.
Anna and Laura Kate helped Daddy clean fish during white bass season. Actually, they just played with the poor fish.

That sums up our year in pictures! More recent and exciting news soon to follow...

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