Congratulations Kara!

Kara graduated from the U of I on Saturday. There were 365 December graduates and they were only allowed 5 tickets a piece. Dan, her mom (Michele), step dad (Lou), grandma (Carol) and her boyfriend (Pierce) were able to attend the ceremony. I offered to stay home with Max and Blake and get ready for the party. The boys would have had no interest in being there and they also had soccer that morning. Austin drove from KY to U of I on Friday night to stay with her on the last night of her college career! He was able to get into the ceremony at the last minute as there were a few empty seats. David stayed home with us and watched the boys play soccer. The proud Papa!! Kara graduated in Actuarial Sciences and will be starting at State Farm in January! We are so proud of her for working so hard in her classes and at her internship with State Farm the past couple of years. There are not many job offers at the moment and she was given an offer driving back from her interview this summer. It was a wonderful blessing for her and a huge accomplishment! Kara had some extra challenges (and opportunities) while in college as we spent most of that time in England and her mom has been in China for the last couple of years. Thank goodness she had Pierce and his family to help provide her a "home" away from school. They have been an amazing support system for her and we can't thank them enough! Kara and Pierce were able to have some wonderful experiences traveling the world too. I do think (and hope!) she is very happy to finally have some family in the states. Michele has to head back to China after the new year to complete the last year of their China assignment. I know that they are very anxious to get back home (to the USA!). Kara and Pierce are a little bit nervous about this new phase in their lives. He will be graduating in May so they will have a few months of a long distance relationship. I don't think they will go too long without seeing each other as Kara will be missing him and Reuben. She will be living with us but I'm sure will be spending a lot of time in Champaign visiting her boys! We had plenty of food and drink...and loads of desserts at the party. Pierce's family was able to make it, including his new half-brother, Croix, who was just 2 weeks old! (His dad married a woman named Jenny and they are now starting a family together!) My parents were also here to help celebrate. Michele's mom, Carol, was visiting for a few days and really enjoyed being with the kids. Blake is just happy snuggling with Reuben!

Congratulations Kara. We are so proud of you and know that you will continue to have many more successes in this next phase of life!

It's wrestling time!!

Max and Blake started a new sport a few weeks ago...wrestling. They have practices 2 times a week and then we can sign them up for tournaments on Sunday mornings (yes, it is a horrible time!!). We just completed our second one today and it was from 7:30a until almost 1:00p. There was about an 1 1/2 hrs in between each of their matches. The matches only last a few minutes but they are intense! The first tournament was at Woodruff. It was a lot of fun for both of them as they each wrestled 3 people and beat all of them. Yes...the outfits are very sexy!! This was Max pinning one of his guys. He is one on top, of course! My camera doesn't take good pictures at all in the gyms.

Blake...the winner!! Check out that belly!

The boys with their number one fan, secret coach and brother!

We headed to Washington today. It wasn't as much fun for Blake as he lost the first 2 matches and one his last. He finished strong after shedding a few tears in the other matches. That is not very fun for a mom to watch! I absolutely hated seeing him cry and not being able to run down and give him a big hug. They keep the parents in the balcony just for that reason! Max won all of his today and got another first place medal. He also got a tooth knocked out! He had 2 very wobbly teeth this morning and I had a feeling that one of them would come out today. For some reason he just hates pulling them out! He lost one just eating watermelon. So hopefully the tooth fairy remembers to come visit him tonight.

The boys had a big cheering section today with Austin, David, Kara, Grandma, Grandpa, Mom, Dad and some of our friends came too. Thanks for coming everyone! (Terry, Lisa and their kids had to leave so didn't get them in the picture!)

It ended up on a good note, but it was tough for Blake and Mommy today! We are signed up for one more tournament in January and that might be it. Great job Max and Blake! We are so proud of you!!