In the good ol' USA!

Well we are here in the good ol' USA, Virginia to be exact and are enjoying our new surroundings! We arrived in August and Shawn started teaching at the college on the 25th of August. Alexander and Benjamin are in grade 2 and Hannah and Jacob are home for one more year before starting kindergarten. They spend their days exploring our new surroundings and doing a bit of school work at home.
Here are some photos from the last 2 months (yikes! Has it been that long since I last posted something here?). They are in no particular order since I can't remember how to change their position in the post:

Alexander and Benjamin turned 7 in August and we took them golfing for their birthday. Now that I think of it though, this picture is actually from last week when we took them golfing again! Hannah was at a birthday sleepover so we decided to take the 3 boys golfing for the afternoon. Here they are posing in the cart.

As I wrote above, Shawn started teaching (his title says Christian Studies as he has to teach both Old and New Testaments) in August and Hannah and Jacob and I went over to capture his "first day of school"! This was after all the students had left. :)

My mom and dad got new bikes for the boys for their birthday. Alexander and Benjamin picked them out and decided to get the same one (they must be twins or something!).

And here are Alexander and Benjamin on their first day of school, walking to the bus stop.

On the last day of summer holidays, we went to the local county fair. They loved the rides as well as the animals in the barns. There was also an "Exotic Animal Farm" at the fair. We couldn't believe it when we saw this wonderful reminder of Scotland!

Alexander and Jacob enjoying the bumper cars at the fair

Benjamin and Hannah had fun as well

We had to buy a vehicle shortly after we arrived and here are the children proudly displaying our Toyota Sienna

Hannah and Jacob aren't quite 5 yet but my parents told them to pick out their bikes early so they could get some riding in before it got too cold

This was taken of Alexander just last week and I liked the leaves starting to change as you look down the fairway on this hole

We went to the dollar store the other day and each of the children got to pick out a toy. Here is Hannah "displaying" her purchase. We have great neighbors who have two little girls (5 and 8) and Hannah is turning into quite a princess with their help! :)

The primary school had a fall festival and there were fireworks at the end of the night. I hadn't realized that none of the children had seen fireworks before....we had seen lots from our windows in Edinburgh but not in person. They weren't quite keen on the "close up experience". They were quite funny....they really didn't want to watch as they quite a bit scared yet they couldn't take their eyes off of the fireworks.

That is all for now. I know that many of you have seen these on facebook already but there are a few who still enjoy our blog.....these are for you! Hope you are all doing well and that our paths cross again soon!