Anya lost her very first tooth! It was very exciting, but Mommy was a little sad that it happened at school! Nevertheless, she came home with a cute tooth shaped necklace from the nurse, with her tooth inside, and that’s what we slipped under her pillow for the tooth fairy! Her first lost tooth, the tooth fairy gave her $5! I think the most I ever got was $2 when I basically knocked out 3 teeth at one time by falling off my bicycle, but inflation occurs even with the tooth fairy apparently!
I took Anya to Wal Mart Sunday morning and she selected two small toys and came home with some change. We made her put 20% into her savings though. On the ride home, Anya was looking at her change. She explained all the coins to me…penny, nickel, dime, quarter, and one dollar. I asked her if she knew who the man was on the dollar, what was his name? Anya’s answer…”His name is Bill”. Hence, the one dollar Bill! I loved that!
Elsewhere in the Almand home, life has been good to us lately. We went to eat at Denny’s last week and a very nice man who thought we were just a sweet family, paid for our dinner! Turned out he was from my Mom’s home town and knew my cousin and Aunt! Small world and a very nice surprise!
Travis and I are looking forward to our trip to Gatlinburg soon for our 10th, almost 11th, anniversary present. This includes birthday and Christmas presents for us this year too and it is quite rare that we ever get to do anything like this. Its just for 2 nights but we are very excited to have a little time to ourselves, I think every ten years or so a couple nights away is okay! Although I may change my tune when we get up there and I realize how much I miss the girls.
Chance is also on high alert right now as a cat has joined our family. He stays outside, and I of course had him neutered four days after he showed up at our house, but Anya has named him “Tony Stark”. He’s a sweet, sweet cat and he’s solid white. He lives outside, but we are enjoying his company. Ignore the foot, Travis took the top two photos!

And some recent shots of us outside when the leaves were all falling!