HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!! I absolutely love Halloween for one simple reason....it's the mark for the cooler weather, hot drinks, changing leaves, and my 2 favorite holidays are right around the corner.

Papa, we took Dad to your favorite place to eat today! He liked it. And in your honor, I had gingerbread and Dad had the ice cream! I thought about posting a picture of it so it would be an incentive to come back to stay with us again!

I was working in the office today and noticed that Ellie was missing. When I went to check on her, I found her in the pumpkin pulling out pieces of candy. Lollipops appear to be her favorite, because she's drug out 3 in the past 15 minutes!

I've decided...

So......thanks to my best friend, Heather, and of course Raun and my family, I've decided to go back to school. I'm going for my master's in music therapy. I had been putting it off because I wouldn't be able to get it unless we moved. However, they just sent out a paper a few weeks ago offering MT classes with an emphasis in whatever field of study (i.e. autism, medical, mental health, etc.). It's at Georgia College and State University in Milledgeville, GA. It is the same college that Aunt Maxine got her master's at. They have an excellent music therapy program and best of all...it's ONLINE! I get to have in-state tuition, which is great and only have to go there one weekend every semester and one week out of the summer for my intensive training days. I'm thrilled to start! I probably won't start until the summer because life here is hectic, but I'm very excited. My emphasis will be in the medical/mental health field, since God is apparently wanting me to work with these type of clients/patients.

I love my work! My boys at the psych hospital created a band today and I taught them the bass, electric, drums, and keyboard. By the end of the session, they played "Lean on Me" fairly well! And only one fight almost broke out! We're improving! But what a thrill to work with them. The staff that was with me today (I call them my body guards) was actually in school to be a music ed teacher. I told him to feel free to help anytime! He said he would be there every Friday and he'd make sure he was with whatever group I had. And...I had a boy request classical music. I almost fell out of my chair. I usually only get Rap, R & B, or Country. I was excited to finally get to play some REAL music!

I'm looking forward to the weekend. We're having friends from church over to watch the Florida/Georgia game (Raun loves Florida and Walt loves Georgia). Jamie (my nutritionist friend) and I are going to be cooking our wonderful, famously healthy dinners. Raun laughs at me because his poor tummy can't handle lots of grease or heavy meats anymore. I'm proud....that means I'm doing my job! We're doing shrimp again, so Nessa...wish me better luck than when we cooked together! I'll let you know the verdict when it's done.

God is good!

What another great day! It rained most of today again, thank goodness. The grass is actually starting to recover from the brownish color it had become. Plants are actually looking green and some trees are FINALLY changing colors. Yes, it's late in changing colors, but it's been so dry, they just think it's still summer, I guess.

More updates on my little autistic boy. He had some changes in meds this past week, so he didn't do as well as last week. He still counted to 10 and said his A, B, C's, though. The best part...I was leaving and I told him "bye!" He waved at me and said, "bye, bye!" He has never told anyone that and we've been working so hard to get him to say those words. His mom looked at me and said "that has made my day!" It's those little steps that get me so excited about music therapy and the benefits. It's amazing how music therapy helps bring kids out of so much isolation and into a world that communicates! I love my work....have I said that before? I'm so blessed to be able to do what I love!!!!

A few fall leaves....

Monteagle Mountain
on our road

Our house view from the front yard
Suzzy and Ellie
Ellie
Monteagle Mountain
Monteagle Mountain

from our deck
from our deck
from our deck
from our front yard
from our front yard

It's raining!!! I think most people in Northern Georgia and Tennessee and praising the Lord! You don't hear one person complaining about the rain...and it's supposed to rain all week. All I've heard is "Thank goodness it's raining," or "I'm so glad it's raining!"

We went to Manchester this past weekend and got to see John. It was good to see everyone for a little while and to get some wonderful food. Dad's had another calf, so he was really happy about that. And John's loving his work. Mom's been working out and I'm so extremely proud of her for her endeavors!

Enjoy the pictures!!!

Prayer....

We FINALLY got some rain yesterday...Praise the Lord!!! It wasn't nearly enough, but it's a start. I feel like I'm living in the Old Testament 'cause I'm literally praying for rain....but oh, well! The leaves are starting to change just a little, so that's really pretty. I'll post some of pictures up soon, so Nanny and Papa can enjoy them!

Today's entry comes more in the form of a prayer request. Many of you know that Raun and I are leading the children's choir (4th and 5th graders) at our church. It is a lot of fun, but still a lot of hard work. We have a boy in there that is a refuge from Sudan. He's been in the U.S. about 2 years. He is so precious, but he's only 10 and has seen so much. A little of his background: he and his brothers and sisters traveled about 1200 miles or so on foot to Egypt to escape the wars in Sudan. He lost a twin brother on the journey. His dad (who was a pastor) was put into prison in Egypt. They haven't spoken to him since he was released. The dad apparently went back to Sudan when he thought it was safe so he could get the mom's sister to bring to the U.S. However, they think he might have been killed over there, since there had been so many threats on his life. He was telling my mentor all about this and she was trying to tell him that he needed to write a book, but he doesn't really know how to write in the English language. He said "I want to write a book....how do you do that?" Him and his siblings want to go back to Sudan to find their dad. The mom remarried about 1-2 years ago, but the step-father just left the mom, who is now having to work almost 24/7 to keep her family of 6 alive. So anyway, Raun is going to try to gain the boy's trust so that he might could help him in school and still acheiving those goals that his father so desperately told him that he could do. Please pray for us as we are put into this ministry so that we would know how to reach out to this boy. It's amazing where God puts us, but we definitely would love to help this boy see that Christ can help him. How wonderful it would be to see him become a Christian and give his entire life whole-heartedly to Christ!

Another prayer is for a boy in my mentor's daughter's class. He had apparently had difficulty controlling his bladder. The principal had come to talk to the class about bullying this little boy. He would go to the bathroom 5-6 times in his pants. It turns out that this boy had been so sexually abused that he couldn't help it. My heart broke for this boy. Please pray for God's protection and for removal from the person who is abusing him. Pray for the kids at school to see that you never know what another person is going through, so we shouldn't judge someone.

My heart just breaks over these two boys. I know that God has put some Christian people into both of the children's lives. I pray that they will be such a powerful testimony of God's love and faithfulness to them. Thank you for partnering with us to pray for this wonderful ministry God has called us to!

What a great day!!!

So...I had the greatest day! After a rough time with "the boys," I went to see my 2-year-old client with autism. He doesn't speak...at least he didn't. That's changed over this past month. Today, I couldn't hold back my tears of joy! He spelled his name to a song I made up and he said his name, his A, B, C's, as well as counted 1-4. Last week he counted 1-6. It was kinda sad, though, because his mom his still battling with an ear infection and couldn't hear too much of what he was saying. But she still had tears in her eyes when she saw his lips moving! It was a GREAT way to end the day. I love those music therapy moments. She said that I get more out of him than his PT, OT, and Speech Therapist! How exciting!!! Oh...and he even cleaned up the instruments, which is AWESOME because he normally has a hard time transitioning into things and following directions! What a sweetie! Just wanted to share my little music therapy moment that all music therapists strive for!

house updates

God's protection....

As many of you know, God totally watched over me (Megan) this past week. I hydroplaned off of I-75 last Tuesday. It was an indescribable experience. I could feel God's presence and it was as if His hand was slowing my car down. I had felt like something bad was going to happen on Tuesday, so I spent all Monday night praying for my family to be okay. When I woke up Tuesday to go to Knoxville and Maryville, I still had that feeling. I continued to pray. When I was coming back home, I hit a stretch of hard rain. I had just switched to the slow lane to get away from a motorcycle before I headed for the grass. God protected me...just as I had been praying. I was so at peace during the entire thing, but once I realized how God had timed my movements, I started crying. I was so thankful! On Thursday, I realized that I had been driving without my license for who knows how long. But God worked that situation out well because on Friday, I was able to renew my license a year ahead of time. On my way home from looking at cars that morning, I blew a tire on I-24 downtown. So I pulled into on a place to wait for Raun and one of his co-workers to come change my tire. Let's just say that it was definitely a long week. However, God's protection and His love made this past week bearable. All I could do was smile when I got to Friday and praise God my car still runs and nothing was hurt on it!





We have been making small updates to our house, which has been lots of fun. I'm really looking forward to getting the downstairs built. Raun's been spending lots of time researching how to go about that, so hopefully this winter it can be finished! I'll post some pictures of some of the new updates that we've been doing.





I'm looking forward to November, but I think that the holiday hecticness is on it's way! I think I've managing to be gone almost every weekend from November to December, but that's okay! I'm excited about all the places and people I get to go and visit!





We thought we'd create this so we can keep our families and friends up-to-date on our lives and what we've been up to. Since we don't get around to writing too much, maybe this can serve as a way of correspondance between us and everyone.





We'll post more soon!





Raun and Megan