The Loony (Cor)Bin

Father Daughter Dance

2010-02-24T09:55:00.000-05:00

It's a local tradition here. Every year, around Valentine's Day, daddies and their little girls get all dressed up to go to the Father Daughter Dance. It is SUCH a big deal.
This year was Maddy's first time, and she was excited. She picked out her own dress ("Dark pink, Mommy, it has to be dark pink!"), she practiced dancing all week, and she sat so still and serious while I curled her hair!
They had a wonderful time. Casey took her to the Japanese restraunt for dinner with another "couple"- a friend from work and his daughter. Then they danced, danced, danced all night, or at least until she fell asleep in his arms around 8:45.

Here's the pictures, and in case you're wondering, she came up with these poses by herself! She is quite a ham.

Cole is dressed up for his date with Mom. He ran in from school and said, "I want to wear a black shirt and a tie for our date and I want you to wear a dress!" And when I tried to put on a skirt and a sweater (it was cold), he said, "That's not a dress! I want you to wear a dress and be fancy!"

Like Fish In A Barrel

2010-02-01T10:11:00.002-05:00

My sister has a contract on a house that needs a lot of work. One of the most interesting...ummm...issues...is that the inground pool has fish in it. Real fish. Big enough to catch with a hook, as evidenced by the photos below. (You might be a redneck if......you buy a house with a stocked swimming pool?)

Pawpaw (my daddy) and Alina (my neice)

Cole's bream

Casey caught his first fish EVER!! (We kept looking at the picture and saying, "Where's the fish?"

Here it is!

Riiiiiiight!

Cole had to bring his catfish home, so it's swimming around in a bucket on my front porch.

For those of you who are curious, our theory is that the fish washed into the pool from the creek nextdoor when our area had some flooding last spring. And to answer the second-most frequently asked question: they'll probably keep fishing in it for now. It's too cold to swim anyway!

Blogging and Potato Peel Pie

2010-01-28T09:56:00.005-05:00

Preface: OK, I have been thoroughly shamed into picking the blog back up. I apologize for being a slacker, really.

Yesterday I drove my dear friend Bethany 2.5 hours to meet a friend she made in "Blogworld" (meaning she had never met this woman in real life). I didn't think it was crazy at all.

It reminded me of the book I just finished reading: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. It is written as a series of letters written as a result of a sheer coincidence between people who start out perfect strangers and end up being the very best of friends. Framed by World War II and the Nazi occupation of the unique little Brittish island town of Guernsey, it is a wonderful mixture of poignant sad moments and hysterically funny ones.

As the digital era takes over, fewer people write letters....but after yesterday, I realized that, in a lot of ways, a blog serves the same purpose: to connect and inform.

So here's my "letter" for today: connect with someone-send them a letter, a card, an email, or....write a blog!

(Oh! And read the book, it's great!)

Praying Simply

2009-08-31T16:55:00.002-04:00

I posted the following story on my Facebook, and then this awesome guy honored me by reposting it on his blog. Glenn Hatcher is responsible, in part, for making my husband the fabulous man of God that he is, and I am honored to have him call me his friend. Rather than repost the story here, I've included a link to Glenn's blog, because I think you should read a few more of his blogs. The richness of his relationship with Jesus is inspiring, and he is so smart! Check him out!http://kingdomreflection.blogspot.com/2009/08/praying-real-simple.html#links

Star Trek

2009-05-09T07:40:00.004-04:00

We went to see the new Star Trek movie last night. It was fantastic!

My husband and I love Star Trek (or almost anything sci-fi), but we were kind of bracing ourselves for having our hearts broken. All the ads with "This isn't your father's Star Trek" and sexy ads made me worry that they were going to ruin it. **Slight spoiler alert** But the only sex scene is the one you see in the ads, and it doesn't go any further and is almost just as short as what you see in the ad, anyway. (I did still cover my 12-year-old's eyes.) The characters were great, I definitely hope they make another one.

I think my husband says it best:

"Star Trek was awesome! Even better than I thought it might be! Just the perfect balance between old and new, special moments to special effects, twists on the story line that satisfies “true blue” Trekkies, enjoyable to those that don’t even know a Tibble from a Tricorder, and also allows endless possibilities for additional movies. Perfect!"

Oh, The Things They Say...

2009-05-07T21:08:00.003-04:00

I bought Maddy an adorable new sundress, and within an hour of putting it on, she had gotten her lunch (peanut butter) all over it. So, being the resourceful gal that she is, she took it off, turned it inside out, put it back on, and declared, "It's CLEAN!"

I was laying on the couch watching TV last night, and Maddy said, "You need to go to bed." After I told her she wasn't the boss of me, Cole said, "Well, Daddy is the boss of you." Hmmmmm... I explained, "Daddy is kind of the boss of me, yes, but he doesn't boss me around or talk ugly to me." After the slightest of pauses, Cole replied, "He did one time."

We were at my sister's, splashing in the wading pool, when Maddy suddenly got out of the pool and started to strip off her swimsuit and announced, "I want to swim with my body."

Here are some of my favorite things Cole says regularly:
"Are you kidding me?"
"Are you tinking what I'm tinking?" (No, that's not a typo, that's how he says it.)
"Dang it."
"Seriously?"

His Hands Blog

2009-05-06T13:13:00.003-04:00

Hey His Hands has a blog now. You should check it out. I added a "donate" button, so if you have lots of rich friends, send them a link, tell them how wondeful I am, and tell them I need money for camp. (o:

'Being His Hands'

Introducing....

2009-05-02T21:38:00.006-04:00

I just realized i haven't posted anything since my "grumpy" post. That's not good. Especially since I haven't been grumpy at all.

So let's get you folks caught up!

Let me introduce you to the newest members of our family: 'Alice' and 'Ruby':

We've been searching for a kitten since December. How rediculous is that? Anyway, I posted a 'wanted ad' on MoodyYardSales.com, and someone in a vet's office called and said they had two kitties without a mommy. I'm still surprised Casey let us get them BOTH, but they are so sweet. The kids adore them. They look almost exactly the same except Alice has a little pink on her nose. Their temperments, however, are very, very different. Ruby likes to cuddle and doze, and while Alice has her moments of calm, but she mostly likes to explore and have adventures. And plan the occasional sneak-attack.

Although I spent the first week exhausted from trying to keep the kids from loving the kittens to death (literally--Cole was intent on carrying them around at perilous heights in various containers, and Maddy seemed to think their little neck was a handle.), they made it through in one piece, and the kids have learned how to carry and show affection to them correctly.

Maddy fell asleep on the couch and the kitties curled up on her and went to sleep, too.

I came home from the store to the scene below. Casey says Cole swore he wasn't sleepy, so he told him he could just read on the couch. I didn't know it when I took the picture, but the other kitten is under the blanket next to Cole.

This is Ruby snoozing in my clean laundry.

As we speak, Alice has climbed up onto the back of my neck and fallen alseep while I type. Now I need to go to sleep, too!

Grumpy

2009-04-22T11:27:00.005-04:00

I'm grumpy today, so here's a grumpy post to go with my mood.

Yesterday I had to run two errands: Pick up Bible Lessons for Bible Club from the Mailbox Club, and pick up bags of cereal for Bible Club from WalMart. Maddy hasn't been feeling well, and whined, "I wanna go too" 63 times, so I took her too.

We made it through the first errand ok, Maddy actually broke through her self-absorbed meanness to wave goodbye to the sweet lady that compiled my lesson order. Then as we drove to WalMart she fell asleep. In the parking lot, I was thanking Jesus because there was an empty spot, literally right by the door (shady, too). As I was about to pull in, these people who were in the spot next to the empty one walked right through my spot, parked their cart right in the MIDDLE of my spot and proceeded to unload. I was miffed, but they only had a few bags, so I just inched forward and put on my blinker so they would be sure to see that I was waiting (I'm not very aggressive when I'm in my car).

I was absolutely shocked when the man got into his car and LEFT the cart right in the middle of that empty spot. I mean, geez, I wasn't going to leave my sleeping kid in the car to push HIS cart out of the spot so I could park! To make matters worse, I now had a line of people behind me, and the jerk who left the cart was trying to back out, but had no room with me cramped behind him.

Do you think they moved the cart THEN? No, they waited until the car in front of them moved and then drove forward. Ugh. By this time, a lady must've seen all this and grabbed the cart and wheeled it into the store. I didn't even get a chance to thank her.

I had to ask God to forgive me over and over for the ugly thoughts I had toward the selfish individual who left the cart in the MIDDLE of a parking spot. My penance was that I had to carry my 40 lb. two year old around walmart (she wouldn't wake up) with one arm while pulling a cart full of cereal with the other. And my arms ache even now to remind myself not to be selfish and at least push the cart over to the side.

I whipped it!

2009-04-03T09:15:00.002-04:00

Laundry used to be my nemesis, my mortal enemy. Anyone who knows me, knows there was always, ALWAYS laundry hiding in mounds somewhere in my house. Always. No matter how clean my house looked at first glance, there WAS a pile of clothes somewhere other than where it should be.

Usually it was clean. Oh, I have no problem stuffing into the machine and pressing the right button. Most of the time, I'd even fold it. No, my achilles heel was getting it put away. Then the kids dig through the basket, it hits the floor, someone scoops it into the hamper, and there we go, I'm washing "clean" clothes all over.

Well, I've finally whipped it. I've exorcized my laundry demon. And I am so proud of myself. How did I do it?

Well, my breaking point came after watching the Duggars (you know, the lady with 18 kids), and hearing her say that she does 10-15 loads of laundry a week. Hey, wait a minute.....I did that much laundry a week!!!!! (Well, that depends on your definition of "doing" laundry, as I explained above.) If I had as much laundry as a lady with 18 kids, and I've only got three (four if you count the husband, and sometimes I do)......what is wrong with this picture?????

So after a 2 week debate with my husband who would rather NEVER get rid of anything, I finally won (or maybe I just ignored his argument) and I spent a week going through EVERYONES clothes. I got rid of stuff that doesn't fit, stuff that was the wrong season (although I kept the winter stuff in tubs in my closet--I knew we were going to the mountains for spring break), and stuff that was ugly or stained. Then I further refined the stash by only keeping what would fit in their drawer.

I know that seems like such a no-brainer--why in the world would you have more clothes than will fit in their drawers in the first place? Well, for starters, my wonderful mother-in-love goes yard-sale-ing regularly and frankly gives me stuff faster than I can keep up with. Add that with my love for a good sale, the fact that my kids grow way too fast, my husband is a packrat and fakes a heart attack evertime he sees me with a trash bag.....well anyway.

That week, I also moved CJ's room down the hall to share space with Casey's office, and the guest bed into CJ's old room, which is now Cole's. This moved Cole and Maddy's clothes into their own space (and out of mine). (Bonus: Cole has slept in his own room for a week and a half!)

So this is the second week in a row that I was able to wash, dry, and fold ALL the laundry, and it is sorted and waiting for my little minions to put away in their proper place. THAT has to be the best part of the whole thing--even Maddy can put her own laundry away. And CJ miraculously learned (finally) the proper way to hang clothes in the closet, so his school uniform and church clothes are no longer squeezed into his drawers. It makes my heart happy for everything to be in the right place.

But that doesn't mean that my house will be clean if you come over. It just means I don't have laundry hiding in the corner! (o:

36 Gallons

2009-03-21T09:36:00.003-04:00

I've been busily organizing my house and rearranging furniture all week. It's actually been pretty fun! Of course the house always looks worse during the process, but I have faith that it will be fabulous when I'm done!
Casey paid me the best compliment yesterday, when he told me he was amazed at how much I can get done. I was excited about how much was getting done, too, but it was nice to have my hard work acknowledged.
One funny thing I HAVE to tell you: Casey has a bunch of video tapes from when he used to record Star Trek Next Generation and Star Trek Voyager. I'll admit, when we were dating and Voyager was still on, and yes, I, too, became a Trekkie. Anyway, yesterday he told me I could put his tapes in the attic. I filled two 18-gallon bins with Start Trek!!! My husband had 36 GALLONS of Star Trek in his office!!!!
No wonder we don't have any room in this house!

Colors

2009-03-15T21:15:00.003-04:00

Maddy has taught herself all her colors. One by one, she would ask, "What color is this? What color is this?" Until she had them all figured out. So she has got them all down except she will occasionally get pink and purple mixed up.

The cutest thing, by far, is that when you ask her what color something brown is, she says, "Chocolate."

Buddies

2009-03-13T10:42:00.004-04:00

My good friend Bethany came back! For a minute anyway. They moved the closing date of her house up, so she needed to come down earlier than planned to sign papers and pack up all her stuff. Her boys hung out over here Thursday while she and her mom packed boxes. Canaan spent the night, to Cole's absolute delight. They were so adorable.
We moved all the stuff into storage Saturday. My dad is such a wonderful guy--he spent the whole day helping (with his big trailer), hurt his back (that part was his fault for trying to be He-Man and pick the piano alone), just because he knows I love Bethany. He really is great, and I love him for it.
It was so sad to see her house empty, and to hug her that last time, but they'll be back in two weeks for Cole's Bday party, so a least we have that to look forward to.
In the meantime, I catch myself looking at the insulin she has stored in my fridge and sighing.

A pile of kids on my bedroom floor. They took it upon themselves to build a nest. Canaan is "reading" Star Wars comics.

This is standard behavior for Cole and Canaan. I'm so glad Canaan accepts Cole's demonstrative nature!

Blogging

2009-03-09T09:26:00.002-04:00

Blogging is so much fun when I'm supposed to be doing something else. This morning I'm supposed to be mailing Thank You notes to His Hands contributors. Ah, procastination!
Once again, it's been nearly a week since I wrote anything, and once again, I have to catch everyone up!
Relatively speaking, Ms. Renee's funeral was pretty tame. No one jumped in the casket, no one passed out, there actually was very little crying. This was kinda disappointing to me, since there is a great feeling of catharsis and community when a group of people get together to be sad for the same reason. I kind of missed that sadness release. I'm trying not to be too sad at the moment, because the children are probably NOT going to get to stay in Valdosta after all. I will be missing them alot.
Last week, Casey was out of town for three nights for a training. It was very difficult without him, and Maddy cried every night for her daddy. Even when he left, she seemed to know that it was more than his usual "going to work", and she cried and cried. As she stood in a chair, looking out the kitchen window, crying for her dad, Cole announced that he would "make Maddy feel better".
In his best fake "man" voice, he went up to her and said, "Hi Maddy, I'm your Daddy. I growed my hair." Maddy was skeptical, but curious. "Do you want me to make you a peanut butter sandwich?" Apparently that put her over.
Cole ran up to me and (still in his "daddy" voice) said, "Can I make Maddy a sandwich?" He pulled me down and wispered in my ear, "I pretending to be Maddy's daddy."
Knowing he was going to make a mess of that sandwich AND my kitchen, I gave him permission and thoroughly enjoyed listening to him continue to pretend to be "daddy" for his little sister, while she giggled and played along. It was so cute, and how funny is it that he thought to explain why he isn't bald like his dad, and for whatever reason, thinks that is the only thing different about them? (o:
Casey had a heart episode Saturday. He was outside restling with CJ and a couple of his buds, when he ran in the house, flopped on the couch, and asked for some water. When I brought him his glass of water, he was shaking badly and then his head rolled back and he passed out for a second. FREAKED ME OUT! His heart beat was irregular all day (we have a blood pressure/heart rate monitor here), but Sunday he was much better. He's going to the doctor this morning to get checked out and try to determine what caused it. Pray for him!

Crisis over.....sort of

2009-03-02T09:16:00.003-05:00

Well, as way of an update, Mrs. Renee's funeral is this Thursday. (Read my previous blog, if you haven't already.) It looks like there will be a regular His Hands carpool going: Me, Vivian, Diedre (a long-time volunteer), and Michael (the new guy). It should be pretty interesting. My brother in law, Danny might go, too. He's been mentoring Renee's oldest son (now 21) since he was 13. I don't know if Danny's every been to a funeral at a black church.....should be quite an experience for him! (o:
The children don't have any clothes to wear to the funeral, so we went and got them a gift card, and I'm sticking it in the mail this morning.
What a week.
One a happier note, Elaine's sister and her husband came for a visit on their way back home from a month in Florida. The children love Uncle Jerry and Aunt Merrill, and of course, Elaine thoroughly enjoyed visiting with her sister. Merrill always brings little presents for the kids, and this time she brought Maddy a pink stuffed pony and a pink fuzzy hat with matching gloves. Maddy slept with both the pony AND the gloves. Five minutes ago, she stumbled sleepily out of the bedroom--still clutching her pony and her gloves. So cute!
We had dinner with Casey's brother and his wife, and Casey made some awesome food. I love good food.
I promise to better in the blogging department, now that last week's crisis is over...sort of.

Loss

2009-02-27T12:05:00.004-05:00

It’s taken me 4 days and at least 5 attempts to blog this. Then I decided to edit it for confideniality reasons. *Sigh*
One of the families we minister to lost their mama Thursday. It is absolutely heart breaking. She had five children and two grandchildren that lived with her. We were the same age.
All we know is her kidneys stopped working. Well, that’s not all we know....
The kids thought she had the flu. Listening to them, how they tried to get her to eat, and their sad attempts to nurse her, was just pitiful.
Her family: grandmother, sisters, aunts, drove for an hour to sign a ‘Do Not Resuscitate” Order......and then drove back home. When the doctor made his rounds, and explained that the order prohibited him from doing dialysis to save her life, everyone had to be rounded back up to rescind the order. Utter chaos ensued and she never got the treatments.
I was with the kids all day, from morning—when I picked them up to take them to the hospital to visit their mom, to 9:30 pm-- several hours after she went to be with Jesus. I have never seen anything like the scene in that hospital hallway. Two family members were drunk already and yelling at the kids for not calling an ambulance sooner, not being at the the hospital faster....infuriating. They also demanded that the children pack up their stuff immediately to go back with the family (about 1.5 hours away), which Kerra (16) took very badly. Basically she screamed and cried and begged and had to literally dragged out of the hospital. I talked one of the Aunts into letting her stay one more night and say goodbye to her friends at school. She stayed with my assistant Vivian, who also spent most of the day at the hospital. She is pretty close to the family, and has offered to take the two younger children in so they won’t have to stay in Cordele while their older siblings stay in Valdosta.
I still can’t believe that it was just last week that I saw Mrs. Renee, when we were cutting up in the driveway. I can’t help feeling like it was such an unnecessary loss. And my heart goes out to those babies who lost their mama so suddenly. And honestly, I’m sad for me, too. I’ve known the family for over 8 years...Terica (9) was just a baby when I met them! I liked Mrs. Renee a lot, she was a good woman, a good mama, and she will be missed. If the kids have to stay in Cordele, I can’t imagine what it’ll be like not to see them twice a week!
So pray for the kids, that God’s will will be done in their lives, that He will comfort and protect them. And pray for me. Because I’m so sad.

Exhausted

2009-02-24T21:14:00.002-05:00

I am utterly exhausted. The days go by and at the end of it, I haven't completed the task I put at the top of my list. Why does that keep happening?
Since E is staying with us while she recuperates, there is a lot more on my ever-increasing plate lately. Plus, since E. is out of commission, I've had to find a new babysitter while I'm at Bible Club. Today I put the kids in Mother's Morning Out to try to get ready for the two presentations I have to make this week. Also, this is the first week we are implimenting a new schedule at Bible Club which puts me home 30 minutes later than usual. I guess it was a little much for little Cole, because about 7:00pm CJ called me and said Cole was having a meltdown. Apparently he had fallen asleep on the floor, wet his pants and when the sitter tried to change him, he wigged out and started crying for me. By the time I got him on the phone, he was refusing to change his clothes until I got home and crying hysterically.
But now I'm home, everybody's had a bath, including E. (o: , and we're about to read stories and cuddle.
Deep breath. And it all starts again tomorrow.

2009-02-22T18:01:00.002-05:00

Holy Cow! I haven't written a blog in forever. Almost a month, even. It's not that I don't have anything to say, I'm just too busy. And I don't like it.
Well, first of all, updates:
Maddy is learning to use the potty. She's doing a good job, and is very into the "I can do it" stage. And for the most part, she can! She started a mini-revolution in her nursery class when she went peepee in the potty and her teacher gave her a skittle. Suddenly EVERYBODY wanted to use the potty! (o:
Cole's best friend in the whole world, Canaan, is moving this week, and I finally got the nerve up to tell Cole. His realization is coming in stages, but I'm so sad for him. I'm sad for Maddy, too, who loves Canaan's little brother, Zion. She calls him "My Zion". AND I'm sad for me, too, since their mom, Bethany is someone I would consider a very, very good friend, and I will miss her desperately while she's gone. The good news is, they will return.
CJ is doing well in school, and learning to manage his pre-teen hormone imbalance bit by bit. Ultimately, he's a great kid, but oh, help me--the mood swings. Anyway....
Casey's business is going well, which means lots of fighting for us! (o: It's kind of funny at the moment, but of course when his business is doing well, he's working a lot, and that makes it hard on me, and we don't see each other much. I don't handle being too busy very well, but I'm learning to cope.
Casey's mom is staying with us for a little while, while she recovers from hip replacement surgery. We spent the week getting Casey's office moved into our room, so she could have the office to live in. She's here now, and the kids are very happy, but she is pretty fragile. Poor thing. Ya'll pray for her.
There are more blogs kicking around in my head, but for now that'll have to be good enough. I'm going to watch Heroes with my hubby!!!

120+ hours

2009-02-02T07:30:00.003-05:00

I've decided to "fast" recreational computer-time for the rest of this week.
I get so frustrated with my lack of time to get things done. I never have time to finish the laundry, I never have time to clean up, I never have enough time to play with my children.....on top of that, I have "real work" to do-- meaning outside the house stuff (that I actually do inside the house)--newsletters, meetings, etc.
I sound like I'm pouting, I'm really not. I like having a lot to do (a long time ago, I had to ask God to forgive my pride in my "busy-ness"). I just don't like not having enough time to do it in. I have this re-occurring dream about a tidal wave crushing me and my family that I always have when things are bad--even if I'm not conscious of feeling overwhelmed.
I've had it two nights in a row.
So I figure I'd do an experiment to see if I stay off Facebook, and don't read any blogs for a week, if there would be more time for other things.
To be very honest, I'm doing it because I'm aggravated with my wonderful husband for spending so much time working. He lives in our home office. I know he's got a lot of work to do, but last night there were several windows open with YouTube open and other silly stuff, and I KNOW how much time he can waste on that. I was on my way to chew him out, when God said I better get my own stuff in line first. So there you go, no more extra-curricular computing, at least this week.
I'll still check my Yahoo, since I need to for the ministry, so if you need me, you know where to find me!

Random Things

2009-01-31T10:49:00.005-05:00

I'm not in the mood to write anything vey cohesive, so here's some stuff I have to say:

1. Since CJ has been at school, Cole and Maddy have started playing the cutest little role-playing games. Cole seems to invent them, and come up with the details, but Maddy falls right in. Their favorite seems to be a variation of "house", where Cole is always the baby, and Maddy is the mommy. She "feeds" him and puts him to bed, and he "cries" and asks for more food. They also play "school", "store", and "Jedi" a lot. The "house" game can be a little unnerving when Cole is yelling, "Mommy!!" and when I come running, he says, "I'm not talking to you, I'm talking to Maddy."

2. Two days ago I put an end to Cole's long-term obsession (since about 10 months old) with saving a cup of water from the last bath. One too many meltdowns after it accidently spills out, and I couldn't take it any more. He seems to be recovering pretty well.

3. CJ's spending the night with a friend who lives in the country and they're going to ride the horses. I'm extremely jealous.

4. I haven't done any theraputic shopping in about a month, or been by myself for about twice as long. I can't believe I'm even slightly sane.

5. Cole's new obsession is mail. I've got to get this kid a penpal.

6. I want a kitten. Today.

Bible Club

2009-01-29T08:58:00.006-05:00

OK, I don't post too much about His Hands on here, but I love what I do and sometimes it trickles into my "other" life.

I've been teaching the little kids about prayer, and how you don't have to use fancy words, just talk to Jesus. Colby (an ADORABLE little 8 year old with serious ADHD) prayed before the lesson Tuesday, and took it to a whole new level: "Jesus, thank you for Bible Club. Thank you for Mrs. Mary who comes every Tuesday to get us and teach us. Sometimes she doesn't come on Tuesday. Sometimes she's sick, or her babies are sick, or she takes a week off for the school breaks. When she doesn't come I am sad, but when she does come I am real happy. When she comes on Tuesday, I am ready, but sometimes I have to get my shoes on first. Sometimes I get in trouble on the van, and have to sit in the front. I like to eat Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Amen."

Colby

Yesterday (Wednesday) I had the teen girls. A little background: This group has always been riddled with meanness and disrespect. Several months ago, my team and I came up with a plan to "reform" the group: 1) They have to let us know by the day before that they want to come. (builds respect for our time, and value and commitment to the group) 2. Every other week, we do community service together (a bonding exercize) 3. EVERYONE must participate in the group discussions on the weeks we have Bible Study. It has worked WONDERFULLY. They've gone froma sullen, bickering group of petty girls who just shrugged their shoulders and rolled their eyes through the lesson, to being a happy unified "church" of young ladies.

Teen Girls' Group

To show how far they've come, yesterday we talked about the difference between being "saved" (an event/decision) and being a "christian" (a lifestyle). I started by just asking questions, and I'll be doggoned if they didn't get it before I even connected the dots. Amazing. We finished up with James 1:22-25, where he talks about being "doers and not just hearers" of the word. Ashely, my little "tough girl" said, "This makes sense....it makes so much sense," as she took it upon herself to start copying the verses into her notebook. "This is going on my MySpace." (o:

Presents, Gifts, and Blessings

2009-01-26T21:36:00.003-05:00

I have wonderful kids.
Today I had the priviledge of watching my two little ones play with their friends in cute little sing-song voices. They pretended to be jedis (Cole and Canaan), and shared peanutbutter pretzels (Maddy and Zion), and were very sweet.
Then we went to a parent-teacher conference at CJ's school where all five of his teachers made it quite clear that they not only genuinely cared about his success at school, but also enjoyed him as a person very much. It was very nice to meet with people who spend so much time with my baby who actually seem to like him as much as I do!!
Today when I was getting Cole out of the tub, I told him how much I loved him as I dried his hair. I told him I felt so blessed to have such wonderful children. I said, "You guys are like this awesome present that God gave me. You know, like a Christmas present or a birthday present. A wonderful, special gift."
He replied, "Yeah, we are like a hospital present. A nice present from the hospital."

Reading Challenge

2009-01-26T11:07:00.003-05:00

I decided to do a reading challenge this year, one that my friend posted on her blog. I know, you're gee-whiz, don't you have enough to do? (At least that's what I keep thinking to myself), but the truth is, I love to read, and if I can do something I love AND feel like I'm accomplishing something and checking off a to-do-list...Well, SIGN ME UP!
Here's the list, and how I'm doing so far, with approximately 1/12 of the year over:

1. Read a collection of short stories.
2. Read a play.
3. Read a nonfiction book. I read an awesome book: In The World But Not of It, by Brett Grainger, in December. I guess that doesn't count for this year, though...
4. Read 2 essays from the same collection. I think maybe reading 'Newsweek' and 'Time' counts, since the contributing writers are basically essays.
5. Go to a book event. Hmm...this is the LEAST likely to get done!
6.Borrow a library book. Done! Many times over!
7. Read a book by a new to you author. Got one on hold at the library now!
8. Make a donation.
9. Promote literacy. This I do every day, when I read to my kids!
10. Participate in a buddy read or Group discussion.
11. Read a book outside your comfort level or from a genre you don’t normally read.
12. Read a classic (defined as anything published before 1970). I'm reading To Kill A Mockingbird. I forgot what a great book it is!!

I can't wait to enjoy my challenge!!!

Updates

2009-01-24T18:44:00.002-05:00

I haven't had ANY time to blog this week, which is down-right depressing. (Seriously, I cried yesterday because I have not had a single MOMENT to myself to do something other than work, work, do dishes, do laundry, work, break up fights, deal with a tantrum, work, work....ok, you get the picture--poor me. Well, I also cried because I was PMSing and just weepy in general.
Today I feel much better. I cooked two meals (accidentally thawed out too much meat. Ah, well. The wonton soup was rockin' and Casey even fried some of the leftover wontons, YUM!
CJ made me some of his famous chocolate-chocolate chip cookie, and I only ate a half-dozen, so far. (o: Good Lord, those things are good.
So I wanted to let everyone know that Maddy is doing much better in the terrible-two's department. I actually like her again.
Also, CJ got a 95% on his science test! I was so proud of him! We're going to take him to El Potro for lunch tomorrow to celebrate. The reason this praticular test was such a big deal is that the day before the test, he got a 40% on his pop quiz and he very little time to study, since he was practicing for the youth Dessert Theatre. I was almost afraid to ask him how he did when I picked him up from school, and then I almost cried when I saw that big red "A"! (I'm sure the hormones had nothing to do with it!)
The Youth Dessert Theatre was awesome!!!!!!!! I will post a video as soon as I get it from my friend. Can you believe I left my camera at home???
I still haven't finished the laundry, but I'm going to work on it now. I am so excited about having a Top Chef on the DVR, and a Battlestar Galactica!! We watched Lost last night until 12:30 (in hind-sight, a bad idea).
Maddy is going through some sort of redneck phase (from my husband's side, I promise you), and refuses to wear a shirt today, or let me comb her hair. Gee whiz!

Savannah Visit

2009-01-18T11:30:00.005-05:00

We had an awesome time with my brother and his wife at their house in Savannah this weekend.

My brother is a stinkin' rock star to my boys; they were so excited! Casey and I were excited, too, because Jeremy and Marie love food as much as we do, and we knew they would know all the cool resteraunts to try (our great vacation pastime).

We ate at a cuban place with awesome food and yucky sangria (canned fruit, yuck!) one night, and lunch at a greek resteraunt with flaming cheese and awesome bread with real butter (I'm a bit of a butter fiend, since Casey is lactose intolerant, and I only get it when we eat out at certain places. I've been known to lick it right out of the little plastic containers.....mmmmm.....)

Sunday we walked around downtown to look at art. The museum we were going to didn't have free admission to residents of the county like we had heard, so we opted out and created out own art:

Then we looked around at all the shops and galleries. Lots of beautiful stuff. Cole chose his favorite piece, which they printed on note cards:

Casey had a favorite, too:

And Maddy practiced naming her colors in a gallery aptly named "Chroma":

Cole SWORE this was a real pirate ship. It was, in fact, a really neat ship that had been restored and was open for free tours. It was really cool. This picture was taken right before it started to sho-nuff rain, and Maddy was already getting pretting wet.

You can take carriage tours of the city, which we did not do, but as you can see by the look on Maddy's face, just seeing the horses (Gasp: "Horseeees!!!") was a delight.

Back at the house, we chilled out and dried off (we had gotten drenched walking back to our car). Marie made so wicked-tasty Chicken curry, and the boys worked on their video game. Yes worked--my brother, in his spare time, creates video games. (I think I may have mentioned that in a previous blog). Anyway, he and the boys spent the weekend, off and on, creating "Bat Cole", complete with theme music, sound effects, and evil ninjas. Here's the link, if anyone would like to download it to play (I promise my brother's site won't give you a computer virus): http://www.darthlupi.com/games/cole.zip. That's my brother's voice that announces, "BAT COLE!" when it first starts, Casey provides the, "GOOD JOB!", and Cole's talent is lent to the karate-chop-'hiya's. (One note, when you hit the ninjas, that's not blood, their pink eyes just get bigger...go figure.) You use the right and left mouse buttons to make Bat Cole fight the ninjas that chase him.

We played a rediculous board game, Quelf, which was introduced to us by my good friend Bethany, who was introduced to it by her good friend Carrie. It was truly silly. One of the cards made us all talk by putting "izzle" at the end of each sentence, which my brother decided to continue to do, even after we had finished playing.

It was a great visit, but it made me miss my brother terribly. I can't wait until the make the move back in a few years.

Terrible Two's

2009-01-16T11:04:00.002-05:00

I'm not sure what happened to my sweet little princess this week.

We've had our moments of willfulness and tantrums, but never anything too bad. This is my third time around with terrible two's, if you don't count my two younger siblings, so I should be able to handle it.

This week has been nearly unbearable.

I literally haven't gone anywhere in the last two days because of how awful Maddy has been. She throws herself on the floor when she doesn't get the sippy cup she wants, she throws herself on the floor when she doesn't get the snack she wants, and sometimes she just throws herself on the floor for who-knows-why. She gets mad and screams, and sometimes I am just SURE that if she only had the vocabulary, she'd be cussing me. I have spanked that little hiney so much this week, I feel like a child-abuser or something.

My sister came over yesterday afternoon to hang out for a bit, and we sat down to eat dinner. I knew fits were coming, because mealtimes are difficult for Maddy anyway. As usual, she wanted her cup, more chips, you name it, anything but the sandwich that was the only healthy part of her meal. She'd beg, we'd say, "Take a bite of your sandwich first," and she fall apart. I would ignore it until it got to the "cussing" volume, pop her butt and sit her on the bed. She'd come back, beg again, and the process would begin all over. (Very exhausting dinner, let me tell ya!)
One thing I will say for Maddy is that after I spank her, she wants to "make up" quickly. I never reject those little arms when they go up for a hug, so even though this was the 5th trip back to the bedroom, complete with bottom-swat, and I only wanted to throw her across the room, I sat her on my lap and said, "Mommy loves you but you have to bite your sandwich or no chips. Mommy's boss."

She looked up at me with those big, pretty blue eyes brimming with tears and said, "I 'ant to be mommy."

CJ's First Day

2009-01-07T19:06:00.009-05:00

So CJ started school last week. Real school. For the first time in five years. To give you some perspective, here's what he looked like the last time he started school:

And this is him on his first "First Day" (This is also when he stopped wanting me to kiss him in front of his friends, so he'd put one of his tiny little hands up to sheild us from view.):

This is him now, all grown up:

I'm really proud of him. On top of his normal attention-deficit issues, he was struggling with his schoolwork here at home recently. Struggling to do it, struggling to stay on task, struggling to have a good attitude. I anticipated a rude awakening for him at a academically-competitive private school. Much of the material they are covering is completely foreign to him: Algebra, cursive writing, even things like writing his name on his papers! But this week, he has really picked things up, been responsible with his assignments, and brought home some surprisingly good grades for someone so new to all this!

So far, he's gotten two A's and a B, one 100% (!) and although he got a C on his first Science quiz, but I'm cutting him slack since he didn't even have a book yet! His math teacher is impressed with his progress in catching on to equations, and all his teachers are just so nice.

On his first day, it became obvious that the girls were going to be an issue. It was reported by my friend's daughter (who is in CJ's class) that "four girls" like him. She wouldn't say who. When I picked him up in the afternoon, high school teachers were making comments about the stir he was causing with the girls. One day, when I picked him up a little early, he had three girls huddled around him--one of whom was an 11th grader. He was looking slightly uncomfortable with the attention.

This Monday night we got home late, since he just stays with me at Bible Club on the afternoons I have it (we meet at the same building that also hosts the school), to find two phone messages from "Elizabeth" waiting on him. She had called the second time to make sure E had written her number down correctly. Then during dinner little Elaine called. All these calls were supposedly about homework assignments, but we know better. On the way to school Tuesday, I said, "let me jsut make this easy on you. You cannot have a girlfriend. You can have girls that are friends, but no girlfriends that lay claim to you and distract you--God KNOWS you don't need more distractions." Honestly, he looked relieved.

All in all, he's doing really well, although today he left without eating his breakfast or taking his Omega-3 (our homeopathic way of dealing with his attention challenges--it works, too!). I didn't have time to take him his breakfast after I came home and found it in the microwave, but I may be running that vitamin up to the school around lunch-time. After all, he's got three quizes tomorrow and he needs to be able to study tonight!

I love the picture below for the story behind it. This is Zay, who started coming to His Hands Bible Club when he was 11 (he's now 20). He is such a great kid, now. (o: He came over for dinner the other night because we missed him badly--he is in college and working fulltime, so we don't see him much. CJ was doing his math homework, and Zay just jumped right in and started helping him. Double irony is at work in this picture, as Zay struggled at frist to pass college algebra and was proud to be able to help CJ, and secondly, although Zay only advised CJ the exact way I had, only moments before, CJ still credits him with showing him how to do these equations. (o:

Blessing

2009-01-05T20:06:00.009-05:00

I was seven years old when my sister was born. Because of the way our household functioned (or didn't) I was already stepping into the (unhealthy) role of "grownup", so it was more like she was my baby than my sister. Later, when I was grown up and on my own, she moved in with me and stayed until she met her husband. She's still my baby, always will be. Her middle name is very appropriate: Blessing.

We are very strange together. The older we got, the harder it was for some people to tell us apart. People still get us confused occasionally (even though I'm truly beginning to look over 30, and she still looks like a young 'un). We speak our own language, and can talk about completely different subjects in the same conversation, deftly switching back and forth, picking up where we left off, and never missing a beat.

Realizing how weird we are at times, here's a conversation we were having today, while I did the dishes.

Me: Somebody should provide the service of putting non-stick back on non-stick pans after they get sticky. 'Cuz sticky non-stick pans are terrible.

Autumn: Someone does, I think. They make a spray.

Me: Really? Well, I want someone else to do it for me.

Autumn: Using non-stick pans isn't good for you if you use really high heat.

Me: Define high heat.

Autumn (ignoring me): If it gets too hot, it will get into your food and it's not good for you. And if you're a parakeet it will kill you.

Say what?? Who stores this kind of information in their brains? Why would you cook a parakeet's food anyway?? Why bring it up at all?

Here's a classic Autumn story (there are a few): I was in the kitchen, and as I walked out, she came around the corner and we nearly bumped into each other. She was startled, and said, "OH! I thought you were ME!!"

Just think about that one for a minute. Let it sink in.

Put all three of us interesting siblings together and here's what you get:

A few Christmases ago, my brother and I were joking around, somehow got on the subject of aphrodisiacs. (We were probably talking about how disgusting raw oysters are, how much like boogers they seem, and then just declined from there--who knows, I don't remember, and besides, it's not the point...) So Autumn overheard our aphrodisiac conversation, and fresh from her trip to Europe, feeling a little smug, goes, "Oh I saw a statue of one of those!!"

My brother and I immediately stopped and looked at each other, and then at her and said in stereo, "Oh, I gotta to hear this." Sensing some serious sibling ridicule coming, she became hesitant, but still pretty confident. "Well, we were in this museum, and there was a statue of an aphrodisiac." Stifling a giggle, my brother says, "Oh? What does it look like?"

She looked at us both for a moment, and said sheepishly, "Well, you know. It had both things."

AFTER we finally stopped laughing, I explained, with tears running down my face, the difference between and aphrodisiac and a hermaphrodite.

My Holiday Typhoon

2009-01-01T11:27:00.013-05:00

This holiday season has been a whirlwind of activity! Family, friends, fun, along with to-do lists, shopping (grr...), and housework (double grr...)..it's been a wonderful ride.

Maddy and my grandma at dinner.

Maddy and my brother, Jeremy, at brunch the next day. Mmmm...gingerbread pancakes!

The highlight of my Christmas would have to Saturday after Christmas. We had dinner with my whole family, we had great food, wonderful company....Ahhhh. Awesome!

Our tradition to demolish the gingerbread house (Godzilla-style) at our family dinner:

Part of the awesomeness of Saturday was due to my brother's visit, and my mom's. My relationship with my mom is, as I've said, complicated. But she strode in the door the morning of our planned family dinner and blessed my socks off by baking the bread and helping clean, and best of all, loving on and playing with my kids. I wouldn't exactly call her a cuddly grandma, but she sure is a fun grandma. She had brought beach sand from near her house in St. Augustine, along with various shells and starfish. She's unemployed at the moment, so the ocean provided her Christmas gifts this year. She had made all us grown kids a fragrant oil warmer out of clam shells that was pretty genius.

Neena (my mom) playing in the sand with the kids. They kept disappearing all day and I'd find them out in the garage in the sand.

My brother is definitely the star around here. He and his wife live in Savannah, so we don't see them as much as we'd like to. Jeremy is a computer programmer (or something like that...network administrator, I think? OH, I don't KNOW!). He love video games (and has even won an award for one he created!) so CJ loves having him around. Jeremy and his newest fan, my niece Alina.

For Christmas, he and his wife bought a Wii, and rented Rayman and the Rabbids 2. Oh, my gosh, that was such a hilarious night. We all took a turn, and then took turns laughing our butts off at each other. More awesomeness. In hindsight, I wish I had taken some video.

Of course, I don't want to leave my dad out, who is so sweet, loving and generous. This year we all decided to get gifts for only the children, since "things are tough all over". I think my dad missed the point, because he seems to have spent the same amount of money, just all on the kids!! My kids got so much stuff from them! (Nerf guns were a fave--for the grownups, too.)

Dad with his gag gift from us:

Last night we had some wonderful friends--some old, some brand new-- over for New Years Eve. We played games, talked, and ate-- ALOT. Some of the kids fell asleep, some did not (especially mine, *sigh*).

Miscellaneous children piled into my bed:

We watched the ball drop and toasted each other with sparkling apple juice, kissed our spouses.....and went right back to our game of Apples to Apples, where I FINALLY won a card in the very last round. Whew, at least I wasn't a total loser. Maybe if I wasn't so insistant on picking smart-a** cards.....ah well, "smart a** is, as smart a** does," isn't that what Forrest Gump said?

HAPPY NEW YEAR, EVERYONE!!

Bubble Day

2008-12-30T10:35:00.005-05:00

Yesterday, Cole's homeschool co-op met at our house for Bubble Day. I didn't have a lot of time to plan, what with all our Christmas celebrating (more on that in my next blog), so it wasn't quite as cool as our Snow Day we had at our house last week, but the kids had fun playing with bubbles, making bubble art, and making (& eating!) bubble bread.

You can make Bubble Bread with canned biscuits, but I like to make my dough from scratch. (Yes, once again, I am a foodie-snob!)

Bubble Bread

1 cup scalded milk

1/2 cup oil

1/2 cup sugar

Mix milk, oil, and sugar, cool (to no hotter than 110 degrees). Add 1 1/2 Tbs. (or one packet) of yeast. Let mixture "sponge" for 5 minutes.

Add 2 beaten eggs and 3 cups of flour, mix well. Add 1 1/2 cups of flour and knead lightly on a floured surface.

Place in a greased bowl and let it rise until double. Punch it down and let it rise 10 more minutes.

Meanwhile, melt a stick of butter. Also, combine 1 cup of sugar and 1 Tbs. cinnamon.

Make "bubbles": Pinch dough into walnut-sized bubbles, dip into butter and then sugar mixture, and drop into a well-greased tube pan. Layer bubbles with chopped nuts, if desired. (yes, please!)

Let your bubble bread rise about 45 minutes, and then bake at 350 for about 40 minutes.

Maddy's Dollhouse

2008-12-26T19:17:00.006-05:00

Sometimes I just get this idea of what I want my kids to get for Christmas (whether they want it or not), and I just HAVE to get it. This year, I really, really wanted to get Maddy a doll house. After tons of research, I decided we couldn't afford the one I wanted to get, so I decided to make one out of the pile of foam-core board we have lying around.

I started it a week ago and it was so much fun. Cole helped me pick out the "wallpaper" (scrapbooking paper from the Dollar Tree), and gave his opinions about where the walls should go. He kept saying, "This is the best Christmas ever!" He was very upset when Maddy woke up from her nap and we had to put our project away.

When we got it mostly done, I started shopping for inhabitants for her house. It didn't take me long (well, actually it was several different stores and a few lost bids on ebay) to figure that was going to be a frustration, too. As a last try, I looked on Target.com and found these adorable little animal families that I used to play with when I was little. The hamster family was even available with free shipping!

I didn't get it all the way done by Christmas morning, so this morning I put the shingles on and made some furniture. Casey's cousin had sent us this awesome gift tower from Harry and David's (Thanks, Gina) and the pretty little boxes made an awesome couch and coffee table. I used the foam from inside the boxes as mattresses.

Oh! And I learned a valuable lesson about cutting with a razor blade (away from your body!) when I stabbed myself in the leg. The razor went in about 3/4" (and it kinda hurts)!

Inside View

Outside View (CJ wanted to pose the family outside like it was their Christmas portrait)

Hamster Sister in her bunkbed.

Maddy playing very hard with her dollhouse.

Mama Hamster watching TV (Cole insisted they needed a Christmas tree).

Master Bedroom

Daddy Hamster taking care of Hamster Brother in the kitchen. PawPaw (my dad) bought her some real kitchen furniture.

Apologies

2008-12-15T22:09:00.005-05:00

My pastor said a few weeks ago: "Sometimes relationship is more important than being right."
Wow. It seems to be the theme of my life right now.
I've always prided myself in being pretty quick to apologize, at least professionally. In my ministry, working with other churches, pastors, and organizations, diplomacy often means apologizing for things that weren't your fault. So I've had practice.
Today I gave the hardest apology ever. It's not the offense that I had a hard time apologizing for. (It was a relatively minor, stepping-on-of-toes situation, and I like to apologize quickly, thoroughly and sincerely, so I set off to do just that.) It is just that the person I was apologizing to was so nasty to me--even during the apology, that by the time she sneered, "Well. I forgive you," I wanted to say, "Well, don't. Because I take my apology BACK!"
It occured to me during my drive home, as I fought back angry tears, that perhaps I am too proud of my humility. Maybe I take a perverted sense of being "right" when I apologize for being wrong--after all, I'm being the BIG one, the one with the chutzpa to "take one for the team". And when someone isn't so quick to dismiss what I feel is a small infraction, my true feelings come out. That it "isn't fair", that "I didn't do anything wrong", "she was so mean to me", "whine, whine, whine"......
So I have some new things to ponder. Some more iron sharpening my iron. *sigh*

My Christmas List

2008-12-13T20:41:00.004-05:00

Okeedokee, my friend Bethany had this on her blog, so I stole it. Feel free to steal it from me!

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Gift bags feel like laziness, but they are sooooo much easier! I do wrapping paper when I can. And homemade gift tags.

2. Real tree or Artificial? I love the way real ones smell, but the penny-pincher in me can't stand the thought of spending $40 on something I throw out in a few weeks. So I bought an artificial one after Christmas years ago. And the Christmas tree candle from Bath and Body Works is awesome!

3. When do you put up the tree? Not until after Maddy's birthday party!!!

4. When do you take the tree down? Sometime after the new year.

5. Do you like eggnog? In moderation.

6. Favorite gift received as a child? A baby doll that was a whole lot like a Cabbage Patch. I think it was a Pumpkin Patch Kid or something.

7. Hardest person to buy for? Casey's dad and brother...definitely!

8. Easiest person to buy for? Cole-- he loves everything. And this year he still wants scotch tape and juice boxes.

9. Do you have a nativity scene? Yes, a white one. And a tiny one carved from olive wood. And a stuffed one. I think that's it.

10. Mail or email Christmas cards? I mail some but not a bunch.

12. Favorite Christmas Movies? How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Mixed Nuts (hilarious), Island of Misfit Toys, Small One. The Lord of the Rings also says "Christmas" to me...don't laugh, but the all came out right around Christmas, so I love to watch them then!

13. When do you start shopping? I shop all year. But I have a hard time waiting, so people get gifts from me all year!

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Sure!

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? One thing, seriously? Rosette cookies.

16. Lights on the tree? Yes, please, LOTS. This year, white.

17. Favorite Christmas song? Emmanuel

18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? Stay home. Maybe we'll travel next year!

19. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer’s? Hmmm...nope.

20. Angel on the tree top or star? Up until this year, we've just had a very pretty bow. Pretty, but no symbolism there....so I read the story of Jesus' birth to the kids to explain why we were changing and let Cole pick out a star for the top. He was so cute and thoughtful when he chose it.

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? Growing up, we did all our celebrating on Christmas Eve. My parents said it was because of our Polish heritage.... Now it depends on when/if we have to share CJ with his bilogical dad. This year we will open presents (with our household)Christmas morning.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of year? Cranky people.

23. Favorite ornament theme or color? I love sparkly ones, white crystaly ones. We found one in a box this year that reminded us all of the ship Superman came to earth in as a baby. (o: Cole saw it and said, "Oh. I like that one." Hands-down, the ones with my kids' pictures in them, though. I love to see how they've changed each year.

24. Favorite for Christmas dinner? Mom's bread.

25. What do you want for Christmas this year? We're not exchanging grownup gifts this year, so it's irrelevant. We are researching a memory foam mattress pad. These bones are getting old!

Okay, TAG, you're it! If you want to do this, go for it. I would love to know if you do it though, so please just leave me a comment letting me know to come look at it, okay!
Merry Christmas!

Yesterday

2008-12-10T12:44:00.005-05:00

So I just have to share about my day yesterday.
Apparently, I am the current victim of the bug that's made its rounds through my house and many others, and I woke up feeling really bad. I took some of my kid's prescription, which I thank Jesus I had the presence of mind to have the doctor call in last week when the first one went down....(I realize it's semi-illegal to take someone else's prescription meds, but I was desperate). The medicine was all that stood between me and puking my brains out all day, and it still only helped a bit, but I had to go to Bible Club, because my assistant's pregnant and on bed rest and I can't just call the kids and cancel--most don't have phones.
Those babies were so......chatty yesterday. Oh. My. Gosh. I promise you, they called my name a million times. No lie. 1000 times 1000= a million times. I took them outside because my head was splitting from their love and affection, but they just wanted to run and scream and play....right next to me. I knew I didn't feel good, and that's the main reason I didn't get on to them or anything, but they were oh, so noisy.
The climax of the day was when we were loading into the van to go home, and they were arguing over where to sit, yelling at each other, laughing hysterically, etc. and this little girl sitting directly behind me was saying, "Mrs. Mary, Mrs. Mary, Mrs. Mary..." And since this was the one million and third time my name had been called in one day, I said, "Kenyetta. WHAT." through my clenched teeth.
She just looked at me with her big eyes and said sweetly, "Nothing. I was just saying your name."

Guest Writer

2008-12-05T18:42:00.002-05:00

For those who don't know (hmm...I think everyone, all three of the people who read my blog already know this), I psuedo-homeschool CJ. We use Georgia Virtual Academy, which is technically public school, but since I'm doing all the WORK, and he's at home while he's schooling, it's homeschool. No matter what the snobs at our former homeschool group thought.

For his portfolio assignment, he wrote a persuasive essay. He did a great job, I think, so I wanted to share it.

C.J. Dickerson
Millicent Pilate
Persuasive essay

Every four seconds a child dies from starvation and treatable illnesses. There is a great need for food, water and health supplies all around the world. There is a way you can give a gift to help. World Vision is a very cool organization that helps people in need. When you give a gift in honor of your friends, you not only get some Christmas shopping done but you help children everywhere.

Today alone, 26,000 children will die of treatable illnesses. 53% of these deaths are from starvation. In Ethiopia, only 22% of the people have access to clean water. They have to drink pond water while we waste water all the time. Right now there is a food crisis in Africa, and nearly 9.2 million people are in danger of starvation. These people need help and you can give it to them.

World Vision is a Christian humanitarian organization that reaches out to children in poverty. World Vision serves the poor in over 100 countries. 80% of their budget goes directly to programs that help people in need. World Vision’s gift catalog has gifts from a price range of $10 to benefit the Child Health Fund, to $500 for a dairy cow, all the way up to $39,000 for a health clinic. Also, because of corporate donations, a $35 gift multiplies 14 times to provide $480 worth of clothing and shoes.

Getting a gift in honor of a loved one can be very helpful with Christmas shopping. World Vision has an online catalog that allows you to order gifts like food or clean water. The online shopping saves the time of going to Wal-Mart and waiting in line. It also saves you the stress of having to put up with crabby sales people. It also saves you worrying about what to get your friends and family, because no matter what it will make them feel proud that they helped a child.

You have an opportunity to help these children. The people at World Vision want to help families in poverty. The gift catalog will help you spend more time with your family because you just go and order the present and you are done. In the time it took you to read my essay, 22 children died. Consider making a difference in the lives of children and with the way you buy Christmas gifts this year.

This is Tekalgn, the Ethiopian boy that CJ sponsers through World Vision.

Five Things I love...Finally!

2008-12-03T22:08:00.009-05:00

I was tagged several weeks ago by my friend Bethany. She did a great job on hers, so here's mine!

Five things I love:

1. Jesus!! He said whoever is forgiven much, loves much, and man--was I forgiven MUCH. If it weren't for my Jesus, I'd probably be dead, or at least miserable enough to wish I was. He is my all.

2. My family. They are so wonderful. God has used my husband in amazing ways to bring healing to my heart. He's a wonderful man, an awesome dad, and the perfect friend. My children bring color to my life and make everything I do so much more fun. They make me feel RICH. My extended family is precious as well. My daddy is such a sweet man and my sister Autumn is bright spot in my life. My neice is a precious little peanut. My brother is strange and wonderful and funny. My mom is dynamic and interesting. My three other siblings are a joy to watch as they grow.

3. My ministry. I feel incredibly blessed to have a "profession" that is as rewarding as His Hands is. I love what I do, I love the kids I see every week for Bible Club, and I love being available to God to do whatever He asks me to do. These kids are just so wonderful, so full of potential.

4. Parties. I love food, I love friends, put them together, and I love PARTIES. Three times a year I get to go all-out when I throw parties for my kids' birthdays. My husband and I joke that one reason we want more kids is so we can have more birthday parties.

5. At the moment, number 5 is going to go to my electric blanket. I hate to be cold--it actually hurts me. When I get out of the tub at night, and I'm shaking and shivering, and I skooch down into the covers where my husband has thoughtfully turned on my balnket for me already....ahhhhh. It is so wonderful.

And now, finally, I will tag five others: Autumn, Tonya, Kim, Jessica, and Mary. I'm surprised I even have 5 people who read this thing for me to tag, but I'm glad it's you guys. Can't wait to see what you have to say!

Our Trip (Must see pictures)

2008-12-02T10:25:00.004-05:00

Our trip to Illinois was absolutely wonderful!!! There was lots of fellowship, food and FUN!

On our way up we stopped in Atlanta (see previous blog) to stay with the Andersons. The second half of our trip, we stopped in Kentucky at Patty's 1880 settlement and restaurant. We weren't hungry, but decided to get out and see the beautiful lights that they display every Christmas. Cole as ecstatic at the sight of all the lights, and as we parked he shouted, "Oh my, I didn't know Christmas was HERE!!" and didn't stop squealing with glee the whole time. Kids make things so much fun.

Click here to see pictures of: Patty's (click "back" on your browser to come back here.)

In Illinois, we stayed in Granite City, at the apartment of Casey's cousin's in-laws, who are in Florida for the winter. CJ spent most of his time with his cousins, so we hardly saw him at all! Aunt Merrill hosted several pre-Thanksgiving meals for the whole family, so I think I gained 10 pounds before the Thanksgiving feast even began! She was a wonderful hostess, and everyone enjoyed all the food, coffee, and LAUGHTER.

Thanksgiving dinner was at Jeff and Ann's, and it went on (literally) all day!

Pictures of: Illinois (click "back" to come back.)

On Friday night, we stayed with Casey's cousin Gina in St. Charles, Missouri, but first we spent the day at the City Museum in St. Louis. I cannot say enough about how TOTALLY COOL this place was, omigosh! It was created by artists, and it's probably totally unsafe (I kept having flashbacks of my dad saying, "Be careful, that'll put your eye out!"), but oh, so stinkin' flippin' awesome!!

Two actual Cessna planes are suspended in the air connect of a myriad of metal tunnels, with secret paths, hidden room, and funky slides. There was a ball pit for little ones, and one for the rowdy older kids so that they could pelt one another to their hearts' content. And that's just OUTSIDE. Inside there were caves on the bottom floor that were just dark and spooky enough to give you a bit of an adrenaline rush, but not scary enough to keep Cole from dashing from tunnel to tunnel and making me slightly nervous about losing him in the semi-dark.

At first, Maddy was frightened and didn't want to do anything. I was dreading a day of being stuck watching everyone else (selfish mom that I am, I wanted to play, too), but Gina showed her how to climb up and slide down, and suddenly she wasn't afraid anymore! I mean, NOT AFRAID AT ALL!! I was struggling to keep up with her as she dashed across wire-looped tunnel-bridges and around dark corners! She was crazy!!

The second floor has a treehouse with tunnels and ladders and all sorts of things to climb and a whole other half-floor that we never got around to looking at! )o: The third floor consisted of a huge art room where you could paint, make stuff with clay, cut fancy snowflakes, or whatever you want! There was a circus show that we didn't get to see, too.

I was totally not ready to leave, even though we were there for an entire day, but everyone got hungry. I was like, "C'mon, you can eat anytime!!" But majority rules, we left about 7:30pm to go eat supper and drive to Gina's.

Pictures of: St.Louis

Alas, on Sunday it was time to pack up and start home. After breakfast with Aunt Merrill, Uncle Jerry, and Uncle Bill at Cracker Barrel, we were off. We stopped at Patty's again for a late lunch, and to celebrate Maddy's second birthday (one day early). After lunch we drove to Nashville, where we stopped to see the pretty lights at Opryland, and spend the night.

Pictures: GoingHome

The next day, we got up to drive home, and Cole finally got his wish: SNOW! We stopped off at a gas station in Tennessee to play a little, and then drove on into the mountains where the snow was much more impressive. We pulled over again, and had a great time playing in the snow. Casey made a sled out of a cardboard box and a trashbag that we had in the van, and we all had a blast!

Pictures:SNOW!!!

It was a wonderful trip, not too long, not too short. Beautiful weather all week, so the kids could have fun outside, and then snow on the way home. Perfect.

Atlanta

2008-11-23T20:26:00.006-05:00

We're in Atlanta for the first portion of our trip to Illinois to visit family for Thanksgiving. We're staying with our good friends, the Andersons. We had a lovely day today.

For those who don't know, Casey and I are total foodies. Vacations are punctuated by where we ate, and remembered by who had the best bread, or most original dessert. For this tri, we've planned our stop for months.

We saw a segment on The Original Pancake House on the Food Network, and knew we wanted to try it. They have an apple pancake where they saute brown sugar, cinnamon, and fresh apples in a pan, and then pour the batter in, and then bake the whole thing. It puffs up really big, and slowly deflates as it cools. It's like a giant souffle, and it was awesome! Our friend Eric ordered the fruit crepes, which were served with real whipped cream, and the yummiest looking fruit I've ever seen. The blackberries were huge!

Maddy really enjoyed the whipped cream and licked two bowls clean! At the end, we swapped out her whipped cream bowl for a bowl of sour cream--the look on her face when she dug into it was priceless!

After we ate like PIGS, we went to an awesome park in Kennesaw. We played for hours and watched the guys fly their model planes.

Here's some pictures from a great day.

Cole's Story

2008-11-20T21:14:00.005-05:00

We leave Saturday morning for Illinois to visit Casey's family!! This has been a crazy week as I try to get Angel Tree going and independent to prepare to be out of town for a week and a half! Plus Casey is in a business competition and he has a huge project due tomorrow. We see each other in passing, and have only been alone for 2 hours this whole week (but we've made those hours count! Wink, wink!!) Anyway, I've been "tagged" for the first time (thank you, Bethany, I am honored!), and I promise I am going to do that...maybe in the morning, since I'm the first one up and it's nice and quiet then.

But I just had to share Cole's story tonight.

We're going to visit my grandmother tomorrow. She's been in a nursing home for rehab (the physical-therapy-kind, not the drug-kind). She's been really lonely and lost 10 pounds, and when we went to see her last week, Cole was a little fidgety and impatient. So I thought if he made her something they could talk about, he'd be a little more engaged. So he made her a book, and he is very proud of it. He told me what to write, and he illustrated it. Here it is:

FYI, my dad's name is Bob.

Facebook

2008-11-15T20:07:00.004-05:00

So I've kicked MySpace almost completely. I was at one time, completely addicted to it. But I got sick of the nasty ads, especially around Halloween, and I realized that most of my family is on Facebook, so I made the switch.

My favorite Aunt lives in Connecticut (most of my mom's side does, and it's where I grew up), so I don't see her like I'd like. She posted several old pictures of everyone. Ah, technology and the possibilities it opens for making fun of your loved ones!

So I decided to post some of my oldies:

My dad, me, my brother, and my sister, Autumn.

Me and My brother.

Me, 21 months

2008-11-15T20:01:00.002-05:00

Well, I think the last time I posted, I told you guys I was discouraged. I've been waiting for my attitude to improve before I post again. My attitude is getting a little better, but I'm still frustrated and angry with some people......That said, I talked to someone this week that reminded me that sometimes people make decisions (that affect you) that don't make sense but maybe God's just telling them to. Maybe it's time to move on. His time.
So here I am, bad attitude and all, and maybe God's hand is the one shifting and moving things. I wish I knew that for sure...I wish I didn't feel like people are being petty and stupid, and affecting my sweet precious His Hands kids with their pettiness and stupidity.
Ultimately, I know God is in control, and the ministry isn't mine, it's His. And while I am a steward of it, it is ultimately His responsibility. And while some things may catch me off gaurd, he is never surprised!!!

Discouraged

2008-11-06T09:56:00.002-05:00

This has been a very difficult, extrememly discouraging and frustrating week for me, in regards to ministry. I don't even want to get started on here, because it wouldn't be at all productive. Please just pray for His Hands-- for our Christmas angel tree, for God's favor, for wisdom, for my sanity......

Halloween '08

2008-11-04T21:24:00.003-05:00

Halloween is normally a pretty big deal in my house. We don't do scary stuff, no spiders, bats, monsters, and definitely no witches. But when I was growing up, we didn't do anything for Halloween. It was the devil's holiday, you know.
But when I became an adult and had a kid, and developed my own personal theology about things, including Halloween, I was like, "Hey, since when does the devil get a day?? What's up with THAT?"
And what can be more fun than dressing up in costumes (LOVE it!), walking around in the cool air (LOVE it!), and CANDY (another thing that I missed out on as a kid! LOVE it!!)
So usually I make elaborate costumes for the kids (and me and Casey), and make it a big party. This year, I'm a little tired, so while I made Maddy's costume, it wasn't a big deal, and Cole wanted to wear his Spiderman costume he got for birthday (gasp! A store-bought costume!), and CJ waited WAY too long to decide what he wanted to be, so he was on his own.
I was somewhat disappointed in the not going all out, but we still had lots of fun.
We had a bunch of friends over, and the adults all dressed like crayons. (We joked that we were Family Dollar crayons, which why our labels don't say "Crayola" and why some of tops don't match our bottoms very well...) CJ had some friends over and for the first time ever took off on his own. He was excited to be on his own--in the dark.
Cole wanted to hold my hand tightly all night, which was very sweet, since he usually dashes off independently. He and I walked up to one house by ourselves, and the lady scooped up a huge handful of bubble gum and cheerfully dumped it in his bag. He was so shocked, he just stared into his open bag, and she said, "Oh, wait", and scooped up ANOTHER handful and poured it into his bag. He was speechless!
Enjoy the pictures!

Independent Candidate to vote for!

2008-11-03T08:42:00.009-05:00

This morning when I woke up, this was on my lawn:

The story behind it is several months ago, Casey emailed out a link to this silly "news" video that declared him a presidential candidate. (To see the clip go HERE.)

Somehow it has become almost viral. I've actually recieved an email promoting Casey and containing the link from several people (one of whom I didn't know)! This morning there was even a bulletin on MySpace with the link.

But the sign takes the cake. I have a list of suspects...I'm sure someone will call here giggling around noon to confess. (Casey's friends know he's not a morning person. He hasn't even noticed the sign yet and he's been up for about 30 minutes.)

GO VOTE ( for someone who's actually running) TOMORROW!!!

Preschool Shows

2008-11-02T19:44:00.006-05:00

I know I shouldn't admit it, but there are a few of Maddy's shows that I really enjoy.

I love the songs and the humor on Bunnytown. It's a great little puppet-based show on Disney. The best episode is the one where Underwear Bunny keeps interrupting all the musical numbers by running across the screen yelling "Underwear!"

There are some that aren't very appealing, even though the kids love them: Dora and Diego always seem to be yelling. Yo Gabba Gabba is just too psycholdelic. I hate the ads Nickelodeon has, too- both the number and the type: They actually had an ad for the Bloody Mary ride at Six Flags!!! (During Preschool TV?!?!? Have you seen that commercial? It's awful! It shows "Bloody Mary painting her lips with what seems to be blood and them she bursts screaming through someone's mirror! I'm sure it was a mistake, but still...)

My absolute favorite, though, is Charlie and Lola (pictured above). It's adorable. First of all, it's Brittish, and I love their little accents. Also, Lola has a great imagination and so many of her antics are so right in-line with the crazy stuff my four-year-old comes up with. Plus, she drinks strawberry milk which Cole at one time obsessed over, and she even calls it "pink milk" just like he does!

And then there's Charlie, Lola's long-suffering big brother. He's just so sweet and kind to her, he reminds me so much of my CJ. He never yells at her, even when he gets frustrated (well, CJ does raise his voice occasionally, but he is a good big brother). The show even opens with, "I have this little sister Lola. She's small and very funny."

I love that Charlie and Lola love each other, when most shows now depict a irritating younger sibling and a mean older sibling. On those shows, even if they don't DO mean things to each other, they TALK mean. But Lola adores Charlie ( I love the way she says "Chaaah-leeee"), and Charlie is obviously besotted: "Oh, Lola."

We got a Charlie and Lola book from the Library and Cole makes me read it with a Brittish accent. Maddy asks to watch it every morning when she wakes up. They even had an episode last week about pumpkins. I think I've seen 5 times already.

And I don't mind.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

2008-10-29T18:52:00.005-04:00

In honor of "Pumpkin Time", here's an awesome recipe I tweaked to my tastes.....These are so yummy. (Hint: They're better the next day, and they freeze well, too).

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

1 c. butter
3 c. sugar
5 lg. eggs
3 c. all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
2 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
2 tsp. vanilla
15 oz. can of pumpkin
1/6 c. apple juice
1/6 c. rum (or more apple juice)
1 bag dark chocolate chips or chunks (I use Ghirradelli 60% cacoa chips, because I'm a chocolate snob. You can use another brand, but don't you dare insult my recipe by using WalMart brand "chocolate"! Eww.)

Beat butter at medium speed of mixer about 2 minutes or until creamy.

Gradually add sugar, beating 5 to 7 minutes. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating only until yellow disappears.

Combine pumpkin, juice, vanilla, and rum in a bowl.

Combine flour, salt, spices, and soda in a bow.

Add flour mixture to creamed butter mixture alternating with pumpkin mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture. Mix at lowest speed just until blended after each addition.

Fold in chocolate chips. (I tossed the chips in flour first to keep them from sinking to the bottom, but the batter ends up so thick, it probably wasn't necessary.) Scoop batter into greased (or papered) muffin tins. Bake at 325 degrees until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. (I can't remember exactly how long it took, but I set the timer for 30 minutes and then checked them until they were done.)

Pumpkin Rap

2008-10-26T15:40:00.000-04:00

This is what the silly boys that hang around my house did with Cole's I Like Pumpkin book.

The story behind it, if you'd like to know, is that all these boys followed us home from church (as they usually do), and while Casey pumped gas and CJ waited for our Macadoos chicken, Cole handed Avery his pumkin book (he's obsessed with them, remember?), and voila, this is what they did to it.

My apologies to the author.

Warranties

2008-10-26T15:16:00.000-04:00

Yesterday we were driving to CJ's soccer tournament in Tallahassee, FL, when our van broke down. Again. In the same way.
We were driving through Thomasville when it started "clunking" and the gears started slipping, so Casey pulled over. Once we stopped, it refused to go back into gear. So our wonderful friend Paul, the manager of Firestone, went to our house and got the 15-passenger van and came and got us, along with a tow truck. What a GREAT friend. The other cool thing is the transmission is under warranty, since they just rebuilt it, so, "Yay!"
While we waited for our ride, we called CJ's assistant coach, to see if he'd swing by on his way to the games. That worked out well, and CJ wasn't even late to the first game. (We, on the other hand, didn't arrive in Tallahassee until the end of it.)
While we waited in Thomasville, we walked to the Farmer's Market the was across the street from our unfortunate pit-stop.
My smallest children are OBSESSED with pumpkins. They were in heaven. The Market had all shapes, sizes, and colors. They even had some apple gourds, which look their mama was a watermelon and their daddy was a pumpkin. Cole and I talked about the tiny gourds that looked like 'God painted half green and yellow and half orange and yellow'. Awesome. They had beautiful dark purple eggplants piled up next to red, yellow, and green peppers. And I had left my camera in the van....auughhh.
And it was such a pretty day. It was a perfect day to be broke-down and walking.
And we got to see CJ's second game, where they still lost, but CJ got a goal, and the score wasn't nearly as bad (with the first one, his team never scored, and when I asked how many goals the other team got, he said, "I lost count").
Cole played on this really cool tree we sat under to watch the game. One of the dads said, "You know all those kids are going to have poison ivy rashes from playing around that tree". So I said, "That's ok, we'll bring them to you to get fixed up!" (He just happens to be my kids' pediatrician. Besides, his son was running all over the place barefoot, so I wasn't worried.)
Casey had a stroke of brilliance and had brought Maddy some 'night-night milk' (what my kids call the cup of milk I give them at bed-time) in the cooler, which was awesome because she didn't seem to be feeling really great and probably would've screamed the whole way back home without that conditioned response of sleeping after her milk. Thank God for Pavlov's dog and Daddy's genius.
Oh! Hilarious thing Cole said after we moved all our stuff into the big van, watched our white van go off to the "doctor", and were finally on our way. Cole says in his 'grown-up' tone: "Ok, Dad, now don't break THIS one."

The Joys of Scotch Tape

2008-10-24T11:47:00.000-04:00

Cole loves scotch tape. He makes the craziest stuff with it, like a superhero mask, or tapes toy animals to the walls. One time he even encased Buzz Lightyear in tape so he could be "frozen".

I've been saying that I 'm going to get him a case of tape for Christmas. Can you imagine how much fun he'd have with that?

Well, that was before last night. Casey's been trying to unclog our tub for weeks, going through two jugs of Drano. (Do you see where this is headed?) But it was getting worse, and yesterday it wouldn't drain at all. So I decided to "Polock it" (which is my ancestral term for rigging up a tool to get a task accomplished....sometimes causing damage to property or bodily harm) and bent a clothes hanger to dig the icky clog out. Guess what it was??

Yup, a bunch of scotch tape. Apparently, Buzz "thawed" in my tub and his "ice" went down the drain.

And guess what Cole JUST asked me for?? Yep, MORE tape.

Something Found

2008-10-17T16:17:00.000-04:00

This summer, I lost my new camera lens.

It was so wonderful, and I got such a good deal on it. It was a Sigma 70-300mm Macro AF-S for my Nikon DD40--which means in non-camera-geek language--a sweet lens under $300!!

So anyway, yeah I totally lost it. I remembered the last time I had it (taking kids to camp), but everything was fuzzy after that. Well, after quite a search, I gave up. My husband said we couldn't afford a new one. Man.... I continued to look them up online, drooling, wishing, conspiring, hoping I would see one on ebay for $50 or something (yeah, right...)

Well, yesterday I found it. The story of its discovery is too long (and disgusting) maybe I'll share it for another blog. But--suffice it to say I decided to clean out my pantry, top to bottom with bleach, and that's where I found it.

Yes, in my pantry, in a bag of cooler-bags. Someone must've mistaken the lens case for a cooler..(???)

In honor of my found lens, Here's a picture I took with it:

Now, why I love the lens: There's some technical word for it, but beside the fact that it can zoom in from really far away, I love the effect it has where the background is REALLY blurry. It makes your subject stand out so awesome-ly. Ahhhhhhhhh.....love it.

A visit with my Mom

2008-10-17T15:33:00.000-04:00

To say that Mom and I have a complicated relationship would, for some people, be an understatement. Nonetheless, we love each other very much.

Yesterday my mom, my sister and I had a lovely visit. Mom had driven up to hang out with us and the kids. Normally restless and busy, she was relaxed and chatty. Me and Autumn gave her a makeover. We (yes, both of us) cut her hair and plucked her eyebrows. Then we took pictures of her with our wonderful cameras. She seemed to enjoy it....or at least she was a good sport.

But the highlight of the day was watching her with the children. She cuddled with my little neice and pushed my little girl in the swing. Oh, to hear my princess call, "Neeeenaaaaa!" from across the yard, and seeing my mom laugh and play with Cole, showing him how to smell herb leaves and look for bugs in grass.....It was just SUCH a great day!

Yesterday's Bible Club

2008-10-08T08:23:00.000-04:00

I just have to share how proud I am of my His Hands kids!
Every single one knew their memory verse this week, right down to Malaysia (pictured above)who is only 3! (Well, it was difficult for me to understand her, since she has a lisp, but it sure sounded like she got it). To see a bunch of little preschoolers chant:
"Nothing can separate us from the love of God, Romans 8:39!" was so awesome. The bigger kids had to know the whole thing: "For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Romans 8:38 & 39.
Yes, well-worth that case of king-size Snickers I got from Sam's!

Last Week--Whew!

2008-10-04T19:59:00.000-04:00

I really just have to get in the habit of posting a blog everyday. By the time a few days go by, my head is so clogged I don't know where to start! Plus, I don't want to write, like, four blogs in one day and look as if I have nothing else to do!
This has been a really hard week. Maddy and Casey were sick all last week, and part of this one. Casey's stuff was assumed to be mostly stress, because of a lot of pressure he's under with his practice, paying the mortgage and providing for his family--you know, that kind of menial stuff. We were in the middle of a fight (with both of us having experience with counseling--him doing it, me receiving it (o:, we both know how to "fight fair", so it's not like it could truly be categorized as a "fight") about how much stress he's allowing in and how it's affecting the family, how he's too busy, etc., etc., which had to be postponed because he fell asleep when I paused to get Maddy a snack. Realizing he didn't feel well, I encouraged him to go to the doctor. Actually, it was more like, "Get your hiney to the doctor!"
So he went and they discovered an irregularity in his heart beat that they wanted to run more tests on. Basically, the bottom half of his heart was beating away, and the top was just kind of quivering. When he left the doctor's office, he wanted me to pull over so we could "chat" (seriously that's the word he used, "chat") about whether or not he should obey the doctors orders to go to the hospital immediately for more tests, since we don't have insurance. He got as far as "They're worried about a blood clot forming and causing a stroke. And she said that's why my arms are tingly, they're not getting enough blood."
Oh, we were so done "chatting".
I drove him straight to South Georgia Medical Center.
I should add here that Cole had also started running a fever and throwing up, and Maddy was still puny as well.
The doctors at the hospital decided it best to keep him overnight, and threatened to keep him two. They tried to explain to my reluctant husband that his condition could be very serious and dangerous. To which he wittily replied that "We don't have health insurance but we do have life insurance."
After which I popped him upside his head.
They did admit him to the cardiac unit of the hospital. The next day I took the kids to visit him on my way to taking them to the pediatrician, as they had all developed new and exciting symptoms. I would've rathered to bring them after, but he missed them too bad. Maddy was a little nervous about all the hoses and wires attached to her daddy, and Cole was excited to see his artwork hanging beside his daddy's bed, just like I said it was. CJ was, as usual, concerned, sympathetic, worried, and sweet.
Hours later, the pediatrician's exact words were: "Congratulations, they all have strep!"
Casey got to come home that night, since they had returned his heart to normal ticking behavior, and since they found now underlying health concerns for his heart issues.
Our good friends brought us dinner. Everyone was so loving during our trial.
So Casey was home, the kids were on antibiotics, and everyone was on the mend.
Then my crazy husband thought it would be a good idea to go to work the next day...not only was I worried about his stress level and health (he still wasn't feeling good), but the kids hadn't seen him much since he spent a good part of two whole days in the hospital, and they were too little to understand why. Needless to say, I recommenced the argument that had been put on hold for his trip to the hospital.
It was a good one, too. No yelling or screaming, but, boy, was I mad. I have a wonderful husband, though, and he recognized the truth in most of what I said, and sympathetic to the emotion of the rest of it. (o:
The next day, we decided to go to the Hahira Honey Bee Festival for some family time. As we turned off our exit, our van went, "Ker-Clunk!" and absolutely refused to go anymore. We ended up walking to the festival (hey, it was a short walk on a pretty day!), and watched the parade. My sister was there with her family and some friends, so they let us take a car and they squished into another. A good friend of ours had the van towed to his shop so he could assess the issue.
All in all, by the end of the week, it was almost FUNNY how much junk happened in one week. In fact, as we walked to the festival, Casey and I were literally laughing about it all.
And we spent the whole day together as a family, no work calls, no paperwork, no talk about finances. We played Monopoly with CJ and Cole (well, Cole rolled the dice until he got bored and went off to play with action figures).
It was a good day.
That night during prayers, all the kids thanked God for a great day (well, I heard Maddy say "Thank you Jesus", but I couldn't make out the rest...). I am so grateful for my awesome kids who chose to be grateful to God for a good day, rather than the negative parts.

Maddy

2008-09-20T11:29:00.000-04:00

Maddy recently announced to me that she is "So Toot (cute)." This was a well-timed proclomation, as I really wanted to kill her, and she must have realized I needed a reminder. She is definitely practicing being two. She won't be the real deal until December.

I love the way most of her words start with the "t" sound. It makes everything a little harder to understand, but it is, well, "toot". She loves to sing and dance, which is also adorable. Out of all my kids, she is the most stubborn, by far. She also the most incredibly self-assured little thing.

She loves her little baby cousin Alina (5 months old), even though she will occasionally move Alina's toys just out of reach, just to see what happens.

An Introduction

2008-09-20T11:21:00.000-04:00

For many months I have contemplated beginning a blog. After I finally made the decision to go for it, the next question is, what purpose will it serve?
Will I use it to vent daily about my inner struggles? My highs and lows as a homeschool mom? My many adventures as a children's minister working with needy local families? So many hats, so little time....
In the end, I guess we'll just have to see what happens!!