Well.... I hate to do it, but I have just gotten so frustrated the few times that I've come on here to post lately.  I love this community so much, but my time is precious and I can't spend time rewriting posts when it doesn't want to work the first time, etc., etc.

Be sure to come visit me at my new blog:  http://heartfelthomeschool.blogspot.com/

I hope to be able to get back to posting regularly very soon!  :) 

We just have too much fun stuff to do this summer to for me to try and write regularly!  So, I'm going to just plan to take a summer blog break!  

I'll be back sometime towards the end of August when we start school back up again! 

Hope you have a wonderful summer!

~LISA

Well, here is my son four days after his injury.  He goes in tomorrow for a follow-up appointment.  I'm praying that it doesn't need to be reset.  I don't know if this mommy heart of mine can handle that.  It looks pretty good in this picture.  There is still a large swollen area on the right side of his nose that can't really be seen in this picture.  If you are passing by my blog tonight, will you say a prayer for him? 

~LISA

Well, here's my son three days after the injury to his nose.  The swelling has gone down quite a bit, but his sweet face is turning all sorts of colors!   Pray for my very active boy to think creatively and be able to play in a not-so-active way for this next week.  He's having a hard time being still and careful!  ;)

~LISA

Okay... this has not been a good week for my sweet Nathan. First, his glove was stolen earlier this week, and today he was out in the backyard playing catch with his older brother and he completely missed the ball. It hit his nose and after two-and-a-half hours in the ER with x-rays included, the diagnosis is his nose is broken.

It is SO swollen, that they didn't want to do anything to it. They put in a referral to the ENT/Head & Neck department and they are supposed to call me on Monday to come in next week after the swelling has subsided to see if it needs to be reset or not. PLEASE PRAY THAT IT WON'T NEED TO BE RESET.

I do not handle this stuff well AT ALL. He came running into the house screaming, blood was everywhere. I took one look at his face and knew we needed to go to ER. My husband was napping and I just started yelling his name as I grabbed the nearest kitchen towel and ice pack. I was really concerned that he broke more than his nose, because the area under his right eye was/is extremely swollen. I mean, it swelled right away. The lady at emergency took one look at him and took him in right away -- and there was a room full of people waiting, too.

Wanna add in a little comedy? I had parked my van right in front of the ER because there wasn't any other nearby parking. It was a loading/unloading zone. So, after I got him settled a bit and the doctor came and looked at it and determined he wanted x-rays, I went to go move my van. Well, I could not find any parking in the parking lot. At this point, I finally let myself cry. I was not showing my son my concern, etc., ya know, as I was driving him to the ER and in there with him, but once I couldn't find parking, I just started bawling. So, after what felt like forever (and was probably just five minutes), I went out of the parking lot to see if I could find parking on the street. I had to park across the street near residential housing. I get out of my van and turn around to click the alarm thingy to make the doors lock and out of a nearby bush a BIRD flew right at me and started attacking my head!!!!!!!!!
I kind of ran off and the bird CHASED ME, attacking my head twice more!! I was screaming like a loonatic!!!!!!! Right now, the image of myself and what I probably looked like makes me laugh, but at the time I was so scared and freaked out and didn't know why this bird was doing this!! I finally got far enough or something and I was running with my purse over my head, and the bird left me alone finally.

So, NOW I was really a blubbering mess, running across the street to get back over the hospital. Some lady saw me and said, "Are you okay?" I have no idea if she saw the bird attacking me or not, but as I ran by her, I said I was okay. My son was scared and I hated leaving him alone and I was trying to hurry up and get back to him! I was SO out of breath when I got back to his bedside!!

When we left and walked back to my van... guess what? That bird flew out of the bushes and onto the top of my van! Nathan said, "Mom, my ice pack isn't cold anymore; I'll throw it at him." I said, "Just wait a minute..." and then the bird flew back into the bushes and my son and I raced to the van and got in!!!!!!!! What I think is that the bird must have been a momma bird protecting her nest or something. I don't know why else it would attack me like that!

So now... back to my son. Something sweet... as we were in the ER and he was lying on the bed with an ice pack on his face, he said to me, "I hope Ryan isn't worrying about me because I'm okay." Bless his heart. He felt bad that his brother was feeling bad about hitting him with the ball. He is one tough kid, my Nathan! Bless his heart. Oh, and when we were leaving he said to me, "Too bad my friends from school won't see this!" (Today was his last day at school).

When we were leaving the hospital, my son wanted to go watch his team play. When I first told him I was taking him to the ER, that was his first question, "You mean I can't play tonight?!?" Uh.......... NO! His team is undefeated so far and in the playoffs, and he was so upset that he was going to miss his game. So, when we were leaving he wanted to go watch the rest of the game. I called my dh and he said to go ahead and take him because it'd be no different sitting there with an ice pack than it'd be sitting on our couch with an ice pack. So, we went to the game. It was so neat... normally before the game, the kids huddle up and put their hands together and say, "Go Team!" or "Get some hits!" Or whatever. But tonight, my husband said that they did that and said, "Nathan!" My son got a kick out of that. So, he sat in the dugout with his team for the last hour of their game. And they won.

Now... here is the difficult part... this is my most active child. And doctor's instructions are that he is not to do anything active for 10-14 days! No sports (we have a basketball hoop in our backyard). His next playoff game is in nine days. I've already told him that he is going to miss that game... but my goodness... I don't know how I am going to keep him not-so-active in the next couple of weeks!! He's not a "sit-down" child, KWIM?

So, anyway..... that was my afternoon/evening. I'm tired.

And since I'm a avid scrapbooker... you know that I took a picture, right?   You can see the imprint of the baseball seam on his nose.  Bless his sweet heart.  Please pray for him if you think of it over the next few weeks.

~LISA

Over on HK, we were issued a challenge to get over being self conscious and get on the other side of the camera!  One of my HK sisters recently lost her 18-month-old son due to a tragic accident and she has shared how grateful she is for the many pictures she has of him.  Hence, this challenge to get out from behind the camera.  So, here are my pictures that we did for this challenge:

Here I am with all three of my precious ones!  And below are ones with each individual child and some with my hubbyman. 

Now it's YOUR turn!!  Get out from behind that camera and get some pictures of you with your family!  You won't regret it! 

~LISA

For Mother's Day, I got gift cards to Old Navy and so my sweet hubby let me have a "Girl's Day Out" with my mom today, while he stayed home with our children.  We had so much fun!  We were gone all day!!  We went to Old Navy and spent a couple hours there trying on clothes!  I never do this!  It was so fun.  Then, my mom and I went to lunch and got a smoothie.  Then we went to Kohls because I had a gift card that I received for Christmas and hadn't used yet!  I really needed a new bathing suit.  Boy, that was not fun.  I really hate trying to find a bathing suit.  I did find a pretty cute one.  It's the kind that has a skirt for the bottom. 

Let's see.... then we went to Barnes and Nobles because I had a gift card for there, too!   Can you tell I just never go shopping?   I used the gift cards to get fun travel games and activity books for our road trip later this year.  Then, my mom and I got some dinner before going home. 

It was a lot of fun, but I really blew it on my food points today.... honestly, I didn't think I did THAT bad until I got home and added up the points.  Good thing I exercised today.   I haven't been adding in my activity points, so hopefully that will show on the scale.  We shall see.

Anyway... just felt like sharing before heading off to bed.  Hope you have a blessed week!

~ Lisa

Well, tonight was the end of my boys' regular season games.  That doesn't mean we are done with baseball yet, though.  Playoffs start next week!    So, guess what happened at Nathan's game tonight?  I think I sprained my ankle!  Guess how I did that?  I was jumping up and down.  Guess why I was jumping up and down?  My Nathan hit a homerun over the centerfield fence!! 

I was sitting out past the homerun fence in left field and when he hit the ball, I shot up and started jumping up and down and screaming like a looney mom!  LOL  It wasn't until a few minutes later that I started feeling a burning pain sensation in my right ankle.  I had no idea why it was hurting.  It wasn't until I was driving home that I realized the pain hadn't started until after the homerun.  I can't believe I hurt it jumping up and down.  Gee... that makes me feel old!  LOL

So, now I'm sitting here with an ice pack on my ankle and praying that the swelling goes own.  Yes, it's swollen!  And throbbing!  :(  But, my son hit his first homerun and it was a great memory!!! 

My boys are on different teams this year because of their ages, so playoffs will be interesting.  Ryan's team has not done very well during the season, so I'm not expecting them to go very far.  You never know, though.  Nathan's team, however, was undefeated this season.  So, I have high hopes for his team to go far in the playoffs.  It should be lots of fun. 

And speaking of end of the season, school is wrapping up here.  There's really only one more week of real school left.  The last week of school is full of field trips and classroom parties.   I'm looking forward to the end of school.  I will post our plans for next year soon.  I'm still trying to figure a few things out.  Like what I'm going to do for history!  LOL 

Hope you have a blessed weekend!

How was your weekend?  We had a good day today. 

CHURCH:  We have been going through the book of 1 Timothy, and today was on chapter six, verses one through ten.  I can sum it up in two words:  ATTITUDE AND CONTENTMENT.    It seems I can always benefit from a reminder regarding those two things.  It's so easy to become negative and down and discontent, isn't it?  The bottom line right from the Scripture:  If I cannot be content with the basic necessities of life, then I will never be content with anything.  That is certainly something to consider, isn't it?  Wow.  That just really gave me the right mindset for the remainder of the day.

After church, we went and got our children some new shoes - why is it that boys do not tell you when they have HOLES in their shoes?  Good grief!  Both of my boys' shoes were horrendous!  I can't believe that they didn't disinigrate right before my eyes!  LOL 

Hubby and I really wanted to go out to eat at La Salsa, but we showed self control and went home to eat.  We are trying to save for our upcoming road trip and instead of eating out on Sundays as we usually do, we are taking that budgeted money and saving it for our trip.  Hard now, but I know we will be glad we did later on.  It's a good lesson for our children, too. 

Hubby made spaghetti and meatballs and I made myself some of my favorite pineapple salad and ate a huge bowl of it.  I'm not a big fan of spaghetti, but my hubby is and the kids like it.  So, I just make myself a big salad when they have spaghetti.  :) 

Anyway, it's Sunday evening, and I feel like I've gotten a head start on tomorrow.  I already cut up meat and veggies and put it all in the crockpot.  I have the crockpot in the fridge and tomorrow I will only have to get up, take the crockpot out of the fridge and plug it in.  That will give me time to eat a healthy breakfast.  :) 

I've also written out each child's school goals for the week.  This has been working well for us.  My boys like to play video games.  We've always limited it to Friday evenings only.  However, the last month of school, it finally dawned on me to create an opportunity to teach them to be responsible for their own work.  Usually Monday morning (although, I did it tonight instead), I write out on their goal card what they need to get done in each subject by Friday.  They can choose to do more work each day, which will give them (and me) Friday off of school.  Or not.  That's fine, too.  However, they must get all of their goals done by Friday or else they cannot play video games.  For my boys, this is a huge incentive.  It only took the first week of me following through with that plan for them to realize what they must do!  Complete their work!  And I don't prod them along either!  It's a lesson in reality, as far as I see it.  :)

We only have three weeks left of school, and I am really looking forward to this school year ending.  I'm excited about our summer and our next school year when my kiddos will be home full time with me again.  I've got our curriculum pretty much (almost) figured out.  I just need to prayerfully work on a daily routine/schedule and how I'm going to get it all in.  But that... I'll have to share for another blog entry, as I need to get myself to bed.  :)

Blessings to you on your week!

Content in Christ ~ Lisa

I had fun Friday evening and Saturday scrapbooking with my mom again. I will try to take some pictures and post them soon. I got 24 pages done!! Woo-hoo!!

Hubby and I got our taxes done finally last night. Glad that's done!

This week, I'm hoping to clean out my pantry, the boys' room/toys/clothes, and my office, as well as finish up Managers of Their Chores and set up a chore system before we head back to school next week.

Think it can be done? ;)

How are you doing on your spring cleaning??

I pray you had a wonderful day of renewal and refreshment in the Lord!  He is risen!  He is risen indeed!! 

• Play with my kids!! They've been busy with school and I've been so busy with work, we haven't had much play time together.
• Yes, my kids will still be doing a little bit of school everyday. Two weeks of no math just won't work around here!
• Declutter... DECLUTTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!
• In other words, clean out my closet
• Clean out the kids' clothes
• Clean out kids' rooms
• Clean out my office
• Clean out the pantry
• Clean the inside of my fridge
• Get school files and papers in order
• Finish reading Managers of Their Chores and create Chorepaks
• Do our taxes (this one's not optional, is it?)
• Continue planning out our three-week road trip that we are going to be taking this summer!
• Scrapbook!!

Anything else I think of between now and then!

How about you? What are your plans this Spring?

Well... I'm so tired!  Who's not?  I don't think I've yet to meet another mom who's not tired!  LOL 

Let's see... my husband and I were considering taking the kids out of the school that they are in due to a myriad of reasons (the main one being financial); however, we have decided to have them finish out the year where they started.  I am annoyed at myself for fretting over it for the past two weeks instead of just waiting on the Lord for His answer in His time.  I don't know why the Lord makes us wait for answers to things, especially things that I feel I needed to know in a timely manner... but nevertheless, He is always faithful to answer when we seek Him. 

My husband and I spent all day today planning a three-week road trip we are going to be taking this summer.  Our first family vacation.  I am so excited!!  I am going to be getting lots of library books between now and then on all of the various places we are going to be visiting in hopes of spreading my excitement to them!  Two places that we are going to be stopping that I'm most excited about are Mt. Rushmore and Springfield, Illinois, which is the hometown of Abraham Lincoln.  Of course, we are going to be visiting family along the way in between these stops, so that just makes it all the more special.  So much to prepare for all the time it seems.  :)  I'm so blessed.

I'm not working as much nowadays.  I lost one of my accounts.  I'm actually kind of glad, even though it makes our financial situation tighter... but it is the Lord's doing and so we rely on Him for provision. 

I just wanted to stop in and say hi.  These are my tired ramblings... I'll share more another day when I am more awake.  LOL  :)

Blessings,

Lisa

I really do not want to complain about my life.  Life is good.  I am blessed.  Truly, I am. 

I just don't know how to slow my life down.  Life is so busy, and I feel like I'm just along for the ride whatever may come with no say.  I know ultimately God has the final say in what happens in my day.  Attitude and effort.  I'm always telling my kids that those are the only two things they can control... their attitude and effort. 

So, I do my best with what comes my way and try to keep a smile on my face and thankfulness in my heart.  I just wish I could get a little more on top of things.  I used to be... I used to be... where did that person go?

I have so many books I want to read.  I don't have the time.  I've had so much work for the month of January, that if I had any time at all, I was working.  And yes, I have to work.  I have to.  It's not an option.  It pays our bills.  My husband has a really good job with good benefits, too.  Where we live, the cost of living is high and we aren't moving either.

My boys are involved in sports.  They enjoy it.  My husband wants them to have the opportunity to be involved... so I am the one driving everyone around town.  LOL

So, this is where I'm at for this season of life.   I'm really not complaining!  I'm just venting a bit... if I hold it all in, I think I may burst.    Sometimes I just get so weary of the "have to's" and wish I had more time for the "want to's." 

Life is good and I am blessed.  Even though I may not be doing all of the things that *I* wish to be doing at this very moment (like scrapbooking and reading, cleaning up and getting things more organized again). 

How about you?  Are you busy?  Do you have to work from home while homeschooling your children?  Does your husband work long hours or is away from home for periods of time?  How do you manage?  Do you sleep?  LOL 

And to blog-related items.  Why is HSB so much slower since the change?  And does anyone know of a graphics site that has free headers?  I can't seem to find one I like.... one that fits that big space at the top of my blog... and if I had the time, I'd do the searching myself.  I actually enjoy doing that.  But like I've said repeatedly already... I don't have the free time. 

Thanks for listening....  I wish I could chat more, but I have to get some work done while I have the chance...

Nathan just turned eight years old.  I can hardly believe it!  He is such a fun person!  He makes me laugh!  He is so sweet and tenderhearted.  He is still my cuddle bug and gives the best hugs.  He's not embarrassed to tell me he loves me in front of his friends.  He is smart and diligent with his school work.  What a blessing he is!! 

We went ice skating on his birthday and had a great time!  :)

It seems that I say that all too often.  I guess at least I'm not giving up, but getting back up and getting back on track.  So many areas to work on. With the holidays, life as we know it just seemed to take a backseat.  Then, my nephew was admitted to the hospital for five days.  He got better and then the guys in my family took turns being sick.  I've been swamped with work since the first of the year.  I haven't been able to stay on top of things at home.  I hate feeling like I'm barely treading water.  Sigh.

But, I know that if I just keep treading, that I will stay afloat and eventually I will be able to start swimming again.  That's how I feel today.  I still have a lot of work, which I'm grateful for since we need the income.  However, today I set the work aside and the kids and I took a good portion of our day cleaning house.  Why does it always feel so good to do that? 

We cleaned out the school area in our home.  That was way past due!  It's all so nice and organized now!  Makes me look forward to Monday.  hee hee ;)

I hope to switch my older son back to Math-U-See within this next week.  I need to sit down and plan out the rest of the year and submit it to the school he attends for approval.  I also want to sit down and create a home management binder.  I spent way too much time a few evenings ago perusing other blogs and drooling over theirs.  LOL 

Oh, and health-wise, I'm hanging in there.  I need to update my sidebar I think (again).   I've done really good at exercising five days a week regularly.  Some days I really have to force myself to do it, but I'm always glad afterwards.  My mom gave me a book titled You on a Diet.  Supposedly after reading this very thick book, I will know how to lose two inches around my waist within two weeks.  I need more time to read!!!  My pile of books that I want to read is getting higher everday!  LOL

Well, speaking of reading, I need to get back to my proof work.  Just wanted to say hello to all of my fellow bloggers out there.  :)

Well, I know it's been a while since I've blogged.  We had a wonderful two-week vacation during Christmas and New Year's. 

However, shortly after that, the guys in my family all took turns getting sick.  That was basically a two-week ordeal.  No fun at all. 

We are all healthy now, but I'm trying to get back on track and back to a regular schedule.  School is back in session and the kids are doing well.  I've had a huge workload, so that has been taking up much of my "spare" time.  I have so many books that I am itching to start reading, but I just cannot seem to make the time! 

Over at Hearthkeepers, I've joined a group of women in our own "Biggest Loser" contest and I'm doing my best to stay on track with my eating and exercise.  Since December 18th, I have consistently exercised five days a week for a minimum of 30 minutes each time.  That's the biggest change in this new year for me personally.  The weight still isn't coming off as quickly as I would like, but I'm trying to not become discouraged. 

I'm also trying to declutter - again.  It seems that this is a never-ending chore.  How we accumulate so much stuff is beyond me.  I started today taking pictures of stuff to sell onmy eBay and I'll be listing the items within the next few days.  I always start everything at .99 cents, so hopefully everything will sell.  Whatever doesn't will be bagged up and taken to our local thrift store as a donation.

My husband and I are discussing what we will be doing for school next year.  I'm anticipating some changes... I'll share more about that later as we come to a decision.  Please pray for us to be united and at peace with however God leads us. 

Well, that's all for now.  I need to get back to decluttering while I have some time to do so. 

Blessings to you in the new year!