Jan. 10, 2009
Making Muffins
Elizabeth has been asking for an apron lately, and this morning I found the time to make one for her. As soon as I handed it to her she said, "Can we make something?" So, of course, we made muffins! I have a yummy recipe for pumpkin chocolate chip muffins that everyone loves. Enjoy the pics of the girls at work and the new apron.   |
Dec. 28, 2008
Christmastime in Florida
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The sky is a brilliant, cloudless expanse of blue. The sun is shining intensely. The breeze is blowing across my feet as I type, and my wacky children are swimming in the pool! More like jumping in, screaming at each other about how cold it is, and then jumping out. But they have been doing this for several minutes now. We may not have the acreage we dream about. We have to deal with neighborhood bylaws that we don't like. But we have a sweet little piece of paradise right here. I'll take it! |
Nov. 29, 2008
Thanksgiving Blessings
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Happy Thanksgiving to everyone. We had an excellent day with our local family. Mark's parents are in North Carolina, but we'll see them at Christmastime. My sister and her husband were a gracious hosts and we had a blast hanging out together. Their two sons, their wives, and two grandchildren were there along with my parents and our family of six. The weather was perfect, the company awesome, and the food plentiful and delicious. We always have much to be thankful for, but this year was made a little more precious to me after my cancer scare in the Fall. Everything is just a little sweeter now  Enjoy some pictures of the day:My Sister and I  Some cousins with Grandmom at the sandbox.  The rest of my pictures won't upload for some reason, but I"ll work on it! Happy Thanksgiving from our home to yours. |
Nov. 21, 2008
Survey Says...
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Here is a fun survey I copied from Jen's blog.
1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Wrapping paper, but I can't put the gifts out until Christmas eve or the cat will eat through the paper.
2. Real tree or Artificial? Artificial - I can't keep anything green very long. We went over to the "dark side" after having to take all the ornaments off of two trees one year because they lost all their needles before Christmas day.
3. When do you put up the tree? Day after Thanksgiving
5. Do you like eggnog? No. Totally disgusting.
6. Favorite gift received as a child? Baby Alive - loved this doll.
7. Hardest person to buy for? Teenage nephew
8. Easiest person to buy for? My girls - they still love everything
9. Do you have a nativity scene? Several
10. Mail or email Christmas cards? Snail mail a photo card
11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? A vacuum cleaner that I actually asked for. Be careful what you wish for...
12. Favorite Christmas Movie? Elf. I broke my own "not before Thanksgiving rule" and watched it two nights ago.
13. When do you start shopping? October
14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Recycled? No. Donated to charity? You bet.
15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Um - do I have to pick? Probably some kind of cookie.
16. Lights on the tree? Yes - now we have a pre-lit tree. Best invention ever.
17. Favorite Christmas song? Silent Night.
18.Travel at Christmas or stay home? Stay home.
19. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer’s? Of course, but only if I sing it.
20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Love our angel, but the fake tree won't hold her weight so now it is a foil star.
21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? Morning
22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year The fact that stores start marketing in August
23. Favorite ornament theme or color? Homemade tacky kids' ornaments
24. Favorite for Christmas dinner? Turkey and stuffing.
25. What do you want for Christmas this year? Already got it - a clean bill of health and the best family around.
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Jul. 30, 2008
(Almost) Wordless Wednesday
 May 24. A proud mom and dad with the happy graduate. On our way north. No, we didn't let them ride that way all the way to DC! |
Jul. 27, 2008
The ations continue
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College Orientation: Two days designed to cram into your brain all of the information that you will need to know about the next four years of your child's life. Well, school-wise anyway. Whom to pay, how much to pay them, and exactly how to do it. Did you know that a student ID can serve as a room key, debit card, credit card, meal plan ticket, vending machine token, and your ID? Don't want to lose that puppy. In my last post I mentioned that our oldest will be heading off to university in the Fall. He and I attended orientation a week and a half ago and were overwhelmed by the whole thing. He was able to meet with some helpful advisors and one not so helpful advisor. Fortunately the helpful ones were later in the day and he ended up with a fantastic schedule. He got the honors classes he wanted, and was able to sign up for a mandatory introductory class for his major. It's all good... By the way, kids are so spoiled at college these days. I'm a little bit envious of all the perks he'll be getting, but I don't want to go back and do all the hard work over again just so I can play at a top notch fitness center, have meals prepared for me three times a day, and get maid service. Well, maybe I'd better think that one over... On to the next ation - Last week was an awesome week of vacation bible school at our church. We are in a huge growth mode and had to spread our VBS out over 3 campuses: preschool in one building, elementary down the road, and the 5th - 7th graders were at a neighboring church that was kind enough to lend us their youth building for the week. I love it when God's people work together for His glory and cross church/denominational lines! Anyway, I was snack lady for the elementary group. We fed between 90 and 100 hungry little people in five shifts throughout the morning. It was lots of fun, and I love being in the snack room. I get to feed kids fun and junky snacks, so I am at an advantage when they walk in the door! No problem winning this crowd over- the food speaks for itself! We got to share God's love with them all, and even spoke about a fantastic mission we support in Haiti. (of course we supported the main lesson each day, but I especially liked drawing Haiti into the lesson) I even met Amy from over at Humble musings . Great week, met some wonderful people, and got to love on lots of children. Couldn't have gone better. Final ation of this strange post series: Facebook nation During the above mentioned college orientation, we quickly realized that ours is a facebook nation. Many groups and organizations from the university communicate through Facebook. DS#1 needed to open a facebook page, so I signed up for one just to be involved on that front. I am amazed at the number of "old" people like me who have pages! I have connected with a couple of friends from high school and keep "running into" new people all the time. I am still wary of the whole concept, but am also discovering some positive things that come from it. The fact that I have to completely disable our internet filter to access Facebook sends a BIG red flag up for me. There are safeguards in place, though, and you have to go looking for the bad to find it. It's definitely out there, but if kids use the program responsibly I think it will be a good communication tool for them. Raise them up, send them out, and then trust their judgement. Hard life lessons... There you have it. No posts for a month and then two in one day. Hope your Sunday was blessed and your week ahead is a great one! |
Jul. 27, 2008
Where have I been?
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High School Graduation Summer Vacation College Orientation Bible School -ization It's a Facebook nation Well, I was on a roll and couldn't stop. Things have been quite busy around here. Who ever said that summer is a slow time of year didn't live around my house. Sharky and I were talking the other day and decided that we are ready for the routine of school-time to begin again. I am having a hard time with my back to school shopping this year. For the first time in 10 years we will be sending one of our children "off" to school. We are very, very proud of all of his accomplishments. He is an outstanding academic scholar (with the scholarships to prove it!) and is a young man who desires to do his best for God's Kingdom here on Earth. In fact, right now he is in the middle of a two week camp that Summit Ministries is hosting at Bryan College in TN. He is loving it! I'm anxious to hear how yesterday's caving expedition went. Yes, my son is now a spelunker! But I digress... Back to school shopping... My youngest and I were in Target yesterday, and then later Walmart, picking up bargain notebooks and folders for our upcoming year. That was the purpose, but it looked more like this: put a folder in the cart, go buy sheets to send off with #1...get a pack of notebooks, buy a stapler, tape, paper clips, trash can, desk organizer, and pencil caddy for #1's dorm room... look for notebook paper, try not to cry over the scissors I'm buying because #1 can't just come to the kitchen to borrow ours. It was an emotional trip to the store :-) He doesn't leave for another month and I'm already a wreck. It's the way God designs it, but the letting go part is SO HARD on moms! Dad will realize it later, like as we are driving up to the dorms, but I've been processing this for at least 6 months and it is not getting any easier! We had an awesome family vacation in Washington DC in early June. We tied it in with #1's Odyssey of the Mind World Championship competition. We did lots of OM activities but stayed after the closing ceremonies and visited relatives in Maryland. We also toured Amish Country in PA and headed back into DC for one more touring day. It was an excellent vacation with only one drawback. Our #2 son brought home a very unwanted souvenir: Lyme Disease. We stayed in our pop-up camper in a great campground in College Park, MD. Evidently one of the lovely ticks from the woods there traveled partway home with us. #2 found it on him in the hotel we stayed in on the way home. I told him to watch for a rash and sure enough, a week to the day later, he came out of his room showing me a classic bullseye rash. We were off to the doctor's office where we created quite a stir. Lyme Disease is quite rare here in Florida, and the Dr. had only seen two cases before. She had all of the providers in the office tour through and take a look at M's lovely rash. Poor boy was a live science experiment! He is just finishing up his course of antibiotics and we hope to never see another trace of Lyme. I didn't make it through my "ation" list, but it's time for church. I'll continue on my next entry which will hopefully not be 3 months away. |
Jun. 18, 2008
Lost No More
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If any of you have been looking for an inspirational, Godly, and extremely funny blogger friend who appeared to fall off the face of the blogging world, search no longer! JenIg is now at www.jeneralities.com Happy reading! P.S. Jen's running a fun contest right now, too. Swing by and check it out. |
May. 22, 2008
Prayer Request
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Many of you may have heard by now, but the Steven Curtis Chapman family needs our prayers. A tragic accident yesterday took the life of the youngest Chapman. Maria was 5 years old. The fact that her older brother was driving the car that hit her compounds the tragedy. This family is such an inspiration to so many families, and they are champions for adoption around the world. Please lift them up in prayer today and in the future. |
May. 20, 2008
May 20, 2001
 Seven years ago today, a woman in far-off China gave birth to a healthy baby girl. She loved this child enough to place her in a safe spot. This child was soon found and given excellent care while she waited for her forever family to travel around the world and bring her home. Happy Birthday, Rebecca. You are God's gift to us, and I am so happy to be your mommy! |
May. 15, 2008
Camping Fun
Our family enjoyed a fun weekend at Hanna Park in Jacksonville not too long ago. The main draw here is dirt. The secondary draw is the plethora of cool bike trails all over the park. Here you see Sharky Dog and our youngest partaking in my favorite camping activity: roasting marshmallows. Me with the finished product - a perfect s'more. This face says it all... We rode our bike to lots of playgrounds all over the park. This was one of the best spots to stop. Believe it or not, this is our prissy girly girl. See what camping does to a person?  Look Daddy, I dug a super deep hole!  Here the boys are supervising Sharky as he packs up for the journey home. Our next camping adventure will take us to Washington D.C. We can't wait! |
May. 2, 2008
Atlanta in Review
Here are the promised pictures of our trip to Atlanta. These only catch a brief bit of our trip. Most of the time we enjoyed talking to each other while the children entertained themselves in many creative ways! The trip was fantastic, and here are a few snapshots from it: Visiting the American Girl Store - we know it is overpriced and ostentatious, but we did it anyway. And we were rewarded with huge smiles :-) (Just not in this picture...)  Waiting to ride the fantastic carousel upstairs from the AGS.   Happy girls doing their best princess imitations.  One of Booknhome's daughters riding the perfect animal for her - a bobcat with a dead bird in its mouth. This one cracked me up! Perfect for a rough and tumble girl.  This is about all I saw of my #2 son during the visit - a blur doing something outside! This was shot as he whizzed by on the zipline. Note the filthy jeans. Boy heaven.  Proud lumberjacks standing by the raised garden bed they helped construct by chopping down trees off the property they live on. This was an awesome activity for my guy, since we live in a neighborhood with small lots and not many trees at all. Very cool. |
Apr. 17, 2008
A camping we will go...
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We're excited around here because we leave tomorrow for a fun weekend of camping. We'll be headed for Hanna Abbey Park in Jacksonville. My kids love it there - lots of bike trails for the boys and dirt for the girls. Yes, what good is a camping trip if you can't wallow in the dirt for a good portion of it? The kids and I just got back Friday from a 5 day trip to Atlanta. I hope to post some pictures of that when we get home from this next trip. A good time was had by all while we visited with great friends. Our children all get along so well that we hardly see them while they are together. It is shaping up to be a busy spring! Finally, we are off to pick up #3's new pair of glasses. I was greeted at the Sunday school door last weekend with an apologetic teacher and a chagrined child holding pieces of her glasses. Somehow they were completely destroyed during the lesson. (can you say 'active listener'?) We left first thing Monday for Atlanta, and so she has been squinting and rubbing her eyes for a week and a half. I'm thrilled to get the new pair before we leave for this weekend. Hope you are enjoying beautiful Spring weather wherever you are. Happy weekend! |
Apr. 4, 2008
Art in the Park
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My girls recently had the opportunity to participate in a chalk art competition at a local park. My goodness there are some talented chalk artists around here! The theme of this year's contest was "Life Under the Indian River Lagoon" and most of the contestants did a fantastic job keeping with the theme. The winning portrait featured a mermaid, which kind of puzzled me, but it was a beautiful picture. Better keep an eye out for her next time we are out in the boat The contest morning dawned clear and warm, and my little artists were VERY excited about the contest. They each had a 50 by 50 inch square to fill. That is a very big space when you are only three feet tall! They both did fantastic and their drawings are posted below. Some of the detail was lost when they colored in all of the water, but the morning was a blast and they are already planning what to draw for next year!   The happy artists:  I'll leave you with an image of something that most kittens of little girls have to endure:  |
Mar. 28, 2008
Wow - long time no blog!
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I cannot believe I have not posted since September. Do you think our year has been busy? Yikes. Today is no exception to the business factor, but I wanted to take a minute and just say that we are still here. I posted on Sockmonkey's blog, and she actually replied while I was trying to remember how to post, upload pictures, etc.. I'm a bit rusty! There is no way to write about all that has happened, but as Flylady says, I'm not behind. I"ll just start where I am today :-) Here is the newest addition to our home:  Chloe joined our chaos three weeks ago today. She is hilarious and we all love watching her tear through the house. Literally...  The poor dolls didn't know what hit them! Now that I've broken the non-posting spell, I hope to be back more often. I'm off to get the younger ones ready for a sleepover at a friend's house while we take #1 off to a reception hosted by the president of the university he will attend in August. Tomorrow holds Scholar's Day activities, and Sharky, #1 and I are going to spend the night in O-town instead of driving back and forth. Should be fun. I know I'll post more later about my major stress about sending one off to college! We are extremely proud of him, though, as he earned a full scholarship and is a National Merit Scholar! I'll leave you with an image that all of us busy homeschool moms can relate to:  May you sleep this well tonight! |
Sep. 14, 2007
Double Take, Please
A quick peek into the daily life here. Last night as I stood in the kitchen I observed my son helping his little sister put on his goggles. I was so caught up in the fact that he was helping her do something and being sweet that I didn't give it much thought. Fast forward 5 minutes later, I stepped out onto the back porch where SharkyDog and the other kids were. What do I see in the back yard? My precious little girl (WildWoman) holding an airsoft machine gun, crouching behind an easel that had been dragged into the grass for a prior battle between #2 and SD. Across the lawn was, you gussed it, the same young man who had just so kindly helped his sister suit up for battle! And he was armed, as well. Did I mention that Sharky was watching this whole scenario play out and wasn't stopping it????? Enter one hysterical mom and the battle was canceled before the first shot was fired, but it was close. Phew. We told #3 that she may get the opportunity to play airsoft in 6 years or so, but not before then. I'm sure she'll be counting down the days... Wish I had my camera to snap a picture before I burst everyone's bubbles. It was cute, just a little too dangerous for my taste. |
Sep. 2, 2007
Goodbye crazy Summer, hello Fall!
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Our family had an incredibly busy summer this year. My boys traveled, and then traveled, and then traveled some more! Here is a brief synopsis of our wonderfully hectic "time off": Memorial Day Weekend - 5 of us headed off to the FPEA convention in Orlando and had a wonderful time. We were missing our oldest, though, who was in Michigan winning the Odyssey of the Mind world title with his team (yes, I had to bring that up again ) June 18 - 27 - My three guys took a fabulous journey out west to explore part of our big country. That was one of his realizations when Sharky Dog was planning this trip - out West is BIG! Here in Florida we can say that if something is 60 miles away, it will take one hour to get there. Things are a little different when you have to drive around things like canyons and mountains! Anyway, they had a great trip, saw lots of sights, and took over 1000 pictures.   We hope to go again when the girls are bigger and I don't have to worry about my wild girl going over the edge of the Grand Canyon. June 30 - July 7 - Our great friends, booknhome and family, all came to stay for a week. We all love each other so much and the kids all get along famously. We swam, went to the movies, ate brownies, and just sat and talked for hours. It was a fantastic visit. July 9 - 13 - VBS at church. All of us attended or helped in some way and it was a great and busy week. July 22 - 27 - Sharky Dog and #1 were off for a week of Youth Camp with our church's youth program.  Next year #2 will get to attend as well and he is looking forward to it. The camp went very well and several students gave their lives to Christ for the first time. That's why we do this!!!August 4 - 10 -  The three boys were off again, this time on a mission trip to help the city of New Orleans in its recovery process. 50 men, women, and teens from Georgianna spent a hot, dirty week doing demolition and reconstruction in the Upper 9th Ward, a very hard-hit area of the city. It was a moving week for all who went, and everyone came home with a greater appreciation of the blessed lives we live.We girls stayed busy with swim team activities,  playing with friends, and taking care of all the pets. It was a fun, busy summer but this mama is ready for some structure! We are back in school mode and things are settling down nicely. I hope to blog more regularly now that things are back on track. |
Aug. 13, 2007
Deck the Halls with Back to School?
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Well, this one takes the cake. I thought it was odd two weeks ago when we saw some Halloween decorations going up in the local Hallmark shop. I was disgusted when, later that same week, we were in the Dollar Tree and they had Christmas baskets and floral arrangements displayed for sale. My brain figured that maybe they had those out so crafters could get a jump on the season. Too early, but that made a little more sense. Today, I received my first Christmas catalog in the mail. August 13. Christmas catalog. There is no way I can make sense of that one. I'm typing this while my little ones swim, the papayas ripen on our tree, and my husband does his best cabana-boy impression. (vacuuming the pool!) I am in no way ready to deck my halls with Christmas anything. I MIGHT be able to twist it a little and say that as Christians we should celebrate Christmas everyday, but I think even that may be a stretch. We can celebrate Christ without ceramic snowmen and plastic trees in August It's nice to be back in the blogging world. My next post will update everyone - all of my faithful relatives, I mean readers, on our busy, busy summer. My three guys had quite the adventurous season and we have lots of pictures to prove it. |
Jun. 8, 2007
I love living in Florida (reason #427)
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I am so blessed to live here in Florida. Above is just one of many reasons why. (photo by NASA) Today's successful launch of Atlantis was beautiful. Great job launch team! As I was typing this message, #2 called me outside. This is what we saw:  This is the smoke/vapor trail from the shuttle being blown by the wind into a gorgeous pattern. (photo by me) God's artwork in the sky! Happy weekend to all. |
Jun. 3, 2007
Whew!
Boy have we been busy since my last post. My big girl turned 6 a couple of weeks ago. Where has the time gone? We celebrated with a kids' swimming party on Saturday followed by a small family gathering on Sunday. It's hard to get organized for a party right at the end of the school year, but we managed and she enjoyed basking in the spotlight, her favorite place! Here she is enjoying one of her favorite birthday gifts: A fishing pole of her very own! There is actually a small fish on the end of the line in this pic. The following weekend was the FPEA convention which we attended as a family minus one - details to follow. I always love to go and feel like I'm not strange or different - everyone else there homeschools, too! There were several great speakers and of course the vendor hall was fabulous. DH went to several worldview lectures and enjoyed those immensely. I left the deep thinking to him and went to a session on making lapbooks with Tamy Duby from Tobin's Lab. I'm going to try to incorporate this technique in my girls' coming school year. Looks like lots of prep work but fun, too. Every year there seems to be one thing we buy without really planning for it. This year that "thing" was a pair of violins. We are trying to give the kids more opportunities to explore their musical sides and this looks like a good way to do it. I'll let you know how this progresses. Right now things are peachy, as evidenced by this happy face:  Back to where I said we attended as a family minus one. Our oldest was in Michigan with his Odyssey of the Mind team. They were competing in the World Finals of OM. It was painful to put him on the airplane with his coaches and teammates and not one of us! The kids and coaches were staying together on the campus at Michigan State University, so we wouldn't have been together as a family anyway. He was covered by lots of prayer and sent on his way early Wednesday morning. Thursday the rest of us went to the convention, and then on Saturday night we were able to watch the awards ceremony live via the OM website. I'm so thankful for good technology! Another family joined us in our hotel room as we watched our son's team place FIRST in the WORLD! I jumped up and down and screamed with joy, which caused our youngest to dive under the pillows and scream in fear. Poor thing. That set off #3, so we had all kinds of commotion going on. I'm surprised hotel security wasn't called to our room! We were able to watch our son and his team walk across the stage to receive their gold medals and trophy live online. It was an awesome moment. The following day we packed up and left the convention and stopped at the airport to pick #1 son up on our way home. Here is the official greeting committee, which was joined later by other families and well wishers. We spent anxious moments awaiting the arrival of the team. It was time for their flight to arrive but we just hadn't seen any sign of our crew. Finally another waiting dad asked a departing passenger which flight he had been on. He answered, "From Detroit, and yes they are on this plane." Gee, I wonder how he knew who we were talking about? The flight crew even got off before our guys and joked that they left the kids in Michigan. At long last the victorious team arrived and we were able to snap this happy picture: Do you think the funny hats gave them away? Maybe it was the gold medals they were wearing around their necks or the gigantic trophy they stored in the overhead compartment! We love our goofy world champs  So I finally updated my blog and it was a lulu of an entry. I'm off to check out what all of YOU have been doing! |