My 2 Kids For Him
Jul. 23, 2008
It's been almost a month since my last entry and I can't remember what's happened more than 3 days ago , so I'll just write about my dd's birthday:) On Monday of this week my dd celebrated her 14th birthday. We are so proud of the young lady she is growing up to be. She had about 21 kids (or should I say teens) over for her party Monday evening and 7 girls slept over. Well, actually only 3 of them slept. I expected them to stay up really late, but my dd and 4 others stayed awake ALL night. Yep, only 3 girls went to sleep. Here is a slide show of her party and sleepover.
I made her an ice cream cake like the one I described below for ds's birthday. They played several games and I think a great time was had by all. The first game they played had 2 teams, had to put on a pair of boxers (over their clothing of course), get to the finish line with a balloon between their legs, pop it with no hands or feet, run back take their boxers off and the next person had to do the same thing. It was so funny watching them play this game. I think the next game was called dragons tail where they formed a line and place their hands on the persons shoulders in front of them, and the first person had to get the "tail" from the last person without breaking the "dragon". Then they played the lifesaver game....I think the Brithday Girl was the only one that couldn't get the candy on the toothpick. Sorry Chasity, I just had to tell that. I'm not sure what the next game was called, but they passed around a trashbag full of clothing items, accessories, and even some lipstick, etc. When the music stopped, whoever had the bag had to pick an item from the bag without looking and put the item on. It was really funny. Then they went outside and played Sardines (basically hide and go seek for those of you who've never heard of it) until about 11:30. Right before the game of Sardines ds set off the rest of his fireworks he had left from the 4th of July. Then all the ones who weren't staying left and the girls played a few more games, and popped some popcorn and started a movie at around 1:30 am. I somehow managed to roll out of the bed at 7:30 to cook pancakes for the girls. On Tuesday, Chasity and her friend Kasey slept from 1:00 to 4:00 and woke up asking to go the mall:)Chasity had a great 14th Birthday! |
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Jun. 29, 2008
Ds celebrated his 12th birthday a week ago. He had a pool party at my aunts house. Here is a picture of him and his guest....![]() Several of his cousins and a few friends didn't get to come. I made my first attempt at making an ice cream cake.... It was 4 layers of cake with ice cream between each layer and cool whip was the icing. It was actually really good![]() Happy 12th Birhtday Chase! I honestly can not believe he's 12.....just doesn't sound right. He mostly received money for his birthday and has been purchasing fireworks. ![]() ![]() Saturday was dd's last dance competition this summer. It was the Dance Machine Nationals. And believe it or not my hubby actually rode with us.....only because we didn't stay the whole day:) One of the girls had lost an uncle the day before in a car accident so she wasn't able to come. This particular girl happened to be my dd's partner in several areas of the routine. So right before they danced, they had to redo those areas of the routine. But they still did really good. They received an Awesome Gold award. Sat. night we gave dh a surprise 40th birthday party. ![]() ![]() I think maybe that's the camera strap on the side of the picture....not sure. If you can see the chair he's sitting in, his brother made it for him. Anyway, we just invited family, which was still 30 people. I didn't really think we'd be able to pull off the surprise part of it, but after having told a few lies we managed. Fri. night dd and I decorated the church fellowship bldg., and he kept asking what was taking us so long at Wal-Mart:)Happy Big 4 0 Birthday to my hubby! One last thing before I head to finish laundry. A few hours ago my SIL that lives behind us through the woods had a big black snake in the cage with their baby chicks. He had already managed to kill 3 to 4 chicks, but we had no idea how to get him out of the cage. Remember.....2 ladies who are VERY SCARED of snakes....... She finally was able to pin his head against the wire and we tried to shoo out the babies but only one came out.. She jumped and the shovel came off his head and he went down to the ground and we just screamed....and screamed some more. He couldn't get out of the cage.....he was getting stuck where he had a chick in him. Anyway, to make a long story short....she had a shovel, I had a shovel.....and we finally killed it. I hear "you shouldn't kill black snakes"....but what do you do? Let them finish off all the chicks? SIL said they hadn't had any eggs in 3 to 4 days....now she knows why.... |
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Jun. 19, 2008
Wow, once again, it's been a while since I made an entry. A lot has happened the last several weeks. I don't think I've posted since the homeschool covention.....I've finally decided (and purchased ) on the upcoming school years curriculum. I'll share what I'm planning to use and if you'd like to make any comments please do . I'd love to hear your experience with any of these. Dd will be in 9th and ds in 7th.Together: we will do our morning devotions straight from the KJV:) we'll be doing a refresher on NC in a Nutshell Trail Guide to US Geography Dd: Analytical grammar....doing this over 2 yrs. Apologia's Jump In for writing continuing with Spelling Power Vocabulary Cartoons SAT Word Power Teaching Textbooks Alg 1 Notgrass American History...we will do the history, bible, and Literature reading but will skip the writing assignments. I also purchased dd 2 devotional books to add a little more for counting the bible credit. A Beka Physical Science. Rosetta Stone Spanish. Piano lessons She takes 2 to 3 co-op classes one day a week (choir, drama) 2 to 3 dance classes This may sound like a lot for her, but keep in mind she will not do every subject every day. Ds: Growing With Grammar level 6 He'll continue practicing Cursive w/ HWT Sequential Spelling Teaching Textbooks Drive Through History (American) and A Beka History Apologia Science Reading library books. I may slowly add in Jump In, taking it slow. He takes art with co-op 1 day a week. So, I'm excited.... a little nervous about high school, but excited:) I also plan to purchase Homeschool Tracker to help with organization, grades, etc. Now on to other news......dd's drama performance was last week. It went great. They all did such a good job. It was based on the book Little Princess. Here a couple of pics.... For those of you who've read the book......dd is on the left in the top picture....she was Ermengarde, her friend played Sarah on the right. The below pic is the scene of Sarah's birthday. ![]() Other news.....because of the rising gas prices, dh and I have been discussing for quite some time now getting another vehicle. Las week we traded for a Chevrolet HHR. It's not a car I would've ever imagined myself in, but I have to say, I absolutely love it. It says 30 mpg, but I've read several reviews online where people are saying they're getting better than that....so we'll see. It's light grey....I couldn't find a picture online:) ![]() We sold our camper this week. I had a hard time agreeing with this decision because I love camping so. But dh wasn't loving the pop-up life of camping. We had not used it since 06'. We used to have a huge travel trailer with a double slide out and we sold it because we couldn't justify making a monthly payment on something we didn't get to use but a couple of times a year. So we bought the pop-up....no monthly payment...but dh wasn't loving no bathroom....and to be honest I don't know if I could ever get used to being able to hear all the noises outside. Last time we went to the beach in it, a squirrel kept getting on the canvas, right over my bed.:) Well, I need to get off this computer now. I'll try not to wait so long before another entry. Ds will be celebrating his 12th birthday this weekend and dh will be celebrating his BIG 4 0 next weekend, so maybe I'll have something to share. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
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May. 28, 2008
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After about 50 attempts (well, not quiet 50) I have made a slide show to tell you what we've been up to. I also had my entry all typed up, and lost it in the process of trying to do the slide show. My sis-in-law graduated her ds after homeschooling all the way through. Not only should her ds be proud, but so should she. And not just proud of her son, but proud of herself. It's a great accomplishment! Congratulations to Tyler and his mom! The next few pictures are of Chasity's dance recital. I spared you the pictures of the clogging since I've already shared some pics from the competition. And lastly....we were able to take a vacation....and it was great! |
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May. 8, 2008
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Dd's piano recital was tonight. Yay! One more thing off our countdown to summer freedom.:) Everyone played really well tonight. I thought I'd share a video of dd's 2 pieces she played. This first video was a duet she played with another girl. And this is sad, but right now I can't remember the name of it:) And this next video is her 2nd recital piece which I can't remember the name of it either:)) I'll try to come back and edit this post tomorrow with the name of the pieces. Anyway, you'll notice my camera (or me) kinda lost the subject that was being videoed for a few seconds:)) I was managing 2 cameras at one time. And a picture of dd with her piano teacher and her trophy she earned through the points system. She was actually only 5 points away from winning the 2nd place trophy. ![]() Hope you enjoy the videos. We came home to a bad hail storm and are currently still under a tornando watch. Here is what was on our deck to give you an idea..... ![]() I'm going to watch the weather for a few minutes. Good night:) |
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May. 4, 2008
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Well, as of the last couple of days, my blood pressure readings are finally showing normal numbers. After about the first 5 days my Dr. doubled the dose and that seems to be working. We've been super busy, but things are drawing to an end. The only thing left is piano recital and dance recital. A few weeks ago was dd's homeschool choir performance. ![]() And last weekend I endured another dance competition. I say endured because I left my house at 6:30 am and returned at 10:00pm. And dd only had to dance ONE time. We had to wait until awards and then it was 1 1/2 hour drive home....in the rain at night I might add. I felt I had heard enough music and seen enough dancing to last me a lifetime:) ![]() Yesterday we spent the day at the lake with our church outing. It was a beautiful day, but my kids are suffering from all the pollen they inhaled all day yesterday. The sunburn is nothing compared to the allergies:( My ds atayed in the canoe practically ALL day long. Needless to say, he went to sleep as soon as his head hit the pillow last night. Dh and ds got up at 6:30 to get there early and fish, but neither one caught a thing. Here is dd in the back paddle boat....she didn't want to attempt the canoe after seeing someone flip theirs two times....and yep, it was the same person both times:)![]() We're back into babysitting full swing.....well full swing is 2 days a week for us:) Here is dd doing piano practice with her little helper.... Isn't he a cutie. He loves the piano. And lastly ds's baseball season has come to an early end:( We let him quit. Something we've never let our kids do before. They know if they ask to do something, they don't ask to quit. For some reason ds was very unhappy with ball this season. He had made this clear to us over and over and I told him if after 2 games he still felt the same he could quit. I told him this thinking he would love it once the games started and not mention quitting again. But I was badly mistaking. We tried to encourage him but we didn't feel we should make him play as unhappy as he was. Last season he absolutely loved it the whole time...never complained from the beginning to the end. Well that's what has been going on with us. The next 3 weekends will be busy too. And our homeschool conference is in less than 3 weeks now! Yay! I can't wait.....I'm still undecided on next years curriculum and hope to make a decision by then. |
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Apr. 19, 2008
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It's been an interesting week. Well, I guess you would call it interesting?.... I was hit with the finding that I had high blood pressure. Never had an elevated reading before. Circumstances led me to check it....actually the advice of someone else led me to check it:) Anyway, while I was at Wal-Mart getting groceries I happened to see the blood pressure machine and thought, well I'll just see. And....it was high. The top number was near 160 and the bottom 110. I was floored. I checked it 2 more times that day at my moms.....still high. I checked it 3 times the next day....still high.....top ranging from 149 to 163 and bottom ranging from 110 to 116. So.....my mom (who doesn't do Dr.'s visits unless she feels it completely and totally necessary) said I better go to the Dr. So on Friday I made the appointment and the BP reading was even higher. Once by the nurse and once by the Dr. Then I had an electrocardiogram and a kidney test and just generally checked over. So, I'm just asking for prayer that I can get it down. I am taking medication now (first time I've been on medication) and am seeing some slow results, but results none the less. I hope to be able to come off it completely. A friend recommended flax seed....I may give it a try too. |
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Apr. 10, 2008
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We are looking so forward to being finished with school for the summer. Each day gets harder and harder to sit and do our work. At this time of year we seem to get slack in many areas of school. And testing....not looking forward to that either. The test arrived in the mail today so it will be happening in the next week or so. I just need to figure out a time frame when we can have 3 days with no distractions to complete them. Although I am excited and very much looking forward to the state homeschool convention in late May. This is such a busy time of year for us. With everything coming to an end for the summer comes with all the year end recitals/performances/competitions and the extra practices that are thrown in. Not to mention ds's baseball started 3 weeks ago @ 3 practices a week. After the month of May it should only be ball for ds and piano for dd and that will be a nice break:) Last weekend dd was in her first competition. She is taking a clogging competition class this year and she has really enjoyed it. We had to drive 2 hours for the competition, which turned into 3 hours coming home due to rain and several wrecks= very slow moving traffic. Here are a few pics from the competition. ![]() ![]() We are still trying to figure out how they did the awards, but they won the trophy for Gold. It was High Gold, Gold, Silver, then Bronze. They were given points and the points range determined which trophy was awarded. Dd has had many dance recitals, but the competition stuff was new to her and she really had a good time. They will be competing again the end of the month. |
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Apr. 3, 2008
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I was just over at Letitia's blog reading her hysterical vacation story and thought I'd share mine:) I believe it was the summer of 2002 when we took a four night camping trip to the beach. We had a decent size travel trailer and invited our good friends (I'll call them Sue and Tom) to come along and try out the world of camping. Our 2nd day there (actually our 1st full day) the 8 of us were riding our bikes back to the camper after swimming. Dh decides he wants to pass up the 4 kids and rushes forward with great speed only to be brought to a dead stop.....but in a very bad way. When we were leaving the pool, I placed his towel on his handle bars and told him to put it around his neck.....he didn't. The towel fell and wedged between the front tire and fender bringing him to a dead stop. He went airborne, doing a flip in the air, and landing on the back of his neck/head. We all quickly ran to check on him expecting to see a lot of blood, but there was only a small amount behind his ear and LOTS of scrapes all over his body. He wasn't getting up and kept sitting there like he was in deep thought or something. During this episode, Tom had stopped his bike and threw it to the side so fast, he messed up his bike. As he was checking on dh, his wife Sue almost faints thinking about how dh is going to be like a vegetable and I'm going to have to raise the kids alone. So Tom leaves dh's side to take care of Sue. Someone took dh back to our camper in their golf cart and suggested we take him to the hospital and get him checked out. They had to take dh's bicycle apart to get the beach towell out. It was like completely wedged in. My dh kept asking questions like when did we get there and lots of questions about his business....the same questions over and over. Dd (who was 8 at the time) kept asking if her dad was "going crazy":). So Tom and I left to take dh to the hospital while Sue stayed back at the camper with the 4 kids. I might add that it rained the remainder of the day, so she was confined to the camper with 4 energetic kids. We first thought we'd try a First Care center because it was closest (traffic was terrible that day) but they said they didn't have the equipment needed to care for him so back to the van and on to the hospital. All the time dh kept asking the same question about his employees getting paid, etc. When we arrived at the hospital the waiting room was full, and Tom went in and told them we had a head trauma so they took us on back. All the nurses and the Dr. thought dh had been in a motorcycle accident...that's how bad he looked. After the dr. checked him over he began this list of things he was going to do. He would be giving dh shots to numb the scaped areas that needed to be cleaned out (full of lots of dirt and tiny gravel), an xray on the right leg, a cat scan to check the brain, and much to our surprise...he was calling in a plastic surgeon for dh's ear. A chunck was missing from behind his ear. (The dr. had jokingly asked if we brought the rest of dh's ear with us) This couldn't be stitched up without looking deformed so it would need plastic surgery. Dr. walked away, dh went to the restroom, I'm trying to take all this in, all the while remembering the fact that we had no insurance, and I began to hyperventilate (which is something I'm known to do only when really in pain). Now, Tom, who has taken care of dh, taken care of his wife when she was about to pass out, called out to the nurses for help. But they gave none:) Only asked if we needed a paper sack:) I kept telling myself everything was going to be ok...I had to pull myself together. It took the plastec surgeon most of the day to get to the hospital. In the meantime, everything checked out ok with dh. He had a brace on his leg and lots of bandages covering his wounds. When the surgeon arrived we were asked to return to the waiting room. Later they came to get us.....on the way back to see dh, I'm thinking his ear would be all bandaged up.....wrong....they had his whole head bandaged up . I almost lost it when they pulled his cutain back. You could see nothing but a small portion of his face. Not a time to be laughing, but it struck me as really funny. The kids decided to call him marshmallow head. The rest of our vacation he wasn't able to go the ocean or pool with us. When we would go out, people would look him over from head to toe. Picture him walking around with the leg brace and head wrapped up......it was funny just watching people look at him:)He wasn't able to bend his leg, so Tom had to pull our camper home. You would think they would never camp again, but soon after returning home, they went out and bought them a travel trailer. Everyone always tells us not to let dh on a bike:) (Most know that he also has flipped a 4-wheeler while going in reverse!). |
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Mar. 27, 2008
Guess who's smile you see here? Yep, it Chasity's!!! She got her braces off today. After 3 1/2 years of adjustments and 3 less teeth, she now has straight teeth:) Here's a before picture taken right before we left for the orthodontist....![]() and below are the after pictures I asked for a bigger smile....![]() I tried to take some before pictures last night and this is what she gave me..... Lol!. She's gonna die when she sees I really did put this picture on my blog ......I tried to warn her:)) Maybe I should make it larger:)) Now here's the picture from last night when she finally decided to smile for me.... Ok, so you're tired of hearing about my dd's teeth:) How was everyone's Easter? I (the night owl and not at all morning person) actually survived getting up early:) We had sunrise service and then a huge breakfast cooked by the men of the church, then our regular service. It was a blessed day in the Lord....then again, isn't everyday:) Here are the kids Easter morning.... I made it small so maybe you can't tell just how blurry it is. Dh can NOT take good pictures:) If I ask him to take a picture, his response is always "I can't use this thing".Well, it's 1:20 am and I guess I better get a bath and turn in. Good night:) |
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, so I'll just write about my dd's birthday:) On Monday of this week my dd celebrated her 14th birthday. We are so proud of the young lady she is growing up to be. She had about 21 kids (or should I say teens) over for her party Monday evening and 7 girls slept over. Well, actually only 3 of them slept. I expected them to stay up really late, but my dd and 4 others stayed awake ALL night. Yep, only 3 girls went to sleep. Here is a slide show of her party and sleepover.
I'm not sure what the next game was called, but they passed around a trashbag full of clothing items, accessories, and even some lipstick, etc. When the music stopped, whoever had the bag had to pick an item from the bag without looking and put the item on. It was really funny. Then they went outside and played Sardines (basically hide and go seek for those of you who've never heard of it) until about 11:30. Right before the game of Sardines ds set off the rest of his fireworks he had left from the 4th of July. Then all the ones who weren't staying left and the girls played a few more games, and popped some popcorn and started a movie at around 1:30 am. I somehow managed to roll out of the bed at 7:30 to cook pancakes for the girls. On Tuesday, Chasity and her friend Kasey slept from 1:00 to 4:00
and woke up asking to go the mall:)
It was 4 layers of cake with ice cream between each layer and cool whip was the icing. It was actually really good




we managed. Fri. night dd and I decorated the church fellowship bldg., and he kept asking what was taking us so long at Wal-Mart:)
Wow, once again, it's been a while since I made an entry. A lot has happened the last several weeks. I don't think I've posted since the homeschool covention.....I've finally decided (and purchased ) on the upcoming school years curriculum. I'll share what I'm planning to use and if you'd like to make any comments please do . I'd love to hear your experience with any of these. Dd will be in 9th and ds in 7th.
For those of you who've read the book......dd is on the left in the top picture....she was Ermengarde, her friend played Sarah on the right. The below pic is the scene of Sarah's birthday. 




































Needless to say, he went to sleep as soon as his head hit the pillow last night. Dh and ds got up at 6:30 to get there early and fish, but neither one caught a thing. Here is dd in the back paddle boat....she didn't want to attempt the canoe after seeing someone flip theirs two times....and yep, it was the same person both times:)
Isn't he a cutie. He loves the piano. 

We are still trying to figure out how they did the awards, but they won the trophy for Gold. It was High Gold, Gold, Silver, then Bronze. They were given points and the points range determined which trophy was awarded. Dd has had many dance recitals, but the competition stuff was new to her and she really had a good time. They will be competing again the end of the month.
. I almost lost it when they pulled his cutain back. You could see nothing but a small portion of his face. Not a time to be laughing, but it struck me as really funny. The kids decided to call him marshmallow head. The rest of our vacation he wasn't able to go the ocean or pool with us. When we would go out, people would look him over from head to toe. Picture him walking around with the leg brace and head wrapped up......it was funny just watching people look at him:)
Guess who's smile you see here? Yep, it Chasity's!!! She got her braces off today. After 3 1/2 years of adjustments and 3 less teeth, she now has straight teeth:) Here's a before picture taken right before we left for the orthodontist....
I asked for a bigger smile....
Lol!. She's gonna die when she sees I really did put this picture on my blog
I made it small so maybe you can't tell just how blurry it is. Dh can NOT take good pictures:) If I ask him to take a picture, his response is always "I can't use this thing".