One "Two" Special Birthday!

Yes, it was this child's birthday. He is 8 now, thus the 8 whole pancakes he got to eat for breakfast that "night". Yes... these were for supper. We had to be at Chuck E. Cheeses by 10 a.m. for his party, so we left kind of early, since it's about a 45 minute drive there. So the tradition continues, only at dinnertime this year. And in case you are wondering, he did eat them all.

Our fun family and friends party we had at the house the Saturday before his real birthday which was on a Monday. He had a Lego themed party at the house, with a homemade Lego pinata (made by mom) and many fun Lego themed games with prizes. He even had a blue Lego Cake (made by mom, ie... me) too. Here the kids are picking up all the pinata goodies that they can get their hands on. The kids had fun swimming and playing outside. It was a fun relaxing party.Two of Truthseeker's friends each made him a homemade card, and wrote a story inside it. So sweet, and cute. Here his friend is reading Truthseeker his card, since she wrote it in cursive, and Truthseeker was having trouble reading her writing. Too sweet though. Something he will definitely save forever. The metals around the kid's neck were prized from the games they played.

Truthseeker's real birthday was held at none other than... you know who's. He wanted his party there so badly, but adding up all the kids he wanted to invite would have been too expensive for us, so he invited his cousin, who couldn't come Saturday, and a few other friends.

Truthseeker's b-day guests at Chuck E. Cheeses. A fun time was had by all.

Love this boy. Love him even more now that he's 8.

June and July in a Nutshell

This has been an incredibly busy Summer. I can't believe that it's almost over already. In a nutshell, here are some of our favorite photos from our Summer 2009.

One big highlight was having lots of friends come over to swim each day.

Nana gave birth to 8 puppies. It was a huge litter, and she was thoroughly exhausted. We jokingly nicknames her the octo-mom. Those puppies sucked her dry. She most likely (as far as we can figure) bred with 2 different dogs. A Yorkie, and a Pug. Simply because some look like Yorkies and some look like Pugs. At 6 weeks we gave them all away, except one. A little black one that Matt wanted named Ozzie.

This is just a funny incident that made me chuckle. It was pouring rain outside one afternoon, and a squirrel just happened to be resting on our back bumper trying its best to get out of the rain. It kept popping its head out from behind the van. Then it would go back to where I couldn't see it again. Then again it would pop it's head out. It totally made me laugh. I just had to take a photo.

4th of July at the church. The kids has a blast playing tag in the parking lot.

The older boys played a game inside the church called ladder ball. The balls are on strings and you throw them across the room and try to rack them on a plastic ladder.

June and July in a Nutshell (Cont.)

More 4th of July pictures from our church. Truthseeker is playing pin the flag on Illinois. All the kids had fun playing this game.
Kroger was giving away free 4th of July balloons. Thumbody was lucky to get one.

Truthseeker (and all the others) were in love with the puppies. You could find them carrying around one, most of the time.

Another Summer highlight was making Cold Stone ice cream with our Cold Stone kit we got from mom and dad for Christmas, this past year. As you can see (behind Thumbody) we used the bottom of our car top carrier to house Nana and her pups. There were so many of them, we didn't really have anything big enough to house them. This worked nicely.

One Summer afternoon was spent at the Splash Pad in a nearby town. It's a free place for the kids to run around and get cooled off. The kids enjoyed this so much. I did too. I sat under a shaded area, and worked on lesson plans for the upcoming school year. As you can see from this photo, I had a perfect eye view of the kids. Love this park!

More Splash Pad fun.

Our home all in bloom. I just love summertime. All of my flowers are in bloom, and the house just looks so nice.

This is how Skaterboy spent the first part of his Summer. He and World of Warcraft have been companions during most of his freetime. He did complete driver's ed, which took up most of the month of June, but in his free time this is where we could find him. He is currently in Missouri working for my dad, as an electrician's apprentice. We will go pick him up in a few weeks or so.

A fun Summer carnival in the park.

There were lots of these blow-up things, and everything was completely free.

Truthseeker, down the slide.

Here comes Skaterboy!

What is better than an ice cold snow cone on a hot Summer day?

Here we are. Mom and Thumbody. Truthseeker wanted to take a photo of us at the carnival.

One tradition that we tried to hold true to this Summer was a weekly trip to the farmer's market. I loved being able to pick up fresh organic vegetables, and the kids enjoyed getting a little sweet treat too. Thumbody is enjoying a small loaf of banana bread in this photo.

Here is one week of organic fruits and veggies for the family. Yum!

June and July in a Nutshell (Cont.)

More Summer fun stuff. The kids enjoyed a very fun Star Wars birthday party for their friend Daniel.
The pin'ata is always a huge hit.

Truthseeker tries his hand at the pin'ata.

Camp Lean On The Lord was the title of our church's VBS this year. The kids learned all about people with disabilities, and how they can help them, and reach out to them. The VBS was narrated by Joni Erickson Tada. It was a neat experience. Here they are singing some of their VBS songs in front of the church.

Camping... In the living room. We had planned to go camping (for real) this particular night, but there were storm warnings, and so we chickened out. Instead we let the kids have a campout in the living room. Hope to do some real camping soon.

Since our camping trip was post poned, and the next afternoon was nice, we decided to take the kids to the water park. Scott and Skaterboy are resting after taking on some wicked water slides.

June and July in a Nutshell (Cont.)

Here we are. Don't we make a gorgeous couple?
The bumper boats were fun to drive. I tried to squirt Scott as much as I could.

Thumbody on the paddle boat. We took a leisurely trip around the pond.

The toilet slide (as we like to call it) as it feels like you are being flushed down a toilet.
Strange experience, I must say.

Scott and Skaterboy on the paddle boats.

June and July in a Nutshell (Cont.)

This is the scariest slide ever. It doesn't look too bad, does it? Well, let me ask you, have you ever had a dream where you were falling? This is how this slide feels when you are going down it. Then you slide up to the top of the other part, and you feel like you just may go off the edge. Once was enough for me on this one.

Scott took Skaterboy and Truthseeker on the Go-Carts. Thumbody was just a little upset that he was too young to ride.

After a nice trip to the water park, Scott drove us past the hospital where he works. This photo is only a small portion of the hospital. It covers 2 complete city blocks, plus a number of doctor's offices in the area as well.

Our 2nd to last stop after the hospital tour, was a visit to Abe Lincoln's Tomb. Truthseeker did an exhibit for the fair titled Celebrating Lincoln, and he needed a photo of his tomb for the collage he made. He did 2 other exhibits as well, that we will see tomorrow when we go to the fair. Truthseeker and Thumbody are also in the Goat and Chicken Scrambles tomorrow night. Ann and the girls should be here around 4 tomorrow, so they are going to go watch too.

Lots of family reunion time this Summer. Dad, Mom, my brother Ken, my niece Madison, and my brother's girlfriend Nikki came for a visit, and stayed the weekend. Here we are all enjoying the pool on a warm afternoon.

June and July in a Nutshell (Cont.)

Here we are, my family. Not everyone of course. It was so nice to see everyone and visit. It's been a good Summer, after a long hard Winter.
We belong to a playgroup that meets every week. This particular week the kids made homemade icecream. Here they are shaking the half and half (with 2 tsp sugar, and 1/2 tsp vanilla in a small baggie) in a large baggie of ice and rock salt. It's pretty tasty I must say.

Shake, shake, shake....shake your bootie :)

Enjoying their home made ice cream.

MY SISTER JEN

One of my favorite parts about my vacation was getting to see my sister and her and her family being a part of our adventure in Oklahoma. We drove up from Branson, which all in all was a pleasant drive. My dad and I chatted most of the way, and listened to more than one Banana's (http://www.bananascomedyclub.com/) dvd.

My sister and I don't get to see each other too often. We don't really keep in touch through email. Just the occasional phone call, and lately it's been fun to communicate with her through facebook. Jen and I are about 3 years apart in age. I was out of the house as she barely started high school. She has been through a lot in her 30+ years. Lots of good times though, and has remained faithful to her passions in life. She has always been one I have looked to for inner strength, yet not so sure where I stood in her life. Right now she is busy making lots of decisions, and working hard for her family. She has always been good at looking inward. Figuring out what is best for her and the direction she wants to take her life. Much better, I think, than I. I admire her for this. For always challenging herself. For just being her. Love that we are sisters-and that we are now staying more connected.

I found this quote some time ago, and it made such an impression on me:

The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life.

Attitude, to me is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do.

It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company ...a church ... a home.

The remarkable thing is we have a choice everyday regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past...we cannot change the fact that people act a certain way.

We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude...I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you...we are in charge of our attitudes.

Charles Swindoll (AE)

Oklahoma Trip To Jen's

Yes, these crazy kids are cousins. They had such a fun playing together, and getting to know each other all over again. This tends to happen when you live so far away from each other. My boys keep talking about their fun cousins and how much they miss them.

Our original purpose for the trip was because my sister Jen's two oldest children were graduating from HS. It doesn't seem possible, that they could be that old already. Just a few short years before my oldest graduates. Time goes by too quickly. BTW... I don't know why my dad is making a fist over my niece. Something funny was obviously taking place, I just can't remember what it was, just now. Can't believe she will be going to college this Fall.

These two boys. Cousins. Aren't they adorable? I don't think there were two happier boys to be together than these two. I hope they get the chance to do lots of fun things together over the years. I hope they are very close growing up.

Here are my nephews. My oldest nephew who was graduating, and is going to college this Fall, and my youngest nephew, who I got to see and hold for the first time.

Here is my oldest son, who has this laptop his great grandma gave him attached to his hip. He takes it wherever he goes, and is at this very minute probably on it playing Ruin Scape, or WOW, his two favorite on-line games. He knows so much more about computers than I do, or ever will know. He is so technically minded. I am not, and I don't have a lot of patience of technical things either. He can sit for hours dealing with computer stuff, where I would get frustrated and shut it down. I am so proud of this boy!

ON THE HOME FRONT

Life has been busy lately. Skaterboy finished driver's ed last week, and has his permit to drive. He now has to do behind the wheel training, which starts in a couple weeks. He isn't really interested in practicing much, so I'm not pushing him. He's doing very well, when he has driven though, and is very cautious. I'm really glad he's taking the whole thing so seriously. Forgive me if I already put this in a post. I know I posted this somewhere, but don't remember if it was in an email or on facebook, or here. That's the problem with posting so many places, you forget where you last posted.

This week has started out slow, but starting tomorrow, we have a full week ahead of us. Tomorrow is another homeschool picnic at the park, if it doesn't rain, which it's supposed to. Tomorrow night is church, Thursday we are to meet friends at the splash pad in the morning, and Friday morning Skaterboy and I have a date to meet my best girlfriend and her son, for a day of scrapbooking (for my friend and I), while Skaterboy and his friend spend the day at State Farm Park swimming. Then that night, Skaterboy and I are going to see the new Harry Potter movie. Matt is super psyched. He has read all the books more than once. I haven't read any of them, but I always go see the movies with them. The last one was pretty dark, and I really didn't like the ending too much. I'm not crazy about scary films, and it got pretty scary (even for me) at the end. Hoping this one isn't like that.

Well, it's late, and I better get to bed. Goodnight to all my friends and relatives who read. I miss you all!