We're Headed to Texas!

I'm just as surprised as you are.

"Wow! How long has this trip been in the works?"

Oh, a few hours now, I guess. For being sooooo extremely Choleric and always having a plan for himself and several for me (ha!), James sure has turned into a spontaneous kind of guy. It's good, for the most part.

You see, it's like this. We finished up on the Regional Paper today and got it all printed. The next step is assembling all of the pages, folding them, stapling them, and stuffing and addressing the envelopes. It's a 12 page-er and we make about 175 copies. It's not a whole lot of fun to do by yourself and James really misses the assistance we used to get from Sam & Tammy. So we're going to drive 6 hours tomorrow so they can help us! HA! Okay, so that's not ALL we're doing...

We got to looking at our upcoming events and realized that this is really our best shot at being able to visit the Texas churches, what, with all of the District Conventions coming up. So we're going to get some help with the Church paper, make a church visit in Andrews, drive over to Merkel to visit with the Luna's, as well as stay with Aunt Sue & Uncle Jerry, at least have lunch or something with Stacey (if it works out--she doesn't know we're coming yet), and hopefully be able to squeeze in some games with Sam & Tammy and Frank. Ah, yes! Frank, my old game buddy. Wonder if Tammy will let the two of us play on the same team... Nah! Oh well, should be fun anyway!

We had a full and productive day today. Got up and hit the road for a day on the town. First stop: library. We were puzzled by the empty parking lot at first. Ah, yes. The library is closed on Mondays. The kids had great fun with the book drop though. The first time is always so exciting. Apparently!

After that we headed to Barnes & Noble so Katie could look around and possibly use her gift card. No problem there. My kids are all so different. Sam has used his gift card on two different occasions and bought toys that he's gotten a ton of use out of already--and he's got enough left on the card for another purchase or two. Joe has tried with all of his might to use his gift card several times, but just can't make himself do it. Katie marched into Barnes & Noble today (our first chance to get there since she got the card), bought three Children's Classics books (read the first one in its entirety tonight) and a Garfield book and walked out with .56 change. Ha!

We perused the mall a bit today and I'm so glad we did. We had a few gift cards to use up at Sears and Penney's. (We had returned some things that were the wrong sizes and such after Christmas and just got gift cards for the stores instead of fighting the after Christmas crowds.) Everybody was having HUGE sales and we got some fantastic deals. I got a pair of Deer Stag dress shoes for Joe (usually pretty expensive ones--at least for our taste!) for $4 and a really adorable shirt for Katie for $3. I can't remember what all we got, but at prices like that--and with a gift card, making it basically "free"--you can fill up a bag pretty quick! We spent very little money today, but were blessed to find several things the kids really needed, and a few deals for James, too. As if that wasn't enough we stopped at the Family Thrift Center afterward. :-) I told James we really ought to stop in there once a month. We found a really nice dress for Katie for $3 and a suit jacket for Joe for $1 (can you believe that?!), a jean jacket for Sam, a denim skirt for me, some "bloomers" (little cotton pants--in size 3! Ha!) for Katie... It was such a successful shopping day. And being homeschoolers, we did it without the crowds! :-)

We made another stop or two before coming home. It was then that we decided on this Texas trip. So I've spent all evening cleaning the house and I managed to get all of the laundry and ironing done. I've got the kids and myself pretty well packed, too. The kids spent their evening doing school and taking baths. Now it's just past midnight and I'm bushed. But I wanted to let everybody know what we're doing the next few days instead of just mysteriously disappearing from Blogland. Now you know I'll be with real, live people again! :-) Makes me happy. We plan to be back Friday night. Have a great week!

Haley is a Punk

I have selected that title in hopes that Haley will notice she is being addressed. She somehow missed my reply to her comment, expecting it to be in the comments window following her smart remarks and never seeing it in the "HEY, I'M REPLYING TO ALL OF THOSE COMMENTS RIGHT HERE" post from last night. I just received this e-mail from her tonight:

What's up? I went to your blog...... no comment. I know, you can't think of any thing witty enough. It's okay I understand. Pobre tomato she thinks she can comment but she can't. :(
No wait I know you have finally realized that you indeed love NN and to deny it would be a lie. So now you're stuck. Deny it, and well.... have Bro James sing you the song about liars. Admit it and face the humiliation of everyone knowing your deepest darkest secret. II await your fury (that is your forth coming comment) in earnest expectation. Unless of course you really are a pobre tomato :)

~Tsk, tsk, tsk~ So sad. To think of the poor girl sitting on pins and needles all this time, anxiously awaiting my reply. I wonder if she'll notice THIS one... As for NN, I have reconsidered my position, Haley. I want you to buy me that movie for my birthday this year. Yes, yes. I do. Please buy me that movie. For starters, it would be the PERFECT "Haley gift." But I wouldn't have the "Surely this is a gag gift... but if it's NOT, what do I say" dilemma. Secondly, I would most certainly bring it to next year's Girl Party. I have a special ceremony in mind for it. It would, of course, never involve a VCR or DVD player. Just a nice, clear area in the back yard and some lighter fluid, a few matches... And a signed contract with the binding stipulation written in blood that you will never again attempt to choose the girl movie; any violation is punishable by death. Or at least by eternal banishment from the Girl Party. ;-)

Hhmmm. Nothing much to report. We had good services today. Well, this morning, anyway! Ha! Tonight was my VLB service and I must confess I re-e-e-e-eally struggled to put it together. That, "Oh, THIS is what direction I need to go" thing never hit me, so I decided to go with the upcoming holiday. I looked into Groundhog Day, but there's not too much inspiration to be found in Punxatawnie Phil. Besides, after some preliminary study on the subject I discovered that it actually originated from a Catholic-ish holiday having something to do with Mary (February 2nd is 40 days after Christmas; her purification being complete) and then it went way downhill, borrowing from old Pagan beliefs about the seasons and whatnot. Not sure how the groundhog got thrown into the mix. So I opted for February 14th instead. Of course, I've never been a very big fan of Valentine's Day, so we talked about the telephone instead. (February 14, 1867, is the day Alexander Graham Bell applied for a patent on the telephone.) I used every corny analogy I could make up, right down to "Please enjoy the music while your party is reached." You didn't know there was anything spiritual about phones, did you?! Ha! We even sang The Royal Telephone tonight, believe it or not. That's a song that... well, let's just say it's not one I lead very often! Ha! It cracks me up. Always has. Oh well--we went with it tonight! Mostly, I'm just glad it's over.

In other news, I'm still missing Hershey Dog way too much. Not crying quite as often as before, but still thinking of him soooooo often and wishing he was here. It's just so weird without him. Weird and sad and lonely and and quiet... Hardly seems possible with three kids (!), but it still feels that way a lot. I can't imagine what it would be like if I didn't have them to fill my life, my days, and my heart! It didn't help to read that February is Responsible Pet Owners Month and the 20th is Love Your Pet Day. ~sniffle~ All of you pet people, don't take those little furballs for granted! And Stacey, remember to give Jasmine a hug for me on the 20th! Ha! ;-)

Hhmmm. Guess that's about it from here. I hope you all had a great Sunday and were truly blessed of the Lord. And didn't have to sing The Royal Telephone. ;-) James said today that he figures we were probably the only church in all of Albuquerque that sang that song tonight. I told him we were probably the only church in all of Albuquerque that has sung that song for at least 20 years! Ha!

One Big Comment

That's really all this is. I haven't anything to actually POST about right now, but I felt bad having not replied to anybody else's comments on my last little flock of posts. So I'll just reply to them here and make them look and feel like a new post instead of just a comment replying to old comments. Clever, hu? Nah, I didn't think so either, but it's all I've got.

GIRL PARTY

Mom--Creamer? Creamer??? I thought of that actually, but somehow it didn't sound just right. I mean, do you call the coffee pot a coffee-er? Or the tea pitcher a tea-er?! No, they get their own special name. I assumed somebody would've bestowed the same amount of thought upon the poor little container that holds the cream. Guess not. Creamer. How sad.

Rachel--I don't know what to say. First of all, I'm shocked and appalled that your ventures west have only carried you so far as Shawnee. What a terrible place to stop when things will get so much better if you just go a little farther! (No offence to any Okies, of course!) Secondly, you are SOOOOOO RIGHT about our folks having more fun. And you and Sister Tammi pretty well nailed the reason for it. When you're piled up with a whole bunch of friends all of the time you really do take the fellowship for granted. We've never had that luxury out here so we take extra pains to be together, fully intending to have the grandest time possible from the first moment until the very last. :-) And, of course, we also happen to have the most fantastical people in the whole world out here! I'm glad to hear you're planning on moving out this direction (although slightly surprised you would make it public, what, with the possibility of your locals reading it and going nuts)--just name the state and we'll start looking for work and a place to live for you... ;-)

Tammy--As one of my dearest and longest standing friends, I count on you to comment on each and every post. I can't believe you skipped to them end only to tell me you weren't gonna. ~gasp!~ Of all the nerve! ;-)

Haley--Oh, where do I start?! I really should've started a day or two ago because I had a truly grand reply all worked up for you, but it seems to have left me. Hhmmm. All I've got now is, "Nu-uh!!!" I'll see if I can do better. I AM NOT A PUNK. (That's a winning start...) And I most certainly DID NOT laugh at the NN movie. I may have laughed DURING it, but never AT it. And as I described to you before, there are certain things that are so disturbing and appalling that the longer they go on the more aghast you become until finally the next disturbing and appalling thing happens and you snap and find yourself laughing hysterically. Not because the thing was FUNNY--no. Because it was enough to push you completely off the rocker you were already perched so precariously on due what you've already been exposed to. Such is the case of my laugher DURING (not AT) NN. Now that we have that cleared up, have I made it abundantly clear that you are never again allowed to pick the movie in this lifetime?

~whew~ I think that covers that.


MEN'S RETREAT

Sister Nowling and Jenna--So glad Brother Nowling enjoyed himself out here. (Down here? Over here?) I was sorry that I didn't get to see him personally, but it sounds like the guys really enjoyed having him at Retreat. And I DID get to hear him preach in Denver on Thursday through my brother's computer conference call thingy. It was great! And you're both right--the retreat facilities are GREAT, as is the Shuler boys' ability to make great pictures. ;-)


AS FOR NEW YORK

Mom--I haven't thought or worried about the whole "lurker" thing, although it did occupy a good amount of my thoughts that first night! NYC is an awful long ways away and there are a whole slew of people there. I would suspect there are a whole slew of WEIRD people there, thus furthering my belief that one of them would actually buy a sculpture such as Kate's! ;-)

Rachel--Because that would be far too easy! ;-) Actually, James took care of all of the business with the eBay buyer and he's not known for being particularly chatty in such situations. Ha!

Sister Tammy--I felt much better learning that you have a lurker in NY, too. You're closer to them than I am, so if anything happens to you I'll know they're probably on their way out here! Ha!

Jared--I've got plenty of hits from Ohio, so I doubt you're showing up as New York. One tracker (I ended up with two--long story) currently says Westerville-1, Miamitown-15, and Bellevue-41 for the past month. The other says Norwalk-1, Port Clinton-8, Bellevue-8, Cincinnati-11, and Lakeside Marblehead-15. I'm guessing one tracker is more specific than the other, but still the total number of hits is pretty close. Anyway, glad to know you stop in! Tell the folks up there we said howdy! :-)


THE FIRST...OR LAST

Mom--The brisket was fabulous-o! Mmmmmm... :-)

Sister Tammi--It is amazing to watch the kids grow up and develop such interesting personalities. Sam's is just packed. Some things are hidden so much deeper with him, but they're certainly present!

Kasey--I'm the same way; I deal with things a little bit like Joe, a little bit like Sam. Mostly, I think Sam must take after James. James isn't the kind to sit around and cry for weeks on end. He's the kind to shed a few tears, then get up and DO something about it. Thus the gorgeous little box Hershey was buried in the next day.

Sister Tammy--Interesting perspective! I would love it if Sam became a writer one day. I could see that happening... if the kid will ever learn to READ! Ha!

Rebekah--I prefer it that way, too, especially if I can tell that I'm in one of those rambling moods and it's going to be the never-ending post. Like THIS one! That wasn't even supposed to be a post, just a comment! HA! Pitiful.


~Whew!~ That's that.

The only other news is that I've got the Regional paper all put together... except for a message from the Regional Overseer. Slacker. ;-) I'll be able to finish up quickly once he gets it to me. James made chicken parmesan and cheesy baked ziti for dinner last night (so I could work on the paper)--what a guy! I did take time out from the paper to make a Pineapple Chiffon Pie. Yum! The crust is made out of vanilla wafers and the pie has lemon jell-o and pineapple juice and such deliciousness. It's nice and tangy, kind of like a key lime pie. Right down my alley!

Gotta run. It's not like anybody comes around the blogs on the weekends anyway. It just seemed like it was TIME to say something, you know? I just found out yesterday that my VLB service is tomorrow night (I thought for sure it was NEXT Sunday!) and I need to get Sunday School together--and I also just learned I'm on to lead songs. You'd think the lady who makes the calendar oughtn't be surprised by what's on it. It's a strange phenomenon. Every time! Ha!

The First... or Last???

Of 4 new posts, that is. If you're interested (or really, really bored), I put all of my news into four long, drawn-out posts instead of one painfully long, drawn-out post. :-)

We bought a 7.5 lb. brisket for $8 today and I decided to cook it tonight. It's in the oven for 20 minutes right now to heat through, then I'll turn the temp way down and go to bed. Until then I thought I'd slap one more little post up here (since I probably won't have a chance for the next few days--it's Regional paper time) while I'm waiting.

I told my Mom I'd post a picture of Hershey's grave. I know it seems weird, but she asked to see it, so...

Have I mentioned how much I've learned about my kids since losing Hershey??? Well, I'm still learning! Katie has been FINE since the day after it happened. Like I said, she feels things very deeply, but she also recovers quickly. In cases like this, I take it as the blessing that it is. Joe was absolutely devastated--cried uncontrollably for the first few days, at the drop of a hat. Sam seemed more "untouched" and only broke down and cried a few times. He seemed that way... but he's the one who sobbed just a few days ago out of the blue--days after the other kids have been fine. And again tonight...

I had been playing the piano for a while (just found my chorus book with all the chords in it! Wa-Hoo!) and noticed that Sam had been sitting at the table real quiet for a long time. I went over and asked what he was doing. "Drawing Hershey's life," he said.

That's a tree at the top right, with Hershey's "rope" tied to it. (What we used to use to tie him out with when we were traveling and somebody didn't have a fenced yard.) On the top left, under the rope are his dog dishes. Below that is Hershey's leash. On the bottom left is "Hershey's favorite spot": the fireplace, on the right is his toy duck, and in the center is his grave.

And, of course, Hershey Dog. (Don't know what happened to his fourth leg, but he got the curls down!)



Sam seemed fine until he began explaining what everything was, then he got lost in another of those crying episodes where he chokes up and can't speak. !!! He is so different from the other kids--and I'm so thankful to be learning more about him and his nature. Sometimes he seems so aloof (emotionally) and I wonder if he really cares about certain things. But I'm learning so much more about his little heart through all of this. Losing Hershey is just as hard on him as it is any of the rest of us; he just deals with it differently. He never cried buckets for days on end, but he has these unexpected gushes of emotion. Tonight he really opened up and tried to talk about it and tell me how much he loved Hershey and how sad he is that he's gone. It broke my heart, yet it feels so right. That somehow God is teaching our family so many things through this. For that I am so grateful. I have such special kids. I still miss my dog (!!!), but I'm thankful that God is using this to work in our family. All things work together for good somehow, right?

Okay, I just turned the brisket down, so I can go to bed now. I'll post more in a few days--and hopefully make the rounds to everybody else's blogs! (Maybe I'll even sneak in a few of those while I'm supposed to be working on the paper...) ;-)

And as for NEW YORK

But first...

Today's been a pretty good one. We had a slow start and ended up watching the Inaguration; something that I didn't plan on doing. But then we figured that kids all across the country were doing that for "school," so we did, too. The kids didn't make it through the whole thing, but that's okay--I didn't either. That wacky poem did me in. GOOD GRIEF!!!

After that we loaded up and went shopping because we had nothing in the house to eat. Last night we had tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches... but we only had enough bread for two and a half sandwiches, so I dumped the rest of the tortilla chip crumbs on a cookie sheet and made nachos so we'd have enough food. So not shopping was not an option today. Got home and were so tired!!! We didn't even start school until nearly 4:00, but still managed to finish up by about 5:30. The only things we skipped were science and handwriting. It was too late to pull of a traditional dinner, so we had breakfast instead: bacon and eggs and bisquits.

And now...

AS FOR NEW YORK...

Remember a while back when I mentioned that my blog tracker lets me know how many hits my site gets, when they are here, and where they came from? And I seem to have a regular viewer (or more than one?) from New York. It's pretty cool, except that I don't know anybody in New York. Still, no biggie.

Well, do you also remember that crazy little Wikki-Stix sculpture that Katie put on eBay??? Well, it SOLD! For $2.25 plus $1 shipping. Crazy and cute all at once, right? Everything was cool until we realized that the buyer is from NEW YORK!

This leaves only 3 possibilites:

1. A friend or member of the Church in New York (who has wished thus far not to identify themselves) looks at my blog, somehow found it cute that a 7 year old was trying to sell something, thought they'd humor her, looked it up on eBay and bought it. That's nice.

2. There is some weird-o out there stalking us! Sounds nutty, right?! Probably, but these days you just never know! I mean, what are the chances that a Wikki-Stix sculpture is actually going to sell on eBay? Then, that it sells to a person from New York... where there just happens to be somebody who looks at my blog on a regular basis?! (An average of at least 3 times a day, it appears.) Still, it wouldn't be that big of a deal since I try to be real careful about not giving too many specifics about our family--last name, city, etc. But (!!!), now that this person bought Katie's sculpture, eBay automatically sent them our name and address. Gre-e-e-e-e-eat. Good thinkin', Bec. You just HAD to blog about it, right?! It NEVER occured to me that if there WAS a freak out there they could see this on my blog and think, "Hhmmm... I could figure out who and where these people are if only I bought the thing!" ~sigh~ I'm so dumb. In any case, what's done is done. I'm not scared or worried or even nervous about it, but it does bother me that I did something so dumb! It's kind of cool that I have the blog traker though. If I didn't, I wouldn't even know that there was somebody from NY checking out my blog. This way, I've got their IP address and they can be tracked--besides the fact that I now have a name and address as well. Not to say that it definitely IS the same person... which brings us to possibility #3.

3. It was a mere coincidence. That won't make my Dad feel any better (he's going to KILL me when he finds out about this!), but there always is that option. And I really rather prefer it. :-) Perhaps somebody in New York who doesn't even know I HAVE a blog stumbled upon that eBay listing and for whatever reason, decided to buy it. After all, New York is a pretty big place! (But I looked up the address and it is very near where my blog tracker is picking up some action...)

So just in case there is some weird-o out there...

I'm on to you now! ;-)

Men's Retreat

Hhmmm. I thought I'd post a bunch of Men's Retreat pictures on here, but there really aren't that many good ones! From what I hear, it was a really great Retreat with a few experiences, lots of blessings, and some really great fellowship.

I post this picture to prove that they had a guest speaker (only picture I could find of Brother Nowling!) and because Brother V. is so cute. :-) And the other guy, well... ;-)

NEVERMIND! Just found a bunch of pictures that didn't get copied to the computer. Look--it's Brother Nowling! Looks like they even let him preach! :-)



(That kid is wa-a-a-a-a-ay too cute for his own good!)

Not sure if you can tell what's going on here, but apparently the guys were leaping from the porch railing into the snow.

And like we don't see enough wacky pictures of them on their own blogs... ;-)

Girl Party!!!

What a great weekend! :-)

Our family loaded up and left home at about 10:00 and headed for Colorado. We made pretty good time and had minimal stops, so I was able to dump James off at the campground at about 4:30 and make it all the way to Jamey's house (thanks to 29 green lights and only 4 red which must be an all time record--and yes, we really did count!) just after 6:30, I think. Wa-Hoo!!! That's a first. We usually come dragging in sometime after 8 or 9 o'clock, so this was GREAT! Just in time for a larrupin' meal of hot dogs and burgers. Of course, later on we had to do "the chip thing," as called for by Haley. We did "the chip thing" several times over the weekend, even making it our entire meal one time. Don't waste too much energy trying to figure it out. It just means that we ate chips and salsa and guacamole (not ME) and queso dip and Jamey's fantastical 7 layer dip. Haley just felt it necessary that such an event should have an official title and called us all to participate in "the chip thing" over and over again. We humored her. She has forever lost her position as movie-picker-outter, so it seemed best to just go with her chip thing. ;-)

I don't remember a whole lot about Friday night except for total and utter chaos. We had four moms and 14 kids, total. The kids were just as excited as we were about the traditional gathering and it was really showing that night! Everybody was good, for the most part, just really excited. And when you have 14 kids in one house (let's say 13--little Lillie can't be blamed for any of it yet!) it translates into utter chaos. But that's okay; the Hays are blessed to have a nice sized house right now with a basement to lock the--oh, I mean send the children to play in. ;-) We played games and had a great time and finally called it a night sometime after 2:00, I think.

Saturday... Hhmmm. Can't think of what we did. We ate and played and just had a nice relaxing day. I put on a 3-2-1 Penguins show for the kids in the afternoon, buying myself a great 20 minute nap. :-)

We had a TON of food and it was rather disturbing to see how little of it was left at the end of the weekend. We had brownies and popcorn balls and peanut butter chewy thingies and lemon bars and these amazing chocolate chip cheesecake bars and some pumpkin chessecake and... oh, who knows what I'm forgetting, but we ate a whole lot of everything! CRAZY. But it's tough to party without good food. ;-)

On Saturday afternoon Tammy and Cathy (and her two boys, of course) and Genesis came up for a few hours and Sister Karen and MANDIE (!!!) and her two kids came over to visit, too. FUN!!! It brought our total attendance (ha!) to 27! It was SO great to see Mandie have even just a little while to visit. What a perfect addition to the Girl Party!!! She'll have to make it an annual thing. ;-) Oh, and Tammy is PREGNANT!!! I know you all know that already, but it seems more real to me now that I've seen her with my very own eyes. It's somehow exciting all over again! Ha! She looks GREAT!

We had let the kids stay up and talk in bed the first night (they were way too wound up to sleep anyway!), but that meant they were all working on less sleep than usual AND they had been running themselves ragged playing all day. So on Saturday night we put them to bed with a NO talking policy in place. Then us girls when downstairs and I whipped up on Haley in some more games. :-)

We then headed upstairs and watched our girl movie for the weekend. Like I said, after last year's episode Haley has been banned for life from ever being able to pick another movie. And YES, Nicolas Nickelby is THAT BAD. Darby O'Gill isn't a good way to save the night, either. Anyway, we went with a good movie that we had all seen before and thoroughly enjoy so there wouldn't be any chances of a repeat of last year's bomb. :-)

I was priviledged to sleep in the living room with one of the world's great monologers, so we didn't get to sleep until 3 something, at least. I kept waiting to see the sun start peeking through the blinds! Ha! Haley insists that the conversation was 50/50, but since I'm ragging on her about everything else, I'll blame the irresponsibly late night on her as well. What are friends for, anyway?! :-)

On Sunday morning Haley and Emilee headed back to Denver for their afternoon service and Jamey and I spent the morning getting ourselves and kids cleaned up for church there in town. We had a good little service, even without a pastor. The guys got back from Men's Retreat just after service ended, so we went out to eat, then headed back to Brother Dustin & Sister Jamey's house to spend the night. We played some games, but I hadn't thought to pack our traditional ones, so after I Buy we didn't really know what to do. We tried Clue, but James faded fast on us and quit before the game was even over, ruining it for the rest of us. Creep. ;-) Dustin and Jamey and I stayed up and talked until about 1:30, I think, then we CRASHED. I say that because I'm sure they were just as tired as I was and I was BEAT!

In the morning we followed our traditional departure plan: leave around 9:00 and go to Mardel, since that's when they open. We didn't come away with a cart full this time, so that's good! Just a creation book that was 50% off and a new Veggie Tales CD I talked James into. He thinks he bought it for the kids. ;-) We had a nice drive home and got here before it was dark, so that was GREAT! Enough time to get the van unloaded and start getting some things done in the house. And that's about it!

Okay, now for some pictures. I shoulda' put 'em in with the text, but I'm too lazy tonight. ;-)

Brother Dustin's kid ;-) came into the girls room and attacked them one night.

He finally got kicked out of there, so he headed into the boys' room and attacked them! Ha! It was so great!

Haley came bearing gifts. Anybody who knows anything about Haley's gifts just cringes any time she pulls out a bag and says, "Here, this is for you!" In fact, this one got passed around the table a few times before I finally gave up and opened it. And lo, and behold! It was CUTE!!! Wa-Hoo! I love those cowboy boot stockings!

The kids had a tea party one day. There weren't enough girls interested in participating, so they had to rope some of the guys into it, too.
Zekiel Boy got there too late to get a cup and saucer, but he didn't seem to mind using the creamer thingy! (It has a real name, I'm sure, but I can't think of it. Mom will share, I have no doubt!)
And it looks like Anna got cuffed! Weird. Boys sipping tea and little girls walking around in handcuffs.
There was just enough snow (crusty ice stuff, really) in the back yard for the kids to sled a little bit, though it didn't last for long. It's a FANASTIC sledding hill... except for the abrupt halt at the bottom! Ha! One or two turns apiece and they called it quits. I don't blame 'em!
Looks like that's about it. From the pictures we came away with it looks like it was a Kid Party more than a Girl Party! It was both, really, we just don't have to pictures to prove it because one girl took pictures, another girl forgot to, one girl sent her camera to Men's Retreat with her husband, and one girl likes to blame all of her problems on Fuji. (Em, you've got to make sure Haley sees this post somehow--she's gotten so much honorable mention here! Ha!)

Anyway, there you have it! The Girl Party Overtaken by a Kid Party!

And We're Off!

Well, we will be in the morning. We're heading up to Colorado again. James will be attending Men's Retreat this weekend, so the kids and I are going up for the annual Girl Party. :-) The past few years Haley and I have spent the weekend with Emilee at her house while some of the other girls crash at Michele's house in Pueblo. This year we're moving our half of the party down to Jamey's house. :-) Then some of the Pueblo crowd will come join us for a few hours on Saturday. FUN!!! It's always a great time. The kids have a blast with each other and it's sooooo nice to have some girl time. We eat and play games and laugh and eat some more. :-) Then we usually watch a girl movie after we put the kids to bed, then eat and play more games and, of course, laugh a LOT more. It's a grand time--almost like a mini Ladies' Retreat... but with no singing or preaching or classes or... Hhmmm. Okay, well, it's like Ladies' Retreat at night after the service is over! :-)

We've had a pretty good couple of days around here. Joe's been putting more effort and a better attitude into school, so it's been much more pleasant and gone much more quickly. That's NICE.

We just switched our weeknight church service from Thursdays to Wednesdays, so this was our first week of that. It's WEIRD!!! I know it's the normal night for church, but it's been YEARS since we've had church on Wednesdays. It's been Tuesdays or Thursdays for us for so long now. I had to remind myself over and over again on Wednesday that TONIGHT we have church.

Each day seems to get progressively easier in our Hershey Dog grief. I'm thankful that, as terrible as it is, it can't compare to losing a human family member. :-) Still, it's hard. I really thought that everybody was doing better, but this afternoon Sam (of all people!) broke down and just sobbed. He had set his backpack in the "hole" by Hershey's dog door (there's a countertop over that space) and crawled in to get it. Moments after he emerged he just burst into tears and couldn't stop. Then he went and laid on the couch for a while, crying and holding Hershey's old blue collar that I'd let him have a few months ago. (Made me think of Sister Janis' account of me doing the same thing with Dusty's collar.) ~sigh~ Even with the occasional breakdowns, it's still a little easier each day. And certainly better than the first few days when all we did was cry! We're still crying, but we're smiling more at the thoughts of Hershey than we were able to do a few days ago. So that's good.

Hhmmm. Not much else to say. OH!!! Okay, fess up. I wanna know who did it. SOMEBODY out there BID on Katie's little... thing on eBay!!! I figure it was some kindly Church person who read about it on the blog and thought they'd humor the kid. My first thought was that it must be my Dad (!), but he doesn't know about it, to my knowledge, and it wasn't his username. So, come clean, whoever you are. I wanna know! ;-) Actually, there are two of you. The first bid was for $25 cents, but the new bid (yeah, a SECOND bid!) is for $1.25, plus $1 shipping. Ha! Cracks me up! When we got home from church Wednesday night James checked the auction and said, "What?! Hey, Katie, get in here!" Her excitement over receiving a bid was quite amusing, but not half as entertaining as Joe's expression! HA! He has very little GOOD to say about Katie right now (he's big into the not liking girls thing--and Katie doesn't make it espcially easy on her brothers!) and he's just disgusted beyond belief that she made the crazy little thing, that Dad put it on eBay for her, and now that somebody out there is going to PAY her for it! Ha! It's been quite entertaining to watch it all unfold.

Well, I'd best get some sleep. I must be well rested if I intend to not rest at all for the purpose of partying this weekend. ;-) Pray for the Men's Retreat, please. And have a great weekend!

Doing Better

I've been so overwhelmed by all of the comments about Hershey. They've been such a comfort to me! Thank you for your thoughtfulness. If nothing else, it assures me that I'm not off my rocker for mourning a dog; a whole slew of you can relate to the very feelings we've been dealing with! That alone seems to help.

It's been a much better day today. I haven't had to escape to the porch so the kids won't find me crying yet again. I've cried throughout the day, but been able to keep working through the tears. I cried when I changed the sheets and Hershey didn't come running into the room to rub all over the bed. I never could figure out why, but he always got so excited when I made the bed or changed the sheets. He'd jump up there and flop on his back and push himself around in circles and wallow all over the place, having a grand time. (For the sake of our guests, I always prevented him from wallowing in the fresh sheets as I put them on! But Mom, I'm sure he wallowed in yours. Ha!) I cried when I grabbed a granola bar out of the pantry and no little brown furball came rushing from a far corner of the house because he heard the crinkling sound of the wrapper. And I keep crying when food hits the kitchen floor and just lays there until somebody comes to clean it up. We used to just call his name or whistle for him or tap our foot toward the food. You really don't realize how many different ways a dog is part of your life. It's a whole lot more than just feeding him and playing with him on occasion, that's for sure! I'm able to laugh at most of the memories of Hershey. He was a funny, funny dog. But I seldom laugh without choking up and shedding a few tears.

Okay, there's my dog talk for the day. ;-)

We've been doing lots of school and it's taking up a great deal of my life nowadays. But that's okay. It's either that or clean the house, right?! I've been staying on top of the house pretty well lately, too, so that's good. I finally got us all the way moved back into our closet today. I'm not sure why that took so long except for my extreme lack of motivation the past few days. I have a big bag of clothes to donate, including a sweatshirt I've had for 18 years. WEIRD. It's in like-new condition so I couldn't just throw it out, but I never wear it anymore. I just hope somebody up here isn't opposed to wearing a shirt that has "IDAHO" plastered across it. ;-)

I made pork chops and mashed potatoes for dinner tonight. Not much variety, but it was already more than I felt like making! I can't seem to get over that "sick of the same ole' food" feeling, so I've been looking up some recipes online and making some slight alterations to the few foods that our family likes! So instead of our regular slow-cooked pork chops I made "Famous Pork Chops," or some such alluring title. Basically they were dipped in egg, then crackers and butter and garlic and such, then covered and baked. And I made "Cowboy Potatoes," hoping the title would entice the boys to branch out. I left out the jalapeno pepper for their sake and we were out of carrots, but other than that it was basically mashed potatoes with garlic (plenty!), onions, corn, cheese and... hhmmm... something else all mixed in. Sounds strange, I know, but I thought it was really good! And a nice change from the regular mashed potatoes. After dinner Katie helped me make a dump cake, too. She loves to wear her new apron and chef's hat and work in the kitchen.

Can't think of much else going on around here. Oh, before I forget... I updated my blog list a little bit with some sites that I like to try to keep up with, but usually forget to go to. I am keeping with my format of using people's first names, so please don't be offended that I'm not showing due respect! I just like it to be uniform. :-) And I hesitate to identify people by their last names on a public blog. I'm not a paranoid person, but there are some weird-o's out there, so first names seem safer to me!

Ah, yes. This is Katie's latest creation. She found some Wikki Stix today and formed this little lady. And (get this) James listed it on eBay for her! Ha! He started the bid at .25 cents. I can't imagine the thing will sell, but she's so excited at the very thought... and Joe's so disgusted! Ha! I said, "Boy, Joe, wouldn't it bug you if somebody paid $5 for that thing?!" He then acquired a TRULY disgusted expression and just shook his head.

And that's about it. Hope everybody is having a good week. And thanks again for all of your love and comments and, most of all, prayers. They are all sooooo appreciated. I have the best friends in the world!!!

A Rough Weekend

***Disclaimer***
If you're not up for a rambling, pitiful post you might want to skip this one!

First of all, let me say THANK YOU to all who were praying for our family this past weekend, and for each comment you left here on my blog. I read and cried through every one of them repeatedly! It's amazing how much love and compassion is to be found among friends, especially in God's Church. And over a dog. I can't begin to tell you how much your comments and prayers meant to me. Thank you so much.

Friday night. We got the call from our neighbor at about 6:00, I think, that he had found Hershey. After I got him home I worked at getting him cleaned up and inspecting his injuries, then the kids were able to see him and pray for him for a few minutes. We prayed and cried and called family for prayer and all of that stuff. It wasn't until nearly an hour later when I determined that Hershey's back was broken, or spinal cord damaged or whatever. That was heartbreaking in itself, but he really didn't appear to have any pain at all. We prayed and cried even harder. I started to leave the room to go to the restroom, fully prepared to come back and stay and lay with him throughout the night. James says Hershey lifted his head and watched me walk out of the room, then laid down and stopped breathing. I was barely two steps into the other room when James called me to come back. I know it sounds nutty, but I really think he just didn't want to die while I was there. Is that crazy? Maybe, but I believe it. Dogs are so amazing. In fact, the only reason the neighbor even found Hershey is because of one of his dogs. He got home from work and one of his dalmations came and greeted him, then followed him all over the house crying and whining and just wouldn't stop. He finally got up and she led him to the front door, so he let her outside. She ran over to where Hershey was laying and sat by him and just cried and whined until the man got a flashlight to see what was the matter. Amazing. I'm a firm believer of the "man's best friend" thing.

Anyway, we decided it would be best to go ahead and tell the kids instead of waiting until morning. It was so awful! Katie and Joe were just a wreck--I've never seen them cry so hard. It was difficult to even keep them under control, but we prayed together and talked and cried for a while and they finally calmed down a little bit.

James and I worked on cleaning up all of the mess and putting away Hershey's dishes and things like that. Seemed like it would be easier if the kids didn't wake up and see dog things all around the house in the morning. James built the prettiest little coffin a dog could ask for and we dug a hole in the back yard, then I blogged. I knew that sleep wouldn't come easily, so I stayed up and painted and cried until sometime after 2:00. I had started painting our walk-in closet that day and it seemed best to just finish it up. It needed done and I needed the distraction.

The next morning I woke up to Joe standing next to my bed crying. So we laid in bed and cried a while. The kids had breakfast and I put a quick coat of poly on the now red shelves in the closet. Then we bundled up and went outside in the new fallen snow for Hershey's little funeral. At first Joe said he didn't even want to see the box--just couldn't handle it. But then he decided that we needed to have a funeral for Hershey and that he needed to be there. Katie talked about how much she loved Hershey and I told the kids how God wants us to cast our cares upon Him because He cares for us. We talked about how much God loves us and how He cares about the things that we care about. Then we all prayed together and thanked God for letting us have Hershey Dog and enjoy him for these years; and for all of the mercy He showed even in Hershey's death. James took the shovel and buried him, then surrounded the grave with the big rocks we'd dug out of the hole the night before, and pounded the cross into the ground. It's a pretty little grave, but it makes me cry every time I walk out the back door and see it!

We came inside and loaded up to go to one of our member's 80th birthday party. Joe had a horrible day, thinking about Hershey and crying off and on all day. It broke my heart and I cried with him every time! We cried in the car, we cried at Sam's Club, we cried at the party, and afterward at Albertson's, and of course we cried when we walked into to a cold, empty, quiet house with nobody here to greet us and be excited that we came home... ~sigh~ Joe just had such a hard time with all of it. I feel like I've learned so much more about my kids through all of this. Katie cried lots on Friday night, then spent the hour before Hershey died drawing pictures of herself with Hershey and writing how much they loved each other. She cried at the "funeral" too, but has pretty much been okay since then. Her personality feels things very deeply, but also very quickly! I think she's pretty well recovered. Joe, true to his nature, said he wished that he would have died instead of Hershey Dog. He has cried more tears than I would have thought his body could produce. And he has talked about Hershey a lot--needs to talk it out to get through it, just like me. Sam acted distant and untouched for a while, even mean and careless about it sometimes. But he broke down and cried real hard on Friday night. I sat down with him on Saturday and told him that God made everybody different; some people cry a lot over things like this and some people, like his Dad, just don't. I told him it's okay if he's not the kind of person to cry a lot; that it doesn't mean that he loved Hershey any less than the rest of us. He started bawling then! I wasn't prepared for that, but since then he's been better about the situation so I guess it was a good thing. By the way, James did cry. ;-) He says it was because the kids and I were taking it so hard, but I happen to know that a few of those tears were because of his own personal love for Hershey Dog! And he says that there's a big hole here now. You can just feel that something is missing here at the house. There's an emptiness and we all hate it!

All of the kids did much, much better yesterday. Joe only broke down and cried two or three times. But I was a wreck!!! I just felt sooooo exhausted and wiped out, and sooooo emotional. I felt like I just cried all day long. It seemed like I had spent all of my energy helping the kids get through this and now that they were doing better it was finally sinking in to me and I was feeling the loss. After church all I really wanted to do was come home and take a nap. But I didn't want to take a nap. Not without a poodle curled up in the crook behind my knees, resting his head on my leg. (It was one of his favorite things.) It's amazing how many silly things make you think about a dog after he's gone! I did lay down, but I just cried and cried and couldn't stop. How dumb is it to cry yourself to sleep over a dog??? I don't know, but that's what I did. I finally fell asleep at some point, and I actually felt much better after my nap. More rational and not quite so emotional.

Today has been a much better day and I've felt a better sense of balance over everything. I've cried a lot, but I have the sense that life will go on and we will eventually get over this. I've really been surprised at how hard this has been for me. I always told myself that Hershey "wasn't Rusty," the dog I had from the time I was 8 until I was 23. I never imagined it would be so hard to say goodbye to Hershey, but I'm sure I'm taking this as hard as when I lost Rusty! That little rat had wormed his way pretty deeply into my heart and I miss him so much! I've been able to function better and got a lot of things done today, but I did take a couple of breaks to go sit on the porch and cry for a few minutes here and there. And it's amazing all of the things that make you think of a dog once he's gone. I cried when I opened the dryer door and that dippy sweater of Hershey's tumbled out. I cried when I washed up his dog dishes and put his leash away. I cried when James dropped a piece of food on the floor and I instinctively wanted to holler, "Oh, Hershey Dog...!" and have him run into the kitchen to assume his happy duty of floor-cleaner-upper. ~sigh~ It's so lonely without him here!

I warned you this would be long and pitiful! I think I'm going to sit down with the kids in the next few days and make a list of the things we always want to remember about Hershey Dog. He really was a good dog. Even though he had his quirks. And even though he ate part of my pie crust at Thanksgiving time and I was ready to kill him. ~sigh~ I'd bake him a pie of his own if I could have him back! But God knows best. I keep telling myself that.

Ah, yes. As awful as this has been, I feel like God has answered our prayers and we have truly seen His love and mercy in this situation. It still just blows my mind that God loves us so much that He arranged for Hershey to be able to be here with us, by a hot, crackling fire (his favorite spot), being taken care of and loved when he died. For all practical purposes, he should have died alone in the cold. But God cares about us enough that He didn't let that happen. He cares enough that Hershey did minimal suffering. He cares enough that he didn't live through the night, or even long enough for the feeling to return and him experience great pain. He cares enough that he let Hershey die quickly and peacefully instead of living through the experience and being paralyzed and not able to walk--and the terrible decision we would have had to make at that point. Everything about it is just so loving and merciful. Little things that perhaps seem crazy to non-dog people (!), but to me they just display how very loving and merciful God is; how special we are to him that He takes such care and concern even with how our dog dies. I feel so, so, so blessed. We've talked about all of that a lot and the kids, after a while, have begun to see and be thankful for those things as well. There's a much longer list of the goodness of God in this situation, but I can't seem to recall the rest right now.

~whew~ Did anybody actually stick through that entire post about a dog most of you never knew?! I didn't blog it as much for you as I did for me. This is my "diary" of sorts and I want to remember how much we loved that crazy dog and even how much we miss him right now. And I certainly want to remember the lessons that God is teaching all of us through this. I'll try real hard to have something else to blog about next time. ;-) Again, thank you all for your love, your comments, and your prayers. I appreciate them all so very much. You're the best!!!

Hershey Dog

2003 - 2009





~sigh~ I don't know quite what to say. God blessed us with a very, very happy dog that brought lots of joy and laugher (as well as some frustration and anger on occasion!) into our lives and let us enjoy him for nearly 6 years.

Hershey Dog had an unfortunate and fatal encounter with another dog tonight. As awful as it is, there is much to be thankful for. I'm thankful that a gentleman found him and contacted me right away; I was able to bring him home and care for him. He died here by a nice, toasty fire being loved and prayed for instead of alone in the cold. I'm thankful for the fact that he didn't suffer long. In fact, due to the injury he had, I'm not sure he endured much pain at all. So very thankful for that. And like my Dad pointed out, I'm so very, very thankful that it wasn't one of my children who I've lost. God is good and we're so very blessed.

Please pray for the kids. I know a lot of folks say, "It's just a dog," but those are only cold, insensitive people who've never discovered that to people with hearts a dog is truly a part of the family. Does that sound harsh? I'm not up to dealing with any cold, insensitive people tonight, so be careful! ;-) Anyway, the kids finally calmed down a bit and two of them are asleep right now.

James fashioned a pretty little log sided box for Hershey. We wrapped him in a towel and put his toy duck in with him; and managed to dig a hole in the back yard tonight. In the morning we'll have a little funeral, bury our dog, then head to a birthday party. ~sigh~ What a day. Still... so much to be thankful for. Biggest prayer request is for the kids. They'll pull through. Kids are so resilient. But it's not going to be very easy tomorrow, I'm sure. It was AWFUL tonight. I know it sounds silly, but I'm praying for the God of all comfort to help our kids to not just make it through this (of course they will), but to somehow learn and grow from it. To somehow see the love and mercy of God in this situation. I don't know--He knows best. Thanks for your prayers!

A Successful Monday

... today. ~sigh~ I hate it when Monday's jobs don't get finished until Wednesday! Oh well. At least they're finally done. I am thankful for that, even though it's a few days later than I would have liked.

It seems like I've spent a whole lot of my life in school with the kids this week. Their new books have been keeping me hoppin', but I think everybody is happy with them and they seem to be doing well. One thing I like is that all of the different subjects have their own book instead of everything combined into one big book. I liked the convenience of the big book, but it meant they were in only one grade. I know that sounds strange, but really... it's kind of dumb to expect all kids to learn everything in the same order and at the same time! Since one of the glorious liberties of homeschooling is being able to be flexible with your kids' curriculum instead of following the public school cookie cutter system, I was able to look through the books ahead of time and select the proper "grade level" for each of them in each different subject. They span from 2nd grade Math to 4th grade Spelling, depending on their different abilities at this time. The beginning of the math book is way too easy for them, but I think it will catch up with them within a few weeks. Otherwise everything is great! Except that I feel like I spend 3 hours a day grading papers and helping them with their work! That's okay though. I enjoy the time with them (well... mostly!) and they do better work when I'm right there than when they're on their own.

I spent a couple of hours yesterday doing the job I've been dreading all week: cleaning out the kids' closet. It seems like I just did that recently, but it had to be done again. It wasn't totally out of control, but we were just out of room! After Christmas I just kept telling the kids to put their new toys back under the tree when they were done playing with them. When the tree came down, well... ! They didn't get a whole lot of junk this year (wa-hoo!), but the closet was already FULL. So I rearranged several things in there, filled up one bag of trash (amazing how it amasses in there!) and one bag of things to donate, and was able to clear off one small shelf so the new items now have a place of their own. ~whew~ That feels better!

While I was doing that, James was in the kitchen whipping up some linguini alfredo. Wow! I'm always way too scared to try things like that. But we had some whipping cream we needed to use up and he's the master of being able to use what needs used. He also coached Kate and Joe through making brownies. Tonight when I was back in charge of dinner everybody saw the same left-overs I've been disguising as something new and all week! Ha! I browned some burger and seasoned it, then added the rest of the pork from the roast to make the filling for chimichangas. Before it was all over we had thrown in the "stew" from Monday (pork, potatoes and a few carrots, mostly). Very strange. It wasn't great, but nobody seemed to notice. The deep fried tortillas were worth eating whatever was on the inside! Ha!

What else... Nothing monumental, I'm afraid. I finally got the rest of the house vacuumed (I started on Monday)... after I realized that the thing wasn't working right and changed my very first vacuum belt. No, really--first time. Makes me realize how good James is to take care of things around here! It made me feel quite accomplished to do it myself and the children were quite impressed. (It doesn't take much, thank goodness!) And I was able to get the wood floor shined up and looking purty. ~sigh~ Love that floor!

Tonight I watched 3 episodes of Curb Appeal on whatever that site is where you can watch shows for free. I really enjoyed them, except for the one that had the designer who... well, he made me a little uncomfortable if you know what I mean! BLEAGH. Anyway, the shows and a Vanilla Coke saw me through the two weeks worth of ironing, so I'm finally all caught up on that. :-)

And that's about it! The only truly amazing thing lately is this...

The girl never ceases to amaze me. Is there some Etch-a-Sketch contest where she could win us big money?! I should check. ;-)

High Hopes

That's what I had today. How silly. You'd think I would know better than that after recent months. I guess I'm a slow learner.

It still ended up being a pretty good day and I guess, all in all, I'm satisfied with what got done. We had another question packed devotion this morning. The kids LOVE the Old Testament stories. We're reading about Ahab and Elijah right now and everybody gripes big time when I finish the chapter and move along to Psalms and the other books we're reading from. I love that. ;-) Keeps 'em excited to see what happens next.

The kids helped me gather up all the laundry today and I worked at getting the house put back together some more. We had school in the afternoon today and I'm not sure it was a good thing! Joe was in one of those extremely unmotivated moods and it took him FOREVER to finish! It was okay, I guess, because I spent most of the afternoon grading all of their work since mid-December and putting it all away in the appropriate binders. (I'd fallen a little behind!) It feels great to have that taken care of, but it wasn't on The List. You know, The List that tells what all you're supposed to get done in any given day. It's always a drag to accomplish something that wasn't on The List because then you don't get the satisfaction that comes from marking it off! While Mom was here a while back we had a hundred and two things on The List that just never seemed to get done because we were accomplishing things that never made it to The List. So we just started scribbling down whatever we'd just accomplished so we could immediately put a nice, purty checkmark by it. ;-)

We pulled out all of the left-overs for lunch today and did our best with them. Then I took most of them (some things just don't belong!) and threw them into to crock-pot and it became dinner for tonight. I'm sure that would gross some people out, but I just love meals like that! Most of it was the makings of stew anyway. Meat, corn, potatoes, carrots--everything already cooked and sliced and all that. I made some cornbread and everybody seemed to enjoy the Must-Go Stew. That's what Mom used to call it because everything MUST GO. It's cool that we had 8 Tupperware containers full of stuff in the fridge this morning and now we've got one small one with another bowl or two of stew in it. :-)

Anyway, due to the unexpected accomplishments (and Joe dragging school out twice as long as it should have been!) I didn't even get all of the Christmas boxed hauled out to the shed until sometime after 4:00. That was supposed to be first thing this morning. Oh well. I still managed to get the rest of the wood oiled tonight and the boys each grabbed a vacuum cleaner and helped out in the living room. I've got the last load of laundry going right now, so I'll be able to get that finished up in the morning. I didn't get to the ironing tonight like I had hoped. This week's ironing OR last week's. ;-) I had really intended to, but sometime after 9:00 I found myself sitting down with a bowl of ice cream and that was it; I was done working for the night. I don't know how that happened! It's not at all what I had planned. It certainly wasn't on The List. ;-) Hhmmm... maybe I should go write it down real quick. "Sit and enjoy a nice bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream." CHECK! I knew the moment I sat down that I wasn't getting up again. Oh well. There's always tomorrow!

~Aaaaahhhh~

It's been a good weekend around here. Yesterday was the big Undecorate the House Day. Trouble was I was in slo-o-o-o-o-ow motion all morning! I kept moving and kept working, but it felt like I somebody had pushed a button and put me on half speed. Very frustrating when there's so much to be done!

All of my wood was soooooooo dry and I decided I would lemon oil every bit of wood in the room, from shelves and furniture down to door trim and baseboards. It takes quite a while to do that, especially when you're wood is as dry as mine was. It just soaks it in! But things look and feel sooooo much better! And it always feels good to take care of the things God has blessed you with, you know? It's one of those "good steward" feelings. :-)

Remember how dried out your piano was, Mom? Look how pretty now! :-) :-) :-)

Makes me so very happy.

We did have one little issue with the undecorating. I couldn't make myself do it all! Before I go on, let me ask your opinion. That's all I want--just your honest opinion... (Anybody seen "The Shop Around the Corner"?! Ha!) This display... does it look Christmassy, or just simply wintery--what, with all of the red and BLUE instead of red and green. It's just snow and trees and snowmen carrying some BIRTHDAY presents...

~sigh~ I just couldn't put them away yet. It seems like they just got here, you know?! So I pulled out a few of my favorite pieces and decided to let them stick around through January. :-) It's so weird... I'm usually DONE with all of this stuff and ready to get back to normal life by the time Christmas dinner is over with. This is the first year I ever remember just wanting to let it all linger a while longer! James, HE WHO STARTS LISTENING TO CHRISTMAS MUSIC IN AUGUST, is giving me serious grief over it. "What?! You can't keep that out through January! Christmas is OVER, Bec--it's time to put all that stuff away!" ?!?!? From HIM?! A wee bit hypocritical if you ask me. ;-) We've made an agreement, though. Since he's letting my winter snowmen hang around for an extra month, I'm supposed to let him listen to "winter" music throughout the month. I told him he's welcome to listen to anything that speaks of snow or the winter season, but has no direct referrence to Christmas. Of course, right now "Santa Clause is Coming to Town" is pouring from his computer! Ha! We listened to Christmas music yesterday while I was packing all the stuff away and I was even kind of sad to know that I wouldn't be able to hear all of it for another 11 months. I put my three favorite CDs on shuffle and enjoyed them to the max. Between George, Harry and Michael, it was great stuff! Of course George (Strait, that is--that CD you got me last year is one of my FAVORITES, Tammy! It's SOOOOO GOOD!) has this one song (in spite of how much I love the others) that drives me absolutely bonkers. It's too... country for me, I guess! He just talks it instead of singing it. It starts by saying "Leon Dixon keeps his Christmas lights up all year round" in a thick, Texas drawl. So James kept following me around yesterday and saying in his best Yankee-turned-southern accent, "Rebekah (last name) keeps her snowmen up all year round... It's somethin' diff'rent about our town... Folks wonder why she never takes 'em down... but Rebekah (last name) keeps her snowmen up all year round..." HA!

In the end, I burnt out way before the project was actually finished. I got all of the Christmas stuff boxed up... but it's all stacked in the living room still! I was able to get almost all of the wood oiled and room and floor cleaned up and back into place. I just need to vacuum the couch real good, oil two or three more pieces of wood, and scrub the middle of the floor. (I did the edges as I went so I could put the furniture back into place.) Hopefully it will all be gloriously clean and shining by this time tomorrow. :-)

I got my Sunday School stuff all ready last night, then curled up by a very toasty fire and finished my book. ~aaaaahhhhhh!~ What a great way to end a long day! The book was EXCELLENT. One of the best I've read, even in this series of really great books. I'm sad they've come to an end!!!

We had good church services today. Sunday School went good with the kids, good worship (I was blessed, anyway!) and James preached about how the Pharisees skipped over such commandments as "Honor thy father and mother," but harped about folks not washing their hands before they ate. CRAZY! I don't want to be that way. Getting all wound up about things I believe God has called me to while overlooking the basic truths and requirements of the Word.

Have I ever mentioned how wonderful our church folks are here? They are the most AMAZING pounders I've ever seen. Sister Galaviz had a really nice pounding for us this morning, then Sister Grimes said to come by her house after service to pick up the one from her and Pat. We got to her house before she did, however, so we ran down the road to the empty Taco Bell on Central. I can't imagine why we were the only folks in there at lunch time. I mean, it's really no big deal for a fast food joint to have run out of EVERY kind of soda except Baja Blast and lemonade, right?! We toughed it out and the kids thoroughly enjoyed studying and discussing the two bullet holes in the window we were sitting next to. ~ahem~ Gotta love Central Avenue in Albuquerque! Ha! We then went back to Sister Grimes' house and were overwhelmed once again. Between the two poundings, we received several items we had JUST ran out of. God is so amazing that way!!!

We got home to some very icy roads. It had been spitting snow throughout the morning up on our mountain and there was a new inch or so of it on the ground. :-) I told Joe to sit tight and I'd get the gate so James could drive up to the house. HA! Not smart. I was wearing my dress boots. They're great and I love them (I'm not a very fashion conscious person, but boots are so fun!), but these were NOT meant for snow and ice. I didn't think anything about it because there was an inch of snow on the ground, but underneath that inch of snow was a nice, solid, smooth, skating-rink-quality slab of ice. HA! I started slipping and screaming and laughing and for a split second had recovered my footing, just in time to lose it again. I went sliding and flailing and wailing and laughing and finally ended up in a little pile at the rear of the Envoy. HA! It's been ages since I've fallen. I've had several near falls, but have always managed to clumbsily recover myself before I actually hit the ground. It was quite humerous even from my angle. My dear husband sat in his heated seat, pushed the button to roll down the passenger window and hollered, "You okay???" Ha! My hero. ;-) I wrestled my way up to the window and assured him I was fine. My hip should show some pretty good evidence of that hard ice by morning, I would suspect, but otherwise it was actually kind of fun. :-) A good fall (with no broken bones) does a body well every once in a while.

I got a really nice Sunday afternoon nap, which is the only way to have a truly grand Sunday. Especially after staying up late and reading a really great book the night before. ;-) I was sure to wear some different shoes to church tonight, some with better traction. James talked about Regeneration and then, after overcoming some technical difficulties, showed a clip of Sister Morrow's message from the Assembly on the subject. It was so good and really a blessing to everybody there, I think.

One last thing before I go. Am I the only person who is immensely amused by this???

We were at a dear lady's house recently and this is what her walls look like. She's in the process of moving, so she's clearing all of her walls and packing things up. Her shelves had already been hung with some heavy duty anchor bolts so when she decided to paint the rooms in this house she didn't want to take the shelves down due to the giant holes that would be in the walls. So she left them in place and simply painted around them! HA! I understand her logic, but I'm still CRACKING UP over it! So now that she's moving she's taking the shelves down, filling the holes, and painting over the white shadows of the shelves that used to be there. Ha! I love it! She occassionally looks at my blog and I thought she might enjoy seeing this picture here. Love you, lady!!! ;-)

We Had a Good, Productive Day Today!

I know it to be so because James has used that very phrase at least 6 times in the past hour or two. "I would like to have days like this every day--it just feels so good to get so much done." I, on the other hand, would really love to have a chance to put together one more puzzle before real life really settles in again. ;-) It's strange; usually I'm ready to pack up all of the Christmas stuff by the morning of December 26th. Not this year! I still feel like holidaying it. The house is still all decked out and I'm really rather enjoying it. I'm in no personal hurry to change it, but I've heard the boss mention it several times so I know it's time. I was acutally going to get started today, but we had a few hours of uncertainty when we knew we may or may not have company tonight. It gave me the excuse I was looking for to hold off on packing everything up and having the house all torn up! Company didn't come, so maybe tomorrow's my day. Or maybe not... :-)

We started our day off by moving. Again. We have moved so many times in the past year I just don't know what to do with myself. We packed up the house in Andrews last December and MOVED everything into storage. We MOVED everything to our house here in February. We have since MOVED a whole slew of boxes into James' soon-to-be office so he could work in the garage. We them MOVED them back into the garage so Brother Dustin could wire the office. Today we MOVED them all back out to the office so James can start working on the garage. Don't add 'em up for me, I just know we've hauled all that dumb stuff, whatever is in those boxes, way more times than I ever would have thought. Anyway, that's how we started our morning--with a whole family endeavor to get the garage emptied out and all of the stuff crammed back into the office and shed. The kids were a great help and we were able to get it all done in just about an hour and a half, I think.

When we finished that up James went into town, rented a trailer, bought a bunch of sheetrock and hauled it up here. We unloaded it into the garage, then he returned the trailer. On his way back home he found a dude with a load of firewood for sale (we were getting perilously low), so he had him come and dump it in front of our house. Time for some more quality family time! :-) Everybody pitched in and we got it all stacked nice and neat on the porch. It is REALLY sloppy and muddy on our little mountain right now due to all of the melting snow (that's why we started the moving job early this morning--so the ground would still be frozen between the garage and the office!), so we had to spray mud off of everybody's boots and leave them on the porch to dry. Or freeze. We'll see which soon enough!

We then got everybody cleaned up and headed to Edgewood. James was pleased enough with all of our hard labor that he treated us to DJ's Doghouse for dinner. ;-) Hot dogs, corn dogs, grilled cheese, fries, and tots. It was a nice change, actually! Then we went to Wal-Mart to do some grocery shopping. Joe is still DYING to use his $25 gift card, but we kept telling him that nothing had changed at the store--we'd just looked there a few days ago and he couldn't find anything then, why would he find something this time? I finally agreed to take him for one quick spin through the toy aisle while James was waiting in the check-out line. He actually found something he was truly excited about: a remote controlled dragonfly that really flies, at least in theory. It was going to use up his whole gift card, but he was thrilled. "It's so cool, Mom!" We weren't half way to the front of the store before he'd talked himself out of it. I really thought he was going to go through with it because of his initial enthusiasm, but we had barely left the toy section before he started having second thoughts. ~sigh~ I feel his pain! Ha! He wants SO BADLY to spend that gift card and get something grand, but he can't bring himself to part with the gift card because then it would be GONE. It's so painful to be indecisive. I happen to know. Still, it cracks me up when I see it from a distance! I even tried to help him out. "Joe, would you rather have a cool remote controlled dragonfly that you can play with and fly around, or a little plastic gift card that sits in my purse?" There was a long pause and then, "I'm gonna put the bug back, Mom. I'm gonna wait. I don't wanna spend my whole card already!" Ha!

We came home, unloaded the groceries, had devotions, and put the kids to bed. I've been dinking around on the computer and now I'm going to start the final book of the O'Malley series. (Ssssshhhhhhh!!! Don't tell James!) ;-)

Happy New Year!!!

I really have nothing to say about the New Year, as I've given it very little thought to past few days. We went all out to celebrate tonight though. I let the kids stay up 'til 9:00 and we played Go Fish. ;-) Put 'em to bed, talked to Tammy (also home alone tonight) for a while, then to Mom (home alone, of course) long enough to keep her awake until it was midnight where she was. She said a lethargic "Wa-Hoo" through a yawn before hanging up and calling it a night. Dad lasted until about 11:50, I think, before he drifted off. What a pity to be so close and then not make it! Not that Dad cares. I find it hard to believe that he was truly trying to begin with.

After I hung up with Mom I got to work on the calendars again and midnight slipped right past me before I realized it. Missed that New Year "Hoo-Rah," I guess! As for the calendars...

THEY'RE DONE!!!!

Well... practically. ;-) I've just got to make a quick cover page for them tomorrow. No more than a 10 minute job, max. So that's the good news: they're DONE. The bad news is that they're really not all that great! They're so ungreat that I'm posting pictures of them before the recipients have received them. If they were to-die-for-cute I would never spoil it for Mom, but... well, you'll see! (You can close your eyes if you want to, Mama! Ha!) It's not horrid, but it's really nothing grand. Until November. That was the one and only page I was truly excited about when it was all over with. Is it grand??? Or do I just think so because I know how many stinkin' hours I spent working on it?!?!? Ha! That paper thing you do, Emilee (I forget what you call it) is CRAZY--at least on this bear stamp. But it was a fun change. And, of course, things always improve when you go a little nutty with the ribbon. So nutty, in fact, that I ran out before I had a chance to add any to the month bar. ANYWAY, here's what we ended up with this year:

Had to put a close-up of the paper crazed November bear. I love 'im! Can anyone guess at which page I had my "I give up!" surge?! Ha!

Oh,--I wrote the dates on the pages for you this year, Mom, but you'll have to do holidays and daylight savings and stuff like that yourself. I was going to put all of the grandkids' birthdays on for you, but I'm not sure I can remember them all! I know my kids, of course, and I've got Jon & Em's kids down... until Abbie and Zeke! I'm pretty sure Abbie's is July 1st (right???), but all I know for sure about Zeke's is that it's in August. Pick a day, any day!

Okay, that's it. Got to get some sleep so I can start the new year at least somewhat rested instead of wiped out and crabby. :-)