Updates and changes

Adam took this picture. I just love it. I want to have it oil painted.

We survived our summer, barely. After all of our trips we were pretty vacationed out. Now that we are back to a semi-normal schedule we can relax. Um, not really. Since school has begun, I barely see K or A anymore.

The girls started middle school nearly a month ago. The excitement has quickly subsided. Two days a week they start school at 7:30 am and end at 2:30, the other days they start at 8:30, this followed by roughly 4 to 5 more hours of homework. This all lumped together with, daily chores, violin practice, soccer etc, where is our family time you ask? GONE! (more on this later)

E and J are growing so quickly. They are such a joy. They just amaze me daily. They are so sweet, so curious, so loving. They want to do and know everything. They have just started to make friends this year. They have befriended a little girl who is the same age as they are. The little girl has a sister the same age as K and A who is on their soccer team. Twice a week E and J get to play with their "fwiend" at the park. They are just so cute. This is the first interest they have shown in playing with other kids their own age. Usually they are more fascinated with older children.

I have been in the process of trying to find a home church for us. This is harder than one would think, when you have a few specific criteria that church should meet. I have visited a few in my area and have not found "the one" yet. I have two more in line for the next couple of weeks, that I'm hoping will end with one of them being the one for us. I've been lazy in not attending church weekly for sometime now and have decided I'm letting all my laziness go. K and A can't wait!

Finally, I've decided that 11 hours a day should be more than sufficient to properly educate my children. Am I wrong? The fact that they still need home teaching for 4-5 of those 11 hours, has me wondering why they need to be gone for the first 6-7? They are still little girls. They are having to endure way too much stress for a child. Don't get me wrong, my children are not coddled. They are hard working, taught to be independent and responsible. But, they are still, children.

I have been in prayer for a while for God to make it possible to homeschool them with a Christian curriculum. Since, I have been asking God for this, we have had an increase in jobs and money. Go figure. Ask and you shall receive right? YES! Adam has been called back to his full time job that he was laid off from 9 months ago. He still has work and clients, from his own business he started after being laid off. And, as I watch so many unemployed people not being able to find jobs, I have managed to get a part time night job. SWEET! So somewhere in all of this should be the $50.00 to $100.00 a month I need for the girls school curriculum. THANK YOU GOD! If you're interested in seeing what we hope to have be our new school, the link is below.
http://www.schooloftomorrow.com/

I myself have certification in supervising this particular curriculum. I attended the education classes and have my certificate. I used this curriculum while I was in high school for 2 years. 10th and 11th grades. Though, I still don't have my husband completely on board, but hopefully he will be soon.

I forgot I had this blog. haha. It's been busy here. I'm hoping to remember to write more often.

Thanks for reading all of my ramblings. HAVE A WONDERFUL DAY!

Summer has been busy so far

It's been a while, I know. We have just been hit with a whirlwind of events and just being plain busy.

A and K officially finished elementary school. So they will be starting at the middle school at the end of August. They are very excited. A can't wait to try out for the track and field team. She is the fastest girl in her school and the 2nd fastest kid all together.

School ended June 11th, we had 3 days off to relax and then all the girls started VBS (vacation bible school). E and J are even going this year. They are all having so much fun. We've had a neighbor kid coming with us too.

E and J were a little reluctant to go at first but are now loving it. They have latched on to one of the teenage volunteers and they just love her and talk about her all day long. This is their very first experience with any type of "school-ish" setting. They have always been home with one of us so I was worried how they would take it. Their first day was awful, they cried so much I was called back 30mins later to get them. But, forutnately the rest of the days were just fine.

I was glad when they setteled into their VBS class, because I was taking the womans bible study class that is provided during VBS hours. I was really looking forward to going to this class. The subject just called out to me and I knew that God was trying to tell me something. The class has been wonderful. I felt like this class was just for me. I have met some very wonderful women and have decided to start going to church again and brining my girls. I would love to attend the church where the bible study is being held but it's a bit far so I think I will be visiting one a little closer to home. I am quite nervous since I don't know anyone and I'm shy and I haven't been an regular church goer for some years now. I feel now like I'm being led to make sure my children are learning about God and knowing him. So if you pray, please pray for me and my courage.

This Thursday is our last day of VBS and then we get 3 weeks to relax before we head out to Arizona.

CAMPING!!

We left Friday to Memorial Park in Loma Mar, CA kinda near Half Moon Bay. It was a 30th Birthday camping trip for my friend Danielle. This was also E & J's first tent camping trip. The drive there only took us 1 1/2 hours. This is by far the shortest distance we have ever gone to go camping.

I'm always amazed at all of the stuff you (think) you need to bring camping. We only had 4 of the 5 girls this weekend so we removed one of the center seats in the van to have a little more room. It was still packed. Our rooftop bag was packed, the trunk was packed and the inside of the van was so packed the kids were burried upto their necks. With all of the people in our family, I think we need a trailer, becuase Mini-vans are definately lacking in the cargo storage department.

After about a week of getting stuff ready to go & a blissfully short drive, it was time to set up camp. We had two tents this time. E & J stayed with Adam and I and K & A were going to be in their own tent next to ours.

Here is my very first encounter with a Banana Slug. I'd never seen one before. The kids went to science camp in January and learned a song about Banana Slugs so of course they had to sing it.

The finally finished tent. Our tent was dubbed the Taj Mahal of camping. I think it's our very comfortable looking bed. And it is pretty comfy for an air mattress. In fact, E and J were a little weirded out by sleeping on the ground in sleeping bags on our floor, so they ended up sleeping on the air mattress with Adam and me. It kept us very warm (it was freezing outside) but also a little cramped.

The little girls loved being in the tent. They loved camping.

Scooters. We didn't bring our scooters because if we did, we couldn't have brought the children. Luckily D and J brought their boys' scooters. And thankfully the boys were nice enough to share.

This was A's favorite part about camping. She was just flying down those hills, in fact J can't stop talking about going camping again and the scooters.

Hot Chocolate time at our campsite was a big hit. All the kids came over for some yummy warm chocolate.

A, E & R look happy about it.

E even sang us his hot cholate song from Polar Express, something like,

"Here, we only got one rule:

Never ever let it cool!

Keep it cookin in the pot!

Soon, ya got hot choc-o-lat!"

That's how R said it too. I want hot chco-o-lat! So cute.

I learned as long as you are camping and it's cold, 11 am is not too soon to start drinking wine. D, M and K are here to prove that, they even have camping wine glasses!

This, is a centipede. I think

Night time was fun. We roasted marshmallows. E and K are bundled up near the campfire. Night time was sure cold.

And, of course D the birthday girl.

E loved roasting marshmallow's. In fact that's all she wanted to do with them. The would light them on fire and watch them burn into nothing. J, on the other hand would pretend to put them in the fire and then quickly eat them.

K roasting away.

E and all the other kids were racing their cars down the road hills. A couple of our diecast cars got run over by big cars passing through. When a car was coming we had to hurry and try and get the toys out of the street so the car could drive by. There weren't too many cars so that was good.

Ah, trying to sleep in while camping is not usually an easy thing to do. I think the thought that as soon as he gets up he has to repack the car he just packed two days ago was discouraging him from moving. hehe

K took a picture with me and the giant redwood trees.

Me and my hubby.

We packed the car back up, for some reason it seemed like less room then the first time we packed. And, we had less stuff to bring home. I don't understand. All of the kids had a blast. We had fun too. I hope we can go camp again this summer. It sure is fun for everyone.

I don't know how I ended up with more pictures of E and K, maybe they were just more hamish than J & A.

For a more complete camping photo album you can go to this link and see them all:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2023592&id=1043624689&l=dd8da48ac2

PS: I can't figure out how to name the links yet

Wait..did somebody say, PLETHORA OF ROAD TRIPS??

Last weekends trip to Mammy's was the start to our very full summer of road trips and activities. Never have I tried to cram so much into one little summer. Are we insane? Maybe.

This weekend we're off to Memorial Park in Half Moon Bay to go camping. It's supposed to be cold. Brrr. I don't know if I've ever cold camped before. I'm sure it will be fun.

The girls are out of school on June 11th. The week after begins the 2 weeks of VBS. The VBS we're going to is about a 40 minute drive in the mornings. I could go to one closer but we are going with another friend. This year my girlfriend and I are going to volunteer to help and E and J are going to attend their first Pre-school VBS. I hope they do well. They've never gone to anything organized before.

We have the 4th of July next which will be filled with a fun activity soon.

I'm then driving my girls to Arizona to visit Stacey for a week during July. Adam will be staying home. My brother in law is currenlty deployed so Adam would be bored with all of us girls. Plus, I'm sure he wont mind the alone time. Am I crazy making a 12 hour drive without my husband? Probably, but my mother is coming with me. *whew*

A few days after we get back from Arizona, Adam and I are going to take a drive up the CA coast on our way to Anaheim to visit Disneyland for my 30th birthday. I'm so excited that Mickey will be celebrating my birthday with me. And, he's pretty stoked too.

A week after this trip, we go on our now annual week long summer trip to Lake Tahoe. this trip is always a lot of fun. Lot's of friends, kids, sun, water & boating.

I'm working on trying to also plan a Labor Day camping trip to Berryessa. We'll see. This seems like a full summer. It's going to go fast and it's going to be fun!

The Lucky J&S Ranch Annual Memorial Day Weekend Lawn Olympics & Family Reunion (whew)

Last Saturday we took our 3rd annual Memorial Day weekend trip to Litchfield, CA to visit my Mammy and Steve at their ranch. It's about a 5 hour drive for us but well worth it. There are tons of things to do and plenty of room for my children to roam. It's almost like heaven.

We made a pit stop in Reno to visit Cabela's sporting good store. Adam was sure happy about that. Cabela's had all the sporting goods you could think of, along with two huge taxidermy exhibits. They were really neat. There was a huge fish tank/aquarium with tons of huge fish & a pretend shooting gallery. The girls found one of the guns with 40 shots still left on it. Score!

It was so nice to be able to go again this year. There are always such fun things to do. A mini-golf course, volleyball, soccer, badminton and this year a Wii bowling tournament, which I'm pretty sure I won.

My girls loved all of the animals. H aka Dr. Dolittle. There was a small litter of kittens that H charmed. She was able to hold them and pet them, before this they were fraidycats. She is such a pet lover, I think she should be a vet. E and J loved Easy & Juice, the horses. A was right there with H all weekend charming cats. Poor K had a fever all weekend and wasn't feeling well for most of the trip. She would have small bouts when her medicine kicked in where she would feel better but she definately wasn't herself. In fact we are still battling her fever today is our 5th day. I'm hoping it will be gone tomorrow.

It was great to see the family this year. We were missing Aunt Terri & Uncle Dave, and Stacey & Wes so that made it a little sad. This trip seemed to go by faster than usual, we were definately not ready to go home. I'm hoping to try and make it up again before the summer is over. We'll see. Once a year is just not enough.

These kids are ready to roll Adam is tooLets get this show on the road

Adjusting the twisted seatbelt

Detour to Cabela's

This store was so cool

One of the taxidermy exhibits

Cool Cat

This was my favorite

E & J liked it

The 2nd exhibit, there were real fish swimming in the pond

the huge aquarium

Look at the fish

testing fishing reels

shooting gallery

blowing out the smoke

Daddy is a great teacher

all future boyfriends better watch out

Cheese

K, H & A

......And then out at the Ranch

A & H

Adam

Silly girl

 volley soccer

Kasey, Tristan & Christy

Cleaning up the tents & tunnels

E heading up to the barn

The beautiful trees in the front yard

Mammy's house

The Bunkhouse

Eww that horse just sneezed

A petting Juice

The Men Resting

H aka Dr. Dolittle

Of course as always there are a few more pictures I still need from Adam's camera.