Framing

They started the framing this week....it is starting to take shape!! When the roof gets finished they will take out this bay window and place these windows on that wall.

Happy Day!

I was so excited today when I opened my electric bill.....$104! I love the Spring and Fall because we have low bills but I dont' remember it ever being this low!! Now last summer it got over $300 but it was the hottest summer EVER!

Hope you had a happy moment in your day!

My Grandmother's poem

I did find my Grandmother's poem book so I thought I would post her entry. The book was a collection of work from University of Alabama English students published in 1926. My grandmother(pictured above) did major in English...but I did not! hardy har har. She evidently loved poetry because I have a lot of her old books and most were poetry.

Compensation

Perhaps to have had no vision

Is better than one blurred

By all the dilillusionments

That have occurred.

But although my dreams are shadows

My fire but a spark

I have remembered daylight

And do not fear the dark

Ruth Palmer

Poetry

I became a member of the Children's Book of the Month club for the 3rd time 2 years ago just because their introductory offer is so good...you get like 100 books for 1 penny....well maybe just like 5 for $1 each or something wonderful and then you just have to buy 5 over the next 2 years to fulfill your membership. The only hassle is they send out the "month's selection" to you every month unless you call and cancel it or send in the reply card. I usually would just call and punch in some numbers to cancel them sending it or if I forgot and they sent it I would not open it, write "return to sender" and put it back in the mailbox. BUT last week I got "this month's selection" in the mail and decided to see what it was since I am always on the lookout for good books that I could use for preschool.....well it was 2 poetry books. I first thought I did not need these but then I thought I would just read some of the poems. Then I thought of my mother who loves poetry. I remember her reading poetry to me as I would fall asleep. Her mother was actually a published poet. Do you have that poem Mama? Maybe I do??

Anyway....the 2 poetry books I received were "Don't Bump the Glump" by Shel Silverstein...which I sent back(wasn't on the preschool level) and "My Dog May Be A Genius" by Jack Prelutsky. (those are both pretty cool websites....by the way;))
Anyway....the poetry in this book is fun and easy to read. One of my favorites is very easy to memorize....here is it:

Call of the Long Winded Clumsy Owl

Whoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooops!


I know...I know....I am easily amused!:)

The perfect poem for Sophia

We were reading in this new poem book I have (see above post) and this poem fit Sophia so perfectly!! She will be the first one up on Saturday but the last one up on a school day!! Our little sleeping princess:)

Please let me sleep all day today

I need to stay in bed

I'm hardly even half awake,

I'm sure my eyes are red.

I try and try to open them,

but can't remember how.

You say today is Saturday?

I'm getting up right now.

Concrete

Here is the foundation for our room! They are supposed to start tomorrow....but I just remembered it is supposed to rain so it might not get going until later in the week....don't tell Richard though! He is very impatient about this project and wants it done yesterday!

Bowling Alley...phase 1

Here are some pictures of the bowling alley....it will most likely be a small extra bedroom and an extended kitchen....but a bowling alley would be more fun!! ha!

The room will be long and narrow. I know Mama will be happy about this extra room because she wouldn't have to live in that out-building if she had to come live with us;) hardy har har.

The bay window is going to be gone and the kitchen extended out. Those double doors will be put on the right side so you can exit out from the kitchen to the outside.

Just another picture from the back yard.

I will try to post pictures at each stage of the process. They got behind schedule because we thought we were needing to move our septic lines....but thank goodness we didn't have to!!

Highway Robbery!

I wish I could photoshot Nate's face into this picture so I wouldn't have to pay $30 for a set of Kindergarten Graduation pictures!



Well I am not. I really want to since I did buy Sophia's but I know I didn't pay $30 for them because all we got were some wallets I believe. Maybe a 5x7. I haven't bought any school pictures because they are so darn expensive and since we are always taking pictures of the kids why do I need to pay a million dollars for a posed shot that I forget to dress them for!

No tee-fiss

Nate lost his other front tooth this morning....but he didnt' want his picture taken. Here is the process of me trying to get a picture of his toothless grin!
First comes lots of begging and bribing....

Then he reluctantly lifts his upperlip but it looks like he is picking his nose instead...

I told him not to pick his nose! (i know what you are thinking....what a messy desk she has!)

OK...now we are getting somewhere! Look at that sweet dimple!

What a cute boy!

There it is! Those are going to be some big teeth when they finally come in!! The tooth fairy better not forget this time!!

Rock collector

Sophia has always loved rocks and Friday she got the urge to go outside and collect all the geodes she could find. She started off with a sandwich bag but as you can see her collection got too big. She always wants to bring these inside the house but collections such as these are best observed in their natural habitat! She probably has a collection of rocks somewhere in her room already!!

Where does she get this rock collecting desire from????

Yep....Granny! Who has been known to stop on the side of the road and pick up rocks. She even went into an undeveloped subdivision to swipe some of the nice rocks that were left behind when they were making the roads. Did I tell that story right Granny???

Tuesday Tell All

The most wasted

of all days is one

without laughter.

~e.e. cummings

What makes you laugh?

This is the topic for the TUesday Tell All this week. Hmmmmm....I LOVE the quote they used and I do agree with that! Laughing is usually my first instinct for everything. When I am stressed I usually laugh. One time my friend and I were driving in the rain and started hydroplaning so bad we spun in circles and ended up in the ditch. We didn't hit anyone, nor were we hurt but when we finally came to a stop I started laughing. Later I cried but I usually laugh first! So weird!

I grew up in a home that valued laughter. My mother always said if we were not laughing we would be crying! Isn't that true!! One of the most fun things to laugh at now is family stories. I love to reminiscence with Trudy and Frankie about the funny things we did as kids....especially on Sundays when Mama and Daddy were napping. Or how we would sneak down to the creek when Mama warned us not to!

Another thing that makes me laugh is old SNL commercials and skits. You can usually see most of them on YouTube. And there are a lot of LOL vidoes on Youtube of people doing funny things:)

One of my favorite funny movies is Dumb and Dumber. My favorite laugh-out-loud TV show is "Everybody Loves Raymond".

My children are always a good source of laughter as well!

I am trying to remember the last time I had a really good-from-the-gut laugh but I can't remember....that means it has been too long then!!

And anything is funnier when you are tired...or hot and tired like at Girl's Camp...right Natalie? Jordan? Anyone reading this know what I am talking about? :)

I will probably think of something else to write about later but that is all for now:)

Kylie was here...

On Wednesday Kylie(one of my preschool children) stayed with me after class while her mom was at a doctor's appt. Sophia was home from school since she had a fever and headaches the night before. Sophia wasn't the kind of sick where she needed to be quarantined so she did most of our preschool activities with us. Kylie loved having another girl around.

After lunch Sophia was starting to feel bad again so I had her lie in my bed and watch some TV. I went into the preschool room to work on lesson plans and Kylie was going back and forth between the preschool room and Sophia. She would come "flitting" into where I was and then back to Sophia. One time when she came through I asked her what she was doing and her reply was "cooking for everyone". She is often doing this in preschool and I thought it was sweet that she was "cooking" for Sophia. One time when she came through she even grabbed the make-up kit(all plastic) and when I asked her what she needed that for she said SOphia needed a makeover.

Later that night as I was getting ready for bed I noticed just how much food Kylie had fixed for Sophia! It was all on my nightstand!

Wigglers

On Thursday I wanted to get some earthworms for preschool and since we live by West Point Lake I was betting the local gas station would have some. I walked in the door and asked the lady behind the counter, "Do you have any earthworms?". She looked at me like I at a gas station in Utah asking for pork rinds.

She said "Earthworms....??!" as she turned to look at the guy in the store stocking the shelves with bread. "we don't have earthworms but we got some wigglers". Not knowing what wigglers were i said I would take some....and they were earthworms. At least they were like the earthworms we use play with as a kid. Maybe I am wrong and there are wigglers and then there are earthworms. Who knows....I just thought it was so funny that someone didn't know what earthworms were!

Bad day....

I thought I was having a bad day!:)





So today was going great. We had a wonderful day at preschool creating insects and setting up an aquarium full of dirt for some earthworms and bugs! It was great.


Then a friend called and we talked about religion and she still thinks Mormons are a cult and one of the major deciding factors in her mind was because of the whole Warren Jeffs Pologamy scandal that is happening now in TX....which we have nothing to do with!!! We are still friends but it hurts when someone says something like that about something you believe so strongly in....

And who decided which religions are cults anyway??? Dictionary.com states a cult is a particular system of religious worship, esp. with reference to its rites and ceremonies.


That sounds like all religions to me! Anyway.....

I have noticed that I like to put dots....in my posts.....:)

Then the night got better because I went to play soccer with some friends....well I should say I ran around because I don't know the game....but it was fun. But as we were leaving Sophia started whining about ice cream and if you start whining about anything with Mom you definately don't get it!! This turned into a 3 year old screaming/crying fit that lasted 30 minutes...not kidding. I was preoccupied with my earlier conversation with my friend so it was easy to just tune her out! When we got home, she ate her dinner(amidst tears) , I took a shower and said a prayer to know how to help her calm down. She has these "moments" when she is really tired(which she is) or when something bad happened at school. So I asked her about school and it turns out she fell off the monkey bars and everyone laughed at her. She has no one to play with during recess because all the girls want to do is chase the boys and she doesn't want to do that. Plus her friend from the bus doesn't ride anymore so she doesn't enjoy the bus either. On one hand she needs to learn that she can just be with "herself" and doesn't always have to have someone around....but for a social butterfly like Sophia this is a hard lesson to learn! Poor thing. I felt sorry for her but at the same time I just told her this happens sometimes and she will find a friend.....like my mother would always say

"Life is Hard....and then you die!"



I sure love my Sophia even with her quarterly fits!!

Manic Monday...

Remember this group??

Anyway....so tomorrow after school we will run out the door for Activity Days at Jessica's house from 4-5pm. We will actually leave at 445pm se we can make it to Sophia's tennis lesson from 5-6pm. Then I thought to look at Nate's ball schedule and discovered he has a ballgame at 7pm. So it looks like we won't get home until 830 tomorrow night! Plus it is Richard's choir practice night so I am doing all this solo!

**sigh** Oh well....at least all Mondays aren't like this!

Tuesday Tell All....addendum

I forgot this picture on the previous post. Nate drew this picture of us....and he said Fia had a "pickle head". Too precious!!

Tuesday Tell All.....

I dont' think I will ever get a Tuesday Tell All actually done on a Tuesday or on time.....as this one was for the week if April 1st!! Oh well.....



This topic was "Made By Hand". So here are some items in my house that were handmade that I think are pretty cool....



I went through my scrapbooks(which I should have taken a picture of because they are handmade) and took pictures of the drawings the kids have done for me.

We had a family bed until the kids were about 3 & 5 and it was a little hard on Sophia to move into her bed. One day i find this picture taped to my door. It is a picture of her and me sleeping together....it was like she was reminiscing of "the good ole' days"!

Nate drew this picture at church. I love these first drawings where legs come out of heads!

Fia drew this one....apparantly we are the royal family with our crowns!

Some more of Fia's artwork.

My Dad's mom Enid(who Sophia is named after) a.k.a "Nannie" and her mother a.k.a "Nana Henry" or "Nana 2 rooms" (because she had two rooms....one to sew in and the other to sleep in)....always made us quilts and puppets and mittens for Christmas and our birthdays. I also remember Nana Henry making a pillow with a ruffle around it one time. My favorite quilt is at my mother's house but it was one where each square had extra batting inside so it was "puffy".

This picture is of the quilt Nana Henry made for my parents when they got married. It isn't squares but different sized scraps of fabric...my mom called it a "Crazy Quilt". (The quilt is draped on the chest of drawers my mother's mother took to the University of Alabama. On the back of the dresser is 3 triangles because she was in the Delta Delta Delta sorority. I should have pulled the quilt off and gotten a better picture of it but that would have disrupted the dust bunnies living around the dresser and I dont' want to make them mad! )

This really isn't "handmade" but in a way it is....this is my business license for my preschool.
I put a lot of effort into this and love it!

weekend....

So here is what we did this weekend.....



Friday I ate lunch with the kids. They have lunch at the same time which makes it easy for me to sit with both of them! I hope next year we get this lucky!!



Then I finally got sick and tired of riding around in my nasty vehicles. Vacuuming just wasn't cutting it with all the dirt and grime! I had the van detailed a couple years ago(well worth the money!) but I didn't want to fork over that moula again so I decided to rent a rug doctor and detail it myself!

It really is so easy and I looked way better than this lady when i was cleaning my car:) ha! The weather was perfect for cleaning the car! I pulled out the seats and even got all the gunk off the seat tracks.....it was nasty! It was amazing how dirty the water was each time I emptied the tank! Then I came inside and cleaned the carpets in our bedrooms. So for $40 I detailed the car and cleaned all the carpet! Not bad I thought!

Friday evening I attended a bridal shower while the kids and their friends Wesley and Patrick(who live on our street) watched "Water Horse". Sophia, Nate and I saw this movie in the theater over the Christmas break and they enjoyed watching it over....but what kid doesn't like to watch a movie multiple times??? It is a good family movie!

Saturday-

I am going to be team-teach my first RPM class on Tuesday evening and so I headed off to the gym to practice and then we went to the church for a baptism.

The baptism was at 1030am and I thought for sure we would have no problem getting to Nate's baseball pictures at 1230.....well we didn't leave the church until 1145 and in spite of our best efforts we missed the pictures. I was feeling bad for Nate because we(his parents) have not been that great at getting him to practices or games on time this season! I don't know what is wrong with us! I guess it is spring fever! If they were giving out grades to the kids for their efforts this baseball season, Nate would get an A+++. What would we get??

Yep! An F! An F - !

After the picture-missing-fiasco we came home and just enjoyed the afternoon. The missionaries came to our house for lunch after the baptism so we visited with them for a while. Also one is a computer whiz and was able to erase our old harddrive and save the computer I was about to donate to Goodwill! So Richard set it up in Sophia's room and we headed out to Staples to get a wireless card so that computer can connect to the internet. It will be SO nice to have another computer hooked to the internet.

So while we were out we got another movie. This time we rented "August Rush" which I had never heard of but is was really good.

Sunday....

We went to church and then took naps! I love Sunday naps!

It was a nice relaxing weekend. I am looking forward to the summer where we can have these days during the week instead of reserving them for the weekend!

Six Flags

After enjoying themselves at the Fair, Richard and the kids really wanted to go to Six Flags....so we decided to go during their Spring Break. Monday morning we left early enough to get there right when it opened!

The hardest part when you walk into the park is deciding which to ride first! We headed towards the right and got on the first coaster we came to....the Cyclone! This is the roughest coaster in the whole park. I remember riding it 8 or 9 years ago with the youth. I believe that was the last roller coaster I got on. I just remember how it shook us all over the place and how I just gritted my teeth hoping it would end soon! Sophia was brave enough to ride alone. Nate seems a little hesitant about the ride but this was just a warm-up for him! He kept riding the rest of the day and Sophia decided to hang out with me....she said she didn't like the way the coasters made her tummy jump! We did ride a couple "family" coasters-the Mine one and there was another one I can't remember the name for. They were rated "mild" and I could handle them. No big drops but enough twists and turns that I didn't want to do it again!

Here we are riding on a kiddie swing. We only did this one and then left the kid area....not enough excitement for Richard and Nate!

Sweet Fia! She was my riding partner:)

This is the Cyclone and I think you can see Richard waving at me....

Group shot outside the swings.

Disney has the disney characters and 6 Flags has Looney Toons and the super heroes. Here are Batman and Robin....not sure why my camera didn't turn the picture around....it usually does.

The cool batmobile! With a nice coating of pollen!

When we went to the fair in town Fia was so sad that we wouldn't let her play the dumb, money-sucking games to win one of those ugly stuffed animals! I told her the next time we go to the fair she could use her allowance and play those games if she wanted. She was very excited to see the same type of games here at Six Flags. The only difference was it cost $3-5 to play them! She was DETERMINED to win a LARGE stuffed animal and decided she could do this game. You had to climb up the rope ladder and ring the bell without falling on the mat. Impossible....if you ask me....especially for a 8 year old! Well that cost $3. Then she did one of those claw games for $2. nothing..... but tears from Fia. She was so set on being a "winner" and get one of those large toys! I kept telling her that she is a winner to me! She finally realized what a rip-off these games were and let go of the dream to win something!

We were waiting for Nate and Dad to get off a ride. The lines were not long....I think the max wait was probably 25 minutes. Around 6pm my feet were screaming at me and Fia was tired--but Richard and Nate were wanting to make the most of the last 2 hours at the park. So Fia and I hiked back to the car and rested until they returned. They were able to ride the mindbender 5 times in a row!! Richard said the last time on the mindbender Nate just had his arms folded....like "this is nothing!"

It was a fun day!