We can't always be on the mountain top.......

No, the picture does not need to be rotated.........it's me....and I am on top of the mountain. Bradbury Mountain in Maine a short drive from our home. We spent yesterday hiking and enjoying the last day before school and the fall craziness starts. While the older 2 boys and 2nd sons' girlfriend and my daughter were wondering off and hubby and baby son were exploring I took a minute to myself. It was nice to feel the heat of the sun since the breeze had a bit of a chill to it. Then everybody found me...............

We found a cove area in the rock and decided to do pictures. Hoping one comes out good enough for Christmas. We'll see..........

This next picture I think is a super sweet pic of 2nd son and his girl....

After the hike we let the kiddos play on the play ground for a bit. It was a good way to wear the kids out so they would get a good nights sleep for school. ( Although my oldest doesn't start school until tomorrow.)

Sunday evening 2nd son, daughter and baby boy decided to do an iron chef cook off in the kitchen.....here's what our entree looked like :

This was an egg burrito topped with salad and a salad on the side. Although my sweet little daughter forgot which one she had doused with hot sauce at the request of one of the judges ( her daddy) and I ended up with the hot sauce one. It was hot, but not bad.

Our Daughter won , I guess you could say be default. Our older 2 sons got a phone call about meeting some other friends at the park. So, the food the 2nd son made ended up being eaten by him. Since we were kind of tired of eggs by then we had baby boy make the dessert......

Now lets go back and see a picture of our lovely contestant and winner of the dinner portion of the competition.....

Clearly the boy won the dessert portion. Love making things fair :-).

Off to great the kids when they get home from their first day of school.....pics to follow.....

Half lazy Saturday

So I had made this nice list of things I was GOING to get done today. I was going to be proud of myself and feel accomplished! Ok, that is what I thought when I was writing out my list. Now it is a different story! Allen talked me into playing a Scrabble game with him...well, not one but 2!! We have a hand held electronic game. So I tried to sleep between turns. Then I got up early this morning to go to AWANA training at the Church. Super informative meeting. Learned a lot and I am so eager and looking forward to this years AWANA.

Hubby and Daughter went for a walk today......that was nice to see them spend time together. Girls NEED that from their Daddy's'!

Now, for some holidays we give our kids "coupons"...... stay up 30 mins past your bedtime, favorite dessert, extra bedtime story....and so on...... today after their walk, Tiffany decided to use her "build a sundae with Dad" coupon. It was so awesome to watch them interact....

Ugh.........I have been fighting a migraine for 2-3 days now! It is such a pain!!!!! I started feeling a bit better last night when I was making that list...maybe that is why I was so ambitious! Anyway.....it returned to it's "roaring" state. Any of you migraine sufferers know what I mean....you can get the meds to "calm it down" but then once they wear off it's BOOM! So, I took something STRONGER then I normally do......so that being said, if I happen to wonder off subject , bare with me, I'll get back to what I was trying to say....if not, just enjoy......

Ok, yes, back to my "productive/lazy" day. The hubby was meeting with some friends tonight up at Timmy's ( that's what we call Tim Hortons)........he NEEDED to go and do something more then have coffee but whatever, he is old enough to make his own mind up. I just hope he is enjoying himself. So before he left I asked for 10 mins so I could take a power nap on the couch.....I think it turned into more like 30. That was good though. I think my migraines are being fueled by staying up too late and trying to cram too much in the day. With the bits and pieces of cool weather we have been having , it has gotten me into a baking mood!!

My oldest son made some of the BEST blueberry muffins Thursday night....they were SUPER yum!!!

He has become quiet the cook! He has been working at a German restaurant and comes home with some of the yummiest ideas. And we get to taste his SUPER creations/concoctions.

Then the same evening I had made some yummy homemade bread. Basically out of necessity because son #2 likes to have toast all the time........Anyway.....it had been a while since I made homemade bread and we LOVED it all over again! Of course we HAD to break out the homemade strawberry jam..........

That red blob you see is the homemade jam. Again, it was good. Right now, while I am blogging, my dough is rising for the cinnamon buns(mini cinnis) for our high school Sunday school class. Tomorrow is step up day and we will be gaining new students.

Oh, and I also made sugar cookies for the local college students. Our church partners with this ministry thing to where they give the cookies to students. Someone took a survey and it seems that the one thing college students miss a lot is homemade cookies.

Well, it sounds as if everyone is back home from where they had gone......oldest son working at the restaurant, hubby out with the guys and son #2 went to the movies with his "girlfriend"...they "celebrated" their 6 month anniversary....hehehe....how cute!!!!!! Ah.....to be young again.....

the younger 2 have been in bed for some time and I am now feeling the STRONGER meds taking place so that means it is now time for me to take a 10 min nap and then get the mini cinnis done and then to bed!!!!

Sweet ( cinnamon ) dreams :-)

Summer Sweetness and all its' glory

My son just made the announcement to us all that today is the "official" last day of their summer vacation. Monday will not count as it is a holiday....according to him. So how is this last "official" day of summer vacation being spent? Well, the daughter is at a friends, the youngest son put together his first 2 models and the older two, typical ....video games, phone and computer.(too cold for the beach and we already took the pool down).

The hubby is off today and me...........well, I am just spending my time being nostalgic and in comptemplation. Why? Maybe it's the cloudy, overcast weather and the chill in the air? Or thinking that all my babies are growing up so fast! Then that led me to thinking about my Grandmother. Her mothers birthday is the 31st of this month. She would have been well over a 100. Wonder if she was thinking on the day of her babies birth what her babies life would be like.
How many children she would bring into this world and so forth. Honestly, I can say I don't remember thinking those thoughts when my children were born...too much going on I guess. :-)
I love history, especially when it is my families history.

I also have been thinking if my Grandmother got everything out of life she wanted. then of course that made me start thinking if I am getting everything out of life that I want.

I have decided to make a list of things that I REALLY want and things I want to do. I am curious to see how many times this list may change. have you seen the movie the Bucket List? I truly enjoyed it! Of course I bawled at the end! i am such a crier in movies!

Maybe I will share my list on here....maybe it will be too personal, I'll have to wait and see.

until then, here are the things we have been doing since I last posted....back in July! Crazy how much time lapses!

Now let me see if I can think back that far!! :-)

We celebrated my 2nd sons b-day...he's 14 now.....

My nephew William came from South Carolina. He was originally only visiting for 10 days until the airline cancelled his flight and bumped him out 2 more days.

We went to the beach while he was here, although he found the water much to chilly for him. we also did some mini-golfing, bowling and tubing on the boat too. Hope he had a good time.

During this time my Mother's cousin and her husband from Columbia, SC came to visit.( no pics from their visit as I had the digital camera...which I broke:-().

I was only here for one evening of their visit, I was on my way to Boston the next morning to a Women Of Faith Conference with some friends. ( which by the way was AWESOME!! AND I got to talk to Nicole C Mullen!!!).

We went shopping at some really nice places, ate at the California Pizza Kitchen and The Cheesecake Factory... ( do you need someTING?) Let's be serious, sometimes going out of town is all about the places you can eat at!! Especially if none of these places are near your home!

After coming back from Boston, my two older boys went off to boot camp again this year, but to work as staff not to be a cadet enlisted..or whatever you call them.

This was the second time we sent our older two boys off ....the first was with our church youth group for a week of learning and fun in Mass. By the way...the oldest son is going on a missions trip to Durban, South Africa in Feb of 09 I am excited and apprehensive all the same!

Hm..what else have we done this summer...........

Oh yes, hubby had a birthday! And we did LOTS of boating....until we broke the boat.....that has now turned into a project ;-0.

Then there was the GNO....girl's night out....at a baseball game...again, some places you go for the food ( fried dough and fries!!!!). (they were good going down...but eewwww NASTY later!!)

Look girls, there's our "friend" sitting behind us!! UGH!!!

remember I said I had broke the digital camera? Well, I took this picture without having a clue what I was getting! :-) Pretty good huh?

So we pretty much wrapped the summer up with a sailing excursion 2 weeks ago on a Sunday. My 2nd and 3rd child realized sailing is not their "thing". Although they do love them some power boating!! Not the rocking back and forth.

again......pictures taken with a broken digital...you can still take pics but can't see what you are taking them of. Do you know HOW many pics we took HOPING to get a good one ?:-)

so here's to summer.......looking forward to the next one until then....fair winds and following seas...

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!!!!!

This is how we spent our 4th......
Hope yours was just as fun!

I am not a homemaker because I had too little ambition or education to make anything else of myself. No—I am a homemaker because God has given me the infinite honour of being a wife, and I delight in employing every ability that He has equipped me with in this glad career. I love being home. ~Lanier Ivester

Borrowed this qoute and I LOVE it! Hope you feel the same way about caring for your family. Somedays may seem overbearing, but God gives us just what we need huh? :-)

What we have been up to..........

Our oldest turned 16 with a party at the beach. We got him kayaking lessons.

The next child had his semi-formal dance at the school. Don't they look so cute??

HAVE to have some relaxing time thrown in there.......we took the boat out on the lake for a swim...rather they went for a swim, I read :-)

This is our daughter out for a swim....a little dark..........

So summer is upon us....yeah!! The weather hasn't been bad...a little warm here and there. We have our pool and a/c's to deal with it :-)

We went out and picked these........

and made some super yummy jam!!

We also are celebrating our 17th anniversary.

We're Hooked!

The Office.........

Some of you have probably been watching this for a while now while we just stumbled upon it. Actually it was our 16 yr old that stumbled upon it. LOVE this show! This is John Krasinski who plays Jim. Funny! Tomorrow( or whenever) I will post another picture.maybe of Dwight :-).

If you haven't tuned in...try it. You will either hate the show or love it. Allen was actually telling me about a guy at his office not being able to watch it because it makes him angry? Go figure!

Proud Momma and Pappa!!!

CONGRATULATIONS ZACHARY!!!!!!!!!!

Last night was the underclassman awards night, Zachary knew he would be getting an award in visual arts but had no idea he would receive one for Outstanding Physical Education! We are so proud of him for both his awards! Tonight is the sports awards and he will also be receiving a pin in tennis. Way to go!!!

CONGRATULATIONS TO NATHAN AND TIFFANY!!!!!

These two did a FABULOUS job at the elementary school variety show! How many eight graders do you see getting out of school early to come help their sister? they worked wonderful together and received many compliments. they are already talking about NEXT years performance!

Once Nathan gets it loaded on to YouTube I will include the link.........

DANIEL NEWS.......

Allen and I had the pleasure of going on the aquarium field trip with the entire kindergarten from the elementary school. Wanna know something even cooler? Daniel's teacher, Mrs G., had to leave because her baby got sick so I got to sign in and be his substitute for the day! Amazing how things work out right? I got paid to spend the day with my husband and son at an aquarium!

lunch break

holding a star fish

playing duck, duck , goose!

Other stuff....... :-)

School is winding down and part of me is happy and part is not. I enjoy subbing, but I am also ready for some down time. Although I amnot sure when that will come here's why:

*Oldest son will be looking into taking a math course to put him in pre-cal for the next school year. Also will be doing tennis and golf lessons, heading to Crosswalk and doing boot camp this year as staff.

*Next son is taking a math course to put him in algebra II for 9th grade. Also looking at soccer camp, heading to boot camp to staff and heading to Crosswalk with the youth.

* Daughter will be doing Math and Literacy camp because I requested it. Seems to help her retain things taught during the year instead of having to back track at the beginning of a new school year.

* Youngest son will be busy working on reading this summer. He wants to be able to read the dictionary by first grade:-) Love that enthusiasm!

So...there goes some mornings sleeping in!! We are trying to squeeze in some boating days and camping.

Here's to your summer, busy or not and doing what you can to help your children succeed!

food for thought...or thoughts on food.......

So I was just asking my Friend about her menu for family dinners.....
she plans 2 weeks out and write it all down including snacks and lunch and breakfast.
I do once a week planning.
I get so tired of trying to come up with some meal ideas.....wouldn't it be fun to share your menu?
So here's what I propose we do..... lets post our menus and share them so we can all get some new ideas!

Ok, here goes mine for this week minus today:

Tuesday: (b) cereal (l) sandwiches, fruit cup, homemade cookie, yogurt cup, (d) spaghetti, salad, and bread.

Wednesday: (b) pancakes and bacon, (l) same as previous day (d) Parmesan chicken, green beans, salad, potatoes

Thursday: (b) oatmeal or scrambled eggs, (l) chicken tenders (d) hamburgers, homemade fries

Friday:(b) cereal, (l) go back to Tues, (d) homemade pizza

Sat: left overs all day

Sunday: (b) cereal or pancakes depending on time, (L) pulled pork bbq sandwich with coleslaw (d) left overs


a little boring this week I know............ haven't had a lot of time to put into it. Although the hubby suggested meatloaf and one child suggested mac-n-cheese.
Now that I look at the menu....YAWN.... I think I may revise it!

Would love to see your menus..........

Time flies.......

Happy Memorial day! May you be ever grateful to those who have given us our freedom by laying down their lives.

***************************************************************************************

What a busy weekend!!! Allen and the older boys left Thursday evening for a trip to Canada with the Sea Cadets so it was just me and the younger 2. Friday I worked then we rented videos for the evening. Saturday was filled with going roller skating and Sunday we went to the beach.

Today we got up early to be at the parade when it started. By the afternoon Allen and the older boys were home and then off to a cookout at our friends' house.Whew!

The cookout was great! Time to catch up with friends and relax and let the children wear themselves out. And that they did! The kids( and grown ups) had a blast on our go kart that our Friends are soooooooo graciously "storing" for us ;-). (thank you thank you thank you!!)

After a FEAST( love those Jen Beans!!) we topped the evening off with rootbeer floats.

Our friends also have some chickens and recently got a new broad in. I have to show you my favorite....

this picture is a bit dark but she was somewhat shy :-). I have officially named her "Tina Turner". She's so cute!! All that hair up top and skinny brown legs :-) I will HAVE to get a better picture of her to post.

Here are some other fun shots from the day.......

This ones for you Jen....FRIENDS TIL THE END ;-) hehehe

"CHEESE"

Danica Patrick eat your heart out baby!!

This is Nick..........tell me Becky...what's wrong with this picture? :-)

*************************************************************************************

Previous goings on..........

Almost 4 years ago we had a foster child from Uganda come into our home. I remember when I took her to the neurologist and he said she would never function past a three month old level... I just kept thinking.." you are not God!!"

Well, friends in a neighboring town adopted this little angel and now she is flourishing and using a sippy cup, not a bottle, can "color" and walk assisted with a walker and also understands sign language. So there my neurologist!

Allen and I were fortunate enough to go hear the lady that owns the orphanage speak. Amazing the things they are doing for the children in Uganda!

here is a picture of Ruth:

God bless Ruth and her family.

So all in all it has been busy but in a fun way. time flies, but when you are making memories it makes it all worth while!

Here's to you having fun!!

Mother's Day and memories

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms........


Especially my Mom, Mother-in-law, Sister and sister-in-laws!! Love you all so very much!





Well, even though Allen admits to not listening to me when I mention something I would like to have , this year he actually listened!! And this is what I got.....

This is one of those turntables(record players for us old schoolers), it also has the cd and cassette player on it. Plus a radio. He even went and dug out my old albums!! The kids made me awesomely sweet cards and Daniel made me "flowers" at school. What an awesome Mother's Day! This was something I thought would be neat to have but didn't have to keep dropping hints. Nice.......... We have all had such a wonderful time with it to, listening to the albums I had when I was little. Amazingly they are in great shape! Brings back tons of memories while we are creating new ones!

here's to you celebrating the old and the new!

Mustard Island

We took the little boat out along with a friend's kid ( Marley) to Mustard Island. Allen and his brother found this when they were out. While there Allen told us of the GEO cache he and Brian could not find. He pointed out the area and no more then Allen had said it Tiffany walked right to the cache.
It was FREEZING out there and the sun didn't come out until after we were home. It was good anyway.....

Here's to making your not good weather days good anyway.................