Courageous Joy

Friday

I woke up at 4 a.m. (thank you, Stacia). It was good that she woke up early because she went back down at 7 a.m. This means she was sleeping when I was at speech and she continued to sleep through about 2/3 of the sorting of produce. {G}

About 7 a.m. Mike called and we were all able to wish him Happy Birthday - of course in HIS TIME his birthday was YESTERDAY! Ooops.

Happy Anniversary to my Mom and Dad - 44 years! Wow. Dad called me today but I had a houseful picking up produce so didn't get to talk long.

I leave the house at 8:10 for Nolan's speech therapy. I'm so glad we decided to go ahead and do this early on Friday. Today, Miss Natalie gave us a sheet of exercises for low muscle tone. I think we are getting somewhere!!!

We left speech at 9:10 and headed for HEB to pick up our produce order. How smooth is that? I was home by 9:30 and we were done sorting, and the newsletter was updated and printed by 11:10, when the first lady showed up. Shew....adrenalin rush.....so familiar...it was really like stepping back in town. In a strange way my children were EXCITED. They like to help serve. I try to be sure bruised things are pulled but with Arielle, Nolan and even Zander (under my careful supervision) filling baskets....well....they don't always catch the bruises...but they are so blessed to be able to help. Jamin and Jared came and helped us unload and then got back to school. I was so impressed that Arielle and Nolan were able to accomplish so much. It was fun to be doing a co-op again.....it will be a blast to see my friends once a week.

Here are a few photos:

My living room after all the cases of produce were sorted...

A single share of produce - this is $28. I think we are getting manageable amounts now. It's still alot but not terrible. I am SWIMMING in carrots - a single share got 3 lbs and I got 9 lbs. Adrienne and I had discussed it and we thought 1.5 lbs and 4.5 might be to few...but I can tell for US it is going to be way to many this way.....ah well you learn by trial and error....

Here's my triple share....4 of us get this much....I think they do better than I at eating them.....if only Mike were home, I could force feed him produce. ::snort::

I spent some time putting things away. I also found 6 bags of grapes and processed them for raisins. I tried to get all our produce out of here via the freezer and dehydrator. I want to see if we can eat a triple share with Mike gone. I'm not sure if I'll go down to a double share or keep getting a triple and keep finding people to bless. {g} I like being the carrot fairy. ::snort::

I spent some time figuring out how many Tupperware containers I needed to buy to house the bulk spices I bought. I'm afraid of TX bugs. As much as I didn't want to buy Tupperware (price) that stuff lasts forever and it DOES keep moths and such OUT.

I considered going to play this afternoon. I felt like we really needed to play but we also needed to do some couch school. I had planned to do art and work on our Thanksgiving lapbook.

Cy got home from work about then and reminded me that we needed to go get the Honda's tire fixed. ARGH. I couldn't think of a place to go except the gates of hell....bad choice. It took HOURS. We wandered around and around waiting for them to finish. When it was all done Cy said, "We could take it to Sears and I could pick it up when I get off work!" DUH! ::snort:: BTW during our long wandering in the wilderness - er Walmart we discovered anew that I really do snort in real life. {sigh} It's so unladylike! It was such a blessing to have that time to visit with Cy.

We finally arrived home and Jamin had homemade pizza on the table. Yumm. Here Stacia has turned the tables on me. She had been taking pieces of my salad. I said, "You like?" and she said, "I like!" Then this....

It is a hoot to watch Stacia with Cy. She lights up when he walks in the door. She runs to him and hugs him and she melts. He picks her up and does the little rough housing things that men are wont to do....today she ran to him, grabbed his legs and said, "up". I think she's talking.

Jamin is trying to research writing agents.

School - well I realized tonight that I've been feeling for two weeks that we weren't doing enough school....but really we have done ALL of our core subjects and TOG. It's the Thanksgiving unit that we're not getting to.....and so next week I think we will spend it doing the unit and art and our story quilts and games....total fun schooling for those 3 days...because it will be a short week anyway. I should have known better than to EXPECT we would continue our busy life, our full school schedule and ADD 20 books on Thanksgiving.

While we were gone the children at home planned our evening. We'll watch a Veggie Tale we got from Netflix, then a WALTON - yippee, my favorite and not the boys' favorite - and then Hogan's Heroes.

ANYTHING works as a teether for Stacia.