Wednesday, May 03, 2006

More on Wednesday –

I’m tired. I woke up at 3 this a.m. to deal with Zander. I’m not sure what is causing him to wake up again at night. I couldn’t get back to sleep. My mind was spinning. I finally got up and sent in the paperwork for the boys to North Atlantic Regional High School. We aren’t required to have a cover school. I don’t think we need one…but the boys really wanted a diploma from a state. After some research we landed with NARHS. They’ve been very good to work with….but I’d still not sent in the list of all that we are doing this year…and it was about time to get that done. {g} They allow us to school from Sept- August – which is very homeschool friendly. We have to send quite a bit of documentation in (more than we were required to do in AK but it’s once a year instead of every 9 weeks)….but they maintain the transcripts and issue a “real” diploma.

I hit some sort of role and so I straightened out a few more piles of mail left over from our vacation. I may even pay the bills tomorrow. No sense rushing these things. {G}

Back at work yesterday Mike found out that the chaplaincy is getting cut by 200 chaplains. What this meant for today was that he had to choose two positions to cut from our base…yuck!

I mentioned that our endorser was here today. While Mike met with John – the kids and I went out to the lake to visit with Nadine. It was a lot of fun. She even had ice cream cones for the kids in their “giant pop-up” – read road whale. {G}

The kids had been begging to see their “other brothers” (as Zander calls them). We’d not seen Adrienne and kids in over two weeks and so I promised to try to swing by the park today. We made it for about an hour and had fun catching up on the news of the past two weeks.

This evening found us at Logan’s Roadhouse having dinner with John and Nadine…all 9 of us…..Open Bible picked up the tab and we joked that after all my years with Open Bible (I think I was born the very first week my dad was pasturing a church) they “owed” me a nice dinner. John shared that the next convention will be in June 07 in SPOKANE and I shared that I was quite sure we’d make it. {vbg}

OK blogs are nice and I know that family is up on the news but we are going to have to make a ton of phone calls in the next couple of weekends….I miss voices….and the two way conversation that would come late at night when all the little ones were in bed….
Can you guess what's on the shelf in my fridge?
It's a jar of insects. We are studying flying insects this week in science. They are cold-blooded (is that right?) and therefore slow down in the cold. We caught some and studied them, put them in the fridge and then.....
studied the difference in their movements...interesting....then we put them back OUTSIDE where they belong.....
Stacia loves to pull herself up to standing now...so far she collapses when she tries to walk.


Rascal {aka chirp} is back home after his visits with two other families over the past couple of weeks. Thanks to Shannon and Heather and their families. We noticed that he's bigger, he's stinkier but I think he's a bit less noisy.


Stacia discovers Rascal's cage on the floor ....we moved it!
WEDNESDAY – ½ way mark….

10 miles today. The boys and Mike have paced off a 1.25 and a 3 mile running route around our house. This works well – technically – but I think I will go crazy if I must ride around and around the same route for another 460 miles!!!!! I think I’ll buy a trip odometer for the bike when I hit 50 miles. That seems fair. I must cope with routine in so much of my life; surely I deserve to break out of the box in my workout routine????

I don’t like this new ticker…it looked like the turtle was so much closer to the goal than the little star. {G} I still want to find a countryish path with a bike slider….Girls, I beat the little old couple who sweep their yard every morning this a.m. {bg}

Every chaplain has many bosses. Bottom line is that he has three bosses: God, his endorser and the military. An endorser is the denomination that agrees to have you represent them in the military. Our endorser is Open Bible Standard Churches. A chaplain must please the military. This involves things like forms, fitness standards, military training etc. He must also please his endorser. If at any time the endorsing denomination feels that a chaplain no longer represents the denomination well, they can pull the endorsement and a chaplain will be separated from the military. I suppose it is easier for an endorser to separate a military chaplain from service than for the military to do such. Above all a chaplain seeks to please God and fulfill his call to ministry while he pleases a host of military supervisors and his endorsing agency.

The representative of our endorsing agency is in town today. John and Nadine Simmons are always fun to visit with. He’s a retired USAF (go AF) 05. There’s the added bonus that they attend the home church of my parents. It’s a bit of home. Mike is meeting with them for lunch. He and John will meet with Mike’s direct supervisor – our Wing Chaplain…and all of us (kids included) will go out for dinner tonight. I must make sure the littler children not only finish school today but have plenty of time to run off excess energy before the dinner hour. {G}

My goals today are school, laundry, cleaning and the little ones really want to see their “other brothers”; so we’ll try to make it to the park for an hour or so after lunch. We’ve not seen friends since we got back from vacation. I also hope to begin documenting our vacation and posting pictures. We’ll see what gets done….
Stacia is 8 1/2 months old and mobile. She is into EVERYTHING since we got home. Here she is with my vanilla tea - which I don't drink much of in TX.

And here she discovers the whole world outside the door...only to be grabbed and brought back in my a big brother....
Tuesday 2 May 2006
Things I accomplished today: (to assure myself that something meaningful got done!)

14 miles on the bike (that deserves double mention – I have felt it all day! {G}

School done….

Speech attended….

Roast in oven…

Treats for Bible Study done…

Bible study Prep done…

Yummy & healthy fruit dip made (thanks Heather)

Paperwork for upcoming traveling training in…chaplains emailed…

Emailed Dyess AFB about upcoming traveling training

6 loads of laundry and counting…

Last food co-op order delivered (min visiting with said friend)

Fed and comforted a cranky teether….again and again and again!!!!

Emailed a couple of folks, moderated a homeschool list

Signed up for Neflix and picked three movies that are all available now and we couldn’t find around here…..

Called the library and garnered the grace of the circulation dept for all the books that went overdue on our vacation…

Placed an Amazon order for the remaining books needed for the next 5 weeks of school…

Set up and led Bible Study….

Bible study ended early due to severe storm warnings….

Watched God’s amazing light and wind show…