Some Pictures from Arielle's home party.....

Yes, the pig hat is still doing it's duty. It is getting a bit worn. I need to start looking for a new one.


Mike and I gave Arielle a card that said "Good for lunch and your choice of a bike or sewing machine". The problem is that I wrote in cursive and she couldn't make it all out. We waited as she worked it all through...."good for a bike or a swing machine?" She is still deciding which she wants. We'll see. I bet lunch will be Burger King fries or Mr. Gatti's pizza.

Zander passed out gifts all night. He did well at staying out of her gifts - though the excitement of giving her the "dinosaur game" nearly killed him. Finally he nabbed the hat...

QUICK A.M. thoughts...

Pictures from Arielle's party are uploading to the hard drive now. I'll try to find time today to put some here.

Jen - We bought her Zoo Tycoon - complete edition. It has the original Zoo tycoon and dinosaur digs and marine mania add ons. I think they are really going to like it. When Stacia was born "she" gave Jared "Roller Coaster Tycoon" and they really like that one.

I came to the horrific realization that Jamin and Mike almost RUN as fast as I bike ride. ARGH. Of course...my goal here is distance and not speed as I'm trying to get to 500 miles and earn my elliptical machine...but I'm trying to figure out how to pick up speed and keep the distance.

Yesterday is a blur. It began when Mike woke up and realized he couldn't find his wallet. This meant a couple of unplanned trips to base for me. The wallet is safe and sound. We did get quite a bit of school done. We are valiantly trying to finish up TOG this week (3 weeks ahead of schedule) so that we can go to summer schedule with everyone else.

Arielle's party was a lot of fun. Since it was moved to the dinner hour we ended up with whole families attending (Dads and all) and so it was a great time of fellowship for our entire family.

Late last night I booked the tickets for our sons and Porshe to fly to Anchorage for the missions trip with Elmendorf's Club Beyond. They are very excited. We ended up using our free miles for one ticket. We bought one ticket and had a $50 companion ticket that we used to buy the 3rd ticket. This means that instead of $3K for all three tickets it cost $960. Porshe and Jamin will split the cost of the tickets we bought bringing the amount they need for airfare to $480 each instead of $1K each. Jamin continues to mow lawns like a maniac and is so realieved that now he needs to make $900 instead of $1500. Josiah was relieved that his entire car fund hasn't been wiped out. {G} You know, typing this out makes me realize that the boys should probably SPLIT the cost of that one ticket instead of Cy getting a free ticket while Jamin pays for the other ticket.....Jamin is about to get even happier. He has two more jobs lined up and he hits the pavement every afternoon looking for more. I think folks feel so bad for the poor young man with the camelback of water, pushing a mower in 100* heat...that they say "Ok - MOW my yard!" {G}

Today will be full....we must keep pushing if we hope to finish TOG this week. We have speech and probably an hour at the park with "our other brothers".

I woke up with this song running through my mind. I love this group. To hear this song and more from MercyMe, click here. "If" you ever need a song for my celebration memorial service this is the one. No - I don't have any premonitions...I grew up hearing my Mom say she wanted "Our Father" sung at her funeral and she's still alive and well. {G}

I Can Only Imagine

"I can only imagine what it will be like, when I walk by Your side...
I can only imagine, what my eyes will see, when Your Face is before me!
I can only imagine. I can only imagine.

Surrounded by Your Glory, what will my heart feel?
Will I dance for you, Jesus? Or in awe of You, be still?
Will I stand in Your presence, or to my knees will I fall?
Will I sing 'Hallelujah!'? Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine! I can only imagine!

I can only imagine, when that day comes, when I find myself standing in the Son!
I can only imagine, when all I will do, is forever, forever worship You!
I can only imagine! I can only imagine!

Surrounded by Your Glory, what will my heart feel?
Will I dance for you, Jesus? Or in awe of You, be still?
Will I stand in Your presence, or to my knees will I fall?
Will I sing 'Hallelujah!'? Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine! Yeah! I can only imagine!

Surrounded by Your Glory, what will my heart feel?
Will I dance for you, Jesus? Or in awe of You, be still?
Will I stand in Your presence, or to my knees will I fall?
Will I sing 'Hallelujah!'? Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine! Yeah! I can only imagine!

I can only imagine! Yeah! I can only imagine!!
Only imagine!!!I can only imagine.
I can only imagine, when all I do is forever, forever worship You!
I can only imagine."

Organic Thoughts

O.K. here’s some thoughts and I know that many of you who read this will have some ideas…..Jodi, Jen, Becky, Heather, Rebecca, Melody et al

What do YOU think about this?
We should avoid all chemicals, pesticides and etc that we can.
We eat a lot of fresh produce - $100 - $150 every 2 weeks. It’s not organic.

So…is it better to eat FRESH produce that isn’t organic….or frozen Organic? I can’t afford fresh organic – and there isn’t much of a selection around here. First I thought “we eat to much fresh produce to be able to afford organic”. Then I thought “if we eat so much produce wouldn’t it be important to get organic?”. Then I considered the frozen organic from Shop Natural…but still it’s FROZEN and you loose nutrition.

At this point I continue to buy fresh and to rinse it all well…but I keep wondering…what would be better frozen organic or fresh non-organic.

Jen and Jodi: we’ve not split junk yet at our co-op. I wonder if folks WOULD split a case of those cloud 9 candy bars…they ARE good and the list of ingredients isn’t terrible…especially when you realize that my children aren’t eating the snacks at church or such…this IS their junk food. We take these snacks to church or parishioner’s homes who want to give the kids treats. We can’t allow Zander to have treats that are going to set him off for 3 days. Hmmm….I’ll have to float a split of Cloud 9 candy bars or Little Panda Licorice and see…..we mostly split seeds, nuts and grains…which are helpful. OH – this time Melody wanted to split sodas and so we did split those. 12 cans of soda don’t make for a huge indulgence in a family our size. LOL So far we like the Blue Sky Root Beer Encore. We don’t like the Blue Sky Ginger Ale at all. We haven’t tried the Lemon Lime stuff.

Here’s a cool tidbit…my sister in law is meeting with the man who WROTE the organic certification law that is now being threatened by congress and big companies who want to be able to sell “organic” while using synthetic preservatives. I know someone who knows someone….{bg}

Arielle turned 9 today. It was anti-climatic without a party…but we’ll have a party tomorrow – with bumper cars. {G} She did enjoy the gifts that the boys picked out for her. Josiah took the day off work. He suggested we all go to see “Over the Hedge”, which we did. It was a cute movie (though I fell asleep for part of it). :::snort:::

Today was the dreaded “crunch” day in *8 Minutes* and I realized that my problem is NOT weak abs but I have abnormally long shoulder blades…I’m sure that is why I can’t get my shoulder blades off the floor…but with time, I should be able to do this…at least once.

The girls called about 10 p.m. to wish Arielle a happy birthday. Bre called first and I woke her up. She was cuddled up with her picture of them and was totally disoriented when I tried to get her to talk. While I was still talking to Bre, Krista beeped in…..so I had them both on the line at the same time…I suppose that’s a bit like having the whole family in one spot????

I started taking flax oil today. I read up on the benefits of Omega oils again. I came up with all sorts of new questions about this new healthy lifestyle. LOL I’ll save them for another post.

It’s late – I want to try to SLEEP…..

Arielle, Zander and Nolan enjoy our pool....not a TX sized pool (and certainly not an ALASKAN sized pool - it IS the biggest state in the union you know - but who NEEDS a pool in AK)...more like a Rhode Island sized pool.

This is the type of day you only have on Monday….and it was the type of Monday you hope to have only once a year! {G}

I DID get to ride the bike today. My legs are finally loosening up after Thursday’s 8 minutes of torture. I’m hoping I didn’t gain weight this week since I wasn’t able to move on Friday and missed 3 days of both the 8 Minute moves and the bike riding. I’ll be much more careful not to push it from now on – yeah SURE. I have that sort of “gut it out” personality.

The day began with me trying to get my computer to print a brochure that I’d made for SAGE (our co-op). It wouldn’t work and took forever to figure out what to do. I finally saved it to a memory card and plunked it into the computer that is a foot away from my computer…but it took me about 2 hours to come up with a solution. In fact, I tried to email it to one of the other computer’s first and the computer is STILL trying to send it…..15 hours later. {g} I copied the brochure and quickly noted three changes that need to be made right off the bat. Since this IS a family service project I let my youngest two sons (4 and 7) fold them. Nolan has some motor coordination issues and needs to do lots of eye hand things…but maybe folding brochures was a bit of a leap. Ah well….Zander and Nolan had fun folding them and all our really organized types can refold theirs like I did. :::snort:::: I got some good natured teasing from Adrienne and Becky about a line I added. Tell me does this sound like a hammer “Failure to promptly pay for your order will result in your SAGE membership being terminated”. Now I’m worried that someone who forgets to pick up their order will think I’m going to TP their house or something dire like that. Heather, our produce co-op organized, is so nice. I guess I’m going to be the “mean co-op organizer”. Heather, do you still read the blog? Should we work out a good cop/bad cop routine? :::snort:::

I got some laundry done.

I made a couple of PWOC calls that I needed to make.

I took the youngest 3 out to buy a cake and presents for Arielle’s birthday – tomorrow. Zander was sure that Arielle wanted a TRAIN!!!!! He finally settled on a zoo computer game….obviously planning to use it.

We dropped by the house of a friend who had packers at her home today. We took her a couple dozen cookies. Her packers had JUST arrived! Good grief it was about 1:00 p.m.

I had to cancel PWOC Traveling Training due to lack of interest. I was looking forward to it. I was planning on going to Fall Focus in October and now Mike will be away from home. I don’t think I can leave the kids alone for 3 nights and I’m not sure I’ll want to leave them anyway since they’ll be just adjusting to him being gone.

When I got home, Mr Gatti’s (sort of like Chuck E Cheese) had called. I called the manager to be told “we’ll have 500 kids from the schools here during your party – will that be a problem?” Hmmm….let me see one small game room, one buffet line and *500* kids…..yep – a problem. They said they’ll only have 219 students on Wed. I rescheduled for Wed at 1:00 and then realized Mike has meetings he can’t miss. Then I rescheduled for 5 p.m. and most are going to be able to make it – but now I remember that the new chaplains’ wife is going to be in town and we were going to go out for dinner with her. I guess she may enjoy a birthday party or we’ll meet her Thursday.

The older boys went out to shop for Arielle and the younger ones enjoyed the pool that I bought at Wal-Mart…also bought some gifts and some more weights.

Took Josiah to work.

Met the truck. They had a new driver and things took much longer. I was 20 minutes late getting home. Our “worker bees” were already waiting at the house when we arrived. We managed to get it all inventoried, sorted and divided.

Now we’re watching the Mavericks/Spurs match up score on the computer….wish we had a TV that showed Spurs…or we could stream the game. LOL

Becky showed up for co-op with their “spare mower” in the back of her van. Jamin is in heaven (not what I would call mowing lawns in W TX in 100* heat. Adrienne is going to call Town and Country about letting the kids pump gas and do windows for donations for their missions’ trip. Jamin will probably not want to play tomorrow – he’ll want to mow more lawns and dream of the AK missions’ trip.

Stacia is still grumpy.

Bre called and “needed to talk to Mom” and I keep missing her. I cried when picking out a “sister” card for Stacia to give Arielle…we miss Bre and Krista.

I love co-op night and visiting with everyone. There were a few men tonight so Mike even had someone to talk with.

I can’t remember what else happened today but it was an incredibly long day and Nolan, Arielle and I didn’t even start school.

I need to figure out what we’re doing tomorrow. Our homeschool support group is having a swim party….we have speech and Bible Study and its Arielle’s birthday….what to do….score is 111/108 Mavericks are winning…..overtime….

Jamin was pleased with the organic “Cloud Nine” candy I bought. He says its “pretty close” to Snickers. We can survive organic. {G} Of course we aren’t fooling ourselves that it is HEALTHY but if you want a treat it is sure better to grab an organic candy bar made with rice syrup and such than a Snickers. Right?

Score is now Mav 117 and Spurs 111…20 seconds left…I think it is over…