Beach

It's family beach trip time. We LOVE the beach.

Gardening

We have been busy in the yard this summer. My sweet hubby created a flower bed for me in the back yard. He even picked out the flowers. He did a great job.



Unfortunately we have an evil creature that comes to our yard at night.

So now our garden is missing a few plants.


The itty-bitty, bright green specks in the picture are tiny potato vines. At least the evil creature didn't eat the roots. Maybe the will have a lush flower bed in a few weeks. My fingers are crossed!

My Escape

I really love to sew. I enjoy taking a pretty piece of fabric and creating something really fun to wear. EllaBeth is glad that I'm sewing more too. She is always ready for me to make her something else. Here are a few of the things I've made lately.

Thanksgiving & Christmas

We had a great Thanksgiving vacation this past week. The kids were out of school all week and Lee was off work. The weather was warm, so there was a lot of opportunity for the kids to play outside. They had fun running around the neighborhood with their friends.

On Thanksgiving day, I was cooking in the kitchen and Will came in to raid the fridge. He opened it up and exclaimed "where's the turkey." For the first year in awhile I didn't cook a thanksgiving turkey. We helped with a meal at church for our area's homeless population. It was very eye opening for myself and the kids. I wish that I would have been more prepared to help with basic needs that they had, like backpacks, shoes, and first aide kits. I have thrown away shoes that I thought were worn out that were in better condition than the only pair of shoes that many of the people we served had. I now have a purpose for some of my bargain shopping throughout the year now, various sizes of tennis shoes and backpacks.

The last great surprise for the week was an early Christmas present for me from my hubby. I had been wishing for an iPad and he was very aware of my wish. He volunteered to go to the grocery store for me on Wednesday. Little did I know he had other plans. He and Jack took a trip to the apple store and sometime later returned home with my Christmas surprise and a big bucket of chicken from KFC. All I could say was no way. It was a very sweet, shocking fulfilled wish.

I hope your Thanksgiving vacation was a happy one too!

Been a long time...

So it has been way too long since I wrote a blog post so I will catch you up on a few of the latest happenings since Ella Beth's birthday....

Jack turned 10 in August. All he wanted for his birthday was cash. At the time he was saving for a lap top, but instead he bought an ipod. We were very proud with his decision to saving - over $200. It was a first for any of our kids.


Then in September we took a trip to Auburn for a football game. It was great. We had not been to a football game since the boys were babies. It was a very rainy one, but we all made it though and Auburn won!
In October we experienced out first broken bone, stay in the hospital and surgery. Will was playing football in the yard with some friends and broke his right femur. It was a spiral break that required a 14 inch steal rod to heal. He was a champ! Now, he is completely healed and will have the plate removed this spring.

Halloween shortly followed. Each of the kids carved their own pumpkins - Ella Beth had a little help. It was the first year for non-traditional pumpkin faces, but I think they all turned out great.We stayed home for Thanksgiving. Lee and two of the kiddos ate Thanksgiving lunch at the church. I stayed home with the sick third child. (It's been such a sick winter for us I don't remember which one was sick!) We had the meal for members and those in the homeless community in Jackson. Lee said it was really a great time for all involved.

Finally, we celebrated Christmas! We had a great holiday.

Ella Beth's Birthday

Ella Beth will soon be 5 1/2, so I thought it was time to let everyone know about her birthday party. ***Smiles***

Ella Beth had a build-a-bear party at Wacky Bear this year.

They played some games...


ate cake...


opened presents...


and made a bear.


Ella Beth had a blast!!!!

Coming Soon!!

Here's sneak peak at future post topics:

little mushroom

I imagine little fairies dancing around this mushroom!

That's Cool

Ella Beth is really enjoying kindergarten and learning a lot. Her teacher is having us make flash cards to help with learning how to read. She has letter cards, word cards, and picture cards with words at the bottom. Every day when she comes in from school she will tell us that if we don't do her flash cards Mrs. Taylor will be mad at us. So we try to do them each night.

Tonight while we read them she said something that I got a kick out of. One of the picture cards is of a necktie. She looked at the picture for a minute. Then, with her head cocked to the side and a grin on her face she said, "tie, I have a friend in my class named Ty." And then she snickered.

I think it is really cool that she is beginning to connect letters with words and words with things.

Calender

I have been getting more and more things on my schedule, so I needed a calender for my purse. I looked at target and the cute ones cost more than I wanted to spend, so I thought I could make one.
Today I ventured into the task of making a book style calender . I went to publisher and came up with a personalized style. Printed it out and then made a cover for it at my sewing machine. Here are the results:


Now to fill all these pages with my commitments. That may take a while :-)

Back 2 School

The kids have been back in school for about three weeks now. They have all been blessed with good teachers this year. I am very thankful!

Ella Beth is really enjoying going to school. The first day I drove her and walked her to class. She really wanted to ride the bus with the boys, but I wasn't quite brave enough for that. I did let her ride home on the bus. She felt so big! Every afternoon she is very tired and grumpy. It is starting to get a little better, but I am ready for the grumpies to end!

Will and Jack have jumped right back into the school routine. They haven't had quite as much homework so far this year, for that we are all grateful. Will has finished reading his first book for AR points this year. This is a great accomplishment for him (getting one read so quickly), so we are really proud. Jack is finishing some of his homework at school. We are excited that he is using his time wisely!I am thrilled that we are off to a great start! I hope you are too.

More photoshop

Just a quick before and after of Ella Beth from her recital.

Maybe still a little bright. Oh well, I'll figure it out one day.

playing with photoshop

One of the great benefits of creating the yearbook for Will's school is getting photoshop for free. I decided to take a few minutes to play with it this morning. I took a picture of Ella Beth that a took right after getting my new camera and clicked on several buttons - not really knowing what any of them mean. Here's my before:
And here is my after:
A little better, but I still have more playing to do!

Painting and Pink

My mother has graciously taken all three kids to her house for this week. During this time my plan was to paint all the rooms upstairs but the bathroom. Well the game room/guest room (g-room for short) is really big. When we first moved in, it was my daughter's room and bright pink. Now, it is painted "nap sack", a pleasant khaki-green. The boys will be glad the pink is gone from the g-room! The first day, I got it cut in. I hate that part so a break was needed when I was done. The second day I got both coats put on the wall. It is so much more peaceful.

Day three I finished my daughter's new room. It is now pink and teal. I had gotten the teal painted one night while she and the boys were camped out in the g-room, so thankfully one wall was already complete. However, pink is a very hard color to paint. I wouldn't think that is true other than I have now painted three rooms pink. It always takes 3 coats, even if you prime! Three coats is a lot of paint and a lot of pink. I would never like to admit it, but yesterday I was really tired of pink!

I have two more rooms to paint. The kids come back tomorrow. I don't think they will get done this week.

Beach Fun!

Here is a little slide show of our beach vacation. We had a fun trip.

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Painting

I have a new favorite painting in my house. It's this one:
My sister painted it. I really like it on the orange wall. You can see more of her artwork here: http://zinnartstudio.blogspot.com/
Hope you enjoy it; I do.

Swim Team

We have been having a busy summer, mostly at the pool. The boys are both on the summer swim team at the YMCA. They are enjoying it and learning a lot.






Ella Beth also likes the time she is able to spend playing in the pool. And I am excited to say that for the first time ever I am a little tanner than Lee. I know it won't last long though.




Jack got to race against his good friend, Stroud. Jack swam hard, but was defeated in the end. Stroud has been swimming competitively longer. They enjoyed the friendly competition.


Moms from both teams are ask to be the timers for the races. Not a difficult job if your timer works - mine didn't. I missed a race or two, then got a new timer. I was much relieved that the problem was the timer and not the person working it!


Swim team will end in mid-July, but I'm sure we will still be swimming until the summer ends.