Saturday, February 28, 2009

Her Babies


Sweet Pea had some fun recently swaddling the kittens up in a towel. It was quite amusing. We enjoyed the looks on their little whiskery faces the most.


Bailey is our cozy kitty. He is cuddly like a stuffed animal.


Hmmmm......how can I escape?


Pixie/ Now renamed Romeo
This is the most patient cat I have ever seen.



Sassy is a sweet little lady.


All swaddled up.


A kitty burrito!
Aren't kittens fun?







Friday, February 27, 2009

Friday Fill-Ins

And...here we go!


1. I'm very pregnant, I'm very tired, I am very happy.


2. Why do I have a craving for chocolate milk and not any chocolate syrup in the house?


3. How does this technical thing-a-ma-jig work, anyway?


4. Every morning, I put my feet on my floor & waddle to the bathroom.


5. I consider myself lucky because I have 4 sweet kids and 1 due soon, a wonderful husband, a loving Savior, a beautiful home, a great job for Hubby, and all sorts of new people & adventures in our new state! God is good!


6. One day we’ll see who this Little One is!!!!!!!



7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to relaxing after working around the house with Dave (He has the day off! Yay!), tomorrow my plans include going to Nashville to watch my Boo Bear compete in the AWANA games (Go Boo!) and Sunday, I want to try out the Sunday school class again & hopefully stay awake through church. LOL!







Thursday, February 26, 2009

AWANA


"Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needth not to be ashamed. Rightly dividng the word of Truth." II Timothy 2:15
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Our kids are really hooked on their AWANA Club. I think it's neat how a club I was a part of as a child is still around & growing for my children to enjoy & grow in their relationship with God. My favorite thing about AWANA is the importance they put on memorizing Scripture. Hiding God's Word in their young hearts is important beyond words. I can remember many evenings working hard to memorize verses that I still remember today. What a blessing!


A little description of our members:


I was pleasantly surprised to find out there is even a preschool group for Bugsy. It is called Cubbies. He memorizes phrases of verses. At first I was a bit skeptical of his ability to memorize Scripture. It amazes me how fast he catches on. He already earned his first book and proudly walks to class with it every week.



Elvis is in a group for K-2nd graders. It is called Sparks. He earned his
first book a week ago and is very proud. He can hardly wait until he gets his vest to wear every week. Elvis still protests when he first works on a verse stating it's too hard, etc. But once he gets started he learns it quickly and then is on fire to learn more. Every week when we pick him up he is bouncing with excitement from all he has learned, the games he played & his goals for the next week.





Boo loves memorizing her verses. She was jumping up & down tonight when she earned her first book. Her group, Truth & Training is for 3rd through 6th grade. I am looking forward to seeing her book and comparing it to the one I used when I was in AWANA. I did notice that the names of the boys & girls groups and awards have changed. Boo was recently asked to be on the AWANA Games team. An honor! We will be attending her first meet on Saturday.
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I'm thankful our kids have such an awesome group to grow, make new friends & learn in.





Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Loving That Biology!

We finally have our wheels chugging along in Biology. The kids were hesitant at first asking, "What's Biology, Mommy?" & "Do we have to study that?" but now that they have been introduced they are having a grand time. I decided to skip the cell lesson for now and start with something fun & hands on. I chose birds. So far we have categorized them and talked about the different traits. Presently Boo & Elvis are cutting pics out of magazines, coloring them from print-outs & looking them up in our bird fact books. They are making their own bird book. The first thing they do is get the picture. Then they label it with the name of the bird and their category. Next they are to find facts and write those down too. Elvis only has to write 1 fact while Boo writes 3. The neat thing is even though they are only writing down 1 or 3 facts they are learning more b/c they are reading the information in the bird books to find these facts. They can hardly wait for Biology each day. Wow! Next after our fact books are completed we will move onto bird watching & journaling. I hope the excitement continues on!

Boo & Elvis color & label a print-out from the Internet.



Reading facts together from one of our books.


Looking up specific birds.


He was proud that he found the cardinal all on his own.


Pictures cut from magazines and ready to be glued.


Another book we are using.....


And yet another of our reference books.
These belong to us but this past Saturday we checked out some from the library.

This is my favorite of ours.


See the concentration?

Working hard!
We'll add some pics of their finished work soon. I know they are anxious to share. =)

Monday, February 23, 2009

Cutting Back




We've always looked for any way we can to cut back but even more so lately. Dave has a good job, PTL, but with grocery prices rising higher & higher, utilities going through the roof, expecting a new Baby, making a recent move & other costs increasing it's more important than ever. For a few months now Dave & I have been looking at how we can reduce our cell phone bill. When we signed up this summer we decided to get the unlimited package. The cell phone was our only phone and with needing to talk to our Realtors quite a bit, Dave long distance every night in Tennessee and others on a daily basis we needed the minutes. I had also based our choice on my calling habits, (who chatted with me the most), which of course changed without warning a couple weeks after we we locked into the plan. Being the fun way cell phone contracts work we couldn't downgrade our plan for "x" amount of months. Plus we didn't want to until after we moved. We figured we would much rather know our set amount we were to pay each month than getting a "surprise bill". Some of you know what I mean from experience and it is NO fun. I've been after Dave to call our carrier for the past couple of months. He finally did on Sunday and to our relief & surprise we are now allowed to downgrade with NO penalties! Yippee! We want to get a landline in the house, (We miss WAY too many phone calls with just one cell phone. Plus it has been a pain in the butt having to share it and recharge it every 3 hours meaning it is out of commission every 3 hours. And what do you do when the main phone leaves the house but others remain behind?), so we reduced our minutes way down and therefore have cut our monthly bill in less than half! Another yippee! I am extremely happy with this b/c it seems the more I reasearch the more I find how insanely expensive cell phones & their plans are. Neat thing is even having both the landline AND the cell with the reduced minutes we will STILL be paying less than the plan we have been on for the cell alone! I am not one of these people who have to be on my cell 24/7, in fact I am quite annoyed by these people who can never have a quiet moment & even more the ones who DRIVE with them stuck to their ear, so reducing the minutes is an easy thing for us. We are also going to reduce our Internet down to the "economy package". It is supposed to be less speed but I've dealt with dial up before and this is going to at least be above that. I figure I can do my part and sacrifice a little. Besides the way our account it set up I can change it back anytime if it gets too annoying. Right now I'd rather save the $$ and put it towards our debt & grocery bill. Here is the breakdown for those who are interested:


Present Bills:

Internet: $42/month plus taxes & other junk they tack on
Cell Phone: $110/month plus taxes & other junk they tack on
Total = $152


New Bills:
Internet: $25/month plus taxes & other junk they tack on
Cell Phone: $40/month plus taxes & other junk they tack on
Landline Phone: This plan included unlimited long distance AND local calling = $25/month plus taxes
Total = $90


We were also able to get the $30 start up fee knocked off of our landline by letting them know we were returning customers. AND they will give us a reduced fee of $9.95 for the first 3 months! So the first 3 months we will only be paying a total of $75 for our new bills. Of course as I mentioned before these are average totals. They will each be a few dollars more b/c of taxes, etc. But I am still very happy with the savings! The way I look at it it's at least $62 dollars in savings each month, ($77 those first 3 months) and $789 a year.! Whoa! Hmmmm......each month that's 7 packages of diapers. A big chunk of the gas bill. 20 gallons of milk. 31 pounds of boneless chicken breasts or hamburger. The monthly hospital bill plus $12 gas money. You get the idea.


Now off to put on my cape and find more ways to save!!!!!!!

Saturday, February 21, 2009

Valentine's Day Dinner

For Valentines Day this year we did something different and went to the Train Expo. It wasn't full of hearts or very romantic but it WAS lots of fun. The kids were determined to do something more hearts & flowers the next day. When they found out about Dave & my plans to have dinner they immediately wanted to help set up for it. I had approached Dave on Friday with an idea to have a Valentine's dinner for the two of us at home. We do not have a babysitter here yet and with our schedule lately it's hard to squeeze in a date night anyway. Plus to be honest it is an extra cost. We instead got take out from Olive Garden, one of our favorites, and Dave and the kids picked up a Chocolate Silk Pie at the grocery store. It ended up being a wonderful night.


The kids went shopping with Dave. In addition to the pie Dave surprised me with beautiful flowers and candy. The kids helped set the table using our good china to make things extra special.



All the kids wanted to take on a role to make our night special & fun. The boys were dubbed "The Cooks". Don't you just love the eccentric look of Elvis?


My Favorite!
Chicken Parmesan. It makes me hungry just looking at it.

Dave's Favorite
Tour of Italy


I loved how Dave and most of the kids all dressed up for our night.
During our meal we had our waitresses come when we rang the bell. Soft music played in the background and we had time to talk and just be together.


Chocolate Silk Pie
This is melt in your mouth delicious!


We called the kids in to share in our special dessert.


Yummy!


Don't you love the serious look on his face?
(Don't worry it's only Pepsi.)

Our Loving Waitstaff



After our meal Sweet Pea had a little dance time with Sky.


My beautiful flowers & delicious chocolates.


Bugs wanted to pose with "the heart" as he called it.
Dave said he carried it all through the store, in the van & into the house.


I asked him to smile for the camera and I got this goofy face. LOL!


My special valentines from the kids, candy & flowers.


Another Valentine from Sweet Pea.


Daddy was very suprised & pleased with all his Valentines..


Even though our celebration was different from the norm this year it was very special. I love the memories that were made and how much our kids enjoyed joining in to make our date night extra special. That truly touched my heart.

Friday, February 20, 2009

Friday Fill-Ins

1-3 are courtesy of Mar this week. And...here we go!

1. Give me money and I'll make a frugal plan.

2. Whenever it rains I want to snuggle under the covers & read.

3. I wish Baby will be born healthy, safely & on time.

4. Chocolate Silk Pie was the last thing I ate that was utterly delicious.

5. To live in this world is an amazing gift.

6. Other than this one, Alma Mater (Megan's blog) is the last blog I commented on.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to PIZZA, tomorrow my plans include errands & the unknown and Sunday, I want to relax before another Monday rolls around!


Thursday, February 19, 2009

Baby Update

I can hardly believe it! Less than 7 weeks to go. The time has flown but now it is starting to slow down in some ways. I believe it's me being impatinet. I want Baby here now! Lol! But it's good we still have time b/c there is still lots to do.

I went to the doctor again yesterday. My BP is back up again. She told me to stay off my feet as much as possible. I'm trying my best to do that. I have another appointment on Friday to check my blood pressure again & to have a NST. She wants to start them early b/c of my BP. We have another u/s scheduled too in March. I'm excited to see our Little One one more time before we meet in person.

Thank you for all the prayers & for all of you who have been asking about us. It means a lot!

Surprise Trip!


I had seen a Train Exposition advertised on a local television show. It said it would be in Nashville for Valentines weekend. After looking up more information online I was pleased to find out how big it was & that all our children would get in free. Always love that! I talked to Dave about it and he agreed. We didn't tell the kids as we thought it would be fun to save it as a surprise. It was fun to hear their cheers & see their big smiles when we told them as we were driving down the highway into Nashville.

As we expected it was quite busy. But we were still able to get up close to the exhibits. This exhibit had buttons the kids could push. They controlled different things on the model. For example there was a model ice cream stand with a big ice cream cone by it. The ice cream cone would spin around & around when the button was pushed. Some others controlled lights & one even controlled a crane making it go up & down. As you may have guessed these were very popular!


Here comes the train!

My favorite was the Nesquick car.


Can you spot the star from CARS?

Up close

There were 2 trains on this model. Boy were they fast! We liked the Blue's Clues car the best.


Waiting for the train


Here it is!


This was a very small train compared to the others. But boy was it long! I think there were at least 15 cars on it! The model was huge too. We especially liked the tunnels.


Some very smart person, (HAD to be a parent!), thought to have a place for the kids to play. There was a big pile of Thomas train tracks and dozens & dozens of Thomas engines and his friends. There was also a carpet out so the kids didn't have to be right on the cement floor. The icing on the cake was that there were chairs set out for the parents to sit in while they watched their kids play. GENIUS! For a big ol' pregnant lady this was an oasis. Lol.


Bugs wanted his big sister to play too. After a little prompting she joined in.

Lots of Annies & Clarabelles!


Trains are fun!


DUDE! TRIPPIN!
This guy from India gave us these as we came stepped off the escalator. He quickly rattled off something about something somewhere for us to come to and free. That's all I caught. I have an awful time understanding heavy accents especially when people talk a mile a minute. We never did go investigate what he was talking about but we did get a kick out of these kaleidoscope glasses.


He played & played & played.


Bugs even got Daddy to play too.

Still more trains!
We let Sweet Pea walk around the room on her own while the kids played. It was an enclosed area & I had her come back at appointed times to check in. Yep, she's growing up.

There were at least a dozen of these Thomas' to play with. Kids were bumping into each other and driving their trains around. It was quite funny to watch.


I think this was our favorite display. It was right on the kids level and they loved that. There were 3 or 4 different trains going at the same time and at different speeds. The neatest part according to the kids was that the trains all had steam coming out of their engines. And it smelled like candy! Cool!


I was so proud of our kids. They didn't touch, didn't push, listened to & obeyed instructions & just enjoyed the trains.


Another display.
One guy said his display took a minimum of 7 hour to set up. Yow-zah!

They really loved the trains.

More of the display.


Yes! We are in the south! =)

The gentleman here stopped the train to add some liquid for steam.


This is one of my favorites from the day. Boo was being a party pooper about the hat but I have to admit it made the photo turn out to be hilarious!


Loved all the little houses, etc on this one!



Cute little conductor


Ending with a Bang
There were free Thomas rides offered. The line was super long a testimony to Thomas' ongoing popularity. We saved this for last because of the long line. While Dave & the kids waited in line I took my water bottle and waddled off to find a place to rest. I foudn this sweet couple who must have been in their 70's. They were sitting down at a table & soon we were chatting away. They were at the show to get some ideas & materials to make their own model at home. The husband enjoyed telling me all about his plans. He was going to make the stand to put it on and set up all the tracks and trains. His wife was looking forward to doing all the landscaping, buildings, etc. I thought that was a neat plan. The husband also had a lot of information on railroads in general. One he told me about was in the south going into the Carolinas and I think Va. Anyway, I loved listening to all the facts he shared.
The kids finally made it to the beginning of the line. Actually the time went by quickly for me as I was enjoying my new friends. I excused myself and went over to take pics and watch my kids enjoy thier anticipated ride!


Off they go!
Sweet Pea told me later that she figured she had waited so long in line that she was going too! LOL!


Around the bend

Waving wildly at Mama!


They had such a blast!




After a few more quick stops on the way out we decided to call it a day. We have never been to a train show before and this was lots of fun. Definitely something we will do again!