A Special Night with Friends

I do love a gorgeous dinner party (especially when it's not at my house)! This weekend we gathered to celebrate the marriage of our good friend Ken! We loved getting to know his new wife Kyra!


Our friends Brian and Angie hosted us. It was a beautiful evening surrounded by candlelight, laughter and good friends. It doesn't get much better than that! And we saw some mysterious lights in the sky and it wasn't until I read this the next day that I knew what it was!

Ken and Kyra ... the newlyweds!

Angie and Brian... the hosts!

You've gotta love it when the hosts also supply the babysitter :)

Kevin and Reanne

Ryan and I (not loving this picture at all, but it's the only one I had).

Mandy and Jason

So I was totally freaking out....

I had just dropped Christian off at preschool and was heading back home by way of a major highway in our area. I was busy thinking about how I was going to drop some stuff off at the storage unit, return a few things to the library and maybe even get a shower before heading back to pick him up WHEN SUDDENLY the car in front of me hit something in the road and it came flying back at my car. To my horror black paint splattered all over my windshield, front hood, headlights, and bumper. I could immediately smell paint. It was a disaster. I called Ryan and went immediately to a car wash, but by the time I got there it had already dried and was NOT coming off.

So I drove home ((fast)) and got out my scrubby sponges and went at it for the next almost two hours. Once I realized it was actually going to come off I did not stop scrubbing (despite the cramp in my hand). I was so worried that it was going to set in or something and then it wouldn't come off. The picture above was taken about an hour into my scrubbing when I actually calmed down enough to remember that this was in fact a blogable moment. I saved the windshield for last because I figured I could always scrap that if need be.

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So that was today's adventure :)

I still haven't gotten that shower.

I just had to have them...

You know how whenever you go to one of these kids places they always try to rip you off with professional pictures?? Well, I totally fell for it. I paid way too much money for the following pictures and neither of them were all that great, but I just had to have them.

The sun was in his eyes and our family picture in front of Thomas was horrible. McKenna was way more interested in looking at Thomas than in looking at the camera. But I love my little man with his favorite buddy on earth...Thomas!
And guess who did not like Sir Topham Hat?? Ha! I love it! He moved and that was enough for McKenna to scare her to death. Maybe I'll put this in her wedding slide show one day.

#1 Train with his #1 fan

More from our Thomas trip...

Christian was totally overwhelmed by all the HUGE train selection at the Thomas store!

"It's so loud!"

McKenna liked the mini-train the best!

See that whistle in Christian's hand...that's all he wanted from the Thomas store (less than 10 bucks sounds good to me)! Today he was "playing" his whistle on the way to preschool and he said; "I wish there was a whistle contest. Then I could play my whistle and win a big, big trophy because I'm really good." I question the "really good" part and I should know...I heard the whistle playing all the way to preschool and all the way home from preschool :)

Sir Topham Hat with my boys.

I think she loved this day just as much as Christian did!

"Cinders and Ashes! Cinders and Ashes!"

What is McKenna so excited about??

Real Thomas of course!!!

Thomas decided to get away from the Island of Sodor for awhile and he decided to come our way for a visit!

And it was thrilling! Every bit of it! Even dark clouds and sprinkles of rain couldn't dampen our excitement!

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To be continued....when I'm not quite so tired!

P.S. It's Thomas who always says, "Cinders and ashes, cinders and ashes!"

"Goodbye"

Yesterday...to the day...was the sixth anniversary of us living in our old house. It was also the day we said "goodbye." We sat in the empty living room as a family of four and Ryan prayed and thanked God for blessing us with a beautiful home for six years. And we prayed for the future, that God would give us wisdom. And I cried and McKenna crawled off ~ha~ and it was perfect!

Christian drew this picture of our family in the driveway (you know I'm emotional when a picture like this ((with all of us sticking our tongues out...something he learned at preschool)) makes me cry).

We left a little gift for the new family moving in. I pray that they'll have the same JOY we did while living there.

And I vacuumed and cleaned like crazy. The people buying our house are first time home buyers and I know they've got to be so excited. I remember that feeling. So I wanted it to look nice for them, not overwhelming. Although when we started moving furniture I realized just how bad the walls look. I was tempted to paint, but didn't.

This is my last load from the old house. For some reason I ended up with a bunch of big stuff like my bike, McKenna's push car, the vacuum cleaner and a bunch of boxes. I couldn't get the tailgate shut and I didn't have any rope, so I improvised and turned a piece of packing tape into a rope and tied the tailgate shut that way. I was nervous the whole ride home, but nothing fell out and my tape rope worked :)

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And in about an hour we will sign papers making it all official and I will most likely cry. But we are so thankful. So thankful that we got to make this choice, that we weren't forced to sell or give up our home. We are thankful that our house sold (I know I'm not acting like it, but I am happy about it, just not today). In the month of August of 2008 there were 22 foreclosures in our county. This year there are 421. That number is sobering. We are thankful for God's goodness and protection and blessing in our lives. And it's our prayer that we will honor him and bring him glory wherever we live.

Home School Lessons:

When Emma was in kindergarten my sister home schooled her and being the absolute nerd that I am, I would make up lesson plan units and send them to her and then she would send them back and I would then send her a prize. What can I say? I do love being a teacher and I honestly think this kind of stuff is fun :)

Well, I had totally forgotten about this particular unit until Christian went to preschool last week and his teacher had a whole bunch of caterpillars that had weaved little cocoons around themselves and this week he's been enjoying watching the butterflies emerge. And so I've whipped out this old life cycle unit that I made up. Some of it is too hard for him (it's more for kindergarten or first grade, but he can do all of it with some help).

So I thought I would share it with those of you who might be interested or who might be homeschooling and would enjoy having someone else do a little bit of the work for you.

In my opinion this verse (see above) is the most important part of the lesson!!! I love it! I know it's not a common verse, but bare with me for a second. I love talking about how when you "eat" God's word it brings JOY to your life. You can talk about what it means to "bear" God's name. You can discuss HOW you can eat God's word (by reading it, by memorizing it, by obeying it). Then ask the question: What happens when you "eat" God's word??? Answer: It brings JOY and DELIGHT to your heart! It makes your life better. It changes something inside of you.

Here's how you tie it into your butterfly lesson:

You read The Very Hungry Caterpillar and then you talk about how the caterpillar turned into a beautiful butterfly after he ate all those different kinds of food in the book. We're the same way, just like the caterpillar....God will make our hearts into something beautiful when we "eat" his word.

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Here is the basic Lesson plan that I made up for Emma for a week:

Life Cycle Unit Lesson Plan
Day 1:
1. Read aloud the “Butterfly’s Life Cycle” sheet to Emma. Complete the “Listening Comprehension” worksheet that’s attached to it.
2. Complete the butterfly connect the dots.
3. Read the memory verse and discuss it. Practice saying it a few times. Post it somewhere where it can be read often.
4. Complete the art activity in the zip lock bag (it’s labeled DAY 1).
5. HOMEWORK: Have Emma color the title page that I glued on her folder.

Day 2:
1. Caterpillar Story activity
2. Complete the life cycle labeling page.
3. Butterfly addition worksheet (start in school, finish for homework).

Day 3:
1. Chris Caterpillar & Sammy Snail Worksheet
2. Cut and Paste (green) life cycle worksheet
3. Life Cycle acting activity.
4. The Life Cycle of Butterflies worksheet

Day 4:
1. Beebie and the Caterpillar worksheet
2. Handprint Butterfly Craft (you’ll need lots of construction paper). Abby could do this too!
3. Start working on the Butterfly book. There’s a lot of writing, so I would work on this over 2 days.


Day 5:
1. Finish the Butterfly book.
2. Read Fun Facts about Butterflies
3. Complete the vocabulary matching activity
4. Worksheet (doesn’t have a title, has a picture of the life cycle on it).


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Here's the deal....I have no idea how to upload all the worksheets on to the internet. I know that there should be a way to "host" them so that you could just click on them and print it out, but I don't know how to do that. So if you want the unit just leave a comment including your email address and I will email you the entire unit. You could also head on over to Enchanted Learning and see a bunch of activities they have there. That's where I got most of my ideas!

Pastor Appreciation Month

October is Pastor Appreciation Month and I've never really done anything grand for my pastor's before. In fact I usually miss the whole month of October and then end up sending them a Thanksgiving card with a little gift, but I wanted to start thinking about it early this year. And I would love to hear if you guys have any great ideas. I think it's mainly the thought that counts. I'm sure most clergy just love to hear a word of appreciation. I'm always so careful about thanking teachers and Sunday school workers and nursery works that directly work with one of my kids and it's so easy for me to forget about the ones who minister to me. So start commenting....share some ideas of ways to bless our pastors. I'll let you know what I end up doing. Now that I put this out there it's kind-of giving me a sense of accountability to make sure I do something :)