POTD Dec 1

E got the stomach bug last night, she was the last of the kids to get it. she wasn't feeling well enough for school, so we kept her and J home, J mostly so he wouldn't spread the germs we were sure were floating around. so, the kids and i did a craft. the kids colored up some christmas shrinky dinks tom and dawn had given them a couple christmas's ago. i shrunk them and attached them to a pretty red fiber and now we have a cute little decoration. i'll have to get a photo of the finished project. the above photo is the boys watching the magic shrinky dinks in action.

out of the mouths of babes

NL and NT just came upstairs from watching a veggie tales movie called minnesota cuke, it's about bullies. NL walks up to me and says "momma, did you know that God makes it so you can love your enemies?" his eyes were bright with new knowledge. i said isn't that amazing and asked him if he has any enemies. he didn't think he did, but maybe his sister because she wouldn't play with him last night. :)

the other day i heard J and NL talking in the back of the van. J said "God knows everything about you." NL responded with "yeah, and santa too." the holidays are coming, guess he's been thinking about it!

Across the Universe #3

here is my layout for the third challenge. the topic was first love or first kiss. well for NL his first love outside of family has got to be B. she is his favorite friend and he looks forward to seeing her at church and choir each week. the tractor cut out may seem out of place, but the day the pictures were taken we were on a farm, and the colors matched so well. ;)

they rock

e and j's school had an awards ceremony last week for honors from the first quarter. each teacher awards a citizenship award to a boy and a girl in their class each quarter. e and j both got the citizenship awards in their classes! i was very proud! e's class has been together for 2 full years already and she just joined them this year for 3rd grade. so, it was especially sweet in her case. after the 3rd and 4th grade ceremony i told her teacher that j had gotten the citizenship for his class and said "isn't that funny" or something to that effect. she replied "no, that's good parenting!". love her!! actually, i'm sure it's a good portion cool kid and some parenting mixed in.

e also got awards for having straight A's and reading 250,000 words during the quarter.
j also got perfect attendance. there are less awards for the younger kids and they don't get letter grades until 3rd grade in our district. if they did he would have gotten all a's as well as his marks were all o's (the highest mark for k-2nd). i wasn't at his ceremony, but dave was, so the pic of j is on his phone!

a boy and his puppy

NT and Lily snuggling on the heat register last week. I love how Lily is using him as a pillow.

Third Day on the 3rd

My favorite band in the whole world, and the only one I listen to on a regular basis, Third Day. On the 3rd day of the month the have a blog carnival on the bands blog. I thought it would be fun to play along. They are a christian rock band. Their current CD, Revelation, fits my life perfectly right now, I listen to it daily. I wish I could meet Mac Powell who is the front man for the band and writes most of the lyrics. I would like to tell him how powerful his songs are. How so many of the songs are prayers for me. That revelation was exactly what I needed, and that God has given it to me and that his songs helped me realize what I needed and that my priorities were out of whack. Thank You Mac, Mark, Tai and David for your music ministry.

Blog fun

i love going from blog to blog, link by link. it's so fun to discover new people. it's even more fun when a give away is involved! today i found this blog and she has a fun scrappy giveaway. i signed up, good luck to anyone else who does.

High School Musical 3

my kids are all crazy for HSM. they watch the movies over and over and were quite excited to see the third movie in a theater. dave didn't want to go on opening day so the 6 of us waited for our sunday night family movie night to go. we usually watch a dvd at home together, so this was a special treat. there were very few people in the theater and we had great seats. the kids loved it, although it got a little too long for the youngest. i think the music of the first 2 was better and e said the second one is still her favorite. the super cute red and black wildcats jacket that n.l. is wearing was altered by me last halloween. he wanted to be troy bolton so i bought him a running suit and added a hand made felt wildcat on the front and bolton and 14 on the back. pretty crafty if i do say so myself!

it was pretty funny when within the first 3 seconds of the movie the teen aged girls in front of us were gasping at the sight of a sweaty zac efron. i laughed outloud at their reaction. i'm so glad e doesn't pay any attention to boys yet. she is 9 and has girlfriends that are already boy crazy at the same age, yikes!

this man

lately i've been thinking a lot about how blessed i am to be married to my best friend. how fortunate i am to have found someone who makes me happy just by being together. the other night we were on an escape weekend, just the 2 of us. we were watching part of "Almost Famous". there was a quote in the movie that was just perfect for the way i feel about Dave.

"I'm never as good as when I'm with you, when I see myself the way you see me."

yep, that sums it up, he makes me a better person. so very thankful he is mine.
now, i just wish he'd let me take his picture. i got this one on the playground when he was playing with the kids.

Across the Universe!

my big secret has been revealed! one of my SISters Bree has started a challenge blog based on the movie Across the Universe. i was so excited when she asked me to be a member of the design team! our first challenge is up! this is my version. i have wanted to be a part of a challenge blog for soo long! thanks Bree!

I have a secret!

It's always so fun to read on a fellow scrapper's blog that they have some news, but it's not quite time to share it. It usually means they have designed a scrapbooking product, been published or made a design team. I'm so excited to be able to say that i have news that I can't share yet! But, it won't be long. The cat will be out of the bag sometime next week.

Walking the Catwalk!

yay!! double yay!! i love it when one of the fashionista's picks one of my layouts for their weekly favorite. today was my third time to be picked. and each time it makes my day! this layout titled "manifest destiny" was chosen by kim brimall. thanks kim!! i did the layout in response to a challenge by another fashionista, Amy Tan, to use mags and scrap supplies to manifest your own destiny. fun stuff.

Kenner Road

A very sweet lady that i met through an online site is opening her very own kit club called Kenner Road. Kerry Lynn is the kind of person who is just genuinely nice and caring and creative. i wish her the best of luck with this new endeavor. I think she's gonna ROCK IT!

Kenner Road is the name of the street KL grew up on. I can't imagine naming anything after the street i lived on for 7 years of my childhood, it was Tamara Drive. Great house, funny street name. Into my 20's it was my favorite house i'd ever been in. It had 4 bedrooms and a bonus room next to the garage. Even with 3 siblings i always had my own room. i loved that. the best part was that there were 4 girls in the same grade as me on our block, emily, jenny, joey and becky. good times!

Mr. Lincoln, I presume?

Over the labor day weekend our town had a celebration marking the 150th year reunion of the Lincoln-Douglas debates. before Lincoln was president he ran against Douglas for a state race and lost. these debates precluded that election. the big deal about them was that Lincoln talked about abolishing slavery. so, our town had a weekend full of events included a parade with several period entries including both a lincoln and a douglas impersonator from our town. they were both riding in horse drawn carriages and were followed by supporters on foot wearing period costumes.

Back to School

i go back and forth between "yay, they're back in school" and "man, i can't believe summer is over!" it did go fast and that means that winter is just around the corner and i really don't like winter. i need to live somewhere where it doesn't get cold. but anyway, i digress. the first day of school was last monday a week and 2 days ago. e and j were both ready to get back to it. and excited about their new school. the first time they've attended school together. they are both in the HAPP program now. it is an accelerated learning program in our district. i think it will be really good for them. i think i have blogged about it before.



j has never even seen the speed racer movie and only seen a couple of the cartoons on dvd, but loves the merchandise and begged for a speed racer t-shirt. he also was desperate (he is usually full of drama!) for an ironman backpack. he never saw that movie either, but loves the idea of that superhero who can fly and made his own suit.



e is very preteen these days and she's only 8! she'll be 9 at the end of the month, but already exhibits preteen behavior! there is lots of hands on the hips and she's already into fashion. we shopped the end of summer sales for some of her back to school stuff and she adored this sparkly turqoise shirt. she is carrying the same bag as last year, so she could use her back pack money for another shirt. :)



don't let this photo fool you. j wanted to love on e for the photo, but e was none too pleased. as soon as i was done taking a couple shots she pushed him away. very preteen!!