Old Rebekah Pics

We have FINALLY gotten Andrew's new digital camera software downloaded and hooked up the cord so he can download his own pics from his cool new camera. It was a Christmas present--yes, we are that far behind.

Here are some pictures of Rebekah who was so tired in January after all the visitors and Christmas Hullabaloo that she managed to fall asleep while climbing up our stairs. No kidding. We found her like this when she 'disappeared'.

Awana Games

Realized I never blogged about the Awana Games. The boys attend Awanas (Approved Workermen Are Not Ashamed) on Wed. nights. Nathan has been cruising through his book at a fast pace. He's really good at memorizing his verses. Andrew has chosen to make this year mostly a social year at Awanas. He memorizes very few verses, but has a blast.

The Awana Games is a competition between the different Awana groups in town. Each week, there is game time at Awanas. They use some of these games (changes each year) for an olympic-style competition. Nathan's Sparks team came in 2nd place and Andrew's T&T team came in 4th. They both had a great time.

They were at the opposite end of the gym from where the seating was, so my pictures are far away and blurry. Nathan is one of the red blurs and Andrew is a yellow blur.

Here is a movie of Andrew in the four-way tug-of-war. I snuck down onto the floor (illegally) and managed to get a little video. Shhh---don't tell on me or they might toss me out of the games.

Easter Weekend

Thought I'd let everyone see some of our Easter Weekend. We were unable to attend any of the Easter Egg Hunts this year since the boys had swimming lessons at about the same time as the egg hunts. Instead, while they were at lessons, I prepared an indoor hunt at the house. I didn't realize Sean & I had filled 80 eggs for the kids. They were thrilled. Below is Nathan with his haul of eggs and him hugging his new Seal Webkinz (named Swim).

I was feeding Rebekah lunch while the boys were on their way home. I thought she burned her mouth because she was suddenly pointing at it and whining. I told her to drink her milk if her mouth hurt. She threw her milk on the floor and pushed her plate of food to the side. This was right before she opened her mouth to yell and started throwing up. All over the highchair, her clothes and the floor. Yuck!

She was sick off and on all day Saturday. She was doing much better Saturday night. Sunday morning arrives and I'm contemplating taking her to church since I wondered if she had gotten a hold of a cup of bad milk to make her so sick. About the time I have this thought, she runs into our room, looks at me and has a huge poopy moment. Well, we had such moments all day. I took the boys to church since I was singing and Sean stayed home to change diapers and clothes.

She's was doing much better Mon/Tues morning, but then had several episodes yesterday afternoon. Hoping she's over it today!

Andrew had a great time with all of his eggs, too. Then we swiped some of each of the boys' eggs to give to Rebekah when she felt better. Her picture by her basket is with her in her PJ's. After messing up two outfits, I just went to the easy off zipper PJ's.

Below, she has taken the eggs the boys decorated and peeled off the flowers. They were plastic eggs with peel and stick foam stickers. Then we glued jewels to the flowers and glittered a few. She peels off the flowers and puts on her nose. Why? Who knows?!?

Nathan's Diner

I'm behind in posting so this event actually happened over a week ago.

Nathan was up before everyone and decided to open Nathan's Diner for the breakfast crunch. He worked hard to pick foods we would like. He even made place cards for us at the table. Then everyone had to wait to eat together. Wouldn't you know, this is the first Saturday in years that I slept in (after being up from 2-6 with Rebekah and then not being able to get back to sleep). So I was pushing 9am when I finally got up. Poor Sean was starving. This picture Nathan took of us before we ate.





Our menu:


Andrew got to have a Blueberry Controller (Cereal Bar) and Apple.












Sean got to have "Swiss Cheese Super Strength". (Cheese is good for building strong bones and healthy bodies and Daddy loves Swiss cheese.)





I got to have Summer Sausage. You know, the stuff you serve with cheese and crackers for parties. Sean mentioned he hoped my tummy was feeling better before I saw it. I ate every bite that my beautiful son prepared for me. Poor child was trying to cut it with a butter knife (he's not allowed to use sharp knives). He wanted to do everything by himself and he was working so hard at it. Sean finally convinced Nathan that a little help is ok.



Here's a very proud Nathan jumping off his joy on the trampoline. He loves to have a diner and feed the masses. (He inherits that from his mother, grandmoms and great-grandmoms. We never want anyone to leave our homes hungry.)


Oh, just so you know, I did follow up my breakfast with a little Tums for dessert.

Happy Easter

Couln't resist this one.

More Shower Tales

One night this week, Rebekah just wouldn't settle down and go to sleep. After a LONG while, both mom and dad are finished with the day and want to go to bed. Yet, here is Miss Rebekah, still running around and refusing to go to sleep.

We decide to try the last ditch effort and see if she'll fall asleep laying with us in our bed. (After breaking this habit months ago, you know we were desperate.) Sean lays down with her in our bed and I start to get my PJ's on. As I undress, she pops up, slides out of the bed and starts unzipping her PJ's while saying something over and over.

When we figure out what she's saying, the two of us are laughing so hard we can't speak. As I was getting undressed, she starts saying, "Shower, shower, shower" (in Rebekah speak this is "Zsha zah") and tries to strip down herself. I guess mommy putting on her PJ's is equivalent to mommy getting ready to take a shower. And when you don't want to sleep, it's a great idea to take a shower at 11pm.

Once I was dressed for bed and we all lay down together, she finally collapsed and went to her own bed for the night. However, she is still convinced she needs a twice daily shower so every time I get dressed or undressed, I have to hide so she won't try to undress for a "Zsha zah".

There's a Mouse in my House

I think I should title my autobiography, "There's a Mouse in my House--and other tales from the mommy trenches." I believe we have a mouse. Not the four legged kind, but the two legged snacking kind. The one who is starting to assert her independence by getting her own snacks--BY HERSELF!

This is the true story of the Mouse in my House.

First off, Mommy was out at a meeting when this occurred. Our girl must have seen the opportunity--both brothers on the computers, dad resting in the bedroom watching TV. An entire main floor to herself. She creeps to the pantry and slowly opens the door. She manages to get the box of crackers off the shelf and finds--to her dismay--that the only sleeve of crackers is still sealed. Should she risk being told no by asking for help?? Too risky.

So with the stealth of a fox, she starts working on the problem herself. One nibble at a time she manages to eat through the plastic sleeve to get to the cracker crumbs within.

Drat--caught just before she could get out all the crackers. Daddy wouldn't give her these mangled up ones--he decided she should eat the crackers in the open sleeve on the counter top.

It's true, my life is an open book.

Our School's Got Talent

We had our school's first-ever, now first-annual, talent show. Nathan is a little miffed that we didn't let him audition, but there were no Kindergarteners in the show. We told him next year he can audition.


Andrew played a piano piece for the show. Sean ran the sound so Andrew was his 'helper'.


We were pleasantly surprised by how well ALL the kids did. It was an enjoyable night. All of the kids had worked hard and did well. Nobody was terrible. The 'director' of the talent show is a man I went to high school with. Barry did an awesome job of working with the kids and coaching them. The talent show was his brainchild and a huge success. It was a standing room only crowd.



My pictures didn't turn out well--too dark. I lightened this one up so you can see Andrew playing.

Another House Update

It's been a wild week, yet we still are waiting. We are still waiting to hear back from our second lease/offer people. They keep wanting a night to sleep on it. The buyer our agent's broker had changed their mind when they realized the house is on the main street of the subdivision. The other possible buyers had their bid accepted on their first choice house. We also had "U-haul guy" wanting to move in.

Our agent gets a call from a man in the driveway saying he's divorced and needs to find a place to live. He has all his possessions in the U-haul he's towing and wants to know what kind of a check it takes to move in today. Since we have that house staged, there's no way to move in today. We have to get our things out first. So our agent took him over to show him the house. We felt all along he was looking to rent not lease/option. By evening, they were talking about reconciling and so he was changing his mind.

So we still wait. While we pray for God to move NOW, we really want to see His will done. Hopefully, the second lease/option buyers will make up their mind one way or the other so we know if we should move forward with our first offer or not. Your prayers are still appreciated.

House Prayers Requested

Quick update on the house situation. We had an offer weeks ago for a person wanting a lease/option (basically a rent-to-own if you've never heard of this). Negotiations ensued and last week we completed the contract for this buyer to look over. Unfortunately, his expectation for the "tenant is to pay for all upkeep and repair" and our reality did not collide. He planned to pay for the expenses and deduct from his payment. We are working on a way to resolve this situation as the bottom line is he wants us to put a new roof on (even though it is not leaking--it's just older).

We received a second lease/option offer last night. It is a better price, better terms (ie: they understand house sold 'as is' and they pay for repairs). The issues with this offer are lower option deposit (which is essentially our damage deposit) and their agent wants half of his commission now and half in two years when we close. We've countered and hope to hear something back tomorrow night.

We also informed our first lease/option person that there is a new offer for better price and terms to see if he wants to counter.

Additionally, it appears that our agent's broker may have a purchase offer for us tomorrow or Tuesday.

Please pray with us! God has worked on my heart this past week and my current prayer is for God to provide the proper buyer NOW, at this time. We want to see His will done in this situation and we are asking for clear direction and wisdom to follow His will. Finally, we want to praise God for bringing us this far. We know God is faithful to those who tithe and He is proving that to us. He is a good God!!!

Mark Shultz Concert

We were able to take a little road trip and go see our favorite Christian artist, Mark Shultz. Nothing like driving a couple hours to see a concert, then driving home while the kids sleep and sending them to school the next day. We decided it wasn't the best parenting move for education, but what an awesome life experience for our kids. Since we ordered our tickets so early (we had our money to the gal before they went on sale), we got special Meet & Greet passes for after the concert.

Here's some photos of our fun!

Before leaving the concert, we had the kids change into PJ's in the car. Then we set them up so they could sleep on the drive home. Here they are before we left:


And here is after:

More Space Stuff

While at the museum (see Meeting an Astronaut post), we took the time to look through the Mars exhibit. We had so much fun with the exhibit and getting pictures.

I couldn't believe Andrew agreed to pose by the bathrooms on the living module.

I got him to get a photo of my at the entrance to the hydroponic food growing area---proving my existence to the world.

Here's one of Rebekah & I deciding what dehydrated food to eat.

Last, but not least, we got Nathan to lay down in the bed. Figured it would be good practice for when he's an astronaut on Mars. They do have a flat screen TV/monitor to watch while in bed. It looked a little cramped, but he's used to being in the bottom bunk.

Overall, we had a wonderful time. They have added a Space Bike. Looks like a human sized centrifuge with pedals. You pedal as they spin you around. Andrew loved it and rode it over and over. I want to give it a try, but the place was packed so I'll wait until our next trip.

Meeting an Astronaut

We've had such a busy week, there hasn't been time to blog it all. One exciting thing was meeting Clayton Anderson, astronaut. We had the opportunity to attend a brunch and meet & greet with Clay. Then we got to hear him speak about his experiences and life on the International Space Station. He brought along a slide shows of some photos he took. Absolutely amazing!

Last summer, we visited the Johnson Space Center. At that time, the person in the briefing room told everyone that if you were between the ages of 4-12 (I think), you could possibly be the first person on Mars. We had no idea that NASA was directed by the president to continue space exploration. The current space shuttle is being phased out and they will be going back to a rocket-style model. It will be faster than what we have now. They estimate it will take just under 2 months to get to Mars.

When Nathan heard that he was the right age, he announced that he's going to be an astronaut to Mars. He hasn't really wavered on that. Some days he'll be a rock star and other days he plans to be an astronaut. After meeting Clay, I asked him if he planned to be an astronaut, a rock star or both. He told me both, "because they'll need music on Mars." Good point.

When we met Clay, he gave an autographed photo to each of the boys. We told him Nathan plans to go to Mars. So he wrote, "Nathan, I'll see you on Mars." This photo is Nathan studying his picture. Since Clay has the same basic message every time we read about him or see him on the news, it was no surprise to see Nathan day-dreaming about being an astronaut. Clay encourages everyone to dream big and reach for the stars.