How do you like our new RV? We've bagged the storm water stuff and are travelling the country selling Jelly Belly! Hence why it's been so long since my last blog post :)
Wish that was the real excuse, the real excuse is just life I guess. We have been a bit busier with school-related stuff since I signed the kids up for a weekly co-op at our church. You can find out more about that on my homeschool blog. Otherwise, just plugging along with "normal" day-to-day stuff that occurs in a homeschooling, self-employed family.
I have not been too good at taking pictures in 2012. (Except for my homeschool co-op yearbook) I was looking for photos to add to the blog & it was dismal. I've posted photos of the kids since 2010, an idea I borrowed from a friend's blog. (Thanks Molly) These photos were taken in March of the preceding years. I'm in desperate need of a new photo shoot before these children change too much more.
I will recap a few of the highlights that have happened since we rang in the New Year:
In mid- January, I was able to travel & visit my sister in Chicago & meet my new nephew Grant. It was a short but delightful visit. I was able to hang out with my nieces & nephew and hopefully help my sister a tiny bit. Although, she was into her routine with 3 kids by now pretty well, so my visit was more for my need to meet Grant before Grammy got to see him the following week :) Sorry Mom-the truth comes out...tee hee!
While I was gone, the family all came down with a nasty cold/sinus infection. So of course, when I got home, my loving family shared it with me. I was pretty much down for the count for the next two weeks and had just started to feel normal again when we started our new, weekly homeschool co-op.
February was pretty low-key. I turned 39...whoo hoo...less than a year until I am the BIG 4-0! And that's been pretty much it for the new year. No exciting trips for us yet. Scott has travelled for work a few times, but we've stayed home. Oh wait....I did squeeze in an overnight with him in Bishop-without the kids! Thanks Grammy.
Our next family trip is in late April to South Lake Tahoe. Scott has a class there so we'll go up to hang out while Dad is working. No camping trips scheduled yet-but they are being discussed.
I'm sorry I don't have anything more exciting to report. Exciting things have/are happening in other people's lives, but ours....not so much...which is really a good thing because sometimes the "exciting" is not necessarily always good things.
Be thankful for your health, your wealth (or what you have of it), the love of your family & friends and all the Lord has provided you. God Bless.
Merry Christmas!
As the end of 2011 draws to a close and we get closer to celebrating the birth of our Savior, I just wanted to make sure I sent out an"updated" blog to friends and family.
Not too much new since my last blog in...gulp...September! Scott is still busy with work and the addition of some new clients-to my relief-since our trainings have slowed down a bit. We continue to be blessed by the fruits of his labor.
The kids and I are plugging right along with school and I hope to update my homeschool blog very soon as well with our activities/accomplishments. You can always check that out at www.schooldazeofoakvalleyacademy.
In early November, Leah, Mema & I went to see the musical, "Beauty & the Beast" at our new theater in Folsom. The El Dorado Musical Theater Co. puts on a great performance and I'm so excited to have the new theater in Folsom! Now I won't have to go to Sacramento anymore for any performance (unless Josh Groban performs again and I can afford the tickets-then I'll have to travel to Sacramento). But the Three Stages Theater in Folsom offers performances of ballet, musicals, plays, and concerts for an afforable price and free or $1.00 parking! Can you tell I'm exicted!
In November we also went to visit my aunt for the day. In addition to going to one of the kid's favorite parks, we visited the fairly new library near her house in Sacramento. Her daughter helped an artist this summer paint a mural in the children's section of the libary. The mural is incredible and even more incredible is the work my cousin did on the mural. The kids are posed next to her "Dorothy" in the photo to the right labeled, "Visit with Dorothy". Leah looks up to Michelle and hopes to one day "paint as good as Michelle." That is one tall order-since I don't think too many people could even hope to aspire to her level of expertise-and what's even more incredible is that she's only 17!
For Halloween, both kids dressed as Spider-Kids. Leah went as Spider-Girl & Nolan as Spider-Man. And it has been Spidey-Mania in our house ever since. Their Christmas Wish lists were almost identical with their Spider-man wants. I never thought having a boy & a girl, that I'd have to deal with jealousies over toys received. Plus, they both still dress up and play Spider-man at least 4x a week. The picture to the right shows them with their masks on watching-you guessed it-Spider-man cartoons on Saturday morning.
Leah celebrated her 7th birthday in early December. She had a few celebrations, as we took her roller skating with some friends after we'd gone to cut down our Christmas Tree. Mema had even made a Spider-man decorated brownie cake to help us celebrate. Then on her actual birthday, Scott & I took her to the movies without little brother tagging along-which apparantly was a bigger treat for her than we thought. We then had a celebration with her favorite food-Ribs and another Spider-Man themed cake from Mema to help us celebrate with the Grandparent's and Uncle Russ.
The day after our family celebration, I anxiously awaited news of my nephew's arrival after my sister's phone call that he was on his way. I called my mom several times that day expressing my angst about not being able to be there for this birth and that I didn't like waiting for news. But little Grant arrived healthy and without giving my sister too much trouble I'm assuming, as she performed her third (and she says final) birth once again drug-free!
And as we approach the climax of the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, I'm taking it all in-one day, one hour, one breath at a time. This year Leah is 7 and Nolan is 4; and I know all too soon-in the blink of an eye-that next Christmas she'll be 18 & he'll be 15 and the magic and enchantment of Christmas will be replaced with? Who knows?
So this year, if the homemade gifts don't get done-don't despair. There's always next year.
This year, this day, this moment, I'm stringing popcorn for the tree with Leah. I'm reading "Twas the Night Before Christmas" to Nolan for the 12th time today. I'm pointing out which ornaments on the tree belong to Leah and which one's belong to Nolan. I'm telling stories about the Christmas decorations my Grandma made. I'm helping decorate gingerbread houses. I'm making hot cocoa with candy canes. We're squinting our eyes at the Christmas lights and tilting our head back and forth to make them sparkle and dance. We're oohhing and aahhhing over the Christmas lights in the neighborhoods we drive through-just for the sole purpose of looking at them. We're counting down the days until Christmas on the Advent Calendar. And most importantly, we're remembering why we even celebrate Christmas in the first place!
We want to wish every oneof you a very Merry Christmas & Happy New Year! May God Bless you and your families!
Love,
Jill, Scott, Leah & Nolan
Not too much new since my last blog in...gulp...September! Scott is still busy with work and the addition of some new clients-to my relief-since our trainings have slowed down a bit. We continue to be blessed by the fruits of his labor.
The kids and I are plugging right along with school and I hope to update my homeschool blog very soon as well with our activities/accomplishments. You can always check that out at www.schooldazeofoakvalleyacademy.
In early November, Leah, Mema & I went to see the musical, "Beauty & the Beast" at our new theater in Folsom. The El Dorado Musical Theater Co. puts on a great performance and I'm so excited to have the new theater in Folsom! Now I won't have to go to Sacramento anymore for any performance (unless Josh Groban performs again and I can afford the tickets-then I'll have to travel to Sacramento). But the Three Stages Theater in Folsom offers performances of ballet, musicals, plays, and concerts for an afforable price and free or $1.00 parking! Can you tell I'm exicted!
In November we also went to visit my aunt for the day. In addition to going to one of the kid's favorite parks, we visited the fairly new library near her house in Sacramento. Her daughter helped an artist this summer paint a mural in the children's section of the libary. The mural is incredible and even more incredible is the work my cousin did on the mural. The kids are posed next to her "Dorothy" in the photo to the right labeled, "Visit with Dorothy". Leah looks up to Michelle and hopes to one day "paint as good as Michelle." That is one tall order-since I don't think too many people could even hope to aspire to her level of expertise-and what's even more incredible is that she's only 17!
For Halloween, both kids dressed as Spider-Kids. Leah went as Spider-Girl & Nolan as Spider-Man. And it has been Spidey-Mania in our house ever since. Their Christmas Wish lists were almost identical with their Spider-man wants. I never thought having a boy & a girl, that I'd have to deal with jealousies over toys received. Plus, they both still dress up and play Spider-man at least 4x a week. The picture to the right shows them with their masks on watching-you guessed it-Spider-man cartoons on Saturday morning.
Leah celebrated her 7th birthday in early December. She had a few celebrations, as we took her roller skating with some friends after we'd gone to cut down our Christmas Tree. Mema had even made a Spider-man decorated brownie cake to help us celebrate. Then on her actual birthday, Scott & I took her to the movies without little brother tagging along-which apparantly was a bigger treat for her than we thought. We then had a celebration with her favorite food-Ribs and another Spider-Man themed cake from Mema to help us celebrate with the Grandparent's and Uncle Russ.
The day after our family celebration, I anxiously awaited news of my nephew's arrival after my sister's phone call that he was on his way. I called my mom several times that day expressing my angst about not being able to be there for this birth and that I didn't like waiting for news. But little Grant arrived healthy and without giving my sister too much trouble I'm assuming, as she performed her third (and she says final) birth once again drug-free!
And as we approach the climax of the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, I'm taking it all in-one day, one hour, one breath at a time. This year Leah is 7 and Nolan is 4; and I know all too soon-in the blink of an eye-that next Christmas she'll be 18 & he'll be 15 and the magic and enchantment of Christmas will be replaced with? Who knows?
So this year, if the homemade gifts don't get done-don't despair. There's always next year.
This year, this day, this moment, I'm stringing popcorn for the tree with Leah. I'm reading "Twas the Night Before Christmas" to Nolan for the 12th time today. I'm pointing out which ornaments on the tree belong to Leah and which one's belong to Nolan. I'm telling stories about the Christmas decorations my Grandma made. I'm helping decorate gingerbread houses. I'm making hot cocoa with candy canes. We're squinting our eyes at the Christmas lights and tilting our head back and forth to make them sparkle and dance. We're oohhing and aahhhing over the Christmas lights in the neighborhoods we drive through-just for the sole purpose of looking at them. We're counting down the days until Christmas on the Advent Calendar. And most importantly, we're remembering why we even celebrate Christmas in the first place!
We want to wish every oneof you a very Merry Christmas & Happy New Year! May God Bless you and your families!
Love,
Jill, Scott, Leah & Nolan
New York! New York!
Since my last post in late July (Yikes!), as a family we've gone camping with friends, had BBQ's with friends, started school, gone on many field trips, and went camping in Monterey while Scott attended a conference. That's on top of our day-to-day business/house stuff of course. And Nolan celebrated his 4th birthday on Sept. 23-a very low-key day, as we'd had already had a train ride and museum trip a couple weeks before the big day.
I don't want to down play any of the above activities as they were special in their own right and each deserve their own post...but with time constraints and such....it isn't going to happen. Many of you know that my sister & her wonderful-generous husband (yes I'm suckin' up Ron :) ) granted me yet another "make-a-wish" sister's trip. This time to New York City. And thus, what this blog post will be focusing on.
I flew in to Chicago late Friday evening and my very pregnant sister was there to pick me up and take me back to her condo. I had enough time for a quick bite to eat, a short visit with her in-law's & husband...and then it was off to bed for our early morning flight to New York City!
Ron took us to the airport on his way to work and we had an uneventful flight in to La Guardia. We arrived in NYC around 11am? and took a cab ride to our hotel. The cab ride however was eventful-no thank goodness no accidents-just very fast and swervy as if I were on a roller coaster. (I think my nausea subsided about an hour after we arrived at the hotel) We were able to check in to our hotel by noon and after a brief rest (and recuperation on my part), we were off in search of food. We ate at a yummy deli just beneath our hotel and then we were off to explore NYC. Our hotel was a block away from Times Square.
We walked to Rockefeller Plaza and went to an observation deck "On Top of the Rock", a location with an amazing view of New York City. We spent quite a bit of time there as I tried to get numerous photos from each of the 3 observation deck levels. After the viewing on Rockefeller Center, we strode down the streets of NYC to check out the New York City Public Library where scenes from the first Ghost Buster's movie took place. We got photos of the outside of the building, but we reached the library at 5pm just as it closed! (We forgot to go back to check out the inside of this building). We then made our way to Grand Central Station to take a "midnight train to Georgia". Just kidding...mainly for me to take photos :) Unfortunately the photos taken inside didn't turn out, but it was just as well-as I am sure they would not have done it justice to this Grand building. Of course between stops we'd jaunt into to a cafe or ? to grab a coffee, or bite to eat, or use the bathroom, or all 3 :)
We caught our "tour" bus back to Times Square and decided against a Broadway show that night. We went back to our room-rested and then went to find a bite to eat. On our way back to the hotel-Times Square was lit up and bustling with people. It was incredible. We went back to our room and stayed in for our first evening-snacking and watching a movie.
The next morning we we're off and running to find Annie's Bakery that Lisa had read about. We found it by the line of people outside. The line moved quickly and we even found a table inside for the two of us once we made our decisions & purchases for breakfast. Let's just say-it was delectable! After breakfast we walked to find our tour bus stop just outside of Central Park. After waiting about 1/2 hour or so, we both felt able to hoof it & Central Park was on our destination list to tour. So we walked through Central Park on our way to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Once we reached the museum we toured a few exhibits before we hit a cafe for lunch. With all that walking-we were famished. We then finished touring as much as we could handle of the art museum. We spent 4 hours there and didn't even see 1/2 the museum. I think you need a good solid 1 1/2 days to tour this museum. We then found our tour bus and headed back to Times Square.
Lisa and I being the savvy Broadway Babes we are (NOT), decided we'd get in line for a show we'd both read about and wanted to see-The Book of Mormon. When we arrived at the theater 4 hours before show time-we discovered that night's show was sold out-but there was a cancellation line to buy tickets for people who cancelled for that night's show. There was also a line next to us for Advance Purchase. We felt pretty confident we'd get tickets-as the cancellation line was moving & we were only 8 people back when we arrived & 3 people ahead of us had left with tickets. Then our line stopped moving. And we waited. And waited. Then we heard a person in the Advance purchase line saying that the show was Sold out 7 months in advance! What? Hmmm...maybe we wouldn't be so lucky. It was 5pm now, Broadway shows started between 7 & 8 and we hadn't been back to our hotel to change or even have dinner! We left the line-bee-lined it to the 1/2 price ticket booth in Times Square and got in that line which moved very quickly. We were able to purchase tickets for an 8pm show that night. We hurried to our hotel, had a brief rest, changed, and went in search of dinner. We made it to the theater with 5 mintues to spare and saw a show called "Rock of Ages". I highly recommend it. It was late 80's music-hilarious and fun! After the show we stopped at "Roxy's" for dessert & coffee and then back to our hotel.
Day 3 in New York-we had breakfast at the deli beneath our hotel (New York style bagel for me) and then caught our tour bus to the Staten Island Ferry Terminal. The tour on top of the open-air bus was quite informative and well worth the ride. We arrived at the terminal and took the Ferry to Staten Island and back-where I got some amazing photos of the Statue of Liberty. I also could not believe that you could ride the ferry for FREE! We then walked to the 9/11 memorial and toured a local church that had been an integral part in helping people on 9/11 and after. We then took the subway to Greenwich Village and browsed through the streets, a shop or two and had lunch. We then took the subway back to Times Square, got in line to buy that evening's Broadway show tickets and went to the hotel to rest and clean up. We had dinner down the road from our show and then went to see "Mama Mia!". It was fantastic. Not as phenomenal as "Rock of Ages", but pretty good. We found dessert after the show and then headed back to our hotel for our last night in NYC.
The next morning we went back to Annie's Bakery & we were one of the first people there for breakfast. We found a table in the back and enjoyed our last meal in New York. We then went back to our hotel and gathered our belongings. We took un uneventful & much more pleasant cab ride to La Guardia for our flight back to Chicago. We arrived in Chicago and took the train closer to Lisa's home. We had lunch and then grabbed a cab to her condo.
I had 1 1/2 days to spend in Chicago with my nieces and do some thrift-store shopping and then it was home to my birthday boy and his party. Then packing for the trip to Monterey. Whew!
So that's been the last two months in a nutshell. I'm hoping it will slow down by Christmas, but I have a feeling it won't. There is a baby boom starting with 7-yes 7 of my family/friends all having babies from Dec-March. :)
Hope all is well with you and your families!
I don't want to down play any of the above activities as they were special in their own right and each deserve their own post...but with time constraints and such....it isn't going to happen. Many of you know that my sister & her wonderful-generous husband (yes I'm suckin' up Ron :) ) granted me yet another "make-a-wish" sister's trip. This time to New York City. And thus, what this blog post will be focusing on.
I flew in to Chicago late Friday evening and my very pregnant sister was there to pick me up and take me back to her condo. I had enough time for a quick bite to eat, a short visit with her in-law's & husband...and then it was off to bed for our early morning flight to New York City!
Ron took us to the airport on his way to work and we had an uneventful flight in to La Guardia. We arrived in NYC around 11am? and took a cab ride to our hotel. The cab ride however was eventful-no thank goodness no accidents-just very fast and swervy as if I were on a roller coaster. (I think my nausea subsided about an hour after we arrived at the hotel) We were able to check in to our hotel by noon and after a brief rest (and recuperation on my part), we were off in search of food. We ate at a yummy deli just beneath our hotel and then we were off to explore NYC. Our hotel was a block away from Times Square.
We walked to Rockefeller Plaza and went to an observation deck "On Top of the Rock", a location with an amazing view of New York City. We spent quite a bit of time there as I tried to get numerous photos from each of the 3 observation deck levels. After the viewing on Rockefeller Center, we strode down the streets of NYC to check out the New York City Public Library where scenes from the first Ghost Buster's movie took place. We got photos of the outside of the building, but we reached the library at 5pm just as it closed! (We forgot to go back to check out the inside of this building). We then made our way to Grand Central Station to take a "midnight train to Georgia". Just kidding...mainly for me to take photos :) Unfortunately the photos taken inside didn't turn out, but it was just as well-as I am sure they would not have done it justice to this Grand building. Of course between stops we'd jaunt into to a cafe or ? to grab a coffee, or bite to eat, or use the bathroom, or all 3 :)
We caught our "tour" bus back to Times Square and decided against a Broadway show that night. We went back to our room-rested and then went to find a bite to eat. On our way back to the hotel-Times Square was lit up and bustling with people. It was incredible. We went back to our room and stayed in for our first evening-snacking and watching a movie.
The next morning we we're off and running to find Annie's Bakery that Lisa had read about. We found it by the line of people outside. The line moved quickly and we even found a table inside for the two of us once we made our decisions & purchases for breakfast. Let's just say-it was delectable! After breakfast we walked to find our tour bus stop just outside of Central Park. After waiting about 1/2 hour or so, we both felt able to hoof it & Central Park was on our destination list to tour. So we walked through Central Park on our way to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Once we reached the museum we toured a few exhibits before we hit a cafe for lunch. With all that walking-we were famished. We then finished touring as much as we could handle of the art museum. We spent 4 hours there and didn't even see 1/2 the museum. I think you need a good solid 1 1/2 days to tour this museum. We then found our tour bus and headed back to Times Square.
Lisa and I being the savvy Broadway Babes we are (NOT), decided we'd get in line for a show we'd both read about and wanted to see-The Book of Mormon. When we arrived at the theater 4 hours before show time-we discovered that night's show was sold out-but there was a cancellation line to buy tickets for people who cancelled for that night's show. There was also a line next to us for Advance Purchase. We felt pretty confident we'd get tickets-as the cancellation line was moving & we were only 8 people back when we arrived & 3 people ahead of us had left with tickets. Then our line stopped moving. And we waited. And waited. Then we heard a person in the Advance purchase line saying that the show was Sold out 7 months in advance! What? Hmmm...maybe we wouldn't be so lucky. It was 5pm now, Broadway shows started between 7 & 8 and we hadn't been back to our hotel to change or even have dinner! We left the line-bee-lined it to the 1/2 price ticket booth in Times Square and got in that line which moved very quickly. We were able to purchase tickets for an 8pm show that night. We hurried to our hotel, had a brief rest, changed, and went in search of dinner. We made it to the theater with 5 mintues to spare and saw a show called "Rock of Ages". I highly recommend it. It was late 80's music-hilarious and fun! After the show we stopped at "Roxy's" for dessert & coffee and then back to our hotel.
Day 3 in New York-we had breakfast at the deli beneath our hotel (New York style bagel for me) and then caught our tour bus to the Staten Island Ferry Terminal. The tour on top of the open-air bus was quite informative and well worth the ride. We arrived at the terminal and took the Ferry to Staten Island and back-where I got some amazing photos of the Statue of Liberty. I also could not believe that you could ride the ferry for FREE! We then walked to the 9/11 memorial and toured a local church that had been an integral part in helping people on 9/11 and after. We then took the subway to Greenwich Village and browsed through the streets, a shop or two and had lunch. We then took the subway back to Times Square, got in line to buy that evening's Broadway show tickets and went to the hotel to rest and clean up. We had dinner down the road from our show and then went to see "Mama Mia!". It was fantastic. Not as phenomenal as "Rock of Ages", but pretty good. We found dessert after the show and then headed back to our hotel for our last night in NYC.
The next morning we went back to Annie's Bakery & we were one of the first people there for breakfast. We found a table in the back and enjoyed our last meal in New York. We then went back to our hotel and gathered our belongings. We took un uneventful & much more pleasant cab ride to La Guardia for our flight back to Chicago. We arrived in Chicago and took the train closer to Lisa's home. We had lunch and then grabbed a cab to her condo.
I had 1 1/2 days to spend in Chicago with my nieces and do some thrift-store shopping and then it was home to my birthday boy and his party. Then packing for the trip to Monterey. Whew!
So that's been the last two months in a nutshell. I'm hoping it will slow down by Christmas, but I have a feeling it won't. There is a baby boom starting with 7-yes 7 of my family/friends all having babies from Dec-March. :)
Hope all is well with you and your families!
Yes. We're stil here!
I apologize for being MIA in the blog world. Looking over the last couple of blogs-it's starting to become a "quarterly" blog :)
In addition to just being plain busy with activities and travel, those are only excuses as to why this blog has not been updated in a timely fashion. Truthfully, after reading some friends blogs, and "friends of friends" blogs I realize how truly talented some people are with the written word...and in comparision, I dont' feel like one of them :) But then I decided I am not trying to write eloquent novels about my faith or any other agenda except to let friends and family (who may interested), know what's happening in our lives and share some photos of my cute kids too.
In early June, Scott had a training in South Lake Taho,e so the whole family travelled with him. We were staying at a hotel right on Lake Tahoe and I'd had high hopes of spending the days on the beach with the kids. The location of the room was perfect for this-however, the weather was not. It was in the 40's and even snowed while we were there! Of course that did not stop the kids from playing on the beach and eventually there will be some photos in the Shutterfly album to attest to that.
I attended a local homeschool conference upon our return from Tahoe. It was very informative and encouraging.
We had our annual Fort Bragg Abalone Dive Camp trip the week before Father's Day. At our abalone dinner night we had a total of 30 people! This year the weather was perfect-no rain or fog but it was a bit windy. The other challenge for us was that the campsites for our group were spread far apart and it was not conducive for the kids to travel back & forth by themselves safely to Mema's camp or their friends campsites. We may remedy that next year by travelling in May instead of June. You will see photos in our shutterfly album from this adventure as well hopefully in the near future.
In July, we took the kids to the Folsom Rodeo. Other than it being hot, the kids had a great time. And though she will probably be too big next year-Leah has decided she wants to try the "mutton busting" :) We had an early 4th of July celebration at Uncle Guy's house and celebrated Forrest's 18th birthday a couple of weeks early.
I had a heart catheterization on July 6 that was a bit challenging for me. I originally thought it was because I was getting older and perhaps my body's tolerance for pain wasn't up to par anymore. However, when I was able to remove the dressing 24 hours later-I realized that the location for the cath site was 1 inch above the location where it should have been placed. Ugh. No wonder why it was much more painful than any other cath I've had to date.
A couple weeks later, we headed with Scott to Chico for another training. The kids and I spent our days at Bidwell Park, at a roller skating rink, at Chico Mall, and at Max's Miracle ranch in Biggs, CA. The family that owns this place was very friendly and showed us their ranch. Max is a 7 year old boy who has a heart defect-the same one Scott & Nolan have. His family started Max's Miracle Ranch as a retreat for families with children with all types of pyhsical challenges. You can find out more information on their websites: http://www.maxsmiracleranch.net/ or http://maxsmiracles.wetpaint.com/.
The kids had a great time visiting and playing with the Williams children. Nolan and Max became best-buds and Nolan followed Max around the ranch for most of our visit. Leah enjoyed playing with the youngest three Williams' girls and all attempted to put on a "play" on the makeshift stage-albeit it was a bit disorganized with each of the girls and Max doing their own thing :) While visiting the ranch, we also were able to feed the miniature horses, ride the train (twice) pick plums and thornless blackberries, visit the chapel and visit with the Williams family. What a wonderul thing this family has and is sharing with others!
The week after Chico, Scott and I travelled to Redwood Shores & Costa Mesa for more training. While Scott was busy training, I was busy putting together my lesson plans for the year. The kids stayed home for "Camp Me-ma" and she had many activities planned for the kids for the week we were gone. On the way home from Costa Mesa, Scott dropped me off in Modesto for a homeschool conference as I gear up for Leah's 1st grade year.
I apologize for no updated photos in the Shutterfly album. I'm having an issue with photos disappearing on me-so until I figure out the problem, I won't be up to upload the photos. I don't want to take a chance and lose all my photos. But I've added a few from some trips on the side bar.
That's all for now.
In addition to just being plain busy with activities and travel, those are only excuses as to why this blog has not been updated in a timely fashion. Truthfully, after reading some friends blogs, and "friends of friends" blogs I realize how truly talented some people are with the written word...and in comparision, I dont' feel like one of them :) But then I decided I am not trying to write eloquent novels about my faith or any other agenda except to let friends and family (who may interested), know what's happening in our lives and share some photos of my cute kids too.
In early June, Scott had a training in South Lake Taho,e so the whole family travelled with him. We were staying at a hotel right on Lake Tahoe and I'd had high hopes of spending the days on the beach with the kids. The location of the room was perfect for this-however, the weather was not. It was in the 40's and even snowed while we were there! Of course that did not stop the kids from playing on the beach and eventually there will be some photos in the Shutterfly album to attest to that.
I attended a local homeschool conference upon our return from Tahoe. It was very informative and encouraging.
We had our annual Fort Bragg Abalone Dive Camp trip the week before Father's Day. At our abalone dinner night we had a total of 30 people! This year the weather was perfect-no rain or fog but it was a bit windy. The other challenge for us was that the campsites for our group were spread far apart and it was not conducive for the kids to travel back & forth by themselves safely to Mema's camp or their friends campsites. We may remedy that next year by travelling in May instead of June. You will see photos in our shutterfly album from this adventure as well hopefully in the near future.
In July, we took the kids to the Folsom Rodeo. Other than it being hot, the kids had a great time. And though she will probably be too big next year-Leah has decided she wants to try the "mutton busting" :) We had an early 4th of July celebration at Uncle Guy's house and celebrated Forrest's 18th birthday a couple of weeks early.
I had a heart catheterization on July 6 that was a bit challenging for me. I originally thought it was because I was getting older and perhaps my body's tolerance for pain wasn't up to par anymore. However, when I was able to remove the dressing 24 hours later-I realized that the location for the cath site was 1 inch above the location where it should have been placed. Ugh. No wonder why it was much more painful than any other cath I've had to date.
A couple weeks later, we headed with Scott to Chico for another training. The kids and I spent our days at Bidwell Park, at a roller skating rink, at Chico Mall, and at Max's Miracle ranch in Biggs, CA. The family that owns this place was very friendly and showed us their ranch. Max is a 7 year old boy who has a heart defect-the same one Scott & Nolan have. His family started Max's Miracle Ranch as a retreat for families with children with all types of pyhsical challenges. You can find out more information on their websites: http://www.maxsmiracleranch.net/ or http://maxsmiracles.wetpaint.com/.
The kids had a great time visiting and playing with the Williams children. Nolan and Max became best-buds and Nolan followed Max around the ranch for most of our visit. Leah enjoyed playing with the youngest three Williams' girls and all attempted to put on a "play" on the makeshift stage-albeit it was a bit disorganized with each of the girls and Max doing their own thing :) While visiting the ranch, we also were able to feed the miniature horses, ride the train (twice) pick plums and thornless blackberries, visit the chapel and visit with the Williams family. What a wonderul thing this family has and is sharing with others!
The week after Chico, Scott and I travelled to Redwood Shores & Costa Mesa for more training. While Scott was busy training, I was busy putting together my lesson plans for the year. The kids stayed home for "Camp Me-ma" and she had many activities planned for the kids for the week we were gone. On the way home from Costa Mesa, Scott dropped me off in Modesto for a homeschool conference as I gear up for Leah's 1st grade year.
I apologize for no updated photos in the Shutterfly album. I'm having an issue with photos disappearing on me-so until I figure out the problem, I won't be up to upload the photos. I don't want to take a chance and lose all my photos. But I've added a few from some trips on the side bar.
That's all for now.
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