On the Second Day of Christmas

We got everyone up at 3 a.m. (I had stayed up all night) My friend came and took us to the airport at 3:45 a.m. Everything went smooth at the ticket counter. Security was ok - although they fed us through the family line and said it would be quicker - but, it was not! All the people they were patting down were sent to that line too. I felt bad as we passed them, because we got right through after waiting in line. Brian's parents and brother caught up with us.

The girls LOVED their first plane ride. The trip to Dallas was very smooth. Once in Dallas, we changed gates THREE times and made it to the 3rd gate change shortly before boarding began! Once on the plane, we waited... the plane had apparently sat too long. They had to run the engine and the let it sit so they could check the oil before we left. We departed and 8 plus hours later we arrived.

Wow! What a climate change. It was warm and humid. I LOVE it! The walkways between the gates and baggage claim are open. That was kind of interesting - can't do that where we live!

We arrived at the resort. It's so busy here. We walked down to the beach, found a Subway for supper and ate it on the beach. The kids played in the sand.

Panda said, after going down to the ocean, "Mom, the water came to me!" It was so cute.

After being up for 42 hours straight, I crashed. I'm looking forward to enjoying the sun and the warm weather! More later, hopefully including pictures!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Thankfully, even though the weather was bad, our roads were completely clear. We were able to attend church this morning. Here's a picture of the girls with our Pastor:

Testing 123

Ok 6 days to go. Trying to see if I can update the blog with my iPod touch. It's challenging to type on this tiny keypad one letter at a time but I think I can make it work. I'm just not going to write a book this way!

Panda was getting ready for bed tonight and said she wants to wear her dot to dot (polka dot) pajamas. Cute! :)

Time to see if this is going to work before I spend too much time on one fingered typing!

One Week

One week to go. And I'm just plain grumpy. And stressed. And excited, but I'm still grumpy. I have so much to do and I lost two days.

Thursday I came down with a NASTY cold and I just couldn't get moving. That was on top of Ladybug being sick the day before and Butterfly and Panda throwing up Wednesday night and Thursday early morning. So, Thursday was a wasted day.

Friday, still not breathing well, I got up, got us all around and got us to the shop to get my van's oil changed. Then I found out that there was a gash in one of my front tires and the other front tire was in terrible condition as well. So, I decided on tires to buy. Then the mechanic came out and said the back tires were also looking really bad - that really we should get all 4 tires replaced. I then realized that yes, those tires are original to the van and have 53,000 miles on them, so we are definitely due. Something else needs to be replaced while they are at it and so the bill is going to add up to around $850. Joy. By the time we got transferred into a junky (not even kidding) loaner car and then traded Brian for his van as school was getting out (not good timing) and then ran two more errands, another afternoon was shot. Grrr. And I don't get my van back until Monday afternoon because parts needed to be ordered.

I hate it when this stuff comes up at the worst time. It never fails. It makes me grumpy. But, then I am reminded to pray, "Give us this day our daily bread." And already God has. We have been provided today everything that we need.

So, we will leave in a week and keep praying "Give us this day our daily bread" and rest in God and be thankful for what we have been given. And I will get over my grumpiness.

Sometimes you just have to leave it alone

Ok, I know what I should be doing. I should be cracking down on the kids and getting all their school work done. Right?

But, there are days that I just have to leave things alone for a while. The other day they all dressed alike (in purple striped shirts) and got out the Cranium Hullabaloo and their dolls and stuffed animals. They were playing the game using the dolls and animals as the players and making them do all the actions. They were working so well together and playing so nicely that I just couldn't interrupt them to do the usual schedule.

So, I waited and let them play. We got to school work much later in the day, but it still got done. I enjoyed listening to their cooperation and laughter. That, to me, is priceless.

The Countdown

I have so much to do! And I'm not talking about Christmas. Stop reading if your are not going to speak to me if I talk of warm weather, sunshine, sightseeing....

In two weeks, we will load ourselves into a pressurized metal tube and hopefully (8 hours later) land on a beautiful island.

I will do my best to try and update while we are there, BUT - if you don't hear from me - you will know that I'm am soaking up every last sun ray and bit of warmth that I can!

Some of our plans include:

*Pearl Harbor/USS Arizona

*Waikiki aquarium

*Polynesian Culture Center

*Iolani Palace

*Playing in the sand on the beach and searching for sea creatures

We'll see what else we get to.

Now, back to my to do LIST!

Just Pondering and Little Treasures

A post on one of my email groups got me thinking about all the things we do around Christmas. It also reminded me of things that I will miss.

My bassoon teacher passed away this summer and one of the things I looked forward to around Christmas was his Christmas letter. His letters were always so cute. He had pictures of his cats with cute quotes and included pictures of his grandchildren and told about his year. I'll miss that this year.

I was going through my recipes and found the recipes that I had copied with my grandma. They were some of my favorites of hers. She even wrote down some of them for me. One of my favorites was her peppernuts. She made them every year. My kids enjoyed them too. So, now I have a little treasure - my favorite recipes of hers - many written in her handwriting.

Happy Birthday Grandpa!

Today is my Grandpa's 91st birthday. I took the girls in and we met Mom and Dad at G'pa's. We had pizza and Mom made a pecan pie for G'pa. We also had chocolate cake with cherries and some cookies. Oh, and ice cream. :) I think G'pa had a great time.

Fall Fun

The Chocolate Harvest was Plentiful

What was that again?

With all the flu going around we have been very diligent in washing our hands. If we can't get to a sink, we usually reach for the hand sanitizer.

Panda had a cute one though - she asked for the "hanitizer".

Her other cute one is - things that are sparkly are "smarkly".

Butterfly's Art Show

I realized that I never blogged Butterfly's Art Show. So, here it is:

Her bee

Her salamander

Butterfly with her art teacher

Backyard Babies

All of these babies were found in our back (and front) yard this spring and summer. The girls enjoyed seeing them.

Here's the baby hawk:

Baby blue jay:

One of the baby bunnies - it wandered out of the nest:

One of two baby robins which hatched from a nest in our front tree:

We were fortunate to get to watch the mom feed the baby:

Oops!

She must have stopped talking:

The Butterfly

Here's the pretty caterpillar that Ladybug found already attached to a tomato. This is how we suspended the tomato:

That evening the caterpillar changed:

Here's the skin - kind of neat - you can see the head and legs:

Getting closer. We could see the colors of the butterfly:

And finally - here's the beautiful butterfly: