Back Home

Well, we got Jeff home safe and sound last night! He is so worn out! Not as bad as I thought he would be though. Maybe it just doesn't seem that way because we are in a hurry to get things in the laundry, packed & in the car this afternoon. He went ahead & went to work...silly thing! I would've stayed home. He said he had a million emails he needed to respond to soooo, he's there until noon! We went to the birthday party after picking Jeff up from the airport. It was at a large park here in Tulsa. It was so fun....short & sweet. That was nice. It was a little hot but, the kids didn't seem to mind it. It was tolerable for the adults, too. Jacob is so handsome! Addie & Will are sure growing up, too! Jacob and the other kids were so busy that I didn't get very many pictures at all! They were more interested in playing that taking pictures (imagine that!!). We got home and the rush began.....laundry, packing, catching up...Jeff was telling me stories all night about his trip. He did mention that I would not have eaten the entire time if I was over there. He said the food was super hot. I wouldn't have liked it. I asked him if he ate anything strange. He simply replied, "Probably." He was doing the "don't ask" mentality when he was eating. He said there was no telling what all he ate. He was scared to find out. They seem to eat a lot of fish & seafood and rice. I always thought they ate noodles more than rice. My bad! I saw a few pics last night of a beautiful sunset but, honestly didn't have time to sit & look at them. I will have to do that today. When we return from our trip, I'll upload pictures for you all to see. We are geared up and excited!! We leave for Branson today. The kids are pumped! They can't wait. I sure enjoy going because it seems to be so laid back for us. We are going to Silver Dollar City, Dixie Stampede and who knows what else. I finished my first Twilight book and am anxious to start the 2nd one. I bought it yesterday with hopes to start it last night...yeah right! I guess maybe after vacation I will be able to read it & get to the 3rd pretty fast! I hope all are well in my life! Blog at ya later!

COMING HOME!!!

Jeff has been on an airplane since 7:00 PM last night. He won't get back home until 6:35PM tonight. What a long trip!! I am so excited he is almost back! I have missed being by myself at home. Well, I guess we wouldn't have had much time anyway. With all of the running I have done with the kids and all. Anyway, back to Jeff. He called me at about 10AM yesterday to tell me he had just finished supper. They are 12 hours ahead of us over there so, it was night time. He had Thai Barbecue. He said it was very interesting. He was calling me to say he was hitting golf balls. WHAT???? Yeah, that's what I thought....golf balls in Thailand at 10:00 at night???? What in the world? There just HAPPENED to be a driving range across the street from the restaurant where they ate and the guys decided to go hit a few. What fun huh?? I can't wait to hear the stories tonight & see the pictures. Hopefully he got some so I can post on the blog. ANYWAY..... I will go pick him up and head over to Jacob's birthday party. We all are rushing tonight. Andrew and I stayed home yesterday. He woke up with a really bad asthma attack and I didn't feel right sending him off without me watching over him for a while. By the time he felt better it was 2:30. Hannah was almost home & his school would be dismissing in 30 mins. There was no need. The kids and I went to church last night. What a time of refreshing! Pastor David spoke on changing our negative speaking to positive. It seems to be so easy to say negative things at times but, we sure need to focus on the uplifting positive words! Especially in the world at this day & age. Andrew is in a program called Kidz Xplosion. He does a lot of memory work. Last night he completed his first memorization test. He earned his book so he can start the real stuff now!! This is a new program for our church so all of the kids from 1st - 5th are starting on square one. It's going to be a blast!! When we all got home it was pretty late and time for bed. I found myself not going to sleep very easily(because I relaxed so much all day!!). So I started reading my book. I finished at about 2AM. I am not as tired today as I thought I would be. I forgot to catch everyone up on Tuesday night. We had "Meet the Cardinals" night at the football field. What a fun night! All cheerleaders and football players were introduced from 1st grade - 12th. They are so cute when they are small. There were quite a few hams during the event!! Hannah did so good! She is so pretty! Here is just a picture of a little bit of the event. The kids enjoyed it so much and the weather was perfect! I couldn't drag my two off of the field when we were done. It was after 8:00 and I was searching through the sea of people to find my two. They didn't want to go!! Bed called me!! OR WAS IT MY BOOK??? That's all for now. I hope to have some pics by the weekend from Thailand!! Maybe some birthday pics, too! We'll see....OH THE PRESSURE!!!!!

SPARKLE!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JACOB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I stayed up again too late last night! I just can not make myself put down the book I am reading. Twilight is so great! It really reels you in and doesn't let you go. I am so enjoying escaping into another world when I read. I LOVE EDWARD!!! Enough of my "Book Boyfriend". Jeff has been texting me a lot this morning. It is almost 2am and he signed off with a good night close to 1AM (his time). He says it's really very different over in Thailand. He had his first 'bout with the Thai food all day. He mentioned that it was pretty spicy!! I couldn't do it. I would have to be the "Difficult American" who would ask for MILD!! Picky, Picky, Picky. He is doing well. I told him I was not dealing very well with him being gone and he assured me everything was good where he was. He's not the type to tell me if he's not feeling well. After work yesterday, I picked up Sharon and brought her home so she could get Jeff's truck. Her car is going into the shop for some repairs. We got home and had pizza....Monday night!!! Can't beat Mazzio's $6.99 large pizza. The kids always look forward to that. The whole day I was so excited to have a night at home with no running to do and to just relax, do laundry & read. NOT THE CASE!! Hannah and I had a major melt down! She is struggling so bad in math. She hates it! I really think it's not necessarily a matter of I don't know how but, she hates it so much she doesn't even WANT to know how. I sat with her at the table because she had told me earlier in the day she didn't understand her homework....even though they had gone over it in class. By the time I tried to explain it to her and her telling me, "I can't" over and over and over I had had enough. A belt in one hand and her dad on the phone in the other I was about to lose my mind!! She really pushed me over my edge. I had to have her dad intervene on her behalf. After she spoke with him, she calmed down and went and did her homework. Only stopping to ask me a question about her homework about 2 times the rest of the night. The rest of the evening was pretty peaceful! Hannah went outside & practiced some cheers after dinner & homework. Andrew decided he is going to get "FIT". He went outside & ran up and down the driveway bouncing a basketball. He also informed me that he was going to exercise everyday and that I needed to go to the store and buy some fruit for him to have good healthy snacks! (Along with more pop!!! ha-ha) He cracks me up! They are really pushing the health aspect at school. I am thankful for that. Tonight is "Meet the Cardinals" night at the football field. We will be doing our normal running aorund like a chicken with its head cut off. Tomorrow I will have more to say about that! I have been sitting here all day wishing I could be home reading my book! SPARKLE, SPARKLE!! You have got to seriously read these books! Those of you that have...."and so the Lion fell in love with the Lamb!" Till tomorrow.....or another day after that!!

Lonely Week Ahead

Well, we got Jeff on a plane Sunday morning headed for Thailand. He text messaged me at 11:55 Sunday morning and said he was leaving Dallas headed directly for Thailand. I got a text from him today at 11:19 stating that he just was getting off the plane. That was almost 24 hours!!! Can you image! He's lucky because they flew them First/Business class and they had the seats that lay down flat into a bed. He said he did get some rest but, not much. If you can imagine sleeping next to a stranger or in a large area with strangers has got to be AWKWARD!! He made it though, Thank The Lord! He said it would be midnight (Tuesday in Bangkok) before they got out of the airport and then they had another 2 hour drive to the hotel. What a long trip! He will turn around in less than 2 days and come back! WHEW!! He is going to be tired and possibly a little cranky! I guess I have to be really sweet for a few days huh?? I'll try! Poor Jeff, when he gets back on Thursday night, we are going from the airport straight to Jacob's birthday party & then home to repack because we leave on vacation Friday. I don't know if he'll survive!!

Other than that, the big excitement last week was cheerleading practice Thursday, taking Andrew to his dad's on Friday, Jeff having a fishing tournament Saturday, Hannah cheered at a football game on Saturday and everyone was just too pooped to party!!! Jeff had an extremely rough Saturday. Here he stays out in the sun all day long fishing and then has to come home to mow the lawn, pack for his trip and no telling what else he did. He never stops! We were both a little snippy by the night ended but, all in all it was because we were both out in the heat all day & rushed & stressed about everything coming up.

Hannah and I went to church Sunday morning and to lunch with friends from church. She was invited to a friend's home for the afternoon so, that left me alone. I thought I would be able to sit and read my new book Twilight but, I remembered Jeff had asked me to water the dogs & get them set because he forgot to do it before he left. I went & took care of that Sunday afternoon & realized it was time to get Andrew from his dad. Needless to say we were RUSHED!! After church Hannah had an 8-7-6 get together at one of the other youth's home. They swam and she got home around 9pm. Andrew and I went home and had a bowl of cereal and chatted a while. I got to read my book for a LONG time!!

I have started a new book series that is just hugely popular right now. The first book is called Twilight as I mentioned before. It is quite a page turner and I can't seem to stop thinking about it. I just want to go home & read until I'm done! Those are the best. It's worth reading if you get a chance.

Tomorrow starts my rush week! I'll have to document that this week & let you know how the week went! I think we'll all be ready for vacation!! Hugs & Kisses to all!!

Sad day!

My mother and Jerry left today. It was really sad to see them go. I enjoyed them being here so much. I sure wish they could have stayed longer! Maybe they will come back. We had such a great time. Didn't feel rushed to do things and get everything done. We just sat and enjoyed each other's company. Mom had made my favorite meal last night and when we all got home we sat down and ate together. Mom and Jerry taught me a new ice cream recipe soooo, I now have an ice cream maker and will be making ice cream as much as possible. I know my family loves ice cream and what I am doing is so easy.....you just mix together 6 cans of Sunkist and 1 can of Eagle Brand Milk. Put it in your ice cream freezer and BAM you have orange sherbet ice cream. It is so wonderful that I think this weekend we will try doing that with grape soda. I did upload pics last night at home onto my computer but, of course forgot to put them on my USB so I could put them on my blog at work. I hope to remember to do that tomorrow so all can see my mom & her friends. Would love to hear from some of you sometime!! Have a great one!

Crazy Kids!

Here it is Monday again!! Can you believe how fast the weekends go anymore. Then I realized it's the middle of August and that means the holidays are just around the corner. I was at Cracker Barrel this weekend looking at their home decor and seeing the Thanksgiving and Christmas decor out. WHOA!!! School just started.....let us breathe! Time does tick away faster the older we get. It makes you appreciate your time more, also.

The kids got their teeth cleaned the day before school and Hannah is going to have to have braces....YIPPEEE!! She is so excited! Yeah right. She'll realize once she gets them it's not that much fun. She grinds her teeth so badly that they want to get braces on as quick as possible to correct that. Andrew's teeth were great. He grinds a little but not as severe as sister! No one had cavities YEAH!!!!!!!

The kids have sure enjoyed my Mamaw being here. Saturday we went to our friend's home, Linda, to have a cookout with several of my mom's friends. We had such a great time. I did take pictures but forgot to bring them to work to put them on my blog. I'll have to add them later. Sunday was church and as mentioned previously, we ate at Cracker Barrel. After getting home Hannah and I went to get her school supplies for her Jr. High classes. That went so smooth & truly I didn't spend as much as I thought I would WHEW!!! We hurried home to pick up Caleb and take him to Stroud to give him back to his dad. He has football practice going on this week & his school starts on Wednesday. When I got home Sean and Jacob had come over for Jeff to fix something on his car. Jacob is growing up so fast and SOOOO handsome! We got him to play the game Dance Dance Revolution on the Wii. IT WAS HILARIOUS!!! I'll post those pics later, too. I should've been better prepared with pics for my blog but, I can't do it all, I guess :-)

We are going to sit at home tonight and enjoy my mother's last evening here with all of us. We have nothing planned except meet the teacher night at the Jr. High. I put in a request for my mother to make my favorite meal tonight. I know it's terrible to ask your mom to cook while she's visiting but, there's nothing like mom's food!!!

I hope all are doing well. Haven't heard from anyone. I hope I am not boring you all with these blogs. I would love for some of you to get involved in doing this. It's actually a great stress releiver for me to sit & think about nothing but my family and our times together.

SURVIVAL

I have missed a couple of days of blogging due to a major oral surgery and company coming in. Thursday, as you may recall, was my day to get an absessed root taken care of. Well, it wound up being 2 teeth with absesses. I really went through it. The only thing that helped me was the "Catherine special". They call her their bartender in the dentist's office. They gave me sedation and it was WONDERFUL!!!!!! I highly recommend it to anyone! It was what they called liquid valium. They mix a liquid with cranberry juice and make you take it like a shot and chases it with more cranberry juice. It was not a pleasant one but, about 3 minutes later, it was the best thing in the world!! I was out for the rest of the day and still a little groggy on Friday. I woke up Friday in a lot of pain and sensitivity in my two teeth he worked on so, I stayed home and took more drugs. I am still having issues with the teeth being sensitive when they touch together. I know it was some major work done but, I am ready to eat normally. Maybe I have dropped a few pounds since this fiasco!! That would be nice. My mom and her boyfriend came in yesterday afternoon. I was so happy to see her! We have been enjoying our time together by sitting around talking and going to eat a Pauline's Buffet last night. The fish is wonderful! We have a cookout planned this afternoon at 4:00 for all of her friends. Can't wait to see everyone. Other than the cookout, we've kind of been lazy today. I ran into Owasso and about a couple of decorations for Halloween. Mom is in the kitchen making a cake for the kids (their favorite!!). Jeff and Jerry are out fishing and having a wonderful time. The boys are plaing star wars legos and Hannah is helping cook the cake. AND ME??? Doing whatever I can to sit down and ease the pain! Convenient huh??? :-) Hope all is well! Talk to everyone soon. Love ya!

FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL

WE SURVIVED!!!!!! Yes, it's the first day of school for us and the morning jitters took effect a little bit. We first dropped off Hannah at the Middle School.

She was a little more excited than I expected. She has been talking all summer about how scared she was to go and the day came and she was ready! I told her I was going to take a picture of her and she gave me a little grief about that. The words, I think, "Oh, Mom, you're gonna embarass me!!" Oh well, I succeeded in embarassing her because I made her stand in front of the sign so I could get a picture. She's so silly!!

Then it was Drew's turn:

He didn't seem to mind me taking a picture. He even told me where he was going to stand. This was my EXCITED child! He has been a monster this past week. His energy levels have shot through the roof! It's time for him to get back into a routine & calm down!

Now I am settling down at work to get my day of to a good one. Trying to stay calm myself! I have a major root canal today at noon. They have found an absess (sp??) on the root of a tooth. They are concerned that the one next to it also has an absess. I am so nervous and tense. We'll get through it and sleep the rest of the day!

Enjoy and happy back to school everyone!!!!

Weekend Warrior

Hi to all! I hope your weekends and first week of school finds you all doing well! My weekend was a busy one. Running to and fro. Jeff had a fishing tournament on Saturday morning. After he left I slept in a while longer until I had to get up to go to church. This Saturday was our Ladie's Mug and a Muffin day. The second Saturday of every month the ladies get together and have breakfast and drink coffee or cappuccino! It is so much fun and relaxing to get away with other women and chat. I led worship at the end. We all learned about the changing of seasons in our lives. I left straight from the church to go meet my kids. Their dad was dropping them off to me. They had been at church camp with their dad. We met in Claremore and then went over to the Lake to see the end of the fishing tournament. Chris walked away with $40 in his pocket! WAY TO GO!! Saturday night we all sat around and watched a movie as a family. We watched Cloverfield. What a wierd movie. Andrew loved it because it was about an alien invading New York City. I thought it was strange!!! Sunday we got up and all went to church. We ate lunch with friends at Arris' Pizza. What a great pizza place. I will be going back!

Birthdays & School

Today is my mother-in-law's birthday. Jeff and I are going to have supper with her tonight. She has chosen to go to Ted's Escandito Cafe!!! It's a really popular mexican restaurant in Broken Arrow. We are going to have so much fun!! Happy Birthday Sharon! Well, I have done it again. My hair is now cut and colored completely different. Imagine that! It does seem that I change it a lot. I am trying to find a way that I will be content with it but, I haven't found that yet. Yesterday went by fairly quickly. I worked & went straight to my hairdresser's shop. After that, I arrived home and Jeff was in his office working on finances. We toodled around the house for a couple more hours and then turned in for the night. It amazes me at how boring we are sometimes. NOT TOO MUCH LONGER!!! The kids come home Saturday and start school on Thursday!! WHOO! It went too fast! I picked up Hannah's schedule today. I am happy with who she got in the way of teachers. She is nervous so, I guess I am going to have to deal with that for a few weeks until she calms down. She will be fine! I hope everyone is having a great week! Hope to see all of you soon!

Anniversary

Hi to all my friends & family. This week is going by way too fast. I have company coming in next week at two different times. What a whirlwind! Tuesday after work, I was invited to play Bunco with some ladies from church. We had so much fun! I walked away winning the most Buncos & getting an envelope with $25.00 in it. What a great game! I am never that lucky! Yesterday was Jeff and I's anniversary. We spent lunch together and he took me to have sushi after work. We love going to eat sushi at Tsunami's downtown. They do have the best! Our evening last night was spent eating & setting up a computer for the kids. Other than that I must admit we are pretty boring. Especially when there are no kids at the house! We tend to get lost in our world of peace & quiet and just chill out. Hope everyone is doing well!

Manic Monday

We survived another Monday! With kids gone, it is sure a great moment for us to have some down time. Nothing interesting happened at home. Jeff got off work and went over to Chris' church to measure up their youth room for a new stage. I had gone to Target to get a few items and stopped in at Chick-fil-a for us to have a bite of supper. Jeff went straight to his office with supper and started drawing the stage. He finished a few hours later and I took a look at it. It looks like it's going to be a great addition to their youth room! It looks fabulous!! Other than Jeff drawing all night, I sat and folded laundry while catching up on a show. My mother and I talked on the phone for quite a while. When it was all said & done, we didn't accomplish very much. Sometimes it's nice to just chill out and forget about everything around you! Hannah called last night crying to come home. She misses me!! Makes me feel good. We seem to get closer and closer as she grows up. I really enjoy her a lot! Well, I am sure I will have some more interesting news tomorrow. For now, I'm signing off! Have a great day!!!

GREAT NEWS!

I am so excited today. After a weekend of fretting about my visit to the throat doctor, I am finally done and relieved by his words! He examined my vocal chords using a long steel rod that lit up at the end. He said it made my throat glow so he could see the vocal chords. He then pulled my tongue out really far, stuck that steel rod down my throat & asked me to say A and E. YEAH RIGHT!!! It was kind of humiliating. Here I was gagging, dry heaving & drooling all over myself while he was doing this procedure. WHAT A HORRIBLE EXPERIENCE! I guess it was worth it for the results. He discovered the the right vocal chord is about 25% weaker than it should be and he has told me I should be back to normal within a couple of months. YEE-HAW! I don't know how to express what a struggle this has been with my singing at church. I really beat myself down about it. I guess we live in an impatient world and I am truly a part of it! We all have that "I want it now" syndrome at times. Anyway, I am thrilled! Saturday was a bit of a busy day. Jeff got up early and went to men's breakfast at the church. When he returned and started mowing the yard, the kids and I went school shopping. Had to take advantage of that tax-free weekend. We got some fabulous buys. Luckily my kids were content with buying clothes only at Old Navy. So, on top of tax free we also got 20% off our entire purchase....WOO-HOO! It felt like I spent more on school supplies than clothes. After getting everything home, it was time to take the kids to their dad. They had such a great time at camp and were excited to tell him the stories. They will be gone all week & then school starts. Sunday was just a quiet day for Jeff and I. We went to Sunday School then church and took our weekly lunch out with friends from church. We ate at Compadre's and enjoyed the fellowship so much. After being home for a while (he in his corner, me in mine) we decided to sit down together and watch a movie. We watched 27 dresses. HOW CUTE! Worth watching! He didn't know I was going to make him watch a chick flick. He did enjoy it though. After that we went our separate ways & cleaned and organized things. That's the way it is when kids are gone. You can actually get things done. Today is just normal. Work (after my Dr's appt.) and then we'll be home. Have a great day!!

TOO BUSY!

Well, wouldn't you know that I would forget about blogging for several days! Just what I thought might happen. I sure didn't want to but, it happens way too often with me. I tend to get caught up in the busyness of my life and forget about the things I want to keep up on (i.e. blogging, housework). It has been a whirlwind around our home the past couple of weeks. Last week was a lot going on at work with day & evening meetings. In the process, I was trying to prepare my two oldest for youth trip/youth camp. They actually wound up packing their own bags and I must add that they did a FABULOUS job! I was impressed. I only had to double check what they had packed and purchase the few things they needed (snacks, disposable cameras & batteries for flashlights). All in all I was very proud of them! My babies are definitely getting more responsible and growing up a little! School starts in 2 weeks & we have plans to school shop tomorrow before they go back to their dad's for a week. Hannah called me this morning at 7:15 to let me know they were on the bus and headed back home. I am sure I will have a lot of stories to hear about when they get home tonight. The buses are supposed to arrive at the church at 10:30pm tonight. It's going to be a long day for those two. I hope to have some pictures to post of their activities and fun time at camp. My biggest fear this year was sending money with Hannah to manage for a week!!!!! How scary is that? Caleb seems to be pretty good with his money and I didn't worry about him. Hannah has never been on a trip that required as much money. She was sent with $250.00. We'll see if she comes back with any! I know she bought a few things at the Mall of America. She called to tell me about that. At that point she seemed to be doing pretty good with her money. We'll really get the true story when she returns tonight. I'll keep you posted!!! This week has been mostly quiet at home. We have really done nothing but go to church on Wednesday night. I have taken this quiet time to download a lot of scrapbooking things to my new computer. I am doing digital scrapbooking (for those who don't know) and there are thousands of freebies out on the internet to download so you can scrapbook. I kind of enjoy this better because you don't have to get all of your supplies out and clean up a mess when you are done. The options are endless!! I am gearing up for my mother to come visit. She will be here on the 15th of August. I am very excited about that! The kids are looking forward to seeing her. Well, I guess that's all the excitement I can put in words right now. I am sure there will be a lot to talk about in the next few days after I get the low-down from Hannah. Have a great day!