Christian Momma

2008 has come and gone already.  It sure seemed to go by quickly…sometimes a little too quickly!

January

The year started out with me beginning to work on Power Lab VBS (Ah Ha!).  I was also homeschooling Michael.  We were pretty on top of our schooling and things were going pretty smoothly at the time.  I was also beginning to work in the K-1 Sunday School class room at church.  That, wasn’t going as smoothly as I had wished.

February

VBS started to consume my thoughts.  I was having dreams about not being ready, and just an overwhelming sense that I’ve bitten off more than I could chew.  AKA…I wasn’t relying on God to help me, I was relying on my own strength to do it.

February also brought about Daniel & Andrew’s 3rd birthday as well as my 34th birthday.

Michael entered his first Science Fair and ended up with a Superior rating!  I was proud, but knew full well that if he had applied himself earlier in the month, but he decided to wait until the last minute to do it.  Then we hit a rough patch in our homeschooling…a bad one.  Causing me to question my ability to teach him not to mention my basic parenting skills.  But, through the Grace of God we got through it with help from some friends in our church.

March

March brought in a lot of saddness.  My grandmother’s health begain to fail drastically.  And a friend of mine lost her child in a horrible accident. My heart ached in ways I never knew it would.  Things in me shined trhough as well.  I didn’t realize how “in tune” I was to other’s saddness.  Michael had a meeting with the staff from his online school and things turned out so much better than I had originally anticipated.

April

In April, I took a blogging break…school slipped behind and I had to push Michael to get as much done as possible a day!  Spring seemed to bring out the worst in his schooling abilities and slowly we fell behind.

May

I won this Word Press blog…I’m ever so greatful to Lisa for hosting the giveaway that allowed me to win! The final push to get VBS was upon us.  VBS was scheduled for the 2nd week of June.  My grandmother passed away that month as well.

June

VBS week came and went without too much problems.  Yes, there were a few bumps in the road, but overall things turned out GREAT!  I was elated that things went as well as they did and relieved that it was all over with as well.

July

We celebrated Michael’s 11th birthday in July along with Kevin and I’s 14th wedding anniversary.  In between those 2 events, we threw my mom and dad a 60th Birthday/40th Wedding Anniversary party.  We were very impressed that we were able to pull it off!  Mom and dad had only suspected that we were planning on all going out to eat together, not that we would have all of their friends and family at a hall waiting for their arrival!  We even got one of their friends from High School to travel from Chicago to Ohio to celebrate with them as well!

We also got to see Extreme Makeover Home Edition in our town.  My mother drove down the night before to stay overnight and we headed out to the new house to watch the bus move.  That is a day that was HOT, but I wouldn’t have missed for the world.  To see something like that is a once in a lifetime thing.  Michael still claims to have High-Fived Ty!

August

We went for our 1 and only camping trip of the year.  We had so much fun, and would love to go back to the Michigan Dunes again.  Our church also had a Worship Night.  Something changed in me that night and I have been forever changed!

September

School started right after Labor Day!  We decided to send Michael back to public school since things weren’t working out the best for us at home.  We are happy to report that he is doing wonderful in the public school!

We celebrated Noah’s 8th birthday in September.  We also found out that an eight year old child, when given $20 in cash and not watched very closely at the grocery store (because mom and dad were busy ringing/bagging groceries), will spend the whole $20 on lottery tickets!  And before you ask…YES it’s illegal for him to purchase them, but when they have a “vending machine” of lottery tickets just sitting over by the bubble gum machines, it’s just calling for a child to play with it!  And he only wond $2!

October

In October, Kevin and I started going to a new Bible Study.  I was elated that Kevin wanted to go to one since he has never really showed any interest in going before.

We also walked, for the first time, in the JDRF Walk for a Cure for my Niece.  We were so proud of her, she ended up getting 2 awards…one for the amount of money raised and the other for the T-Shirt design!

November

We celebrated Kevin’s 38th birthday.  How?  Well, I went to a Arbone party and he watched football…now that’s love!

We had our traditional weekend after Thanksgiving shopping adventure.  My parents’ took Michael, Noah, Daniel, & Andrew for the weekend (it ended up my parents had Daniel & Andrew and my sister had Michael & Noah).  We always enjoy that weekend away from the boys.  It’s nice to pretend we are childless…even if it’s just for the weekend!  But we are always so excited when they return.

December

We spent most of the month either running from Christmas Program to Christmas Program or from Christmas to Christmas.  However this year it seemed to be a little less travel than usual.  We only spent 1 night up at my parent’s house and we actually had Christmas Eve and Christmas Day at home for the first time in a long time!

For 2009, I’m sure there will be new things that God shows us along the way, new challenges to overcome and new friends to meet, but I trust that God will be joining us along this journey and we will rest in the knowledge of Him.

Michael came home yesterday from school all excited.  He had been preparing for this trip since the beginning of school.  The time had come to pack his clothes to go to camp.

Mommy, on the other hand, has been worried about this trip.  This is the first time that Michael has ever spent the night away from family.  Now, he has spent time away from us, but it’s always been at Grandma and Grandpa’s or at his Aunt and Uncle’s houses…never overnight without a family member.

This morning, I got him up, he got ready to go.  We put Noah on the bus for school (Michael wasn’t able to ride the bus with his bags), and we headed out to the school.

This morning was a time for me to let go.  He’s growing up.  All those memories of me putting him on the bus that first day of Kindergarten came flooding back.  This felt the same way, except, I won’t see him until Friday afternoon.

As tough as it was for me to leave him at the school for this trip, it felt good too.  I know he needs this just as much as I do.  He needs to grow to be a healthy adult…I need him to grow and become his own person.

We left Wednesday Morning (8/13) to go camping. I couldn’t believe how full our truck was! I had to have the dog sit between my feet because there wasn’t room in the back for the Kennel. Good thing we took her to my parent’s instead of camping with us!

We arrived (after a few stops here and there for food and to go potty…we had 6 children with us!) and started putting up all the tents. The family we went with had 1 tent, we had 2 plus a screen tent thingy (yep, I don’t know the correct terminology for things…so I make up words that work!). After we got all that done, we all just sort of hung out around the campfire that day.

Thursday, we went to the beach (we were on Lake Michigan). We all had a blast! We went in the morning (before lunch) and there wasn’t many people there…by the time we were ready to leave, everyone was there…including the Nuns (LOL).

I enjoyed watching the boys (and girls, since the other family had 2 girls) playing in the water.

I also enjoyed watching the seaguls…can you believe how close they would get?

This one even walked all over our stuff. I guess it’s not good to have food almost open when they are around!

Friday morning, the guys went and climbed the dunes…I didn’t go, I was afraid they would have made me try and climb that hill…I didn’t want to exert that much energy! I was on vacation…you don’t exert energy on vacation!

Friday night, Daniel had gotten sick, so Kevin stayed back at the camp site with him, everyone else went to the beach to watch the sunset.

I love taking photos like that! Michael and Noah had saw some photos that someone emailed me a few months ago where it looked like they were holding the sun, so they decided they wanted photos like that…here’s how those came out

Here are some more photos of the sunset.

And this one is by far my favorite photo of all! Andrew refused to look at me!

On Saturday, Heather and I went to Tabor Hills for a wine tasting.

We had a lot of fun…let’s face it, anytime I’m without my children, it’s a lot of fun…but add a little wine and it’s a great time! LOL

I had no clue there were vineyards in Michigan…I guess you learn something new every day right?

On Sunday and headed back home. It was so much fun, we will probably make another trip back there!

Oh and in case you were wondering where exactly we went? That’s my secret, I’m not sharing! We went to Warren Dunes State Park in Michigan.

We leave tomorrow to go camping!  Tonight, softball and packing…tomorrow a long drive up to Michigan!

I’m sure we will have lots of fun, I’m looking forward to it, well to the trip, not the packing part.

I’ll be back on Sunday!  Don’t miss me too much! 

On Friday we headed out in the morning for our camping trip. This trip would be different than our usual camping trips. Instead of pre-booking our site and having to set up/tear down a tent, we used my Aunt Carol’s camper on her permanent site. Kevin’s brother has a permanent site 2 campers down from my Aunt’s so we all got to camp together!

We had so much fun! Daniel & Andrew fought over the play tractor they had at their camper. Michael, Noah, and Kierstin (my niece) all played well together…only a few times we had to say “play nice”.

Saturday, they had a car show at the campgrounds and my parents came over and had lunch and supper with us. Later that evening, my sister and her 4 kids came over. We went and played Hillbilly Golf (aka Ladder Golf), and Corn hole, while my sister’s 2 girls took all the rest of the kids (minus my sister’s boys) to the park.

Sunday it rained…it rained HARD too! We were so thankful that we didn’t have a tent to tear down in that rain! We left that afternoon and stopped over at my parent’s house before heading home!

We all had so much fun! We got home and my boys were asking when we were going to go camping again!

We had our Annual Father’s Day Camping weekend with my mom’s family this past weekend. We stayed at Ft. Loramie this year instead of Indian Lake. Everyone seemed to like Ft. Loramie better, well everyone except Kevin and dad! They said the fishing was BAD there!

We got there on Friday around 3 pm. Unloaded the truck and set up our tent. I took Daniel & Andrew over to my cousin’s in-laws to watch in their camper until our tent was set up.

My mom and dad got there shortly after we had our tent all set up…my boys ate lunch meat sandwiches for lunch. Then about an hour later, my sister showed up.

Saturday, I didn’t feel well, when I got up and most of the day. It was HOT! I had a headache the whole time! I usually get them when I’m out in the sun too long! I tried very hard this time not to rely on my sister’s camper. I wanted to see if we could camp on our own without bugging my sister. I did…until I was so sick on Saturday. I went to take a shower, then sat in her trailer with the air conditioner on for a half hour or so. Felt quite a bit better. As I was sitting there, I then realized that I hadn’t eaten all day!

Later that evening, we had our Big dinner together. Everyone that was there (my 2 aunts, my 2 cousin’s families, one of my cousin’s in-laws, one of my cousin’s friends, my family, my parents, and my sister) contributed a dish to share…and there was more food than we all needed! But since I didn’t eat all day, it all looked good!

After dinner, my dad, my brother in law, K, and my nephew all played cards while my mom took Daniel & Andrew for a walk. My niece took Michael & Noah to the lake to play. It was fun watching my dad teach them all to play poker. My dad was a HUGE poker player and would always win lots of money (back in the day), but he doesn’t play much any more…except with family.

Sunday, we got up and started packing up. I took the boys to the Christian Puppet Show they had there…it was pretty good! My boys all watched it all the way through! Kevin drank a little too much on Sat, and was feeling it on Sunday!

Afterwards, we headed to my parent’s house for lunch before we headed back home!

We left Friday afternoon for Camping over in IN. It was 3 hours away. Let me just say, it didn’t start out so well!
My parents came down and helped us finish loading and were going to drive down together. Michael & Noah wanted to ride with them. We take off…traffic is pretty heavy, Kevin decides to start the GPS (not sure why he didn’t when we were home)…The GPS keeps trying to take us back home so it can start from there! We made a wrong turn and we weren’t even out of Cincinnati yet!! We get there, it’s about 7 pm…we haven’t eaten, we don’t have fire wood, and we need to set up our tent! Kevin gets started in unloading to set up the tent. My mom and dad were watching the boys and then decided to go to Wal-Mart to pick up a tent (they were going to sleep on a mattrice in the back of the truck). They take off, (leaving Michael, Noah, Daniel, & Andrew) and I go looking for my camera…OOPS, left it at home! Kevin and I get to work on the tent, Daniel & Andrew start whining…it’s getting late and we need to feed them. So, I pick up Daniel…and find a tick on him!! Kevin gets the tick off and I go and get the wood that dad brought as kindling to start a fire. Then realize that I had forgot ALL the hot dogs! Did I mention that it was my mom and dad, my sister, her 4 kids, and her husband camping with us? We split up who was to bring what…I was in charge of bringing all the hot dogs! Yeah, they were back in the freezer at home So I go rummaging in mom & dad’s cooler to see what they have…found some meat. All I could think of is how bad of a mom I am…my boys havne’t eaten and I forgot the food! I start a fire, well, I attempt to start a fire. I wasn’t doing so hot with that either! It’s dark, everyone is hungry and the bugs…OH MY the bugs! I hate bugs with a passion…there were a TON of bugs (not sure what I was expecting since we were camping in a woods). Kevin, getting pretty aggravated at me by this point, swipes away the fire poker and takes over. He gets the boys fed, while I sulk and wish I were at home! Mom & Dad finally come back (they got lost on their way back home) and Kevin had to set up their tent too (he wasn’t too happy about that since he hates setting up tents in the dark, but since it was my dad asking for help, he jumped right up and helped with a smile). And that was just day 1!! Of course, we did a Wal-Mart run the next day for hot dogs!

It was So hot there, good thing we brought a tent fan! I also spent time in my sister’s camper with the air conditioner. After I got over my mood from day 1, things went better. However, I was obsessed with checking for ticks! By the time the weekend was all said and done, 3 of my 4 boys had one, Kevin had found 2 of them crawling around on his leg, My BIL found one or 2 as well! But we found them before any damage could be done!! PHEW!

So anyway, we couldn’t play our Hill Billy Golf or Corn hole or Bocce Ball because there wasn’t enough room to play games. On a good note though, we did book a site right next to the shower/bathroom and a park! So the boys were loving that! The guys all got to see how a farm was run in the 1800s. They thought that was cool! Everyone (except me, the twins, and my dad) went to some Caves and had a wonderful time there too!

So, even though my weekend started out bad, it wasn’t that bad! We got home last night. I’m so exhausted…even my autopilot isn’t working so well! Of course Daniel & Andrew don’t want to lay down for a nap before Michael gets home, so there’s no nap for mommy! I wonder how well I’ll play today? Probably not so hot!

I feel…: exhausted

I am working on planning our camping trip. I guess I should explain a bit, last time we went camping, all I had to do was show up with my kiddos and our food. That’s it! Everything else was planned. This time, my sister has to go out of town for 2 or 3 days this week, so she really doesn’t have the time to do some stuff…including getting the groceries for the weekend. Also, my mom has something planned every day this week too. So, I told them that if they were to get me a list, I would do the grocery shopping for everyone. My sister has 4 kids…2 boys, 2 girls, age ranges from almost 15 to almost 9!! And they have more of an appetite than my boys do! This ought to be interesting! I hope I get enough food (but not overly too much). My sister and her husband just had a cow slaughtered, so I don’t have to worry about hamburgers. At first thought, it was going to be, her supplying the hamburgers, me supplying the hot dogs and my parents supplying the buns…but now it looks like I’ll be getting everything (except the hamburgers) for everyone!

It’s only fair though, my sister was the one who booked our campsite this time and last time. She had a bunch of games and activities planned last time too. And by the time the weekend was over with, she was totally exhausted! Not what camping is supposed to be…isn’t it supposed to be relaxing?? So, I decided that this time around, I’m going to do the extra stuff for her so she doesn’t have to worry about it!

Any ideas for activities for kids and adults? (Kids ages are…boy almost 15; girl 13; boy almost 12; girl almost 9; boy 8; boy almost 5; and twin infant boys.) I’m planning on taking some cards, but not sure what else to do. My sister said she didn’t want it “structured”, but we need to plan some activities.

I feel…: working

We are going camping again this weekend!! YEAH!! I’m so excited!! Oh and on Saturday it will be Kevin and I’s 11th Anniversary!! I told him I didn’t want the same type of gift this year (twins) LOL

I feel…: excited