Ditto Kelli...

So I just read Kelli's latest post and I say, "Ditto". Every time I sit down to fill you in on all that's happened since surgery, something else takes over my brain and since I can only focus on one thing at a time these days, the blog goes (again) to the back burner.

So, as a quick summary (while my brain is focused here) I had the surgery, but it didn't accomplish much. The problem wasn't in the tube leading into my kidney, it is in the condition of my kidneys in general, and while my doctor and very good friend tried his best to make it better, I ended up septic in the hospital with
peylonephritis. It was not fun. I don't every want to do it again. And the doctor says that because of this development, he won't do that surgery on me again. Which means, the next time I am blocked, well, I'm not sure what we'll do about it...sigh. But I'm better now, and that was just an update for those who have been wondering what happened to me after surgery.

Now, on to one of the other things that keeps me away from the blogoverse...my daughter's dance schedule. She was in 11 different dances in this year's Spring Show. She is taking 11 classes this year including the performance troupe at our studio which participates in MANY performances and competitions throughout the year. For those of you who think that is too much, and I should lighten her schedule, here is how the conversation went in the car last week:

Maddie: Mom, what am I going to do for dance for the next 2 weeks until summer classes start?

Me: Well, I can just take you up to the studio and you can practice whatever you want while I work.

Maddie: But I NEED a teacher to teach me!

Me: Don't you just want to enjoy a little break before you start up again?

Maddie: NEVER!!!

And this year she choreographed her solo for troupe tryouts completely on her own. She chose the song and planned the entire thing by herself. I didn't even get to see it until the day before the tryouts. I do have a video taken while she was still working out the choreography. It's not danced full out as she was still figuring out parts of it, but it will give you an idea of what kind of dancer she wants to be...and why I don't mind taking her to the dance studio almost every.single.day.

FINALLY got the video to work!

Seen and Heard...

I was having a conversation with Dave the other day. It went something like this:

Dave: "Just one more baby Mom, please!"

Mom: "No Dave, you are the last baby. No more. But when you grow up and get married, you can have your own babies."

Dave: "I can have my own babies?"

Mom: "Yes. When you are married."

Dave: "How many can I have?"

Mom: "As many as you and your wife decide to have."

Dave: "I'm gonna have a thousand babies!"

Mom: "Wow, that's a lot of babies."

Dave: "Yeah, God doesn't have enough pieces to make that many babies!"

A Reason to Dance

You all know by now that my daughter, Madeleine is a dancer. This summer, a week or so after her dance recital, she was finally old enough to audition for the competition/performance troupe at her dance studio. This past year, she was in a performance only troupe with other girls who were too young for the competition troupe as well. I am proud to announce, that she did make the competitive troupe, and is the youngest girl in it (by 2 days, lol).

However, I am even more proud to show you all a video that I recorded of her practicing for the audition. There were several elements to the audition, but the climax was the performing of a solo dance. The girls were allowed to either choreograph their own piece, or perform a dance from the year's recital. Maddie chose to choreograph her own piece. She chose the music, "Call on Jesus" by Nicole C. Mullen and the style herself, and if she ever got stuck on ideas for steps, she asked one of the older girls for help. Then she just kept working at it and changing it until it became her dance. This is a video I took of her rehearsing a week or so before the tryout. Can you say, "Proud Mama"? [And yes, she is sliding a bit in places...she had shoe issues that day, but didn't want to have to do the whole video thing again. :)]

When All Else Fails...Post Pictures!

My baby boy isn't so much a baby anymore....doesn't he look big?

And if you've been reading here for awhile, you've seen this dress twice before. It was her flower girl dress about a year and a half ago...when she was just 7! Then last year, I altered a hat to match the blue sash, added full length gloves, and it was her Easter dress when she was 8! This year, I took up knitting, so I made her a little shrug to wear over it just one more time for Easter...and now she's 9! This will be the last Easter for her to wear it...but I'm going to miss seeing this...

You can click on any of the pictures to get a closer look if you want to.
Hope you all had a fabulous Easter!

Happy Easter Everyone!

Yesterday morning, I was working on the computer and Dave (4 yo) came in and brought my glasses to me.

He said, "Here you go Mom. You need you glasses."

I said "Thank you, David." And I put them on.

He said, "There! Now I can see you!"

HaHaHaHaHa!!!!

Hope you have a Happy, Happy Easter and dye some eggs...even if you don't have kids!

Seen and Heard

Today I was working with Maddie on a History review. The material was comprehensive including all that we have studied so far this year. Since we take off school from Thanksgiving through the New Year, it's been a little tough to get back into the swing of things. And some of that material from way back in September can elude the 8 year old brain, you know?

So, taking this into consideration, I was trying to prompt her with some leading questions to see if she couldn't bring some of that long ago information back to mind.

Her question read something like this, "______________ time is when the farmer prepares the meat for us to buy in the market."

She was struggling to remember, so I prompted her with this question.

"What do you call it when they kill the pig to get the meat?"

Her answer, "Pork?" :)

"Well yes, the pig meat is called pork. How about the man in the market who cuts the meat so we can buy it. Do you remember what he is called?"

Her answer, "The Pork Chopper?" Bwah-ha-ha-ha!

*By the way, the answer is Butchering Time... in case you were wondering. :)

Hello. Is anybody there?

Hello everyone. I'm so sorry for the unannounced bloggy break. It was an equipment failure this time. My computer power cord went bad, and I was not able to use the computer to get on and post. :( The new cord came in today's mail however, and here I am!

Sadly, I only have 16 minutes until the girl is out of dance class, and so I don't have time to catch everyone up on the past few weeks. I do have some Nutcracker pictures for you though. I hope to have a good video to post later in the week, but the one I took last week didn't come out right, so I'm going to try it again this week. Until then, here a a few pictures of my beautiful snowflake as she's both waiting for her turn to dance, and rehearsing before the performance. :)

Babies and Cakes...What More Could You Ask For?

A few weeks ago, I was asked to make a birthday cake for a girl turning 16. She was getting her driver's license and a new car for her birthday, so we decided on a driver's license cake for her.

I obviously had to cover up her personal information, but I wanted you to see the cake. :) I copied as much of the detail of my own license as I could do with icing to make it as authentic as possible. The funny thing was, on my way home from delivering the cake, I stopped by the mailbox, and my new license was waiting for me... it is completely different from the old one, so her brand new license looks nothing like the cake I made! Fortunately, I don't think she has hers yet, so hopefully, her dad still has the old one, and that was her point of reference also. :)
[Besides, the new format wouldn't have looked as good as a cake!]


This past Wednesday was a very busy day. I made a cake for our church's youth group "Holly"ween party. Every year they do some sort of themed party and all the youth have to dress according to that theme. This year it was a Hollywood theme as well as a murder mystery night. So, the cake order was for an elegant cake with a Hollywood/Movies theme. I got the idea from a cake I saw online, but I changed it up and added pictures of the youth group during some of their mission trips to the film reel that is unwinding around the cake. The entire thing was edible. The film reel was cake and gumpaste, the film was chocolate, and the cake was a black and white cake--each tier being one layer of chocolate and one of vanilla.


And while I was making the "Holly"ween cake, my niece was having her baby. Now, when you consider that she's been working on that new little grand-niece for the past nine months, that obviously took longer....but when you just look at the labor part, the cake took longer than the labor....by several hours. Obviously, I'd rather be decorating a cake than being in labor, but I must admit, that when I was all finished and the cake was delivered, all I was left with was a dirty kitchen and a pile of dishes. Alyssa, got this...

I think she wins.

1 Homeschooler + 1 Huffy Slider = Physics Class!

Then and Now

This week my baby girl turned 8 years old! AND my #2 son turned 11! It's really hard to imagine, since this was just yesterday...

And this was just last week..
.In honor of the occasion, I put together a little slide show of the two of them. I could have included a TON more pictures, but I restrained myself.

Odds and Ends...

Since I went missing for awhile there, I thought I'd take this opportunity to catch up on a few things that I never posted here on the blog. But first...

I went to the mailbox today, and look what I found waiting for me from Patsy Clairmont!


I'm not exactly sure why the picture is sideways, it was straight when I uploaded it...Anyway, I'm so excited, and David has been begging me to read the "Basil and Parsley" book to him ever since I pulled it out of the package!

Thanks Patsy!!!

And I made a baby shower cake, and a cookie bouquet awhile back, and I don't think I ever posted the pictures. So, here you go!

And the last thing I have to share with you all today, is a very, very short video that Benji and I made for his youth group meeting this week.

He said that one of the youth leaders asked him to make a 30 second video of some of the "extreme sports things" that he does. We weren't able to take videos of his trials bike events and jumps, or of his trampoline acrobatics on such short notice, but we did find some video that we had taken this past summer of some of his bicycle stunt riding. The video ended up being about 1 minute and 12 seconds because we just had to include the bloopers at the beginning...but the youth group agreed that the bloopers were totally worth the extra 42 seconds! He's was so proud to take the video for his friends to see, that I thought I'd share it with you all as well.

This is David

I have a list in the other room that is half a mile long...and I'm not supposed to be on the computer until a bit more of that list is completed...but I realize that I've been missing for a couple of days, and the twitching was really getting to be a problem! So I decided to just pop in and show you a quick picture of the cake I did this weekend for a woman about to have her first baby...er, babies. There are THREE babies in there, my friends, THREE!!!

So, I figured, I couldn't turn down the request to make her cake. This woman deserves a very special cake, don't you think? Now, I should post a picture of the shower invitation before I show the cake, because it would make more sense...but the batteries are dead in the camera, so I can't take one. However, since she is having two girls and one boy, the invitation simply had a pea pod shaped like a hammock with bows on the ends and a blue pea sitting in between two pink peas in the pea pod. Very simple, and very cute...

...I added some personality to the "Sweet Peas"...


This has gone down as one of my favorite cakes of all time. I just love those little peas!

Okay, and because many of my friends and family read this thing...I also thought I'd share this little video clip from Thanksgiving. Benji turned on the video camera and turned the screen around so that David could see himself...he found himself quite entertaining, and even started to sing "Halleluia--Praise Ye the Lord" right up until he discovered the bouncy ball was in the background...then all was lost.



Why he resorted to baby talk, I don't know...and as for those dirty hands? Well, he is a boy. And he was outside. Enough said. :)

Hey look! I took pictures!

I haven't edited the video or all the photos yet from the first two Nutcracker Performances, but I thought I'd show you just a couple quick ones. :)

This is the entire cast. This is a special demonstration at the schools, it's not the full production. They all have to stay like this for at least 15 minutes while all the classes are filing in and the director gives the opening of her speech...talk about dancer's discipline!



This one is mine. She's a snowflake...and a lovely snowflake indeed! (Not that I'm biased or anything.)
I took several photos today while the girls were dancing, so I'll put together some sort of slideshow soon.

These are just some Christmas cookies I made for a party. Yes, David ate one and I had to remake it 3 hours before delivery was scheduled...sigh. What I'm wondering is why he chose to eat Bert's cookie, when there was one clearly marked, "David"? At least then he could have claimed he thought it was HIS! :) Oh wait, he doesn't read yet...nevermind.

Okay, that's all the pictures I have for your enjoyment today! I did get my hair cut and highlighted today, but I don't have any pictures to post yet. :( I know, you're really disappointed aren't you?

What I do have is today's Jesse Tree lesson! We're finally caught up and we're having the right lesson on the right day! So, here you go.....
****************************************************

Day Five

Genesis 12

Abram Journeys to Egypt

1Now the LORD said to Abram,
"Go forth from your country,
And from your relatives
And from your father's house,
To the land which I will show you;
2And I will make you a great nation,
And I will bless you,
And make your name great;
And so you shall be a blessing;
3And I will bless those who bless you,
And the one who curses you I will curse
And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed."
4So Abram went forth as the LORD had spoken to him; and Lot went with him. Now Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.
5Abram took Sarai his wife and Lot his nephew, and all their possessions which they had accumulated, and the persons which they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan; thus they came to the land of Canaan.
6Abram passed through the land as far as the site of Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. Now the Canaanite was then in the land.
7The LORD appeared to Abram and said, "To your descendants I will give this land " So he built an altar there to the LORD who had appeared to him.


Sometimes God asks us to do things that are hard to do. God asks us to obey when sometimes it seems like disobeying would be more fun. There are things He wants us to do that we don’t want to do, and there are things He wants us NOT to do that we really, really want to do.

God asked Abram to leave his home and go on a long trip. Abram did not want to leave his home, but God promised him that He would be blessed if he obeyed. Abram did obey and he went left his home. Sometimes along the way, he made bad choices and forgot to listen to God’s directions, but God kept all of the promises that He made to Abram. The best thing God did was to call Abram His friend.

Can you imagine having the God of all the universe call you His friend? Guess what? He DOES! When He sent Jesus to us, He offered us His friendship for life! He asks us to obey Him, and He promises to be our friend, but even when we forget our side of the deal, He doesn’t forget His. He keeps His promise to never leave us, and He forgives us over and over again.

[discuss ways that God shows us what He wants us to do]

(pray together that God would help us to obey and do the things that He wants us to do)

*Hang packed car ornament on the tree. (This one I bought because I thought it was a great reminder of God asking Abram to "pack up his household" and go. The kids agreed, and will never forget this one!) :)

Melody is thankful for...

my beautiful children who never cease to amaze me!

Last night as we were setting our family table to be ready for our Thanksgiving breakfast, I put out some new placemats and I wrote this at the top of each one "__________ is thankful for..." (Obviously the blank was each child's name on their own placemat.) Then, I just laid out 4 markers and told the kids to finish them. I helped Dave with his by writing whatever he told me (he doesn't know how to spell yet :)) I think Maddie asked me how to spell a couple of words, but other than that, I knew nothing of what they were doing until they were all finished. This is what I saw when they were all finished...


David's current favorite PBS show is "Super Why" in case that didn't make sense to you. :)


If you can't quite read that, Maddie is thankful for "Jesus and that He made my heart, and the Army." When she asked me how to spell "Army", she told me, "'Cause we have to be thankful for them because they fight for us and keep us safe." I'm not sure what made her think of that, but I was quite proud of her for thinking of it.


This is the one that brought tears to my eyes. Jon doesn't talk all that much, and he gets sullen and angry at the least offense, so when I read that the first thing he thought of was "The Lord" and the way he emphasized his "LIFE", it just melted my heart. If you've ever read "The Shack", you'll understand when I say, "I'm especially fond of that boy!" :)


Really no surprise here, but I was grateful that Benji thought to put the Lord before his motorcycles!

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Ever had a punishment backfire???

So, the 3-year-old has taken up the new Olympic sport of "Spitting". He finds it amusing...the rest of us, not so much.

This morning I was finished with the whole "time out", "explaining why we don't spit", and every other thing I could think of to do, so I told the Boy that if he spit again, I was going to put hot sauce in his mouth. I like this one, because it is just as effective as soap, but since hot sauce is actually intended for human comsumption, I just feel it's a safer alternative.

Guess what the boy did? He spit...mmm-hmm. He did. So.....

I put a drop of Tabasco on his lip so that when he stuck out his tongue to spit again....SURPRISE!

Now, in the back of my mind, I really didn't think the hot sauce would work with Dave because Dave likes hot stuff. Ben enjoys"Flaming Hot Cheetos", "Jalapeno Doritos", etc., etc., etc., and Dave is usually right there sharing the bag with him. However, since I'd said I would, I did.

Well, the boy didn't like the Tabasco sans chips one bit...so he coughed and gagged, and puked.....on my foot and down his shirt. And then he stood there crying and saying, "Dave doesn't wike it. Huggy Mommy, huggy!" Translation..."My mouth is hot, I have vomit down my shirt and now I want you to pick me up and hold me. After you clean up the pile of vomit on the floor, of course." .....sigh.

On the bright side...there has been no spitting for the past hour and a half, and there is now at least one clean spot on my kitchen floor!

Quick Pics

I'm off to run errands and then...bake and decorate more cakes!...what else, right?



But even though I completely forgot to take my camera to Mom and Tot day yesterday, I did have my trusty phone, and I snapped one picture of the Little Man and one of the Girl. This is a "Sprinkler Park" that is way fun for the kids and not nearly as nerve-wracking for the moms as an actual swimming pool. We can all sit and visit with each other while keeping an eye on all of our little ones...it's a great place for a get-together!





Okay, I'm out! Talk to you all later!

Blood N Fire 2008

Hello everyone. Last month I mentioned that Ben and Benji were going on a sort of mission-trip to San Antonio. The youth group at our church goes to work with an organization called Blood N Fire every summer. Their projects change each year, but generally involve some time of construction project and neighborhood outreach. This year they did some work on the home of a single mother and did some clean-up work around the neighborhood as well. Reports are that just the act of helping out this woman has opened the door to ministry in this neighborhood that has been closed up to this point.

In between their community service projects, they have bible teaching and recreation times. This year the theme of their studies was "Rise Up, New Generation" and included lessons entitled; Clothe Yourself in Strength, Loose the Chains, and Shake Off the Dust. The lessons were based on Isaiah 52:1-3

"Awake, awake, O Zion, clothe yourself with strength. Put on
your garments of splendor, O Jerusalem, the holy city. The uncircumcised
and defiled will not enter you again. Free yourself from the chains on
your neck, O captive Daughter of Zion. For this is what the LORD
says: 'You were sold for nothing, and without money you will be
redeemed.'"

Benji is working on a post about the trip that I will share with you when it's all finished. In the meantime, here is a little video from a previous trip to give you an idea of what they do.

There's only one kid left!!!

So for my final kid update, I give you.....Jonathan!

I've been looking for a good picture of Jonathan to post here, so you can see my only curly-haired kid, but pictures of Jon are hard to come by. Mainly because Jon hates to have his picture taken, and you have to sneak up on him. If he knows you're coming, you get something like this....

Sometimes, you might get lucky and get a good partial, like this....

Yep, Jon is the "Wilson" of the family! (And if you are confused by that, you need to go watch some "Home Improvement" reruns.)

Lack of photo-opportunities aside, Jonathan did gymnastics again this year and was finally able to perfect his front-flip-landing on the trampoline. A feat which makes him very, very proud! I already mentioned in Maddie's Update that Jon did not win "Honor Student of the Year" in gymnastics this year, and he was quite upset about that. He plans to go back next year and reclaim his title!

Finally, you may recall that we had a pretty fabulous party to celebrate Little Dave's 3rd birthday last month. That, however, was nothing compared to the celebration that took place in heaven when Jonathan finally decided to ask Jesus into his heart!!!

Jonathan has been struggling with this decision for a few years now. He knew it was the right decision, and he knew that one day he would "probably do it", but he wasn't going to do it until he was absolutely sure that he wanted to serve God for the rest of his life. (Jon's not too big on serving....ahem!) So, when he came to me and told me that he had made the decision and had invited God into his heart all by himself...I'm telling you, the angel choir sang and the heavenly hosts rejoiced, and there was much dancing and carrying on!

So, that's my Jonathan update...and you can see that it was worth the wait, yes??? And in honor of this momentous occasion, I give you.....an actual, full-face picture of my Little Fella, whom you will now get to spend eternity with...WHOO-HOO!!

And the updates, they just keep on coming!

Sorry for the break in posting there. Life was happening around here....what else is new, right?

So, it's time to update on THE GIRL! Miss Maddie was again in a combination ballet/tap class and she had her recital in May as well....naturally....everything happens in May, doesn't it??? She made a beautiful mermaid, and she did a lovely job in her dance. I tried to video the dress rehearsal to share with you all, but I couldn't get in a good spot to tape it. They did a lovely dance to Jodi Benson singing "Home Is" from "The Little Mermaid" cartoon. She and a couple other girls in her class are being promoted up two levels next year! They will skip their Combo IV class and their Ballet I class and they will all start Ballet II in the fall. We are naturally quite proud of her and can't wait to see her concentrating only on her ballet.

Now, I think I mentioned in my "Benji" post that all three of the big kids took gymnastics together this spring. Because I didn't have a blog at the time, I've never mentioned that when Jonathan took gymnastics alone two years ago, he was awarded the Honor Student of the Year award. Can you guess who won it this year? Yep, Miss Maddie won this year! Jon really wanted to win again (they give one to a boy, and one to a girl) but I don't think they would give it to him again since he won last time. Regardless, we were all very proud of Maddie for winning this year.

Soon I hope to be posting some pictures of a sweet little girl missing her two front teeth, but for now, they are still hanging on...a bit sideways, but hanging on just the same!



So I guess that's all the Maddie news for now. Next up will be Jon, and he's got the biggest news of all! Stay tuned!

Continuing with the "Catching Up"...

Benji had a bit of a tough time at the beginning of this baseball season. His team wasn't playing well, he was frustrated, he felt that his coaches didn't really like him, and he just wasn't having much fun. He hung in there, however, and the year finished up quite a bit better than it started, and he seemed to enjoy himself more. This is one of the reasons that we put him in sports. It's important for him to learn to make the best of each situation and to work through it when he doesn't necessarily get along with someone in authority. This will be useful someday if he gets a job working for someone he doesn't necessarily like all that much!

I can't tell you how many times I saw kids moved from classroom to classroom, back when I taught in "real school" because they didn't get along with a particular teacher. I always tried to explain to parents that this was the prime time for a life-lesson, but the school I was in would rather just try to keep everyone happy than actually teach stuff like that....but I digress!

Anyway, Benji also got to do gymnastics this year with Jon and Maddie, and he absolutely loved it! He did really well and even got to do a few things that other class members weren't able to do. He doesn't have the prettiest form, or body-lines, but he has good balance, and he's pretty strong for such a skinny little kid, so he was able to do a lot of "tricks"....even if he didn't look so pretty doing them!

He is mostly into Freestyle BMX these days. He sets up stunt courses in the back yard and will be out there for hours riding and trying new tricks. His dream is for us to take him to New Mexico to an indoor BMX stunt park and let him go wild....I'd totally do it, too....if I ever won the lottery that is!

Anyway, the major event for Benji this past month is that he went from looking as he did in the above picture, to this....



...yes, my son has a metal-mouth, and his dreams of a pilgrimage to BMX mecca are now several thousands of dollars farther away....sheesh! Those of you with pre-teen kids....START SAVING NOW!!! And to President Bush, thank you, thank you, thank you. Your economic stimulus payment is the only way we were able to manage the down-payment on what will hopefully be a beautiful smile some day.

So, that's about all the news on Benji lately, but there will be more soon. He and his dad are heading out in a couple of weeks for a summer mission trip to San Antonio to work with an inner-city group there. I'll make sure that he posts something about it here for you all to see.

As for me, it's time to get back to the daily grind around here...ugh!