Life's Rough

We spent six...count them 1-2-3-4-5-6...hours at the pool today! Life sure is rough sometimes. ;o)

Happenings

First, I'll mention a blog for you to check out (and please leave a message). My daughter, Beth, has started a new blog. You can check it out at www.homeschoolblogger.com/catcrazee/. She'd love to get some feedback!

Second, in regard to the little girl who cut off her finger at our church...the doctor did reattach her finger, but we're waiting to see if her body will accept it. Hopefully I can find something out this Wednesday night.

Canning update: As of today, we've canned 49 quarts of green beans and 50 pints of salsa. The kids and I picked tomatoes again this morning and we almost have enough for a couple more cannings of salsa. We've had lots of squash, too. I don't can it, we only eat it fresh and give it away. We have several spaghetti squash growing out there. We're very excited about that. I like spaghetti squash better than spaghetti! We've had lots of green peppers, too. The timing has been better this year. We've been trying to get our tomatoes and peppers to ripen at the same time. We've only had a few cucumbers, unfortunately. :o(

We're still enjoying all the homemade bread. I made two loaves today and we had BLT's for supper tonight. Yummy!

This week I'm spending time getting ready for our new school year. Lots of stuff to go through and organize! It should be an exciting year though.

At church yesterday, we had our pastor's brother, Dr. Woodrow Kroll from Back to the Bible radio program come and speak. He is such a good preacher, and I thoroughly enjoyed his message.

It was cloudy here today, so we didn't go to the pool. It's supposed to be sunny the next few days, so we'll hit the pool again. :o)

Book I just finished: Sunrise by Karen Kingsbury. Her latest book about the Baxter family. She is such an excellent author...the stories just pull me in!

I guess that's it for now. Neal will be finished with the grass in a few minutes, and we're going to play Uno Stacko with the kids. Have a great night!

It's Jodi's Birthday

And she's having a contest! All you have to do is write about your favorite childhood book and then link her blog to your site. So, here I go:

My favorite book, well actually books, growing up were the Trixie Belden mysteries. My Mom and Dad bought me book #7 and then I was hooked. They started buying them for my birthdays and Christmas' and anytime they felt like it. :o) I ended up getting books 1 - 36. There are actually 39 books in the series. They must not have published as many of books 37-39 though, because if you go to Ebay they are quite expensive! I can see my set of books from my computer and I love them! Beth has enjoyed reading some of them too, but not as much as I did.

A Great Kids' Band

When we lived in Georgia, Neal worked with a guy named Danny. Danny was in a children's band called The Sunny-Side Up Band. Beth was about two the first time we heard them, and she fell in love with music. I can remember going to a local festival and hearing them live. Beth got out in front of the stage and danced. She had a blast! We've purchased all of their cd's and still enjoy listening to them.

I thought of them tonight when I was looking at my friend Perri's blog. She has a short video on there of her granddaughter, Sophie, dancing to some music. It reminded me of Beth.

If you have young kids, check out the Sunny-Side Up Band's website and listen to some samples of their music. There's even a video of one of their newer songs. You can see Neal's coworker, Danny, playing the guitar.

My favorite cd is still the first one they made -- "Walk Tall and Sing a Sweet Song." I think it's most appealing to toddlers and preschoolers. You can hear bits of every song on their website though.

Busy, Busy

It's been quite a busy day. I'll back up a bit to yesterday. The kids each had a friend over to spend the night. They came over at 1:30 yesterday afternoon and the kids played here at the house. Ben and Carlee built a huge 3-room tent in our study. They were very creative with chairs and blankets. They used Ben's battery operated lantern for their light, and when I peeked in they were having supper (pretzels) at their dining table. :o) They were so cute! Beth and Erin talked most of the afternoon...some in Beth's room and some with me in the kitchen. I made homemade pizzas and pizza rolls and then around 5:30 we left and drove to the pool. Neal met us there and we ate supper in the pavillion and swam. It was a fun night. We got home around 9:30 and then we watched Spiderman 2 with the older two while the younger two watched 101 Dalmatians in the study.

This morning I woke up at 6:30 -- even though it was going on 1:00 before I went to sleep. Since I was awake I went ahead and got dressed and headed down to my mom's. Fortunately she was awake too, so we went yard saling! :o) We found one really good yard sale and bought some stuff there. I wish I had bought more. They had really good prices!

Then we got home around 9:30 and Neal and I started making salsa. A friend from church came over to learn how to can salsa, and that was a lot of fun showing her how we do it. We spent the day canning salsa, making bread, snapping green beans, and now canning the beans. We canned 20 pints of salsa and ate about one. ;o) Now we're canning 7 quarts of beans. We canned 7 quarts last night, too. I think we're at 35 quarts so far this year.

Oh, Ben went blackberry picking with his grandparents and aunt this afternoon. They picked a lot of berries, so we froze those. Carlee and Erin's Mom also brought us some corn on the cob, and then about an hour later Neal's dad brought us 5 ears of corn freshly picked from his garden. We've had some good food today! :o)

I'm going to bed early tonight. Since it's 9:10 I think that means I'd better get to bed SOON!

Chaperoning

My little girl is growing up. She had her first church youth group activity last night. It was a pool party with the 7th and 8th graders. Neal and I chaperoned, and had an interesting and enjoyable time.

1. 30 minutes into the party the clouds started rolling in.
2. 45 minutes into the party the lightening started and all the kids had to get out of the pool.
3. We had to sit outside for 2 hours and 15 minutes more and watch the lightening while the kids were running around outside. (no rain yet)
4. We had to watch our daughter try not to be too disappointed when we wouldn't let her run around outside, with all her friends, while there was so much lightening.
5. We had to watch our daughter try not to appear too disappointed when we left 45 minutes early because we didn't want to sit down in the basement watching 45 minutes of a movie.
6. Did I mention our supper was corn dogs? Tasted good, but not on my diet. ;o)
7. We had an enjoyable time visiting with one other set of parents who also didn't let their kids run around in the lightening...and left even earlier than we did.
8. Thrilled when our daughter asked if we could have an activity at our house sometime. (maybe she wasn't too embarrassed by her old mom and pop!)

Another News Article

Here's another article that was in the Athens paper about Madison Mays (the 12 year old boy who died last week). I thought this was a very sweet tribute:

http://onlineathens.com/stories/071507/opinion_20070715031.shtml

Weekend

We had a good weekend! Neal and I had a date night on Friday. Beth and Ben spent the night with their grandparents, while Neal and I went to the movies and dinner. We are blessed with a "dollar theater" in our town, so we don't have to pay the astronomical prices at the regular theater...we just have to wait a bit longer. We went to see Fantastic Four - The Silver Surfer. It was pretty good. The Fantastic Four are not my favorite, but it was an entertaining, action packed movie. And did I mention it was only $1.00? LOL Then we went to a local Mexican restaurant. I was craving mexican food, and it had been ages since we'd eaten in a mexican restaurant. The food was pretty good, but the salsa was lame. Neal said it was basically ketchup. ;oP After dinner, we went to blockbuster and rented a few movies. I'm in the midst of a handwriting job, so I like to have something to watch, er...listen to while I'm writing. We watched The Last Sin Eater. I had already read the book, but they did a pretty good job of remaking it into a movie. We watched another movie about Idi Ameen, but I would not recommend it at all. Then on Saturday we watched the documentary Supersize Me, which follows a guy through a 30 day McDonald's only diet. It was pretty insightful. I'd recommend it, but not for children.

Other than that I've pretty much been doing my handwriting. We did go to church, and that was nice. :o) I have over 850 envelopes addressed...only a little over 600 to go!

Did you find my finger?

Neal had a very queasy experience tonight....and if you're squeamish, you may not want to read this either. We were at church for our Wednesday night "Fun Summer Club." Neal was helping out in the 3rd-5th grade girls game time. One of the girls got her finger caught in the door and then started screaming that her finger was bleeding. Neal, being the only adult in the room, took her out and told her to go into the girls restroom and run cold water over it. He then heard her screaming louder in the bathroom. He rushed down the hall and found a lady to go into the bathroom to help the little girl. Then he went to get a baggie of ice. (game time is still going on with a teenager leading it) When he returned with the ice a lady came out of the bathroom and told Neal "you need to find the end of her finger." HUH??? He thought "no way! She didn't lose her finger!" But he went and looked and didn't find anything, he went back and the lady said "you really need to find her finger." So he went back again and then he got someone else to help. Finally he realized he was looking near the latch, but when he looked at the hinge side of the door he saw something down in the floor near that side of the door....a long finger nail with a bit of finger attached. He picked it up and cradled it in his hand, and then they put it in a wet paper towel and then put it down in the ice bag. Her dad then took her to the hospital. I'll have to call her Mom tomorrow and check on her. I sure hope they were able to re-attach her finger. Neal, poor fella, had to come home and prop up his feet and eat chocolate. LOL He was still feeling sick two hours later!

Please continue to pray for the Mays' family. Allen and Madison's funeral is tomorrow morning at 11:00. The visitation is tonight at 6:00. You can read the obituaries and all the wonderful comments in the guest book at: www.onlineathens.com . Go to the heading at the top that says Banner-Herald and then click on obituaries.

How do you like my new picture slide show at the top of the page? I think it looks pretty cool. All of the flowers in the pictures are from my Mom's flowerbeds. My home looks so beautiful outside due to her green thumb! Thanks Mom!

I bought that popsicle maker at a yard sale on Saturday from Neal's cousin. Best dollar I ever spent! The kids love it. We're experimenting with different popsicles. So far we've had yogurt and strawberry, chocolate (using chocolate soy milk), and right now we have orange dreamsicle. Yum!

We camped out here at the house this past weekend. We had my friend's son and daughter for the weekend, and had lots of fun with them. We had a yard sale on Saturday and then went swimming that evening. Sunday we stayed home in the morning and had a campfire, and I did some baking while the kids played and Neal and Beth cleaned up the campsite. Sunday night we went to church and met the kids' mom afterward.

Tomorrow Mom, the kids, and I are going to go to some orchards in a neighboring county. I'm going to buy some peaches and check out their honey. It looks like we lucked out on getting more blueberries. Neal and all four kids drove an hour away Saturday morning to pick blueberries, they got there around 9:00 and the orchard was picked out. They said there were people there before 6:00 that morning! They were selling them so cheaply that people were picking and reselling. I never thought I'd say this, but I hope they start charging more so that people can't take advantage of them.

Update on my friend who lost her husband and son: I thought the driver of the other vehicle was killed, but I was wrong. He was drunk! And, of course, he survived. However, he is being charged with two counts of murder. In the state of Alabama, if you drive drunk and kill someone, you get charged with murder. Too bad it's not that way in every state! Please keep praying for Rachel and Tabitha!

A friend of mine from Georgia called yesterday with some sad news. Some mutual friends of ours were in a car accident Sunday morning around 9:00 am. They were headed home from a vacation on the gulf in Alabama. Allen and his 12 year old son, Madison, were killed. Rachel and her 10 year old daughter, Tabitha, were taken to the hospital and released. I cannot imagine the pain and grief Rachel and Tabitha are going through right now.



Allen and Rachel were in our Sunday school class when we lived in Georgia. Even though we have not kept in contact for the last few years, I think of Rachel often because I use a few of her recipes frequently. I was her prayer partner when she went through Evangelism Explosion. She is a very sweet lady.



Allen was a cardiologist in Athens, GA. He helped me out with a scare I had with my heart many years ago when I was visiting my parents in Ohio. He was very down to earth and a very genuinely nice person.



Please remember this precious lady and her daughter in the days, weeks, and months ahead. I'm sure she would appreciate your prayers.

Great 4th

We had a really great time last night at my Mom's cookout! Unfortunately I didn't even think about taking a picture! Can you believe that?!!! Anyway, there were 11 of us, and we had lots of fun eating and playing games. We played the game PIT, and another table played Rummikub. We had way too much food...here's what we had available to us: grilled chicken, hamburgers and brats, potato salad, baked beans, stir fried squash, cole slaw, broccoli salad, carrots and cucumbers, tomatoes, cucumbers in vinegar, watermelon, canteloupe, apple pie (of course), lemon pie, lazy day salad, and chocolate cake. I'm sure I'm leaving something out, but I think that's enough. :o)

PIT is our new favorite game. If you've never played it, it's very fast moving and loud. Lots of fun!!!

Happy 4th of July!

Happy Independence Day!

I walked through a county courthouse square,

On a park bench an old man was sitting there.

I said, "Your old courthouse is kinda run down."

He said, "Naw, it'll do for our little town."

I said, "Your old flagpole has leaned a little bit,

And that's a Ragged Old Flag you got hanging on it."

He said, "Have a seat," and I sat down.

"Is this the first time you've been to our little town?"

I said, "I think it is." He said, "I don't like to brag,

But we're kinda proud of that Ragged Old Flag.

"You see, we got a little hole in that flag there

whenWashington took it across the Delaware.

And it got powder-burned the night Francis Scott Key

Sat watching it writing Say Can You See.

And it got a bad rip in New Orleans

With Packingham and Jackson tuggin' at its seams.

And it almost fell at the Alamo

Beside the Texas flag, but she waved on though.

She got cut with a sword at Chancellorsville

And she got cut again at Shiloh Hill.

There was Robert E. Lee, Beauregard, and Bragg,

And the south wind blew hard on that Ragged Old Flag."

"On Flanders Field in World War I

She got a big hole from a Bertha gun.

She turned blood red in World War II.

She hung limp and low by the time it was through.

She was in Korea and Vietnam.

She was sent where she was by her Uncle Sam.

"She waved from our ships upon the briny foam,

And now they've about quit waving her back here at home.

In her own good land here she's been abused --

She's been burned, dishonored, denied, and refused."

"And the government for which she stands

Is scandalized throughout the land.

And she's getting threadbare and wearing thin,

But she's in good shape for the shape she's in.

'Cause she's been through the fire before

And I believe she can take a whole lot more."

"So we raise her up every morning,

take her down every night.

We don't let her touch the ground

and we fold her up right.

On second thought, I do like to brag,

'Cause I'm mighty proud of that Ragged Old Flag."

Happy Birthday America!

"Ragged Old Flag"

By John R. Cash

(C) 1974 House of Cash, Inc.

Pictures taken by Teresa Beasley 2006