Miscellany Monday

1.
We got a surprise on Thursday night last week when Daniel got to come home early from Texas! I didn't tell the kids he was coming, so they were really surprised to see him. He was back in OK for 16 hours and then had to leave for Texas again. Happily, he came back last night and shouldn't have to go again for at least a few weeks.

2.
When we were driving to Tae Kwon Do yesterday afternoon, Sierra randomly said, "When I'm asleep, it feels like I'm in outerspace in just my pj's...and a helmet." She cracks me up with some of the things she says! That girl can always make me smile.

3.
We have been working so hard on not eating out since we've moved and we've been doing really well. For at least the last month or so, we've only eaten out on special occasions. Other than those few times and the times we've eaten at Grandma's house, we've been cooking at home. But last night, I just couldn't bring myself to cook (mostly I REALLY didn't want to do another load of dishes), so Daniel picked up pizza on his way home. Since we hadn't done that in a while, it was sooooooooo good! I like that eating out is a treat again rather than just another meal.

4.
We're still trying to decide whether to keep the internet service we have or switch to something else. After all the trouble we had with it, they sent a tech to fix it for free and also extended out trial period. It has worked well since the tech was here, but I'm still not sure. It worked great before until 4 days after the trial period was over. Not sure I want to take that chance again. I'm not going to be happy with having to call a tech to come every time the wind blows hard. We live in OK, so we'd have to have one permanently camped in our front yard.

5.
I have started working on revamping our homeschool schedule for the rest of the school year. We've had so many random days off here and there and days that we only got to half of our work for the day that we're way off track time-wise. If we continue to do just one day of work each day, we will finish our curriculum sometime in the middle of July! While I do want to continue with some schooling through the summer, I don't want to still be working on the same curriculum we started in September. So, we're going to start doubling up some things and working some on the weekends. I know we'll have more than our required number of days by the middle of June, so I'm hoping to wrap up this first year's curriculum by then. Then, we'll work on some unit studies and fun stuff for the summer and start back with the new school year after Labor Day.

6.
I just looked over at the couch and noticed a yellow-green crayon peeking out from under the edge of it. Surely this is not the same yellow-green crayon that has been there since Friday? I'm sure that I told at least two different children at two different times to put it away. Hmm...Maybe there's just a whole bunch of yellow-green crayons under that couch and they're making their way out one-by-one. Does this happen at anyone else's house?

Okay, I'm off to get these kids some breakfast so we can get our school day started. My evil twin came over yesterday when we were getting ready for church and promised my kids that we would have chocolate chip pancakes this morning since we ran out of time yesterday. I've got to remember to take her key away. She always gets me into trouble. :)

Fishing with the kids!

So, after being gone for six days, Daniel got to come home Thursday night. This was his second trip to Texas in the last month and it was supposed to last three weeks. I was so happy that he got to come home early. I didn't tell the kids that he was coming home early. I let them stay up watching a movie and playing on the computer so he could surprise them. They were pretty excited to see him too!

Daniel decided that he would rather have the weekend off, so he went ahead and went in to work Friday morning. When he got there, he was told that he would probably be heading back to Texas on Saturday to help with the rig move. He told his boss, "If I'm going back to Texas tomorrow, I'm going home today." His boss talked to the big boss and his response was "Well, you'd better go on back home then because we leave for Texas at 2:00pm (today)." So, I got a phone call around 8:30 Friday morning to get everyone up and dressed because we were going to go to town for supplies and then we were all going fishing. Music to my ears! I've been wanting us all to go fishing together for weeks!

Once everyone was up, fed, and dressed, we headed into town to get bobbers (does anyone else call them that? My dad and I always called them corks, but my husband calls them bobbers, so I've picked it up too), weights, new line, etc. While we were shopping, we met a super nice guy who was stocking the fishing supplies at Wal-Mart. He talked to the kids and gave them stickers. It was fun! From there, we went to the bait shop to pick up some minnows (the same bait shop my dad used to take me to when I was little).

When we got to the pond, I wasn't sure we'd have much luck. It was pretty windy and a little overcast. But we went ahead anyway. Boy, was I wrong! Cheyenne ended up catching 2 pretty nice ones, Landon, Sierra, and Dakota each caught one. Not bragging or anything (ha!) but I caught the most-3. I had so much fun and was sad when the alarm went off for us to pack up and head home.

Daniel pulled out of our house around 1:30 Friday afternoon and left the yard at work around 3:00. They made it safely to their motel in Texas around 8:00 Friday evening. Good news! As of this morning, he's only supposed to be gone for 3 days. I hope that's true. Being a "single mom" is much easier now that the kids are older, but I still don't want to do it all the time.

Here are the kids with their fish:

Cheyenne caught the first one. She was pretty proud of herself. (please ignore me in the background. I knew we were going fishing, so I put off my shower until the afternoon)

Sierra was next to catch one. She did it completely by herself! Not a bad looking fish for a little girl. She thought it was huge!

Landon was disappointed at first because his was small, but Daniel told him it was a sunfish and he fell in love. He is still talking about his "sunshine" fish.

We saved the best for last! Dakota finally caught her fish just before we were ready to leave.

We had such a fun day! I'm sad that Daniel had to leave so soon, but at least we got to spend some fun time together while he was here.

Five Question Friday 3/18/11

Woohoo! It's Friday! I'm extra, super excited this Friday because we got a great surprise last night. Daniel got to come home from Texas over two weeks earlier than we had planned! Six days of him being gone was more than enough for me. I don't know if I would have made it 3 weeks!
I didn't tell the kids he was coming home, so when he walked in a little before 11pm, they were really surprised! It was not an easy task trying to keep them up that late. My kids like to go to bed early and get up early (except for Sierra-she likes to sleep in). I was a mean mom-I needed an excuse to make Dakota stay up so I made her sweep the kitchen. But after she did, I let her get back on the computer, so I made up for it.

As is tradition, I am linking up with Mama M. for Five Question Friday. Head on over there and play along!


1. Have you ever testified in court? For what?

I have never had to testify in court. There were a couple of times though when I thought I was going to have to. Both were in custody situations for students of mine. Thankfully, things were worked out without my having to testify. I think I would be scared to death if I had to testify in court!

2. Do you still have your wedding dress?

I do. We had it preserved by the dry cleaner. It's at my mom's right now and she keeps hinting that I need to take it home with me. But I really don't have anywhere to put it, so I keep "forgetting" to get it. :) I absolutely loved my dress at the time, but by the time any of my girls need to wear it, it will be way too outdated. Plus, my girls are pretty tall and thin right now so I don't think they will fit into it (I was neither tall nor thin when I got married.) I'm hoping they can alter it somehow or take pieces from it for their dresses though. My aunt made my veil so I'd really like to see them use that at least.

3. Is there a special place you like to go when you're happy, sad, stressed, etc.?

Can't really think of anyplace special. It just depends on the day.

4. If you have kids, do they sleep with you? If you don't have kids...will you let your kids sleep with you when/if you have them?

Well, a long time ago when Dakota was 2 and I was pregnant with Cheyenne, Daniel worked the overnight shift at his job. Dakota was still at the age where we would hold her until she fell asleep and then take her into her bed. But she got to be too much for me to carry, so I started letting her sleep with me. Once Cheyenne was born, I was so afraid that I wouldn't be able to hear her apnea monitor from my bedroom that I ended up sleeping on the couch in the living room while she slept in the infant seat next to me. So, then it was Daniel and Dakota in our bed. Once the monitor was gone, we could not get Dakota to go to sleep in her own bed, so she, Daniel, and I all slept together in a full-sized bed! Not the most comfortable way to sleep. The thing that finally changed her mind was when we moved to a new house. For some reason, her new room was just what she needed to go back to sleeping by herself!
Landon went through some time where he wanted to sleep with us. He would always start out in his own bed, but make his way to ours during the night. Most of the time, I was too exhausted to get up and take him back to bed, so I would just let him stay. Since we've moved, though, there have only been a few times when he has come to our bed. I usually take him back to his room after a little while.
Cheyenne has always been a pretty good sleeper. She has come in a few times when she's been sick or scared, but not very often.
Sierra will not sleep in our bed. Even if she gets up and comes in during the night (and it's been forever since she's done that), she will just bring her pillow and blanket and sleep on the floor beside our bed.

5. Do you watch late night TV?
No. I do sleep with the television on at night but I don't watch it. We only get three channels anyway, so I doubt there's anything on worth watching.

Upbeat
Fantastic
Accomplished
Thoughtful
Brilliant

My husband is gone. He left to work in Texas on Saturday. He is scheduled to be gone for 2-3 weeks. Surprisingly, so far, I feel very upbeat with him being gone. He makes really good money when he's gone and that's something that we could really use right now with the Disney trip coming up.

Landon actually went to his class at church last night! I was nervous the entire time that I was going to see his little number up on the screen for me to come get him, but it never happened. I went out about half-way through service and got a quick peek in the window. He was having a fantastic time! They were dancing and singing and having so much fun. After church, he said he is going to start going to his class everytime. I hope so!

I feel like we have accomplished a lot with our schoolwork this week. We have gotten back into a routine and it's working out well. Now, if I could just get these doctor's appointments down to once a month instead of every 1-2 weeks we could really get things moving.

My thoughtful husband made sure to leave me a fishing pole to use while he's gone. That way, I could head out to the pond whenever I needed to relax for a few minutes (I love that the pond is just yards from the house!). I've already used it twice since he's been gone! I've only caught one teeny tiny fish so far, but I have loved going so much!

My brilliant plan to not tell my kids that this week is public school's spring break was foiled last night. I forgot to account for Wednesday night church in my plan. They are already trying to talk me out of doing school today. I'm kind of leaning that way too since we have to be at the clinic at 2:00 and then we have tae kwon do from 5:30-7:30 tonight. We won't be home that much, so maybe we'll put it off for today...so much for my routine. :)

Wordless Wednesday-yes, siblings do enjoy playing together sometimes

Check out this giveaway I found!

Rachael at Once Upon A Miracle is hosting an awesome giveaway! $140 to CSN stores! I don't usually post about giveaways, but I'm so excited about this one that I just had to share. Head over there and get entered!

Please help my kids help St. Jude's kids

My kids have been asked to participate in a fundraiser for St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital through their tae kwon do school. We have set a goal for them to each raise $25 for St. Jude. The fundraiser is tomorrow morning. If you are able, please visit their fundraiser pages and donate to help the families of St. Jude.

Dakota's page

Cheyenne's page

Sierra's page

Landon's page

Thank you so much for your help!