Josiah Shaving

I know it's a terrible photo but I love it! He's been pretending with the end of his toothbrush, which is sort of flat and...well, razor looking. He even had a towel around his waist. How great is that? 

Here he is.

His name is Jose, or Joey, or Joe. He's crate trained, house broken, good with little kids....and he was free! He's not too bad. I like him.

How about Hunter's "cool" look? He's cracking me up with it. It's his new look for photos, no smile, half-closed eyes. It makes me grin.

Todd's applied for a youth minister job in Plano with Richardson East CofC. We're praying and fasting.....again. This church seems really great from all we've heard. Maybe...... 

Anybody?

Anyone out there on gmail besides the Kisers? Not that I don't like chatting with Geraldine, I'd just like to not look so pitiful with only two "friends" on my Google Chat list. Know what I mean?
The boys are back in school. Hunter has apparently been making all A's and B's, much to our surprise. We just found out today via e-mail that he's supposed to have the Preamble to the Constitution memorized by Wednesday. He neglected to tell us that. What a dork. Luckily, he's a fast memorizer and has a slim chance of actually doing it in that time.

Josiah is struggling with English but doing fantastic in Math. No surprises there but I ache to help him like English. I know communication is one of the main "issues" with autism but...

Isaac is back into his "no brother" routine now. I think he loves it. I know it would embarrass him so I won't tell you about him running around naked most of the morning. I will tell you that he sliced the crud out of his finger on a globe...of all things. He's recovering nicely with some triple antibiotic and a band-aid.

I've been surfing the web for patterns for tatting and hairpin lace. I've found some great stuff but somehow the whole day has disappeared and I haven't done any laundry. Not good.

Next blog.....pictures of the new pet.

The Problem...

The Problem with being gone a while is getting back into blogging. I keep thinking, "Oooh. I should blog about that!" but then I think, "I can't until after I've done all my blogging about Christmas and posted those pictures." Well, I think it's time to overcome my outmoded notions of proper blog-order and get back in the swing of things.

Christmas at my Mom's was nice and quiet...comparitively speaking. Christmas in Kansas was even quieter considering that noone was there but my dad, my kids, my grandmother and me. And there's the fact that Thayer, Kansas is almost always relatively quiet. We got to go to a sheep ranch and Josiah and Isaac (Hunter was with Grandma at the time) got to pet a newborn lamb, sit on a horse and see bunches of sheep, cows, horses, dogs and even some chickens. The place belongs to a friend of my Dad's and since Josiah had been asking about "farmers" all day he took us out there (actually just up the road from Grandma's). Dad told Josiah that the farmer's name was David so Josiah called him "Farmer David" the whole time. It was awesome, but I didn't have my camera! We had gone to the library and I wasn't expecting a field trip to a farm. That's what I get....

I also inherited some knitting tools while there. My Grandmother's mother passed away this past year (at 105) and left some needles and some unfinished work. My Grandma doesn't knit so she gave them to me. In exchange, I knitted her a scarf on her mother's needles.

I also inherited a tool that I didn't recognize. It was some bars held together by "poles", a little less than a foot long. I came home and did some research and found out it was for hairpin lace. I love the internet!!! Now I know how to use it and am working away!

Snyder was fun, as previously mentioned. The ENTIRE family was there. All of Todd's Dad's brothers, their kids and their kids were at the grandparents' place on Saturday, 30 people and 3 dogs. Most of us went to church with them on Sunday and then out to eat. And I thought the Ennis Christmas was wild. The photo is just Todd's Dad and Step-Mom, Sister and brother-in-law and their three and, of course, us. I haven't had time to go through the others but I (again) didn't have my camera for the main festivities on Saturday. We didn't even attempt an organized group shot. No one was that brave.

My favorite gift of the weekend? While at his dad's house, Todd's step-mom pulled all her yarn out of the back closet and after taking out what she needed, told me, "Take whatever you want." YEEEHAW!!! I behaved well, I think. I only took one bagfull, all sizes and colors.

Again with the internet. I've had to learn some crochet to use the hairpin lace properly and so decided to learn to Tatt as well. The long and the short? I'm not getting much housework done, but I'm having fun.

We've also made some pet additions. When I get up the guts to tell my parents all about it, I'll tell you too. (It's NOT the dog in this photo. That's Todd's Dad's. One of three...and several cats. Wonder where Todd got his thing for pets?)

Todd's working at Verizon still. He's decided that he really was meant to be a youth minister. God works in strange ways. How long do you figure he'll make him wait to give him a youth group again? Whatever it is, I'm sure it'll be just as long as he needs. God's cool like that.

Quickly

Don't you hate it when someone doesn't blog for days and days and days?  I know I do.

 

We are now home from our Christmas wanderings and I'm trying to play catch up on laundry and sleep and e-mails and toy playing and movie watching and all that stuff.  The boys and I had a fantastic trip to Kansas with my Dad last week.  We got home Thursday night and left for Snyder Friday afternoon.  We just had our Thomas family Christmas out in Snyder and that went fairly smoothly.  The kids had a blast and even got to make some fireworks pop.  We took it easy on that because of all the grass fires...and we've seen quite a few of those the last few days.  We even got a good old fashioned dust storm while in Snyder.  I can tell by looking at the cars around here that it blew at least this far East and was probably made even thicker by all the smoke from the fires.  It's like living in California eh?

 

I've taken lots of pictures and will post and give details soon.  Really I will.

 

Alert!

Please read Todd's blog on Prayer!

www.receptors.blogspot.com

Christmas Break

Well, Christmas frenzy is in full swing and we've been having a fun time. The kids got out of school for the holidays last Friday and the first of our family "Christmases" was Saturday in Ennis. The gang was all there and it was good to hang with the family. We're too far to really spend a lot of time with Todd's family so every chance we get is extra nice. All the kids were good and the food was extra delicious. Hooray for Mexican Christmas food!



Sunday Lori Morris was in town and she and her Michael and his sister came to church with us at Axxess and then to lunch. It was really fun to see her again. She was part of our youth group in Montgomery and graduated a while back. She's been in West Africa the last few months working at a children's home. Her hair is all done in braids and none of our kids recognized her. How fun is that?

Today Todd started his job!!!! He's working temp for Verizon and I think he'll really enjoy it. I hope he does anyway. It's an 8-5 job and it's the first one he's ever had. I guess we'll see how the rest of the world lives, eh?

Tomorrow is our 14th anniversary and Todd's mom is coming up from Ennis to keep the kids for us. She'll probably spend the night but we won't be out too late since Todd has to work the next day....YAY for work! I'll take the inconveniences any time over the alternative.

We'll have Christmas next weekend with my folks and then the next weekend in Snyder. Meanwhile I'm assembling Legos by the thousands. That's only a slight exageration. The Milenium Falcon Josiah got was 985 pieces and the Grievous Wheel Bike was....I don't know, around 60 or so. I've finally learned my lesson and started super glueing all non-moving pieces together. It cuts down on interchangeability but it also cuts down on broken pieces, temper tantrums over dropped parts and sore feet from stepping on tiny pieces. The Falcon took me longer than I anticipated. I started Sunday night, worked almost all day Monday and finished up this morning. Josiah could be a real slave driver if I let him. Every time I walked away from the pieces he hunted me down, "You're still working Mom. It's not finished yet. Get back there, Mom. You have to finish." etc., etc. I learned to ignore him to do things like cook meals and bathe. I think we'll stick with smaller sets from now on.


The fighting has finally started. The boys are at each other non-stop today. I may have to get creative....darn it. It's cold and rainy so anything out of doors is out of the question. Blek. I guess curling up with a good book and ignoring them isn't going to work either. Listen to me. Whining already. And this is only the 2nd day of the first week! This may get rough folks. I may have to put a whine ban on the blog site to spare you all. O.K. I promise not to whine about my kids being home this Christmas break from now on. Really.

A Family Christmas Photo 

Christmas Smiles. 

Psyche.

We thought Todd was going to start a job today. He was going to Verizon on a temp' assignment for their corporate office, helping with their phone book somehow. We got a call yesterday from the lady at the temp office (a.k.a Todd's sister-in-law) letting him know that Verizon was unprepared for him to start yet, the job won't start now until the 20th or so, which doesn't help with Christmas at all. He already told the folks he substitute teaches for that he'd be unavailable so he'll have to go back and start with them again. sigh. I'm sure it could get more frustrating somehow, but I'm hoping it doesn't.

Meanwhile, you should read Todd's blog on robbing banks. It is hilarious! I think it is worth noting that I once had a youth minister who turned to robbing banks....for real! The main difference being that he had left the church in disgrace and (obviously) was not of the same moral character as Todd. Anyway. Read Todd's blog, and then read his blog about Christmas. Todd Rocks!!!

My Bad.

It's totally and completely 100% my fault. They are baby dwarf hamsters and they were free. They were at Petco when we went to get mice for the snake. They were with the animals up for adoption. They are the teeniest, tiniest, cutest little rodents I've ever seen, shorter than my thumb and not much wider and I couldn't resist. We already have cage, food and some bedding so they really cost nothing. I held them both for 15 minutes or more and neither one even tried to nip me. I am mortified at myself but.... 

Ice Jumping

Yes, that white stuff on the tramp is ice. They are jumping in it, sliding through it, rolling on it and bouncing it. They won't play outside when it's 50 degrees but 29 degrees and I can't keep 'em inside. They snuck out without coats this last time. All I want for Christmas is pneumonia. 

Snow!

Man oh man is it cold here! We had a fun bit of winter hit us yesterday. The boys had school all day, though. When my driveway iced over I assumed schools would shut down early but they hung in all day long. We got mostly frozen rain/sleet but it still left white on the ground. My sweet little one, who's never seen snow, said, "Momma! There's sand everywhere! Can I go feel it?" He had fun. They all did, way after dark and long after I told them not to stay out any longer. It was just way too fun.
The sunny pictures are from this morning. The normal course of events around here is a freak storm followed by a quick thaw. Today, however, nothings going to be thawing. It's 18 degrees with a wind chill of 4. YIKES!
My little house is so warm! Despite the ice on the metal frames of our windows, there are no cold spots inside. Under my kitchen cabinets are warm! Near the windows it's warm! My floor's not even especially cold. I love this house!

Josiah in Concert.

Josiah was in his very first school program Monday night. He's been in church programs but never without somone sitting right beside him the whole time. He did this one all on his own! He knew every word and all the actions for all the songs. He was the loudest and most animated of all the kids and spent most of the concert staring up at the lights and swinging back and forth.....but he sang all the notes and did all the motions. I was so proud!!! Grandma and Grandpa and Granny all got to see it with us. Wish you could've been there. 

Ike's been watching Speed Racer.

 

George Washington

Hunter had a book report to do today. It had to be a biography and he got extra credit for Social Studies if it was a figure from the Revolutionary War. With the combined efforts of his two loving parents Hunter has a snappy outfit to go with the report. The clothes are marker on foam core and the hair is fusible batting and leftover fabric scraps. He "otta" be in pictures! I, personally, like the unsmiling look....just like George! 

Isaac Tries on the Costume

 

3rd Grade!

 

5th Grade!

 

Yerbil

Well, our little friend Yerbil passed away today. He was a cute and sweet little gerbil and we will miss him....a little. We buried him in the back yard before dinner. Todd wants to replace him with a rat. Josiah wants to replace him with a mouse. Hunter wants a parakeet and I don't think Isaac has made up his mind. But the one who cleans all such cages and feeds all such rodentia does not want anything at all. I just want to clean out the cage and put it away for a while. Geraldine says I should get rid of the cage as quickly as possible so no one will be tempted to refill it. She is a wise woman, but Todd would just buy another cage. So far I've managed to lay down a firm "No." We'll see how long I can hold out. We still have a snake, a Beta fish and a cat. I think we're fairly well covered on the pet front.

Josiah was inexplicably sick in the night last night. He was fine this morning but I couldn't send him to school since he had so recently been sick. He has been strangely "off" all day today. He's much more like his old self, which is frustrating. He kept getting really upset about normal things, like the movie in the player, but didn't seem all that upset about Yerbil. That may have been because we knew it was coming and had tried to prepare him for it. Either way, I'm glad he's asleep now and hope he's feeling more like his "new self" tomorrow.

Todd has spent several days now aggressively looking for work...any work. He's applied at Target, Michael's, Dillard's, Starbuck's and a temp agency that hires fork lift drivers. For now he's looking for something that will be an after school job for supplementing his substitute teaching. I'm signed up to substitute at Heritage's preschool but they've yet to call me. Todd won't let me work nights, I've tried several times to convince him that it makes perfect sense. He just doesn't want me out after dark, which I suppose I'm grateful for. I do feel mightily useless at times.

But I baked some yummy cookies.