Who Me? Procrastinate?

Last year at our Owings family Christmas/New Year's get together, my mother-in-law assigned the moms with making a scrapbook page for each of their children. She even gave us a scrapbook ideas book for our Christmas present. The problem is that I don't scrapbook. I don't even get pictures developed.

Back in November Jon's mom had some of us get together at her place to work on our pages. It's probably a good thing too. One of my sisters-in-law gave me some sheets of scrapbook page paper (or whatever it is called). I had asked previously what size page. The answer I got was, "The regular size." To me regular size paper is 8.5 X 11. The pages my sil supplied me with are about 11 and 15/16" X 11 and 15/16". Like I said before, I DON'T SCRAPBOOK! This was one case in which procrastinating was a good thing.

I had some of the pages done yesterday. The rest I finished today. Keep in mind the following:

1. I DON'T SCRAPBOOK!
2. Since I don't scrapbook, I don't have very many scrapbook supplies.
3. Since I don't have very many scrapbook supplies, I had to make do with what I did have.
4. It's a good thing Jon let me keep a few of my BHG magazines "just in case the kids need to cut something out for school".
   
5. No one else in my family seemed too interested in helping me.
6. Due to number 3, I only have school glue. You know, the stuff that isn't supposed to be used with pictures and makes paper warp.
7. That's alright. I don't have "real" pictures anyway. Remember, I don't get pictures developed. I printed the pictures out on regular printer paper and cut them out.

So, without further ado, here are the pages I came up with.

This is the page for Froggie. I didn't have any good pics of just her.

I could probably do an entire scrapbook of Kitty Kat reading.

Birdie

Monkey

Puppy Dog

Little Bear (He was still Baby Bear at the time of the pics.)

Jon took the kids to Young's Jersey Dairy a while back while I was needed elsewhere. The clip-art images on this one are from
http://etc.usf.edu/clipart/index.htm .

These will have to do. I'm out of time. We have to be at the get together at 6pm today.

Busy Times

I haven't been posting much. I've just had too much on my plate. Here's a little of what we have been up to.

Birdie, Monkey, and Puppy Dog sung in the children's choir with the adult choir the Sunday before Christmas. They did a wonderful job, but we forgot to take our camera.

Christmas day we did our Christmas first thing in the morning; Christmas and a niece's birthday at my parents' house; Christmas with extended family on my mom's side in Lynchburg, Ohio; and then we came home and had to settle the kids down so we could all sleep. Jon and I made the decision not to use credit for Christmas this year, or use credit for other things either. Aside from a few small items that we had picked up here and there through the year, all the gifts we gave this year were homemade. Jon and I did not exchange gifts. We didn't have enough time without the kids around so we didn't get to finish our main gift to the kids. It's just as well though. The gift has become a project for our family to work on together and the kids are excited. Jon is even taking a few days off work at the beginning of the year so we can work on it. I'll try to do a post about it after we finish.

This week, we're working on our projects for Jon's side of the family and the kids are spending time sleeping over at my sister's and parents' houses. Tonight we will all meet up at Mom and Dad's house for a New Year's party. Tomorrow we have our Christmas/New Year's celebration with Jon's side of the family. I guess I better get back to work on those projects.

Merry Christmas! and Happy New Year!

I about forgot to mention that our kitties were spayed/neutered and declawed Monday. Normally they are good about taking medicine, but not this time. They have a combination of an antibiotic and pain killer to take and they fight it tooth and back claws and writhing even though we scruff them or wrap them in a towel and scruff them. It takes both Jon and me working together to get their medicine in them. They foam at the mouth and try to spit out the medicine after I give it to them. The stuff must taste nasty. The poor pathetic things just lay around and want to be cuddled now and then. Does anybody know how to make a collar to keep them from licking their incisions? I was told to make them if they start licking themselves, but not exactly how to make them. So far, they aren't licking the incisions. I have to take them back to the vet to get their mittens off Friday.

The Play Went Well

Last Sunday was the church play, SCROOGE REVISITED, that Jon, Kitty Kat, and Monkey were in. I figured that I better get it posted before tomorrow.

The first two pictures are of Kitty Kat and Monkey in the opening street scene.

Here "Scrooge" is studying his books. "Bob Crachit" was off to Jon's right at his own desk.

"Scrooge" and his "old dead partner Marley"

"Amy" a.k.a. Kitty Kat and "Jenny" a.k.a. Monkey
"Mark Scroggins", "Jenny's" and "Amy's" dad; "Spirit 1"; and "Scrooge" in the background

The actors and actresses really got into their characters. Can you see "Jenny" cowering as "dad" got angry with "Amy"? "Mark S." was a modern day "Scrooge".

"Scrooge" and "Spirit 2"

"Scrooge" observes at the "Crachit" house.

"Spirit 3" tells "Scrooge" the good news about Jesus.

"Scrooge" kneeling at the manger scene

The church choir and praise band performed the music for the production behind the stage. They had a curtainless curtain call, and the choir and band members joined the cast on the stage. The choir and band members came out wearing Santa hats (don't ask why, I don't know). Here is a picture of Jon's mom. She is in the choir.

Luke 2:1-20

Kitty Kat recited Luke 2:1-20 for our Women's Christmas Celebration at church last night. Some of you may remember that she did this last year as well. I went back through my posts so I could link back, but apparently I didn't blog about this last year. She did great.

I was going to take some pictures so I could post them. However, I forgot to take my camera. Jon's mom had hers, so there are a couple pics. I just can't post them here.

Five Kernels of Corn

I got this idea to do a silly post tonight. I asked Jon if he knew five corny jokes. He just looked at me and said, "You are so odd." So . . . here's one corny joke he has been telling the kids lately:

Two men walked into a bar. Which is funny, because you would think the second guy would have seen the first one do it.

There's one joke. I need four more. What's you favorite corny joke? Leave a comment to let me know. The corniest joke wins bragging rights. *


HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Please remember to make the jokes clean ones. Children read this blog.

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

I decided to make today a fun day for the kids. During several of our class times, I let them play with homemade, green playdough. We made shamrock badges and necklaces out of green construction paper and yarn. Then for supper, we had a green meal.


green milk, kiwi, green "shamrock" rolls in two sizes (homemade), and green tuna casserole with peas (made with homemade green noodles)


green cake with green frosting

2008

Happy New Year Everyone!

Less is More

We had a great Christmas. As we were headed home from my parents' house Christmas Eve, Kitty commented, "Mom, Grandma didn't get us as much this year, but you know, it was kinda nice." My heart swelled with pride.

We missed getting to carol.

The older two girls and I were supposed to go caroling with a group of girls from church yesterday. J.'s mom was going to watch the other kids. We didn't get to go because all three of us were running low grade fevers. One girl was off balance too, so we pushed fluids and called off. I would have hated to pass on some illness to a person in the elderly home, but we sure were disappointed.
One girl had even slipped the thermometer out of her underarm to make it read lower. She didn't think I would notice. There was something odd about her temperature dropping so rapidly so I caught on right away. J. and I constantly amaze her, she can rarely get away with anything. We must have been pretty sneaky when we were kids.

Oops! I realized that I had named names w/o permission. I have since taken out the names.

Please accept my apologies girls.

Christmas Symbols

This is an image of our tree. J. asked the children if they could tell what certain symbols remind us of. Each child got at least one turn to answer.

We use: a tree - to represent the cross that Jesus died on
an evergreen tree - God's love for us is eternal
white lights - the purity of Jesus and Jesus is the Light of the World
the star topper - the star that guided the wise men
the color red - Jesus' blood and love for us
gold - Jesus is the King of Kings and Prince of Peace




cross - Jesus died on the cross for our sins

heart - the heart is the seat of our emotions and "God so loved the world . . ." John 3:16
angels - the angels who appeared to Mary, Joseph, and the shepherds.

After we talked about these items, Jon talked about how we add other ornaments that mean something to us and remind us that God is interested in our lives (or something like that). He also made sure to mention that we choose to decorate our tree with these colors and others choose other colors, it's just a matter of preference. So if you use colored lights, don't worry our children won't be appalled or shocked. :)

My Babies are Growing Up and Other Tidbits

My Baby Bear turned three Sunday. He had asked for a marching band uniform for his birthday and Christmas, but we substituted a Bengals uniform and he was delighted.




Baby Bear asked my mom to make a Tigger cake for his party.



He asked me to make a Pooh Bear cake for the day of his birthday.


The darker spots on the legs were where the icing was getting too warm and I put off changing it. The eyebrows are yellow because BB wanted them to be "my color" ( read BB's favorite color). This was my first attempt at a shaped cake. Thanks mom for loaning me the pan and tips and making the icing for me. You saved me a lot of time.

Hmm . . . I guess I could have flipped the cake pictures.


___________________________________________________________________

Baby Bear's birthday served as a reminder that my youngest daughter Monkey will be eight next month and my oldest Froggie will be thirteen next month. Tears are coming to my eyes as I type this. Is the fourth week of the month soon? I need my nursery duty baby fix.


___________________________________________________________________

We did some Christmas decorating yesterday. We now have our manger scene cut-out and spotlight in our yard (I'll see about posting a picture later. My mil gave us the cut-out as a gift last year.) We have some of our smaller decorations displayed. Our tree is up and a curtain set that I got to keep the drafts from our back room out coordinates with the colors on our tree. Kitty Kat and the other kids worked together to put the tree together. Jon just had to help put the top section on. Jon and I put on the lights and ribbon garland. Jon then put a few special ornaments on the tree and then took the time to explain the symbolism of our tree to the children. I'll do a new post of the symbols.

I'm thankful for . . .

. . . God sending Jesus to take my punishment for sin. His mercy and grace are wonderful gifts I
could never earn.

. . . living in a country where I can worship God as I choose.

. . . my family.

. . . my friends.

. . . my children being healthy enough to fight (each other, going to sleep, etc.) though life would
sure be easier if they didn't fight.

I'll have to close this for now and post again later. My children are fighting sleep and I need to go sing to them.

Two Things I Am Thankful For

1. The bat is out of our house (at least out of the living quarters).

2. It has been raining here for a while now. The center (?) of the
storm just finished going over us. That is good because a skunk
sprayed our van Thursday and the smell is awful. I'm hoping the
rain will wash away at least some of the scent.

I have many other things I am grateful for. I will post about some
of those later.

Are we having Thanksgiving early?

That is the question my children asked me Friday when I served them a big turkey dinner. We had turkey, candied sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, giblet gravy, stuffing, green bean casserole, homemade rolls, and iced tea. Our turkey was twenty pounds, so we have lots of good leftovers. We have had four meals out of it and haven't even started the dark meat yet. We still have some white meat left. I plan on making some casseroles and soups out of the dark meat. I will probably freeze some to use later. Tomorrow, I plan to make stock from the carcass. I think I'll stock up on turkey while they are priced right during the holidays. That way, we can have many cheap meals. I will have to be careful when choosing the birds though, a twenty pound turkey barely fits in my biggest roaster.