Our Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!!!

Here are a few pics of our New Year's Eve / Day celebrations (such as they were).

Robert's brother and his wife are in Alaska on a mission trip, so we invited their three kids over to enjoy fireworks with us.

Caleb was the only one brave enough to do the sparklers.

Here's what Mattie thought of the big fireworks. (Strangely enough, she asked for them more than 10 times today!)

This was a stark improvement over our July festivities! (In July, he spent the entire evening inside... this time he was happy as long as he was on the porch and kept his ears covered.)

Gotta love those big brown eyes...

And here's Jacob keeping his ears covered. He did enjoy them a lot more than this face looks like.

Emily liked watching them from on top of the car!

All the happy kiddos on the porch (as far from the fireworks as possible!).

That was it for our New Year's Eve party. We put the kids in bed by nine. And I got to experience the ultimate event: going to Wal Mart by myself... with almost no one there!

Then I came home and we vegged on the couch long enough to see the ball drop. Don't you wish you were so cool??

Then today was my day to help with the kids, so we made pizza for lunch and then did some New Year's Day learnin' and fun. We talked about the calendar starting over and looked at our 2007 calendar. We closed it after December and opened a new one. (I bought Jacob his own calendar to keep on the wall this year.) This seemed to help the kids understand it was a new something. We also did a printable book from enchantedlearning.com and colored a bit.

Once I got the little ones in bed, we made fireworks with glue and glitter! The older three loved this!

Happy New Year!!

P.S. I know I have some issues with my night pictures. It's not the camera's fault... It's quite difficult to take a picture with a heavy camera at night while holding a toddler clinging with a death grip!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

From us and our cousins!

We've had a great day today! We started out sleeping later than I expected... that alone is cause for celebration! Then we opened stockings, had breakfast, opened kids presents, had some snacks, then opened adult presents.

Jacob has a couple of presents left (that may get held until his birthday at this point), and Mattie still has a ton left! She was so content to open slowly I didn't push her at all. Jacob's favorite was the ascending track risers that he got. He also got a Thomas and Friends video game that he hasn't played yet... I'm pretty sure it will move into the favorite spot as soon as he does!

And Mattie has been so overwhelmed with the twenty people in the house, she's hardly noticed her gifts! Plus she only opened about 5, so she has a lot to go. One major hit was a set of animal finger puppets from IKEA that Kjirstin got her. They are SOOOOO cute! She is also enjoying a teddy bear that lights up and changes colors. (Thanks, Danny!) And I'll let you know more when she's finished! Now that I think of it, she also loved the Thomas tee shirt my mom and dad bought her. She's had it on all day!

My most exciting gift was... a new camera! (A picture of one anyway.) Mine has been dying for a month or so. And I've been wanting one that focuses almost instantly and has a great zoom, so I'm getting to move up a bit! I'm going to get the Canon Digital Rebel XTi. :) Thank you, Honey!!!

And Robert got seasons 1 & 2 of The Office and a great back massager that fits in a comfy chair, so we're set for comfortable entertainment for awhile!

After all of that, we went caroling. We have a family that is gifted musically, and with all of us together we have a pretty solid choir! So we went to carol for one of Mom's friends who lives alone and is in bed with a back injury. Then we went to a nursing home right down the street. We walked in and there were 8 or so people right there, so we jsut stodd right there and caroled for them! A few of them sang along with us and smiled, and a few of the others just sat quietly, but they all enjoyed it. We gave them hugs as we left and they hugged us like they'd known us for years. That's worth getting out of my comfort zone. That is what it's all about...

Tomorrow we have more family coming, so we're having our traditional meal and Happy Birthday, Jesus! party then.

I hope all had a great Christmas day celebration as well!

Sweet sleep breathing

I was finding a bit of joy on my journey last night about midnight. Jacob has been having a really hard time sleeping the past two weeks as a side effect of some medicine. He's been awake for several hours each night anywhere between midnight and 6AM; it's different each night. He is getting better about not coming into our room repeatedly as he's realizing there is nothing I can do for him, but I do think he gets lonely upstairs all by himself for that long. So, last night I let him start in my bed and told him I'd move him into Mattie's room on the floor after she was asleep. Well, I went to bed soon after they did and was afraid she wasn't asleep yet, so I just let him stay in my bed (which is a major treat for him!). When Robert is home I don't sleep a bit with a kiddo in the bed, because it's just too crowded, but without him, it's not bad at all, though not a habit we want to get into.

Anyway, as I was lying there awake last night I was just watching his sweet little face with his thumb in his mouth and "Joe" right next to his face, his sweet, steady breathing sounded so restful. (I wanted to get up and take a picture, but I couldn't make myself get out of bed.) I had just some time to realize what good boy he is. He's sensitive, thoughtful, helpful, bright, giving and tries so hard to do the right thing so many times! And then I remember he's only 5! Only 5. As a mommy I spend so much time correcting behavior, sometimes it's hard to remember what good kids I have. I do have two really good kids.

Our First Respite Day

I am so tired! Today we had our first respite day... basically free babysitting for children with special needs and their siblings under 12 so the parents can have a break. We did it from 9-2 today...kind of a long time for our first one, but we wanted the parents to be able to go Christmas shopping. We had 11 kids (6 with special needs and 5 typical) and 6 helpers (yes, I know that sounds like a lot, but with three autistic boys and one more who are all prone to running off, and four kids who were not confident with pottying, we needed more help than we had! In spite of our exhaustion, we certainly decided it was a great success!!

The parents came back very thankful...one mom spent the day alone with her mom (something she hadn't done in more than 2 years)... another couple got their Christmas shopping done for all their kids!... another mom got some painting done... another went home to an empty house to enjoy it. All of these are things we sooooo take for granted!

We had free playtime, then a puppet show (performed by a 33 year old man with autism!) which was the highlight by FAR, then we did some crafts, read a book, had a pizza lunch and had a "Happy Birthday, Jesus!" party.

We're planning another one for Valentine's Day... with more helpers, another puppet show, and dinners in lunch boxes, I think. And because they loved the puppets so much, we're going to make a puppet with each child to take home. (Most of them were begging for more puppets! Mattie is still talking about them!) I think we'll have more kids then also, because we will have more time to advertise and these parents will have spread the word.

It was a blessing to be able to give these parents a break, and a blessing to be able to share the day with other believers as well! We had a great time.

The 12 Days of Homeschooling

Someone posted this on a message board I read tonight. I thought it was cute.


The 12 Days of Homeschooling By Anonymous

On the first day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“Can you homeschool legally?”

On the second day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“Are they socialized, can you homeschool legally?”

On the third day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“Do you give them tests, are they socialized, can you homeschool legally?”

On the fourth day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“What about P.E., do you give them tests, are they socialized, can you homeschool legally?”

On the fifth day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“YOU ARE SO STRANGE! What about P.E., do you give them tests, are they socialized, can you homeschool legally?”

On the sixth day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“How long will you homeschool, YOU ARE S0 STRANGE, what about P.E. , do you give them tests, are they socialized, can you homeschool legally?”

On the seventh day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“Look at what they’re missing, how long will you homeschool, YOU ARE SO STRANGE!,
what about P.E., do you give them tests, are they socialized, do you homeschool legally?”

On the eighth day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“Why do you do this, look at what they’re missing, how long will you homeschool, YOU ARE SO STRANGE, what about P.E. do you give them tests, are they socialized, do you homeschool legally?”

On the ninth day of homeschool my neighbor said to me, “They’ll miss the prom, why do you do this, look at what they’re missing, how long will you homeschool, YOU ARE SO STRANGE!, what about P.E. do you give them tests, are they socialized, do you homeschool legally?”

On the tenth day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“What about graduation, they’ll miss the prom, why do you do this, look at what they’re missing, how long will you homeschool, YOU ARE SO STRANGE!, what about P.E., do you give them tests, are they socialized, can you homeschool legally?”

On the eleventh day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“I could never do that, what about graduation, they’ll miss the prom, why do you do this, look at what they’re missing, how long will you homeschool, YOU ARE SO STRANGE, what about P.E., do you give them tests, are they socialized, can you homeschool legally?”

On the twelfth day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“Can they go to college, I could never do that, what about graduation, they’ll miss the prom, why do you do this, look at what they’re missing, how long will you homeschool, YOU ARE SO STRANGE, What about P.E., do you give them tests, are they socialized, can you homeschool legally?”

On the thirteenth day of homeschool I thoughtfully replied:
“They Can go to college, yes you can do this, they can have graduation, we don’t like the prom, we do it cuz its best, they are missing nothing, we’ll homeschool forever, WE ARE NOT STRANGE!, We give them P.E., and we give them tests, they are socialized, AND WE HOMESCHOOL LEGALLY!

On the fourteenth day of homeschool my neighbor said to me,
“How can I get started, why didn’t you tell me, where do I buy curriculum, when is the next conference, WILL PEOPLE THINK WE’RE STRANGE? I think we can do this, if you will help us, can we join P.E. and we’ll homeschool legally.”