No Field Day today!?!

Well friends, today was supposed to be field day. I organize this event for our homeschooling group every year, at least for the past 5 years (I think), and I ALWAYS have a blast with the kids. Do you remember field day? The 100-yard dash, three-legged race, sack race, crabwalk, wheelbarrow race, and then all of the team relays, like the Shoe Relay, Spoon Zoom, Sponge Relay, Fireman Run, and sometimes even tug-of-war (we've broken at least 2 ropes)!! What fun!! I used to LOVE field day when I was in elementary school, especially since it meant we did not have our regular classes for the day and we did my MOST FAVORITE thing (except for reading and watching Little House on the Prairie on tv), which was PLAY OUTSIDE! I grew up in the country, and every summer, my Momma would chase my sister and me outside until lunchtime. After we ate, she'd chase us outside again. My sister and I wouldn't complain, unless it was hot. Then she might hear a groan out of us, but we usually played in the woods across the creek where it was cooler. Or we went wading in the creek. Or we'd swat dragonflies with sticks (my sister and I both now feel sorta bad about that one). Of course, we'd have to look for ticks that night before our baths, but it wasn't any big deal to us back then. Anyway, back to field day. We won't be able to have our field day today because thunderstorms (including a tornado watch) are rolling in from Alabama, and even if they pass before 2 p.m., when our field day is supposed to start, the ground will be wet and muddy, and the temperature will be a little too cool for us to be getting wet (us because the kids seem to find it amusing to get ME wet, too!). We KNOW how to get wet for our field days. We always end with a huge water gun blowout fight! I hope to have our field day next Thursday, which as of right now has a 0% chance of rain and a high in the 70's. That's more like it!! I'll let you know how things go.
Blessings.

Johnston Family Dairy Farm Field Trip

Yesterday, our family went on a field trip with a bunch of other families from my two homeschooling co-ops to the Johnston Family Dairy Farm in Newborn, GA. You can go visit their website at http://www.johnstonfamilyfarm.com/ and see what they're all about. We had a blast!! We got to see cows milked (cool beans! or should I say cool milk!), we got to watch the milk be bottled, and then we got to buy some of the milk to drink!! Perfect with Oreos! Two great things about their milk: 1)It is pasteurized at the lowest possible temperature, which means 90% of the live enzymes are still, well, alive. 2) It is non-homogenized, which means all of those little, bitty fat globules that homogenization creates are not absorbed by the body; half of the big globules pass right through! Yippee!! We also got to play on and in a hay bale maze, make and eat homemade ice cream (thank you, Mrs. Johnston), and go on a hay ride in which Farmer Johnston fed the cows right beside the wagon so we got a close-up and personal look. I really bonded with one cow in particular!! She kept looking at me with "cow eyes!" There were about 75 of us there, and everything went smoothly. We even had a picnic lunch, just in time for the sun to peek through the clouds and warm us up. So, thank you, Farmer Russell Johnston, for a wonderful day on your farm!! And I hope we get to come again soon (real soon, cause I'm gonna need more milk asap)!

Happy Birthday Rachel!!

I'd like to wish my youngest daughter, Miss Rachel, a Happy Birthday!! She is now a tenager!! You read that right. A ten-ager! Being the youngest of seven, life can sometimes be hard for her, but she gives as good as she gets! She already had a sleepover for her birthday, and tonight we're having grandparents over for her birthday dinner. She has chosen fried chicken, mac and cheese (boxed is her favorite), rolls, and fried okra (which I convinced her to change to green beans since the chicken is fried). I'm buying the fried chicken from Publix, since I just don't fry chicken for two reasons: I make a mess when I fry it, and I NEVER fail to burn myself!! Operator error! I would like to say that she somehow manages to drag out her birthday celebration. My 16-year-old son asked me the other day, "Mom, how is it that we all have a birthDAY celebration, but Rachel has a birthWEEK celebration?" I'm not sure how she manages it either. But they don't complain too much, because they benefit, too. For instance, I usually take the birthday child out on the morning of his/her birthday to get breakfast, and they've always insisted on bringing it home to share with siblings, which is a sweet thing, really (though much more $). They usually do doughnuts from Dunkin. But Rachel chose Chickfila for her birthday breakfast (our favorite restaurant, bar none), so we all had Chickfila biscuits, and she had two biscuits with sausage gravy. Yuuummmmmm!

So, here's to you, sweetheart! Happy Birthday. I love you, forever and always!!

Thank you Amy!!

I have been given the Sisterhood Award by my friend Amy over at Cheeky Cocoa Beans. Thank you, Amy!! This award goes to those who display great attitude or gratitude in their blog. In order to accept this award, here are the rules:

1. Put the logo on your blog or post.

2. Nominate at least 10 blogs who you feel are worthy of this award by displaying great attitude or gratitude in their blog!

3. Be sure to link to your nominees within this post.

4. Let your nominees know about the award by commenting on their blog.

5. Link back to the person who gave you this award.



Here are my nominees:

1. Farmgirl Fare

2. Ants-on-a-farm

3. Jennifer Igarashi Official Blog

4. My Home Sweet Home

5. Little Jenny Wren

6. Posie Gets Cozy

7. the simple woman

8. Chas

9. Heart at Home

10. Rose Cottage



Congratulations to some of my favorite blogs!! I have a few more, but I tried to follow the rules!!

Blessings.

Busy Day!!

Wow!! What a week! And yesterday was the busiest day we've had in a while. We had a co-op in the morning in which yours truly taught about colonial culture during the time of the American Revolutionary War. That was fun!! At least for me! I had the kids play the neatest game called Skin the Snake in which the kids form a line, holding hands between their legs. The last one in line lies down on the ground and the others have to back over him while not letting their hands go. As each one in line becomes the last one in line, he has to lie down on the ground. You end up with a line of kids lying down on the ground in a line while holding hands. What fun!! I divided them up into boys and girls. The boys were especially fun to watch because they were falling down on each other and sitting on each other!! I think much of it was intentional. The girls did much better. They also played Blind Man's Bluff and Hen, Hen, Fox (which is basically Duck, Duck, Goose with different animals). I also gave them a Revolutionary Vocabulary matching game in which they had to match colonial vocabulary words with their definitions. Here's an example of just a few of the words: slump, House of Necessity, limner, cooper, cobbler, peel, and syllabub (a foamy colonial drink). I don't know how much the kids took away from my teaching, but I learned a whole lot!!

After lunch, we went to our other co-op for art class and history presentations. I was so proud of my kids!! Matt 's project was about D-Day, and I was amazed by how much he had learned. He had black and white pictures against a black posterboard, which looked cool. And the title on the posterboard was made up of holes punched through it with a screwdriver so it looked like bullet holes. Tom talked about the U.S. pilots and planes in WWII. I didn't realize that women flew planes in WWII, but apparently they did, moving planes from one place to another. They were not allowed to fly combat, but if they were attacked, they were able to fire back. One woman actually had 3 kills, which was halfway to being an ace. Emily's project was about the Amazon Rainforest. She put it on green posterboard and stapled a fake vine around the outside which gave it a jungle look. Rachel has been studying geography this year, so she made a poster about the Arctic with pictures of her favorite Arctic animals on a black posterboard with twinkly stars all over it (representing the clear sky over the Arctic circle). She also had a picture of the northern lights and Robert Peary, who was believed to be the first guy to make it to the geographic north pole. All in all, it was a good experience for my kids, and we had a good time.

After we got home from the co-op, Rachel had 3 friends over for a birthday slumber party. Yaaaaayyy, hot dogs!! Not. But she wanted them, so we had them, and root beer float popsicles for dessert. There were girls running around everywhere, but all seemed to have a good time.
Not another birthday until next month, when my hubby has his!! I wonder if he'll want a slumber party?!? Naaaahhhh.

Blessings.

Congratulations!!

I have been working on organizing a field trip for the two homeschooling groups we are involved with. We are going to a dairy farm!!! The Johnston Family Dairy Farm!! You should check them out at www.johnstonfamilyfarm.com. They are located in Newborn, GA, and they bottle their own milk produced on their own farm by their own cows. How cool is that? We were supposed to go on a field trip to the farm on March 17, which happens to be St. Patrick's Day. We were going to all wear green or dress up as cows or roosters or pigs. Fun stuff like that, ya know. But alas, we have had to change the date of the field trip to March 18, which is not St. Patrick's Day. That is not to say that we can't still wear green; this is a free country, after all. But it just won't be the same. Anywho, the REASON we have to change the date of the field trip is because the farm is in the finals for the TASTE OF GEORGIA competition, which I think must be a pretty big deal for a farm. Their whole milk is in the finals. I sure hope they win after we had to change the field trip and all. Go and bring home that trophy (or ribbon, or plaque, or cow statue) Johnston Family Farms!! We'll see y'all the next day!!

In other news, my 2001 Ford Expedition is back in the shop. Nothing serious, I hope, but that stupid, yellow CHECK ENGINE SOON light is on again, for, like, the 3rd time in 6 weeks. Our mechanic, Todd, gets it fixed, I drive it for a couple of days, and the fool light comes back on. I hate computers!! Well, I don't hate all computers. I am quite fond of the computer whose keys I am currently stroking. This wonderful, handy, reliable, and sleek computer (sorry, I have to sweet talk it every once in a while to keep it happy). But I AM NOT fond of my Expedition's computer because it keeps YELLING at me with that silly yellow light. Anyway, I am stuck at home today because I don't have a ride. It's probably a good thing that I'm stuck at home, because I am forced to do things I would not otherwise do because I'd be gone, like clean a toilet, or make bread, or organize my homeschooling books. So, I guess I'll get off my awesome, sweet, and attractive computer now and grab a toilet brush.
Blessings.

Anybody else sleepy?

I strongly dislike Daylight Saving Time. Why do we have to change the clock? Why can't we just leave well enough alone? Is anybody else out there sleepy? Or is it just me (and ALL of my family)? We were late to church this morning, but not because we forgot to set our clocks forward. We remembered to do that. And it wasn't my husband or my kids that made us late. It was me, yours truly, moi, me. And it wasn't because I overslept, because I didn't, not really. Ya see, we normally leave home at 9:40 on Sunday mornings in order to get to church and get settled for the 10:30 a.m. service (I like leaving myself PLENTY of time). Well, this morning, I woke up at 7:40 and actually left the house at 7:45, but it wasn't to go to church; well, not to my church anyway. Matt's friend's Josh's church had a lock-in last night, and of course, Matt had to go, and of course, Mom had to pick Matt up this morning (I don't know why they chose THIS weekend, time change weekend, to have this lock-in) almost before daylight. So, I picked him up at 8 a.m., we were back home by 8:15, and I got ready for church, right? Wrong. Upon entering my bedroom, I thought (bubble talk here) "I'll just lay down here for just a minute, and then I'll get ready for church." Right? Wrong. I laid down there for almost an hour, during which time my 16-year-old, who got absolutely NO SLEEP, by the way, got a shower and got ready for church, after I had preached at him about how if he went to this lock-in and then wasn't alert for church, he'd be in big trouble. Aaaaahhhh, the energy and endurance of youth!! So, it was MOM who made us late this morning. I did finally get up and get moving, and we did make it to church, and only 10 minutes late, too. I can still move fast when I have to! AND I managed to stay awake this afternoon (well, except for that little bitty catnap), while Matt slept like a tranquilized and tagged elephant. I can't really blame him for that; I'd have done it if the phone ringing off its hook hadn't awakened me (seems no one could find the portable phones, surprise, surprise). Anyway, I think we should all write our Congressmen and complain about this time change. You might be thinking that they have enough to worry about right now with the economy, but I really think that things would look a whole lot brighter if we could just get a really good night's sleep, and it might help the Dow Jones average, to boot!

Blessings.

College already?

Well, I dropped another one (16 years old) off at college Tuesday night!! No, he wasn't going to stay, just to spend the night with his older brother and get a taste of what college life is like. His brother, Jon, is a junior (or is it senior now?) at Georgia College and State University (GCSU) in Milledgeville. It's no coincidence that we chose Jon's busiest days at school to send Matt to visit him. Not only is Jon a college student, but he works full-time too. He has been supporting himself since he graduated from high school, and we're proud of how hard he works. He's a fine young man, and intends to go to law school. Matt was in for a rough intro to college life, since Jon had to work Tuesday from the time Matthew got there until after 11 p.m. He is in charge of the apartment building where he lives; like, he's responsible for all of the residents in the building (over 100 of them). Now, I am overwhelmed somedays being responsible for the 4 I have at home. I can't imagine any more!! But Jon does his job well, and the apartment building is still standing EVEN THOUGH every apartment has its own little kitchen, INCLUDING a stove. Miracles never cease (I remember what it was like when I learned to cook). Matt got to hang out with Jon during his employment duties for the apartment complex, including making rounds twice and compacting the trash, handing out student info and surveys, and meetings. By the way, Jon also works at Chickfila on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. And all of this while maintaining EXCELLENT grades, including being on the President's List (that's a good thing)!

On Wednesday, Matt went to Jon's classes, which is the part of college I really wanted Matt to experience. I have been trying to get him motivated about getting his high school work done and preparing for college, including establishing good study habits and being responsible for his own education and the stuff that makes up his life. Matt got a taste of Medieval Literature, Romanticism, and World History. I think he was impressed with the amount of material covered. He said everyone he met was nice, and he enjoyed listening to the professors. He even took notes!! The hour's ride back home after I picked him up was a wonderful time for us to talk about what he had seen and experienced. He talked about everything that was running around in his head (while eating his combo meal from Wendy's), and I enjoyed listening. My boy is no longer a boy, but a fine young man. Just before we got home (after going to the grocery store at 10:15 p.m., yes, I'm a nut), I asked Matt what his favorite part of his "college experience" was. His answer: "The best part was riding around the apartment complex doing rounds with Jon. He's a crazy golf cart driver!" Maybe there's some of the little boy left in there, after all!! I'm so glad.
Blessings.

Daily Rituals

Most folks who know me know that I have been in the process of simplifying my life for some time now, like, a year and a half. When I first began this process, the folks at Goodwill would smile, real big, when I drove up because they KNEW they were gonna get lots and lots of stuff. I think I made 20 trips to Goodwill in the first 6 months. In our defense, however, I will say that 8 years ago, my husband and I joined our two families, so we each brought a bunch of stuff to the marriage (including 7 awesome kids between us). It was a lot of junk to sort through (not the kids), but we did it, and I'm proud to say that the only stuff in our bedroom now, besides our bed, is a chest of drawers, a bookcase, and a desk with the computer on it (a small desk). Oh, and a pretty green bench that sits at the foot of our bed. It is so much more relaxing now that we've cleared out so much clutter. I am probably going to have to move one more bookcase back in, however, because I usually grade my children's work (we homeschool) in my bedroom, and I need a place for all of those books. All of that was to say this: I have been reading up on simple living and simplifying one's life for over a year now, and have come across an interesting book.

The title of the book is Living a Beautiful Life: 500 Ways to Add Elegance, Order, Beauty, and Joy to Every Day of your Life. It was written by Alexandra Stoddard, was published in 1986 (could I really have graduated that year?), and I checked it out of the library (FREE is such a nice word). Ms. Stoddard reminds us to live each day to its fullest, appreciating each day in the present as a gift to be opened and enjoyed. She suggests that one of the best ways to do this is to work rituals into our lives that make those daily, sometimes mundane tasks something refreshing to our spirit and encouraging to our lives. An example might be playing some of my favorite music and swaying to it while washing the dishes and enjoying the fragrance of my favorite candle. Any Mom with kids KNOWS what it means to have daily, neverending, BORING chores. Washing dishes, laundry, picking up after children. We're glad to do it because we love our families, but it can be draining, and the work never ends. But I like the idea of developing rituals to make those chores more enjoyable, and even refreshing. My bathing ritual might include listening to some soft jazz, lighting a gently scented candle, and then slathering on my favorite lotion after toweling dry with the fuzziest, softest towel ever made. My morning ritual might include getting up before the children and reading my Bible while drinking my hot tea and listening to instumental hymns. In the summer, I might do this while sitting on the back porch watching the sunrise, and hearing the birds twitter away in the early morning. My "picking up" ritual might include popping a piece of my favorite bubble gum in my mouth (memories of childhood) and beebopping to my favorite pop or dance music and singing along ( being careful NOT to swallow the bubble gum, or let it fall out of my mouth into my hair, not that I've ever done that before... no, not me).

So, what rituals would you add to your life to totally involve your senses and wake you up to each moment of your life? Leave me a post and let me know.

Blessings.

The life of Drama Mama

Welcome to the drama that is my life!! I am not necessarily a dramatic sort of person myself, but my children have somehow managed to pull the whole drama gene out of the proverbial hat. I don't know how they managed it, but they have. Thus the name of this here blog, because I am wrapped in drama not of my own making.

I guess you need to know a little about me. I am wife to 1, Mom to 7, Granny to 1 (and 1 on the way, praise the Lord), sister to 1 (hey Kim), Sister (as in the Lord) to all in my church family, daughter (hey Pop and Gran), chief cook, bottlewasher, maid, and teacher. I'm sure there are a lot more hats upon my head (I feel the weight on so many days), but that's enough for now. We live in Conyers, GA, which is just east of the metropolis that is Atlanta. But alas, Atlanta is growing and absorbing all that is in its path, so we have had our house on the market for over a year now. Yeah, great timing on our part. We live our lives in the Lord's hands, however, so we know He'll send a buyer when He's ready, whether or not we are. It's hard sometimes, though, not to try to help, and to just trust and obey, or obey and trust, which is probably more accurate. All this to say, if you need a house in Conyers, GA, leave me a note and we'll see what we can do!

I recently had a front porch sale at my house in which I placed all of the stuff (ummm, treasures) we no longer needed. We did okay, although my Dad made half as much money as I did and he wasn't even here! The funny thing was, I actually had my front porch for sale!!

I'm not really sure of this blog's purpose, except maybe to give me a place to brag on my kids, or keep up with my appointments, or even vent on occasion. I do pray that all that is said (or typed) here will be glorifying to my Lord and Saviour. Blessings.