The Squatters Have Multiplied!!

Well, the little bird's nest we found in our camping chair, now has four new residents. The eggs have hatched and they are SOOOO tiny and new.

Bringing some dinner.

A Full Weekend

Well we had a fun and full weekend. On Saturday, while I was making some belated birthday gifts, Charley and Joshua went on a hike to their favorite lake. Joshua is getting so big and he really loves to go with his Papa and hike. Then on Sunday our church held the annual Celebrate America party complete with bicycle parade for the kids, hotdogs, lemonade, orchestra, and fireworks. It was such a great family fun evening!

Our little man just marching to beat the band!! He just looks so tall!!

Okay, THIS is the look that he uses sometimes, when he is in the time out chair and I am talking to him about being disobedient or sassy. At times it is very difficult not to laugh. How does he know how to use that at just the appropriate time!!!????

Sweet boy.

"My am so big!" (He uses 'my' instead of 'I')

Digging around in the dirt.

So here is a little squatter we found in our camping chair, in our car port, when we went to pack it up in the car for the party last night. She has 3 little eggs in there!!


Captain USA on his parade trike!

Riding around the parking lot with his buddies. This is Eli.

Checking out the airplanes overhead.

Waiting in line for the parade to start.

How fun! I remember being in these fun bike parades!! I will have to see if I can find the picture and post it.

Riding across the stage in the bicycle parade.

Okay, and now for a good laugh!! Here I am in 4th grade. We had a bicycle parade on the last day of school.

Okay, I am thinking that our playground was looking pretty barren!!

VBS Week

This week, at our church, was VBS week. The theme was Outrigger Island, using Hawaii and all things tropical, the Truths of the Bible were taught. It has been an awesome week! Yesterday, 80 children gave their lives to the Lord! It has been such fun. I have been team teaching first grade and Joshua has been in with his 3 year old class. The preschoolers had a separate program from the elementary kids, but they also used the Outrigger Island curriculum. Joshua has really come out of his shell this week in his class. He has been pretty quiet and does not do much talking when he is in Sunday school or Mother's Day Out. But when they began the week with their daily morning worship time, he apparently just bubbled over with the music and has gone non-stop since!! They say that he dances and is so animated! Now mind you, we see this at home all the time, but how exciting that he is letting others enjoy this gift of joy that bubbles over in him! We are just so blessed to have been chosen to love and raise him!! THANK YOU GOD!!!

Joshua's whole group worship.

Classroom worship time with Miss Ginger, who by the way, has iconical status among the children! He literally broke free from my hand and RAN screaming to her at the special pizza dinner last night for VBS family night. She said to me, "I feel like the Beatles must have felt. But these little friends are much more precious than a Beatles fan!!"





Riding the VBS train with Erin!!

This is during the VBS program for families last night. The preschoolers sang a few numbers.

Joshua was just singing and dancing his heart out!!

He did not stand still the whole time.



I guess he likes to sing and dance for Jesus!!

Yard Work Day

Well Saturday morning we spent some time working out in our yard. Good hard work. Our friend Sean and his nephews came and mowed on Friday and then we raked up the grass and then cleared out some areas. This has not been done in probably a decade or more, so it is much needed. We just piled the stuff in our fire pit and had a big old bonfire! Kinda cool! By the lunch time we were wiped out and it was hot, so we came inside and rested and then did some more there. Here are some pics of our day.

Sean and Noah on the big old mower.

Joshua, who loves to be around the mower but is a little sensitive to the LOUD NOISE it makes.

T.J mowing as well.



Our little helper.

He just loves that wheelbarrow!

Rennovations

So here are a few of the things we have been doing in the past 4-6 weeks, since we moved into our house. YIKES!!! What a job! We had some wonderful friends, Don and Peggy who labored tirelessly to scrape the "popcorn" off the ceiling and then paint the ceiling and the paneling in the whole house. What a blessing that we could at least have it painted, carpet removed and somewhat cleaned before we moved into it!!

The house is about 1800 sq ft and sits on about 2 1/2 acres. Lots of trees and space.

Before we began the work.

This is the room we had our stuff stored in!!

Lots of stuff!!

The lovely pink carpet that we removed.

The lovely linoleum, which is still there, for now!

The kitchen peninsula that we tore out.

A crazy built in "desk" that we tore out.

The dining area.

Removal of the wall!

The wall and peninsula are gone!!


Here is where that "desk" was. We found this lovely little mouse nest under neath!
Joshua and Aunt Peggy making roads in the "popcorn" rubble.


Prepping to paint.

Scraping the ceiling.

Carpet removal with benefit of official supervisor!

The next big job is painting the kitchen cabinets which have this heinous layer of crud on them so just scraping them clean is quite a hefty task.

Not sure if the photo really does it justice, but this is the goopy stuff coming off the cabinet doors!

We will post "after" photos a bit later, after the mess is more cleaned up!!