Wow.....where has the time gone??

Where has the time gone? We've been soooo busy that time just flew and here I am almost 2 months w/o a post!! About mid to late Oct Brianna and I started rehearsals for American Theatre's production of "A Christmas Carol". Between having school Monday through Friday myself in the mornings, then play practice Monday through Friday evenings, we've been super busy! I realized in going through my pictures to post that I didn't even take ANY pictures on Thanksgiving :( And the only pics I DID take in November were the ones from going to see Rhema's lights! So here are a couple of those.........

And of course with kids you MUST have a pic w/funny faces :)

My next task is going to be to post some pics of/from the play. Once it's done on Dec 23 we will have done 14 performances!!

Education on weather

One of our support groups hosted a local weather lady to come in and do a demonstration and talk about weather. We talked about different weather conditions and how they produce different types of storms as well as how to handle different weather situations.

Here they were showing some static electricity.
Since she had them mess their hair up, she let them mess hers up too :)
Then she had them practice what to do in a tornado and explained why...

If I can find it I also have a short video of when she had some volunteers (Ethan got to be one) simulate a thunder storm forming :)

History, close to home :)

For our history lesson one day we had grandma over with a bunch of things her parents had kept from history and old family pictures. I never grew up knowing much about either side of my family's history as 3 out of 4 of my grandparents were dead before I was born. The remaining grandparent I only met once in my tween years then he died before I turned 20. So it was very neat and interesting to get to see a piece of MY history. A glimpse into my family's past. We all had a neat time, my mom relive some wonderful memories as well as learning some new things herself, and the kids and I seeing a piece of history that had personal meaning :)

This was a math/riddle book of mind teasers that had belong to my grandpa as a boy or young man.

This shows the size of this pocket size book :)
Just more memories.....
This dress we believe belonged to my grandma or her sister, we aren't sure.
Doesn't this picture almost look like it could have been pulled out of history!

Projects

My mom found out about an art contest that a local group was doing to come up with art for their slogan about the importance of family, and what family means to the individual doing the drawing. It was a rather last minute thing as we found out about it only a few days before the contest ended, but we decided to give it a try anyways, maybe next year we can do some more planning for it......but the kids still had fun and did a great job!

Like Pumpkin Spice lattes??

Then here's a recipe for you :)

PUMPKIN SPICE LATTE

Which soil are you?

I want to be the soil that hears the word, understands it, doesn't take offense (of persecution or tribulation), and keeps the weeds of life (cares of the world, deceitfulness of riches, and desires for other things) plucked out! You see, in Mark 4 all four soil types HEARD the word, but it was what they did after that that made the difference. The first soil heard but didn't understand. The second heard but became offended when trial and persecution came. The third heard, began to produce fruit but was choked out by more attention being given to (1)the cares of this world,(2) deceitfulness of riches, and (3)desires for other things. BUT The fourth accepts the word and bears fruit....he meditates on it (muttering, repeating, and pondering) continually that he may be a doer of it allowing it to transform him!! God has given the seed, are we doing our part with the soil?? :)

Kids say the cutest things...

So we were sitting there chatting after dinner and David tells this joke about how some men figured out how to make man so they talked with God and told him they should get equal rights since they too know how to make man. He says go ahead, you say you can do this, sure I'll share my power with you if you can. So the men scoop up a pile of dirt and God stops them saying wait, you have to make your own dirt, I made that! David then has to explain to the kids about how since God made EVERYTHING how can we create anything God hasn't given us. He then questioned the kids, "Right? What is anything we can have that God hasn't given us?" to that, Caleb replied, "A spirit of fear."

Can you tell what scripture we've covered alot in our home?

Branson outing

Brianna has been singing "I Won't Grow Up" from Peter Pan for voice lessons and her teacher recommended taking her to see the production in Branson. So Mom and Tim took me and her to Branson to see it! We all loved it :) But just as interesting was our visit at The College of the Ozarks....nicknamed Hard Work U.

As of right now she's proclaimed this is where she wants to go to college and we're all for it!
The philosophy of the college is so neat and most students get the opportunity to work in their field during school. The university has a bakery, hospital, their own dairy and much more. Either all or most of their students work throughout the school year (at the university, in some area) during the school year and some work throughout the summer to pay their room and board. I think it's such a neat way to give them experiance and teach them a good work ethic! Anyway, here's our mini visit to the milking station.
MOO!

And Brianna getting autographs after the show :)

And of course a few trips to the zoo :)

We actually got to see so many animal that we don't get to see very often in our 2 trips this summer.

Kinda funny that we have goats and sheep yet the kids still love to go to the petting zoo :) They had some young Nubian goats this time!




My "boys" climbed this "BIG" rock :)






Grammy even made it on this trip!
It was so cute, Caleb was being such a big brother helping Micah out.....and Micah was letting him :)

Fun with Famiy

My Dad, Stepmom, little brother and sister came to visit in mid July and we had a wonderful time! Here are just a few of the shots of the kids playing together and having fun.




Kate is only a few years older than the girls so they love hanging out with her, and Robbie is wonderful with all the kids and keeping them inline ;)



The last day there were in town they made it out to our house for a bonfire. Micah spent some "quality time" with Dad talking him out of his Whoppers! LOL







Those would be Ethan's feet at the top of this picture as he's sitting IN the basket ball hoop!
Micah wanted Kate to help with the marshmellow shooter ;)