A HOT SUMMER

Well as summer comes to an end.....I will attempt to catch up on this blog once again. It was extremely hot this summer...which I just love. I love to swim and so the weather was perfect for that. I really won't enjoy swimming if its not REALLY hot out and so this summer was just great for that. My next door neighbor Dickie blessed us this year by paying for a pool membership at our community pool (Town Creek). It was awesome !! We went there almost everyday of the summer that was hot and sunny and made some very nice friends there as well.





So mostly we slept in late, played with the doggies and then off to the pool for the day.
Brianna has learned four different swimming strokes this summer....she swims like a fish. Christian has done really well this year and can now do the doggie paddle with no swimmy vest on. He wears it mostly so I can relax and not have to watch his every move but likes to take it off once in a while to shine !!

Our church sponsored a MEGA SPORTS CAMP this summer in July. It was HOT but so much fun. It was a vacation bible school that also featured a sports theme. The kids had a choice of baseball or basketball. So along with learning about the King of Glory they also got to learn how to participate in a sport. They loved it. Christian couldn't do it cuz he was too young...but Brianna chose baseball and did very well. The men who coached kept commenting on how well she hits the ball. It runs in our blood !!



I have many photos from this summer that I will soon post....but my computer is being silly tonight....and it's really late. So come back again to see the pics...

We also enjoyed visting my father and his wife Barbara this summer in South Carolina. They always welcome us into their home each summer and we double it as a beach vacation. They live in Conway, SC which is about 20 minutes from Myrtle Beach. We usually stay with them for three or four days and then stay on the beach for a couple days at the end. So lovely down there. Dad and Barbara love the Lord so staying in their home is quite comfortable for me and my family. My dad taught Christian how to fish this year and the first thing that he caught was a very large turtle !! So cute.

Since we have returned from the beach.......our fall classed at church have begun again and I am teaching the Rainbows class for the 3 and 4 year olds....what a joy. My rainbows are just so smart and loving and fun !! My co-sponsor for this class is Leslie O'Conner and she is wonderful. I will teach a month and then she will teach a month while I sit in service and hear Gods Word. It is working out great !!

I was totally blessed today with a gift on freecycle !! A woman GAVE me her pool and filter and pump. I am blown away by people's goodness. I give a lot away on freecycle as well....but a swimming pool? God you are too good to me.

I got to visit with my good friends the other day whom I have missed dearly. Kathie and I had some good laughs, great adult conversation and a fun trip the the Bend and Dent??? Amish store on Parsons Mill Road. Sarah was there and Ruthie so you know Brianna was in her glory ..... Sarah and I click and I enjoy her company so much. Even tho she is modern and I am country !! lol. I love that entire family and thank God for meeting them through FREECYCLE !! Yes I was looking for a cookbook on freecycle and Kathie out of the goodness of her heart invited me into her home to teach me. SO kind.

Well it's like almost 1 am and everyone is sleeping....so I guess I need to bring this to an end and spend some alone time with God. THanks for bearing with me on this inconsistency problem I am dealing with. Sarah asked me to pray for her to get into this special college class.....I did. Lots of people prayed...and God answered. She is IN !! So I fully expect her to share all the notes....so maybe just maybe I can overcome my most bothersome problem of inconsistency !!

Until next Blog.....live life to the full......know that Jesus loves you JUST where you are and BE BLESSED !!

I am going to attempt to catch up here since I have been horribly inconsistent with this blog. If I can't do something perfectly I tend not to do it at all so I will try to at least put something up and do my best to better about it.

Pool : Every year for the past 4 years we have had a swimming pool in our backyard. The walmart kind with the inflatable ring on top. We LOVE it. It serves our needs just fine and we actually have friends kids over all summer to enjoy it as well. Each year at the end of the season it gets cleaned out, dried out and rolled up to store for the winter months. The next season....its up again. Well, last fall my hubby would not help me clean,dry,roll it up so it sat. Much too heavy for me to manage alone. It sat through the winter and the multiple blizzards and so now has cracks all throughout the liner. SO SAD. We are beside ourselves without a pool so here is our humorous attempt to keep cool this summer !!



A friend of mine from church named Meghan just gave birth to a precious baby girl named Kayla Elizabeth and here is a photo of Brianna holding her at St. Mary's hospital. She weighed in at 5.7 pounds and 19 inches long. What a gift from God.
Brianna is a little mommy at heart.



I have asked God for a bike and he promptly responded. A friend from church provided me with her old mountain bike which only needed one new tire and tube. Now me and the kiddies take bike rides all the time. On this particular day i was walking Daisy and the kids rode their bikes. Christian made it to the dead end on our street all by himself on his little bike that the Peissners gave to us. At the end of our road is a beautiful farm and we really enjoy the peaceful scene.



Yesterday I heard it would be 91 and so without our pool to cool off I decided to take the kids over to the beach which is about 4 minutes from my house. Its nice in June but once the water warms up the jellyfish are too much and the kids can't swim. They had a great time swimming and playing in the sand. We stayed for about two hours...
We are so blessed to live in a beautiful county surrounded by water with access to beaches like this. I love Southern Maryland !!!







Now I am off to soccer practice with Brianna. Tonight is her very last practice and her last game is tomorrow. Then off to the coaches house tomorrow for an end of year party for the team and family members. That should be fun. The coach is Dan Seep who is a NAVY guy from Pax and he is just really super with the children. He HAS to know Jesus just from the way he conducts himself and I admire him for that.

I will try to update more frequently...so please check back !!!

Be Blessed !!

Here is a photo from the snow blizzard we had in Feb. We had a house guest from church come get snowed in with us since her hubby was away. Her and her two year old daughter stayed about 7 days. During her stay we bundled up and took a VERY LONG walk in the middle of a blizzard condition to our local Walmart. What fun that was. She is pregnant and I have a hernia but we made it there with my two little ones. They did very well. Jimmy had her baby in the truck and don't you know he ended up at walmart to make sure we were okay. So sweet. So we opted to RIDE home with him instead of walking. I LOVED the snow....and we had a lot of fun in it.



I just love the fact that my little girl who just turned 7 still enjoys playing dress up with her friends. This pic is of her and Carissa and they had a lot of fun changing outfits over and over. So cute. I don't EVER remember doing that when I was young.



Recently my kids were invited to a bowling birthday party and they enjoyed it SO much that Jimmy and I took them bowling at our local lanes...(Esperanza) and they really had a great time. Both of them love it and must get this from daddy. He is an expert bowler.....who actually gets 300 once in a while.

Kyle got a job at Catamarans Seafood Restaurant in Solomons Island right on the pier. He loves it. Great money....the people he works with are nice and he really feels good when he dresses up. So here he is my gorgeous boy all ready for work. He can't stand me taking his picture so he won't look at me......


Well it's movie time AGAIN and so I will post more another day.

Be Blessed !!

T

Okay so yeah it's been forever since I have posted. I know. Just been busy and not taking the time to put my thoughts down in words.

A lot has happened so I don't know where to start other than to just start from today....and as I remember things from the last month I will post them also.

Today we went to Kristins' house for a play day. It's always fun cuz I have some adult conversation and the kids get to play with her children. She and I drank coffee and chatted. I kept the boys and she and Brianna went to pick up Kai from school. Then we all stayed outdoors in the sun (which was supposed to be rain today) so we were blessed there. She has a wonderful backyard with a swingset and slide and a trampoline so it's big fun for the little ones.

My muscles are really sore today because my son Kyle was showing me some exercises that I could do that would not affect my hernia. WOW. Really out of shape I guess. I am super feeling it today.

Did school with Bri this morning. She is reading so well now so it's so impressive to sit back and listen to her actually sounding the words out and figuring it out.



Well a few weeks ago Kyle was in a very bad car accident in Hollywood. It was on 235 at Clover Hill Road. 4 accidents have occured there within a two week period and one was a fatal. Sad. All due to a 15 foot pile of snow that the St. Mary's County snow removers piled high and wide at the median strip leaving NO room to see oncoming traffic. Horrible. Kyle was hit in rear end and the explorer he was driving was spun completely around. It scared him pretty bad. No one was injured thank the Lord. Here is a picture of the explorer. I am so thankful he was driving that instead of his Honda Civic. This truck is solid like a tank. Not sure if the outcome would have been so good for him had he been driving his car that day.... God is GOOD. His Hand is ON Kyle.....Thanks to good friends who pray immediately when I ask them to.




This pic below was the OTHER vehicle that hit Kyle. He was nice and had three very young children with him. Thank GOD for protecting angels.




School has been going great....we have lots of fun learning and Christian goes right along with the school program so he is getting smart right along with Bri. He loves it. Here is a photo of them in Art Class doing some painting.




Last Friday evening I attended our Annual Tea Party at church. All the ladies get together once a year and have a lot of fun drinking hot drinks and laughing and fellowshipping with one another. We each bring a tea cup filled with change to donate. This year the monies collected went to an orphanage in Haiti. Then we exchange tea cups with another lady there ...and add our name and the year to the tag. Each year the cups go home with a new person and you are supposed to pray for the last person on the tag everytime you use the cup during that year. Its neat. Some people wear silly hats.....and here is ONE really good example of that. This is Florence but she LOVES to be called FLO. lol




We have been thoroughly enjoying the spring like weather lately and have been outdoors A LOT. Having breakfast out on the back deck and cleaning the yard up. Three dogs can put a hurting on a back yard....they chewed up a lot of things...and so I was picking up for many hours. Not good for the back. Kyle helped me move the old pool and so under it was some nice playing sand for the kids. They call it the beach !! They got some buckets and shovels and love playing in the sand. I enjoy sitting out back and watching them play...



Well I could go on and on but I need to upload a lot more photos....and I am too sleepy right now to do that. Thanks for having patience with me. I do so much enjoy writing here and hope you will continue to read and keep up with my life.

Be Blessed !! T

Well it's been a long while since i have been on here. I couldn't figure out my password and was frustrated trying to get a new one cuz my computer got a virus of some sort and was freezing up..... so now my computer is clean again....and I am back in the game. A lot has happened so I will try to give a quick synopsis of my life in the last few weeks.
Both kids got a well needed haircut....by mommy. Brianna didn't pose for the camera that night so only got Christian.... He looks so handsome.




Another really fun thing is that my dryer went out. An almost brand new dryer...a Maytag too... it was continually heating even when turned off. Scary for me since I have lived through a house fire before. No thanks. I unplugged it and have been waiting TWO weeks for the repairman to show up. We have a 4 year warranty on it thank goodness. I just need to put pressure on the people instead of being TOO nice. In the meantime I have had so much fun hanging wet clothes all around the house. NOT. It is aggravating but I have to do something. I couldn't find enough places to hang all of the little kiddie socks...so I rigged up a nice redneck dryer using my pellet stove.

Hey it worked....dont laugh...

This blanket is one I made years ago....a friend of mine got me started on a granny square and I just kept on going. I love the colors in it. I am such a dark blue person although lately I am somehow getting excited about the sage greens....which I never thought I would like...

Here is a granny square that my friend Sara started for me. I still can't START one by myself though....ugh

One of the gifts my mom gave to Brianna this year was a Paula Deen cooking apron. It's really cute. The pockets had some cooking utensils just her size. Too cute. Here is a pic of her posing in it.

While helping my friend Sandra out by taking Mariah to cello lessons, I had the opportunity of talking with her instructor Miss Sue. She offered me free piano lessons for Brianna in leiu of working at her music studio a couple hours two days a week. Just sitting in the shop to keep it open while she goes to a college class. Awesome !! I have been wanting to get lessons for Bri but cannot afford it. So as much as I DO NOT like leaving my home ....and I am not a morning person at all,...I guess this is God saying hey this is your chance...so I may take her up on it.

I did a lot of SITTING in my recliner for about a week cuz I woke up last Sunday with a pounding headache. That's what I thought. By the end of the day it was still pounding and motrin was not helping. I figured out a couple days later it was actually a pinched nerve in my neck. OUCH. It's way better now...Praise the Lord for that.

The weather has been weird...warm day and then back to cold. Getting me excited about spring and then hear we may get snow this weekend.

Church has been awesome. I got to visit the Fredericksburg Prayer Furnace and oh my goodness that was a great time. We stayed till midnight and then had a two hour drive home. I would love to go every Friday night but the drive is hard and that's a lot of gas money.

Life is good......God is awesome. Brianna is now 7 and didn't want to have a birthday party ON her actual birthday because big brother Kyle wouldn't be home. So if the snow is not too bad this weekend she will have cake and ice cream on Sat. afternoon. Big brother will be flying in this wed or thurs !!

Well I sure do miss my visits with Kathie the cook and her six children. I need to get over there again soon. This week I shall be cleaning and organizing so maybe next week will work. I really need a day to learn all about...ground beef. It's cheaper than most meat and I have no clue what to do with it other than spaghetti sauce.

I am enjoying a nice quiet evening for once. Everyone went to bed at a decent hour. It's just me and the computer. I think I will do my online reading for the bible in a year and then go to IHOP 24 hour prayer center live and fall asleep listening to them sing.

Enjoy your week and as always ....

Be Blessed !!

Today was a great school day !! While Brianna was excited that she got an A on her math test and her spelling test, I was excited that she did well on her reading comprehension. We had a good day and of course Christian wants to be in school as well so he sat down to work on tracing the alphabet letters. Pretty good work for a three year old. He is such a good boy.



So another big excitement for me today was receiving a free sewing machine and table. A girl on freecycle gave it away !! Its an older table that could use some resurfacing work on top and the machine is a really old Sears Kenmore model. It had all the original paperwork with it and extra needles and other things that I haven't fully investigated just yet. Jimmy went to pick it up for me since it was heavy and when he brought it through the front door I happened to be cooking dinner. So I quickly snapped two photos for my blog and I will get acquainted with the new machine later tonight.
I cannot believe the things I have received from free cycle. It's truly amazing to me. I have given lots of things myself...mostly clothing but it is truly a blessing to use this site and save the landfills. Of course if I can't get the machine to work properly I will have Dr. Kathie take a look at it. She is my resident genius when it comes to sewing machines...lol.


Since the top is kinda messed up I may just sand it down and paint it a nice color to fit into the living room/dining room atmosphere.

















Our dinner tonight was baked Chicken and homemade mac and cheese and corn. The dinner was delicious. Jimmy love it !! Means I am getting better at cooking. I spent a couple hours today cleaning the toy area.....and its still a complete zoo minus the live animals...lol. We also began the fun process of taking the tree down. Most all of the decorations are meaningful or homemade so we have to be extra careful taking them down so as not to break/tear any. Now I will have the entire corner back....yippee for space !!!!!!!!!!!!! I could really use some organizational help here. A lady at my church offered to come help me but I am too embarrassed for her to see the mess. Anyways, tomorrow I will work some more on the toys and try to catch up on the laundry!! We are watching a movie now so I will end this for today. Stay warm. Supposed to snow tonight again !!!

Be Blessed !!

Okay it's been a while since I sat down to write here...and boy do i need it. Good therapy for me. Last night it snowed so its super pretty here. I love waking up to a beautiful white scenic view out of every window. It makes our home brighter.


I have a lot to catch up on ...starting with Brianna has really taken an interest in cooking. So the other day she asks if she can make us lunch. I was more than happy to let her. She used her new Paula Deen Cookbook for kids that mammaw bought her last year at Christmas. She made us a delicious homemade pizza. It was so good I had to take a picture of it since it's her first. She did it all by herself too.



I took Ky back to North Carolina this past Sunday. We left around 8:30 or 9:00 ish and had a very nice ride ALONE to his base. He slept for a couple hours but for the most part we got to talk and laugh and just be together which I miss so much. I love him so much it hurts. God gives us a love for our children that I cannot understand. It's so deep and unconditional and wonderful. Wish God gave us that kind of love for other people too. That is not so natural...lol We got a good laugh at some of the small towns in North Carolina and how really backward they are. WOW. I had no clue that people living only 6 hours away were that behind the times. Some towns were only a few streets long and their biggest excitment was a Handy Mart gas station. Oh my I would go nuts there. Anyways people are different and that is a good thing I guess.
We had the directions from mapquest and a GPS and still got lost. Their roads are not updated in the system I guess. We went an hour out of the way. I still have no clue where Camp Johnson is but we did find Camp LeJeune and called a taxi from there to come get him. I drove home alone. Took about 6 and a half hours....stopped for strong alert coffee around Richmond. I sang and cried most of the ride home. Partly missing Kyle and partly the music just gets to me. I am moved by music. Alone time in a car is really nice.

Back to school and we are getting back into the groove of studying after a long holiday break. Bri writes about God in her daily journal and Christian has a dry erase wipe board that he traces his alphabet letters on. He wants to be in school too !!

Tuesday I had a Dr appointment in Waldorf......I hate that drive. Dr. Leon has a lot in store for me. X-rays, and surgery, and bloodwork and prolotherapy ....I will be busy the next couple months with all that. I pray my back will finally feel better after the new prolotherapy treatments and after my surgery I won't have to walk around with this large hernia in my belly. Getting old is so much fun. Too much dancing when I was younger I guess has now taken it's toll on my body.

Thursday I went to my friends house to make a new church dress for Bri. So much fun. Sarah had make some yummy beefaroni (homemade) and after that we got to work. She is my instructor for sewing and gets help from sister Anna and mum too !! They are like sewing experts...(in my eyes anyways). The dress came out beautiful and Bri loves it.









Thank you Sarah, Anna and Kathie for your loving patience and expertise. I want to go back really soon to do more cooking !!
Last night I made a matching purse with leftover material and today I am making a slip. So today is Friday and I am in some pain but not too bad. I will not do too much in the house today. Trying to figure out the elastic part of the slip and waiting for Sarah and Ruthie to come over to play..... Life is good. Enjoy every minute of it.

Be Blessed !!