Some random thinking

As I was washing dishes and getting dinner started this morning, I was going thinking through what needed to be done today. I just started thinking of how great God has been to this family of mine. Yesterday I traded in my van and purchased a newer van. I was thinking how that mini van that I had purchased a year and a half ago was my first big purchase on my own after the divorce. I was so thankful of that accomplishment. It was an oldie but served us very well. I had little trouble with it. We worked hard to keep it clean and wash it weekly. It paid off in that I actually made a little money when I sold it. I was able to purchase a newer car with many new exciting features. Including my favorite - the radio controls on the steering wheel and the boys favorite - a tv and dvd player as well as wireless headphones and a remote control. I love that I was able to pay cash and provide us with a nicer vehicle. Another step in this single life journey. Ok so back to my thinking of how God has blessed us and taken care of us and I realized I don't just want to be thankful. I want to be a good steward of what God has given us. I want the boys to realize my wanting them to help out and keep things clean is not just so we have a clean and organized home but also to show our thanks to God who has given us all things. I know I will still fail, I can not possibly keep my home clean at all times (hello I have 5 boys) but it  was just a great way of thinking and encouraging myself to keep up in training the boys as well as being grateful for all we have. It seems I have grown so much in learning to be thankful for things. I have come to appreciate Gods blessings in my life in a deeper way then I use to. I thank God for working in my life in that way.

Spring break 2014

I was so super excited for spring break. I love having my boys home. I actually was suppose to finish my quarter after spring break but I wanted to enjoy my guys so I worked extra hard and finished up my quarter on Saturday. I was beyond ready for this quarter to end. It was a rough quarter. Some family issues had happened lately that kept me occupied and running in different directions. I took on an couple of extra part time day care children plus often had my nephews and niece. I feel like I could not have done this quarter without some help. So thank you to my friends that let me use your children in my observations and assessments. Thank you to my boys for being understanding on the nights they had to put themselves to bed on their own while I studied and for the extra help around here. Thanks to my dad whom helped with computer scanning on many assignments. Thanks to my friend's daughter who helped majorly with submitting and making my assignment "pretty" when I had no idea how (got an A+ on the assignment, you rock AW). I do not plan to take on as much at school as I did this quarter. I have signed up for 3 classes next quarter. Thankfully they only have 1 text book per class so hopefully not as much reading.

Here is our spring break recap:
Day 1: Hike at pioneers park with 7 boys. Our morning started with me beginning spring cleaning. (how come cleaning is so much more fun when you call it spring cleaning?) After lunch we hit the grocery store for some snacks and went to pioneers park. It was a beautiful day.

Don't even ask. There really are no words for this picture other then to say oh how I love this guy. He was a trooper hanging with a bunch of kids all week.

Love, love, love this picture. They are a great group of guys and I feel so blessed to have spent the day with them.

    Day 2: We all went and worked at church in the am. Then we went to kids eat free at Valentino's. We then went to the movies. They had $5.00 movies with a popcorn. The younger boys and I went to Mr. Peabody and Sherman and the older boys went to a different movie.

 

Day 3: we went to Morrill Hall. They have a new display so we went to check it out. Sadly I had taken meds for a headache without taking food and got a stomach ache so we ended up leaving before everyone was ready but we did enjoy the couple hours we were there.

 That evening we enjoyed the skate night for Awanas. Sadly my phone was dead and my camera was left at home so no pictures. But is was a fun night for mom and kids alike.

 Day 4: Try a pinterest recipe for breakfast. Pancakes on bacon. Pretty easy and pretty good. I used turkey bacon. (I love turkey bacon) I was ready for a day at home so our big adventure of the day was going to toys r us for the Disney infinity sale and got the boys the new one they had been wanting but we could not find. We then fired up the grill for dinner and had family over. We then decided on a late night park time. We ended up at Mahoney park until after 9:30. The younger boys and I then went to bed and the older boys did movie night.

Day 5: Friends day. The boys had three extra friends over. (I don't feel comfortable adding friends kids pictures here without permission) we did frozen pizzas for lunch and then walked to the local snow cone store for a snack. The boys will be going to their dads tonight so that ends our spring break week. Dalton will be having friends over Saturday night and then leaving for Colorado Sunday morning. I love that the kids want to come hang out here before they head out at 5 am. They plan to stay up so that they can sleep on the way. Wonder if I will get any sleep?

I have a friend coming this weekend to help me make a t-shirt quilt for Daltons graduation. I figure I better get going on graduation stuff because it is quickly approaching.

We also have- the much looked forward to- derby races at church Saturday. The boys and I had some help from our friends at church and we have 6 cars ready to race. I love this day and can not wait.

 

Reading....

 The last few weeks have been super busy again. Seems like we are always on the go. Finally today I had to stop and be home for a while. I have been told that I need to learn to say no. Today I had lots of practice. I told three people no when they called and asked of things for me today. Mind you one of them I really wanted to do but I think I have reached my limit this week and needed some home time. Time to catch up around here. I had no extra kids today (have had extra kids any time I was home lately) , no appointments until after school today, and no homework due today. We have Bronson's school almost done for the day, got lots of laundry done, floors swept and mopped, and kitchen cleaned. Makes me feel much better. We have some windows open and some Matthew West playing. Makes for a happy me. Here is a look at the books I am reading right now.
I do believe Dalton is way ahead of me in reading this year, but I have had a lot of reading with school so I am a little behind. We both keep lists of the books we read each year. I usually win because  he looses his list. This book, What Every Man Whishes His Father Had Told Him, I decided to read because Dalton and my dad had both read it and just thought it was really good. My dad encouraged me to read it and not really look at it from the name. I have just started it so I am not sure about it yet. I have also had Emery begin reading it with me. I try to read books that will help me with this task of raising 5 boys. Sometimes I wonder if maybe God made a mistake, expecting me to raise them on my own. (For the majority of the time) Then I realize this was HIS plan. I only hope to raise them in a way that would please God. Trust me I fail often,  but I am so thankful for the days he allows me to be these boys mom.

This book is more just for fun. I like reading the book and then watching the movie so I plan to rent this when done. I love taking time out during the day where Bronson and I just have reading time. He is reading Brisinger. Dalton read this series and has gotten Bronson started on it. I still have a stack of books and a "stack" on my kindle to make my way through. This homework stuff sure takes away from my reading time. I have made it half way through this quarter and I can tell you I kind of overdid it this time. I won't be taking this large of a class load again. It's is nice getting a big chunk out of the way but I feel like I am constantly thinking of school work. Thankfully its going well. I get overwhelmed when I think about how long this will take me and that I am not even half way there yet. I am taking baby steps though and making progress. I encourage anyone that feels they could not do school, to try it. It does give you a sense of accomplishment and pushes you to work on the assignments. This never was even a goal of mine but I am so excited to be working towards a degree.

 

A snowy night

Finally a snowy day! They have not yet decided if we will have a snow day tomorrow or not. I am really hopeful that we will. I would love a day to be lazy and just enjoy some time with the boys. I feel so bad for our school board that has to make the call on that as they end up getting a lot of opinions and upset parents no matter what they end up deciding. Well as I typed that I got the call from the schools that it is cancelled for tomorrow. Even better they made the call in the evening so we can shut off alarms and sleep in tomorrow.

 

 

A while ago we went camping with some friends and they had the game Monopoly Deal. The boys loved it. We began our hunt to find this game. I checked all the places that we could think of. The only place I saw it was on Amazon and the price seemed  high for a card game. My parents joined in the scavenger hunt and found it for us while in Florida. The boys were so excited and tonight are enjoying playing it. I have yet to join in so I am not even sure how to play but the boys playing nice together makes me love the game already. The extra boy is my cousins son. Deciding a sleep over will be easier on all involved so that he does not have to come over at 7 am to hang out with us tomorrow. 
 
 
 

During a  trip to Shopko the other night, (for a homework assignment for me) I found notebooks for 24 cents a piece. I had this idea in my head and had been looking for a sale on notebooks so this was the perfect deal for me. I purchased 5 notebooks. One for each child. I wrote a letter to each boy and then put it in their dresser. In my note I asked that they write me back and when done put it in my dresser. I plan to write to each child about once a week. Dalton is a little old for this but I do hope he will humor his mother once in a while and play along. I hope that this will give the boys some extra time to communicate with me as sometimes boys are not very talkative. It also gives me another to chance to tell them how much I love them and how much they mean to me. I don't know if it has ever happened to anyone else but there will be times I realize later I forgot to thank so and so for this or I forgot to make a big deal of _______ when this happened. So this gives me another chance to make my guys feel special. Hope they enjoy it as much as I do.

Well we are going to make some hot chocolate and put in a movie. Cuddle time here we come:)

Bible studying 2014!

 The new year started me off with some new bible study tools. I had noticed that my other bible was needing replaced not to mention I had some information wrote in it that I didn't really want to see every time I opened my bible. So I purchased myself a new bible. Our church has a great book store and I found a new bible. It is taking some getting use to when flipping through the pages. I have never had a bible with the indents for the books of the bible and actually they end up confusing me. I didn't want to purchase it for this reason but decided I liked the other options about the bible enough to go ahead with it. I also got a one-year bible reading plan. Its the longer paper in the background. It has three different reading plans. I am doing the front to back plan. You read about 3 chapters a day going in order through the bible. I did stop after Exodus and skipped over to Psalms for a little while just to lighten things up a bit before hitting Leviticus.

 

 

 

That is a terrible picture of the prayer journal but you get the idea. Our church hands out these prayer journals for free. I went through and added tabbed sections for each of my boys. I can add specific prayer request under their names. I also read Praying for Boys: Asking God for the Things They Need Most by Brooke McGlothin. This got me very motivated to improve my praying for my boys. I also have another prayer journal that is for all the other prayer request. I may add tabs to another one and add family, friends, church, etc. but for now I am working on praying more for my guys.

 

I am a note taker. I seem to remember things better if I write them down. I purchased a 5 subject 5x7 notebook. I added tabs (I just love tabs). I labeled these 1. Sunday school notes (have I mentioned I have the best Sunday School class ever) 2. Sunday Am notes 3.Sunday pm notes (our church has two different services on Sunday) 4. Bible study notes (have I mentioned I have the best bible study ever) 5. prayer request - these ones here are mostly ones that we talk about at bible study but I add other ones from church also. There is a pocket in the front where I keep my Sunday School prayer request sheet each week.


Well there you have it. That's my bible study tools for now. I am working hard at trying to be more consistent with spending time daily in the Word and in Prayer. This quarter I have a lot of reading with the classes I am taking and its not easy to find more time to sit and read. Having the bible reading plan to follow is helping. I am determined to read through the bible this year. Well now you all can hold me accountable to that. Next step: helping the boys get a better system for doing their own quiet times. I have two that are pretty good about motivating themselves to do it. I hope to encourage them all to make this a priority daily. Ohhh I am going to go add that to my prayer items for them.
 

Souper Week

This week we had a "souper week!" Each night we had some kind of soup for dinner. Monday was a very crazy busy day here and it ends with a soccer game in the evening so I was very simple in making a beef stew. I love this in that you can just throw in some veggies you have on hand. I don't use a recipe just added beef broth, cooked ground beef, carrots, potatoes, split peas, celery, and onions. This is actually a hit here. I served this with some cut up fruit.

On Tuesday one of my favorite soups: chicken pot pie soup. This recipe was shared by a friend and can be found herehttp://www.shugarysweets.com/2013/04/chicken-pot-pie-soup.

 

I do not add the pie crust but served it with breadsticks. I also add carrots. We had company this evening and they enjoyed this soup as well. Yummy!!!! 

Wednesday we have a tradition of dinner with my parents. About a year ago I had a class to take on Wednesday evenings and my mom was able to feed my kids and get them to awanas for me. When I was done with the class my boys wanted to continue Wednesday evenings with grandma. I told mom we were having a souper week and she was happy to carry on with her creamy chicken noodle soup. I do not know the recipe but I do know it is really good. I love when my mom makes this dinner for us.

On Thursday we had  Baked potato soup. This is a pinterest recipe found here.http://www.pinterest.com/pin/149955862566565549/  I loved this topped with bacon and green onions. Adding of course cheese. My boys do not like that I add cream cheese to this recipe but I love that. I don't think they would have noticed but it was not totally melted. This time I only added half the cream cheese and told them I compromised with them. They seemed good with that.

 

Friday night the boys went with their dad for and Dalton was working so I did one for lunch,  I am not sure the boys would have ate this. I don't really let them decide they wont eat something but if I know that most would not like it I just don't really make it for them.  I tried a chicken and white bean chili. I added cheese to it. It was pretty good.

 

Saturday the boys didn't come home tell after dinner and I came down with the stomach flu so there was not really any cooking or eating going on here. It is Sunday and I do have a basic chicken noodle soup simmering in the crockpot right now. I still am a littler nervous eating so its just a plain chicken broth, carrots, onion, chicken, and egg noodles.

 

It was a great week of soup. I love the soups that I can put in the crock pot and have dinner ready. What a great time of year for warm soup also. Nothing warms the house and soul like nice warm soup on a cold day.

I have had some comments in regards to why I am now  screening the comments that come in. I will not be posting comments from names that are made up. If you would like to post under your real name feel free but for those of you wanting to just say mean comments under a different name I will not be posting these. My children read these post and they do not need to see smart, uncalled for, and untruthful comments from those who do not know the truth of what my children and I have faced. Those of you that have been very encouraging and kind to my boys and I, Thank you, I appreciate and love you all.

Newest family member

The boys and I still have moments that we are so sad we had to get rid of our dog when we moved. I have been trying to decide what kind of animal we could do here. I am allergic to cats so no cats, I don't know about hamsters, rats, gerbils, they remind me to much of little mice and well they gross me out. No offense to you that have them I just don't think they where for me, not to mention not sure if my allergies would act up to these animals. I also didn't want any smell. So Dalton, Bronson, and I headed to the pet store. We where just checking out some options. I was leaning towards a turtle.

We met a lady there, we now call her the dragon lady. She was very helpful on different animals. (she was working there) She brought out her own, full grown, bearded dragon. Bronson held it. I asked some questions but was sold when she told me that you can put a leash on them. Can you see me in the summer, sitting on the grass with a book and beside me my leashed bearded dragon. haha sounds totally fun. So we went home and told the other boys about it. The boys quickly jumped on board. All but Emery, he is not an animal lover. They began to save their money thinking of ways they could earn some. We found out that "the dragon lady" had some of her own that she sales and they are half the price of the ones in the store.

So last night we headed to the store to get all the things we would need. I could not believe that I was getting a reptile that would have me feeding crickets in a "bug house". But the boys where so excited and I just wanted them to have this. They have been through so many changes and this was something fun I could do for them.

Bronson and I where home doing school today when the dragon was delivered. We are getting use to just how to hold it. The boys have named it pascal. I have decided to just call it PJ. I still have not purchased that leash, will wait tell it gets bigger but don't worry, this thing will be seen outside with us this summer.

11 years old today

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Carter was my 4th son. He joined my family 11 years ago. I can not believe my little peanut is 11. This boy has grown up so much lately. He has always had the best smile. The most sweetest touch. He is tender to the core. He has an energy that if bottled could make millions. Carter is friendly and loving to anyone. I love to watch him.... not just because I can't keep up with him but because he is always moving. When he is observing something, such as bugs, you can just see that his mind is moving just as fast as his body does.

 Carter is so good to his mom. He is always ready for a hug or kiss. I think back on the days that I have been blessed to have Carter and I will admit this child...... wow this child is about all I can say, what is the right words? handful is to mild to describe how Carter was. I used to say Carter was put on this earth just to teach me patience. As a young boy he just had no measure of what he should and should not do. Thankfully he has mellowed a bit. He is always moving so fast and yet is never in a hurry to get anywhere.  He is a kid that really does stop to smell the flowers, or chase a bug, or throw a snowball, or well just about anything other then what he's suppose to be doing.

Carter is a joy to my heart. I can not wait to see what the Lord has in store for this little man of mine. I hope that his happy, joyful attitude never leaves. I hope this world keeps that mind  busy and that  it's kept away from bad things. I want him to always have time to stop and smell the flowers and enjoy Gods creation. I want a lifetime of those hugs and kisses.

Happy birthday tarter sauce!

Time for the beach

 Florida trip 2014!
So I just had this all written out and then I hit the wrong button and it erased it all. Since I need to go work on laundry and finish unpacking, you will now get the shortened version.
My parents travel to Florida each winter for about a month. We decided to fly down and spend a week with them. We have never flown in a plane (except Dalton, he has)
These envelopes each hold a small activity for the boys to open during the flights. They liked these and it helped to keep them entertained.

Headed out from  Omaha on the first of January, it was cold and snowy here. The flight got delayed a few times. We showed up at the airport 3 hours early since we where so excited so the delays made for a long time waiting. We finally where able to take off and ended up stuck in Chicago, on the plane, for over 3 hours. Remember I have 5 boys, in the dark, hot, crowded plane. They did amazing though and handled it great. We arrived in Orlando after 1:30 am and had a 3 hour drive ahead to the condo. We made it to the room after 4 am and hit the sack. We where awaken very early by an excited grandma who could not wait to take us to the beach.

Carter was born for the beach. He finds treasures like a pro and was always willing to head down to the ocean with anyone who would take him.

This was our first walk down the beach, this area is about 1 1/2 from the condo.

A pool right outside our condo was used very often by these guys.

This was here when we arrived. Its really neat the picture does not do it justice. The numbers are filled in with shells. The water erased it by our second day.

Many moments where spent jumping waves.

A big hole dug in the sand provides much entertainment for boys.

So I asked Dalton to pose expecting a cute picture, Lesson learned.

Those of you that know my boys, know they hate photos. (well all but Carter who is always happy to give a cheesy grin) but they allowed mom a few moments to take some shots on the cold morning of our last day.

Bronson

love love love

Atley, yes he is very cold

Its always my youngest that clowns around

my beach boy

Got this idea to do a family pyramid on the beach. Um fail. the shells where cutting into our knees and Atley just could not get on the top. It was a funny try though.

The plane ride home was much better. We only had 21 flying since they had to cancel the Chicago portion and was now a direct flight from Tampa to Omaha. We each had our own row to spread out and also window views. This was amazing to see from the day.

This was a great trip for us and we will always have these memories.