Italian Soda Stand

Leeann opened her own business this weekend-- An Italian Soda Stand!

She used her own money (mostly from her Birthday) to buy cups, lids, straws, club soda, whip cream, ice and half and half. Mommy and Daddy contributed some flavored syrups.

She set up her stand at our friend, Eroica's garage sale. Due to a little advertising geniusness on her Mommy's part (facebook and an email to just about everyone we know in Albany!), she had customers come by from far and wide!

She seriously had so much support from so many wonderful people. It makes me giddy to watch her work so hard and to watch others go out of their way to support her and to give generously to her 'cause'. She made more than 50 cups of Italian Soda over a two day span and also earned some wonderful tips for what I kept hearing were, "The best Italian Soda's ever!"

"What is her cause?" you may ask. Well, you can read all about it, and what she's doing to get there on Real Life Pastor's Wife (my other blog), but in short, she's working toward a Nintendo DSi. She's saving her money and working hard to accomplish her goal, and I couldn't be more proud of her!

My heart belongs in Disneyland

I don't think words can begin to express our family's love of Disneyland. We have so many great family memories there and it's a place that we can go and truly "get away". We talk and dream about Disneyland on a near daily basis. Since our 2007 trip we are always in the planning process for our next trip. It may sound silly, but it's just what we love to do!

We plan to go in 2012 (when the new Cars Land opens), but we're hoping to take a trip between now and then too. We've been talking perhaps, February. Or maybe next Fall?

I just found a one day deal on air fare between Portland and Long Beach for $69 each way if you travel between August 31st and October 27th. I want so badly to book these tickets. I've thought so much this month about just getting in the car and driving down there. Though, summer is NOT the time to go if you can help it. And depending on the price of plane tickets driving can actually be nearly as expensive. And well, driving to Disneyland on a moments notice isn't necessarily the most responsible thing to do.

But maybe flying is? :0) Then again, do I always have to be responsible? Sometimes I wish I could let myself be less-than-responsible and somewhat impulsive. Would it truly be impulsive if it's been "in the planning process" for some time? I wish money grew on trees. I wish I could go to Disneyland at least once a year. Maybe once each season? I wish I could work there. Or live there. Or maybe split my time between here and there. I can feel myself "Soarin' Over California" as I type this!

Maybe if I walk to my mail box today and find a random $1,000 check out of the middle of nowhere, I'll book the tickets. See, that's about as impulsive as I get. Darn my responsible nature...

Maybe if I get something in the mail from Disneyland? They send us things from time to time. Can I take that as a sign? Maybe if my husband calls me back and tells me we can go (Yes, I called him at work and told him about the deal. He laughed and said he'd call me back after his meeting). He's the one working on our current Disneyland budget.

Maybe my garage sale this weekend will net enough to go earlier than we'd planned? Then again, I really don't have that much to sell. Maybe I can sell my house by this evening? Or a kidney? Platelets? All of our kitchen appliances? My first born? Perhaps not my first born... but you get the picture.

Perhaps I ought to stop blogging and thinking about Disneyland and start thinking about swimming lessons? Because a responsible person would be getting their children ready for swimming lessons that we need to leave for in a half hour. Darn it all, I don't want to be responsible today... can you tell?

I just want to be a kid...

Cute conversation

I'm sitting here catching up on some blog reading while my kiddos color at the table with their friend, Kaylee who is hanging out with us for the day. Kaylee is 5 and cute as can be. She wears glasses too, just like Titus.

Titus has talked for quite some time about marrying "Kaylee with the glasses". Well, Leeann just told Kaylee, "Titus wants to marry you." Kaylee just kind of said, "Oh."

Then Titus chimed in. "Kaylee, do you love Jesus?"

"Yup," she said.

"Okay, then I'm going to marry you so we can both be cowboys together."

Ah, to reason like a four year old!

Swimming Lessons

The kiddos have been taking swim lessons at the Cool Pool this last week. Leeann has taken lessons for a couple of years and has become quite a good swimmer. As you can see in the first picture she swims side ways for the most part, it's really cute!

This is Titus's first time getting to take lessons though. He's finally gotten to the point where he'll actually let go of his instructor instead of hanging onto him for dear life. He even 'swam' on his own holding onto just a noodle today. You should have seen the look on his face, he was so proud of himself!

Portland's Cutest Baby

K103 - Portland's Soft Rock

Click on this link to vote for my adorable nephew in the Portland's Cutest Baby Contest. Because seriously, he's adorable! The prizes are awesome and it just takes a quick second to vote. You don't need to sign in or register, just click on this link and vote for Jace. You can do this once a day until August 20th.

My brother asked me to post this (which I was of course, happy to do) on my blog. He seems to think I have some fantastic readers (which I do... I think?) that might take a small minute out of their day (which you will... right?) to help Jace win a $1,000 contribution to his 529. Please help me out with this blog readers!

Kyndall

On our way back from The Pike Place Market, we decided to see if we could get a hold of Kyndall, Leeann's birth mom, to see if she could meet us for dinner. I wasn't able to get a hold of her on her cell and I was really bummed. I was especially bummed after I talked to her dad and found out that she was actually working the evening shift. So sad to drive right past her base and not get to see her!

When we were about 45 minutes from her base I got a text from her though, and she was able to squeeze out a long lunch (why is it called a lunch break no matter what shift you're working)? This whole time we kept it a secret from Leeann. She just thought we were going to the food court at the mall for dinner.

After a few minutes Kyndall walked down the long corridor in her fatigues. I almost cried. Leeann didn't recognize her at first, but then flew into her arms when she realized who it was.

We enjoyed some food court food and then snuck over for some Krispy Kreme doughnuts before she had to head back to work.

It was so good to see her! I can't believe how strong, and confident, and poised this young lady has become. The statistics surrounding teenage mothers are astounding. Kyndall has defied all odds however. She is proudly serving our country, and has grown up into quite an admirable young woman.

It's hard to believe she's the same shy, scared, quite teenage girl that came to our youth group seven and a half years ago. Who could have ever imagined our lives would be so entwined, and that we would be forever connected in an awesome way by the little life that was growing inside of her?

I had a very special connection with Kyndall from the very beginning. And for obvious reasons, an even more special connection with her now. I'm so glad that God brought us into each others lives. I'm more grateful than I could ever adequately express at the fact that Kyndall made the choice to let me share in the joy of motherhood to what might be the world's most amazing little girl.

And of course, I'm extremely proud of her for serving our country!

The Pike Place Market

On our way back to Oregon we decided to take a detour to The Pike Place Market. It was Abby's first time in Seattle and we wanted to give her at least a little taste of the city. What better place to do that than at this well known market?

We saw fish fly, tasted some yummy samples and sat on a famous copper pig. I'm not sure why the pig is famous actually. Hmmm...

We also wanted to get some yummy drinks at the first ever Starbucks. Our family has a little, um, obsession with Starbucks.

Too bad we already ordered our drinks before we found out that the Starbucks we patronized was actually a sister store to the very first Starbucks, but not the store itself. The first one was just down the street. Oops, guess we'll have to go again sometime?

Gingerbread Houses

We did gingerbread houses with Rob's family in July this year. It was a special treat to share this time with Rob's Aunt Barb and Uncle Ken, as well as his cousin Stacey and her family who flew in from Indiana.

Gingerbread houses were always a special thing Rob's mom and step-dad did with all of the grandkids who were 3 years old and up. The last Christmas Janice was alive she was in the hospital so the already assembled gingerbread houses didn't get decorated. She passed away in February, so we decorated them near her Birthday in her memory. This year we were going to do the same but decided to wait a little while longer so the Indianans, Indians, Indianites, Indys... I'm an Oregonian, but I'm not sure what they are... could join us.

It was so great to have so much family together and to continue a well-loved tradition in memory of a well-loved woman. Shelly was of course, a gracious hostess to a million and one family members, and her family wore are kiddos out with all of their love and attention.

It's always great to be up in Washington, and this time was certainly no different. My kids just got a larger sugar-high than normal!

Kindergarten Celebration

Why yes, yes I'm INCREDIBLY behind on blogging. So far behind I almost don't want to blog anymore because there is so much left unblogged. My summer has been insane. Dare I say it's winding down just a little? At least enough for me to finally try to catch up a tad bit?

These are some pictures from Leeann's kindergarten celebration. She was so excited to perform in front of all of the parents. She sung nice and loud and knew all of the motions. It was very clear that she was taking her job very seriously. Her music teacher made sure she was right in the middle. I'm pretty sure that was because she had so much gusto!

You'll notice that all of the parents were acting as if their child was the star in a Hollywood production. This went on for a good 5 minutes before the program started!

Leeann's Grampy and his then-fiance, Sally came to cheer her on.

And finally, this is a picture of her with her teacher, Mrs. M.

Shortly after school ended we received her end of the year report card. She met or exceeded all kindergarten standards and reportedly did exceptionally well in math. And, it comes to no surprise that she got along very well with her peers and was a delightful helper to everyone around her.

I can't believe Kindergarten has come and gone and first grade is just around the corner!

My Little Barista

Today I was making myself and Rob both blended mocha's. After I got done making mine I sent Leeann out to ask daddy what flavor he wanted. He told her to choose, so she came back and told me that she wanted to choose gingerbread.

I asked her if she wanted to make daddy's mocha for him. She quickly washed up her hands and went to work!

She was excited to give it to him... that girl loves to serve others, and help in any way she can. Her first blended mocha turned out delightful according to Rob. This could be a good skill for her to learn!

Meanwhile, Titus spent way too much time perfecting his Lego Starwars skills. At one point he came outside and questioned why Leeann got to help in the yard but he didn't. He didn't stick around long enough to hear the answer or volunteer however... there are more characters to unlock!

So Leeann went to 'work' with her daddy and Titus continued his adventures of conquering... I'm not quite sure actually. I still don't know the Starwars plot. Is that awful?

Seven!

A few days ago my sweet, sweet baby girl turned seven. Seven!

She now stands just below my chin (which is a testament to both of our heights!). She's a beautiful, delightful, thoughtful little girl.

She loves polly pockets, princesses and Hannah Montana. Her best friend is her brother, and her favorite color, without a doubt is still purple.

She loves to watch movies, and is especially fond of the American Girl DVD's. She's really into crafty things, like painting, crocheting and creating other art projects out of anything that's available.

She honestly LOVES to help. She seems to feel most accomplished when she's helped someone with a task. She's always looking for ways to help someone around her. She even honestly loves to help with household chores... especially when we do them together. She regularly switches loads, empties the dishwasher and puts her laundry away.

She looks for opportunities to help those in need too. Especially those who are sad or hurt. The other day she looked up at me and said, "Mommy, you look quite sad today. Are you doing okay?" She's so insightful, and so sweet and caring.

Perhaps I should let her contribue to her updates from now on. Afterall, she is seven now!

An interview with a seven year old: (I'm typing this as I interview her)

What's your favorite:

Toy- "I like my special Leeann teddy bear. And I also like my best favorite toy is the one that I got from my mom and dad for Christmas. My purple puppy."

Movie- "The movie we just watched (Chrissa) because they were being bullies first but they ended up friends. Because Chrissa needed to tell the truth so the bullies would stop being mean so that they could be nice. Because being a bully is bad."

Place to go- "To Aunt Suzy's house, and Aunt Shelly's."

Song- "Hannah Montana. Pop it, lock it..."

Restaurant- "Red Robin. I like macaroni."

Color- "Purple."

Food- "I like macaroni and cheese. And I got two favorite desserts. Pudding, and ice cream... home made ice cream!"

People to play with- "Titus, Weston, Logan, Ashly, Amanda, KayLee, Josh. Even Landon."


What do you grow up:

What do you want to do- "A doctor. To care for people."

Do you want to get married- "Yeah. To a guy who loves Jesus."

How many kids do you want- "10."

Boys or girls- "5 of boys, 5 of girls."

Names- "I don't know yet."


At school:

Grade last year- "Kindergarten."

Favorite thing to do- "Play. I liked to play blocks."

Favorite friend- "Sam."

Favorite subject- "Reading."

What did you like about your teacher- "That she was nice and was telling us what to do so that we would know."


General:

What are you good at- "Taking care of people."

What's your favorite way to help around the house- "Mopping. Cause it's fun to do."

What else should people know about you- "That I'm a good friend. Cause I like to make friends and I like to be nice."

Move over Martha!

Leeann is having a Tea Party for her 7th Birthday which is on Thursday. Abby and I began preparing some of the yummy mini treats tonight. Move over Martha Stewart, we made baklava! And we made pecan scones (we'll make the maple topping tomorrow) and bite sized brownies that will be topped with home made salted caramel.

We will also make some orange mini muffins, mini cup cakes, french pastry puffs and chocolate covered strawberries tomorrow and/or Thursday. I know we'll have WAY too much food, but you just can't halve the recipes on some things. They're all cut into really cute tiny bite sized pieces.

And we'll serve fresh squeezed lemonade instead of actual tea. I decided not to make an actual Birthday cake for Leeann this year, which is a little bit hard for me because I love making her fancy cakes. But, it seemed unnecessary given the fact that we will have so many yummy sweet treats already.

I realized tonight that baking is so much more fun with someone else. It was nice to have Abby help me tonight, especially with the baklava. The phyllo dough used to make it is very tempermental and needed a lot of care and attention that was much easier with two of us!

We found out today that Abby will be going home Thursday. I'll be honest, I'm going to miss the girl! It's been fun having her around. I'm hopeful we'll keep in touch. Especially since she's having a baby boy in December and I certainly want to meet him!

I should be headed to bed, there's lots of baking and Birthday prep (and packing for Abby) ahead of us tomorrow!

OMSI

(Click on image to make it larger)

I'm so far behind on blogging that I'm not sure I'll ever catch up. I had once thought this would be a fairly relaxing summer. Ha!

In fact it's been so crazy that we were quick to steal one 'free' day a few weeks back and head to OMSI in Portland. That place is full of endless fun for kids of all ages-- you should have seen Rob in the vacuum ball room!

We really enjoyed time with each other and our kiddos and even headed to St. Helens for the night. We got to have lunch with Hope, Logan, Brent and my daddy. It was nice to see the kiddos, even if for only a short time. It's hard to believe that it's almost been a year since they lived with us! Hope is getting so tall and Logan's sporting a pink mo-hawk. They seem to be doing well and that's wonderful to see.

And now I'm one post closer to being caught up. Only 20 something more to go!

Mom-1, Dad-1, Titus-0

I felt a strange sense of satisfaction on Monday when Rob pulled Titus's glasses out of his pocket and they were snapped in half! Rob broke them while trying to tighten them.

At least I'm not the only one! I can't get over the fact that Titus has worn them all day, every day, for a year and a half and has yet to break them. That's extremely impressive for a 4 year-old! What's less impressive is the fact that his parents apparently aren't nearly as careful!

I thought he'd go several more weeks without his glasses again, but they had his frames in stock so we were able to replace them quickly this time.

Field Trip

Leeann's class took an end of the year field trip to the Discovery Village in Salem. And I got to chaperone! We brought 60 kids and there were two other groups the same size. It was a zoo. An absolute zoo! But, it sure was fun.

Sleeping Angels

During the school year we've let the kiddos sleep together on non-school nights.

I actually caught this picture a while ago. I went to check on them and this is how I found them!

I love when they crawl in bed with me in the mornings and sprawl all over me. Rob... well, he likes his own sleeping space. They've learned to crawl on my side, and I'm not complaining :0)

VBS

It's the time of year where there is so much to blog but not an once of leftover time to blog about it! Or should I say, it's the end of that time of the year, hence my return after a 16 day absence. That's gotta be a record!

That time of year--Vacation Bible School. It's been a crazy bunch of weeks for our whole family as we prepared for, set-up for, participated in, and cleaned up after VBS. This year was exceptionally crazy for a whole host of reasons. One of which was the obvious addition to our family just 2 weeks prior to the big event. Poor Abby, she's put in a lot of time at the church with me in these last several weeks! She's been very helpful though, and a delight to be around, so that was actually quite nice in a lot of ways.

The kids had a blast. I slept several hours early in the afternoon and after an incident with a wii remote that was part of a Lego Starwars brawl between my two overly tired, over exerted, completely exhausted kids (who didn't get to sleep until 11:00 last night!)... they are both sleeping peacefully too. And Lego Starwars is in time-out for the foreseeable future.

I'll hopefully download some pictures of my kiddos when I get a chance. Though VBS is often like Christmas. There's so much to blog about, and it comes after such an exhausting (though rewarding) time, that I often never get around to it. We'll see. But just in case I don't get around to the rest of them, here are a few I already have on my computer:

Titus hanging with the "Big Boys" during extended day VBS (extra fun stuff for just 4th and 5th graders). We let the kiddos of the leaders staying for extended day be a part of the fun.

The day you see pictured here? Messy Olympics!

Because who doesn't want to slip and slide in top ramen, creamed corn, mustard and baby shampoo?

Sadly, I couldn't participate. Someone has to take the pictures! I was devastated. Absolutely devastated!

"Twister"

And one heck of a food fight. I stayed far, far away from that action!

Confused?

If you're confused as to why my last post seemed out of place... it's because it was. Somehow I posted it on the wrong blog. These are the kind of things I'm trying to keep off Robyn's Nest. If you'd like to read more about FlyLady and my efforts (if you could call it that) at organizing my little piece of the world you can hop over to Real Life Pastor's Wife.

Flying as I can!

I like to think of myself, not as a failure, but as a little late at getting things together. See, I decided to do the 31 day FlyLady beginner steps (as you all well-know) several weeks ago. I think I'm still on day 3 or something!

I have been following her on facebook and via email so I am implementing some of her ideas, but I haven't been precisely following the baby steps as I originally set out to do. First we had a holiday weekend, then a couple of house showings, then we randomly started fostering a 15 year-old foster girl. Oh, and VBS is a week and a half away (I almost panicked as I wrote that... is it seriously just a week and a half away?).

Anyway, she hasn't been on the forefront of my mind, but she has been there. I've actually been thinking a lot about the control journal. I have my notebook, paper and plastic sleeves. I've even started writing some things in there. I really hope to actually make good use of it because it sounds so logical, helpful and useful. We'll see I suppose!

I am one of those people that will think through a logical, fool-proof, fantastic system that I never get around to implementing. The idea works. The function works. I just have to use it.  Novel, eh?

I'm really hoping my control journal isn't that way. The best tools are only helpful if you use them. I think FlyLady told me that!

Maybe I need to stick my baby-steps in my control journal so I don't have to log on to the internet and remember to go to the site first thing in the morning... which I obviously haven't been doing! Though it would require me to actually open up my control journal. Uh, am I beyond help?

Because we're crazy!

Last Wednesday I got a call from our adoption case-worker (she's still our case-worker from when we pursued adopting a teenage girl 2 years ago, as our case hasn't yet expired.) She asked if we were interested in doing foster care for a teenage girl with some special circumstances.

I found out a little more about her and her situation and told our case-worker that I'd chat with Rob and give her a call back. Much to both of our surprises, I think, Rob and I agreed to take her in. We had just been commenting a few days earlier about how we have the extra room, and a good home that we could share with someone in the right circumstance.

We've had several situations where people lived with us in the past, and it's usually worked out well. Over the years we've had a teenage boy live with us for 8 months, Rob's sister and her two boys live with us for 8 months, my half-siblings who were 4 and 5 lived with us for 6 months and we fostered a baby for 10 days a few months ago.

The hard part is in this situation, we had no idea what her personality was like or what we'd be getting ourselves into. She was a perfect stranger outside of the few details we knew about her. And frankly, you never know what you're going to get with a 15 year-old! Nevertheless, I left work early and headed down to DHS to meet Abby. We met together with her case-worker to find out a little more about each other and I brought her home.

I can't imagine being 15 and driving in the car with a complete stranger to a strange house, with no idea of what's in store. But, that was almost a week ago, and we're not strangers anymore! She's a sweet girl and I think it's actually been a really good fit so far. The kids are enjoying having her around, and she's good with them. Personality wise she's been a joy, but the sheer nature of having a teenager around is a little over-whelming. I'm suddenly managing social calendars, appointments, friends, shopping trips, etc.

I'm trying really hard to remember what it was like to be 15, and to have as much sympathy for her in her situation that I can muster. I'm attempting to parent her the way that I would have found most helpful if I were 15 and in foster care. We'll see how it goes. Like all of the rest of the kids we've interacted with, she doesn't come with an instruction manual!

Anyway, I just wanted to let you all know our current family dynamics. I find it beautifully humorous that in spite of the fact that we're not on any sort of 'list' for foster care, we've know had 4 kids placed here in the last year. It seems like God's got a plan and is determined to work it in spite of whether or not we're on a 'list'. God is good, all the time.