Mental Health Day

Back in PBBC days I had a friend whose mother used to let them have Mental Health Days off school. We would take them every once in awhile at college spending the day in our pj's watching tv, painting our fingernails, dyeing our hair, etc. They were good days. Well, today the girls and I had an MHD. It is 4:30pm and the girls have just decided to go outside for the first time today. They are still in their pyjamas. I'm still in mine. Catie and Beka had a long sleep while Emma had some quiet time in her room. You know, it's been a good day. We trimmed and painted some fingernails and toenails, had a picnic on the rug, we watched a video and some tv while snuggling together.

I also took some profile pics of the girls for a project for the "wall of shame." I worked on another project for the wall as well. I'll share them when I'm done (if they turn out.) =) You know, my mom had a wall of pictures when we were growing up. We called it the wall of shame because we were embarrassed of our pictures. And now I have one in my hallway, as do my sisters I believe. I use mine to show the girls' their US relatives. Beka loves it when I pick her up and we go from picture to picture, "who's this?", "who's that?" Do you have family pictures in your hallway? Are they somewhere else in the house? How do you display/preserve your family photos? Have a great day. And give yourself a Mental Health Day sometime. I bet you'll enjoy it. =)

Granny Sampson

Granny has gone home to her Saviour. I know she's been looking forward to this especially since Gramps died 2 years ago. I am so glad that we have the assurance of where they are and that we will see them again.

Update

So I changed the blog's look around again. We still have another month of autumn but it is feeling so nice and cool today. I love winter!!

There's been no change with my granny. She is still unresponsive and has been given meds to stay as comfortable as possible. However due to the bleeding in her brain her body can't control it's temperature. So her body temp keeps rising. When I spoke to my sister earlier she said it was up to 104F/40C. Please keep praying for my family. It is just a time of waiting. My mom stayed at the hospital for the first 2 days and the first night. She went home Monday night to sleep and my sister Tanya is staying there tonight.

Thanks for the prayers.

Emma's hair

looking at her hair from the front.
looking at it from the back of her head.

This is what I did with Emma's hair for church yesterday. Remember looking at it that she's had two naps and 1 night's sleep since I did it. Anyway, thought it was fun. Got the idea from hairtoday

Asking for Prayer

Thought I would post this email from my Dad so you could pray for my family too.

Just to let you know so you can pray. Grandma Dot was rushed to the hospital this morning when she was unresponsive then they went in to wake her up. Mom was notified and rushed to the ER. She just called and said that Grandma has had a massive stroke as a result of a burst aneurysm. She is still unresponsive, but breathing better. There is nothing that can be done at this time, but wait (difficult). Remember to pray for Mom too.

Love you all,

Dad

Clean shower=clean heart??

Do you ever have great thoughts while doing mundane things/tasks? Some of my greatest thinking times are when I'm in the shower or washing dishes or hanging out laundry. Of course sometimes I forget if I've shampooed my hair or I leave some food on the dishes or drop undies or socks on the ground--well, actually that happens even when I'm not deep in thought. At least one thing from every load gets dropped and most times put into the basket to get washed with the next load. Anyway...

I was combining two tasks this morning, showering and cleaning the shower, and had a great thought. Part of it I've thought of before--Cleaning my shower is like Jesus cleaning my life. Now, before you think I've gone crazy and call Josh and tell him to shoot me, think about this. My normal way of cleaning the shower is waiting until it is absolutely disgusting to take a shower in there (sooner than you think thanks to QLD humidity and mildew) and then getting out the big guns, namely my steam cleaner and some really nasty hold-your-breath-while-you-clean shower cleaner/mildew remover. Then you wonder if you should actually take a shower after using that. Anyway, most times that I clean like that I think, "If you would wipe this down after every shower or at least wipe it down once a week this wouldn't be so hard to clean." And then, bang, it hits me! If I let Jesus work in my life everyday and show me all the little things that need to be cleaned up then I don't need to wait until something big happens and try to get it all cleaned up at once. So often I don't take the time to listen to what the Holy Spirit keeps nudging me about. But then when communion time comes at church (every two weeks here) I try to spend that minute of silent prayer thinking of everything I've done wrong/need to change/should've done different in the last two weeks. I promise to read my Bible everyday, not yell at the children, be a better wife, etc. And then I do it all over again two weeks later. Let me tell ya, it ain't working! So along with trying to keep everything clean and tidy in my house everyday I'm working on having my time with God and letting Him do the tidying up in my life.

Which brings me to my great thought this morning. I was cleaning my shower and it only took a couple minutes. Everything was still basically clean from last time I cleaned. And I thought, "you know, sometimes though you get a bigger satisfaction from taking a HUGE mess and cleaning it, rather than cleaning a mostly clean surface. " It made me think of my college days. We had Bible study on Wednesday nights in home groups. I went to the home group at Andy and Deb Hudson's home. They were my professors at college and I babysat their kids often. Whenever a new student came to the group they were asked to tell their testimony. I, and so many others, said things like, well, I don't have a really great testimony or I have a rather boring testimony. Because we had been blessed enough to grow up in a Christian home and had never been on drugs/alcoholic/messed up, etc. We can all think of people with "great" testimonies of God's saving grace. How He picked them up out of the pit and saved them. Andy always said that any testimony was great and how our testimony was not that God saved us out of these evils but saved us from these evils. Anyway, all those thoughts combined to show me that being saved from those evils and not needing to clean up huge messes are much better and healthier for us.

And now as you go to worry about me and wonder if I've sniffed too much of those cleaning chemicals I thought I would give a little promo for the magic erasers. LOVE THEM!!! But I've also heard heaps of good things about METHOD cleaners and I actually found them in my store the other day. So I bought the pink grapefruit surface cleaner and the eucalyptus mint tub+tile cleaner the other day and am trying them out. Thanks for worrying about my sanity and for reading this whole post. =)

funny

Addicted to blogging? Get one of these

Happy 2nd Birthday Nathan!!

We hope you have a wonderful day and lots of yummy cake. The girls send you lots of cuddles and kisses.

I know the picture is old so tell Mommy to start a blog and upload some recent pics. =) Or at least to send Auntie Tamra some new pics of you and your brother and sister.

(Debbie, I'm admitting to being a bad Auntie--can you please remind me what his middle name is? And Tanya, how do you spell Adreyn's middle name??)

Last post about the concrete =)

And of course, about 5 minutes ago while I was putting dinner in the oven I heard a little girl sounding awfully close to the back door. I walk over and what do I see? Beka putting dirt all over Daddy's handprints. So we now have some extra marks in the concrete and some of Josh's handprints wiped out. GRRRRR!!! Even more frustrating? Catie was just standing there watching!

Finally!!

I know you're probably tired of hearing about our concrete but this is my second to last post about it. This is the view I had out my back door at 8:00 this morning. And of course it was this morning because I was up until 2:00 chatting on the phone (love ya, Cassie!) And of course after talking for 1.5 hours I couldn't go to sleep right away so the last time I remember noting the time it was 3:00. The guys actually showed up sometime around 6:30 I think. Beka had just crawled in bed with us, I heard a truck and the other two girls get up and sound excited. Josh jumped out of bed, I rolled over to his side of the bed and didn't get up until he left for work at 8:00. The guys finally finished around 1:15 today. Looks good. And Josh ordered his shed and it will be here in the next 4 weeks sometime.

Links

Here are some links I really enjoy looking for ideas with the children

Hair today is a blog I just found last week. I'm already inspired to try new hairdo's on the girls.

Hubbard's Cupboard has some really great homeschooling resources including full preschool Christian curriculum.

Wondertime has some really great play ideas. Be sure to check out their cutting pages.

More homeschooling resources at abcteach.com and easy child crafts.

Young Adults

Josh and I have been asked to host the Young Adults group on a Saturday evening in May. We've also been asked to come up with some fun activity while they are at our house. Any ideas? This group is from 11th grade up through young marrieds. Basically ages 17 - 26. We enjoy spending time with this group but our main focus is the youth group so we don't always get to spend time with these guys.

May is Missions Month at our church so something missions minded would be nice but I don't know what. Plus it needs to be interesting. Marlana, you and Shane interested in sharing about Vietnam, show us how to cook something Vietnamese or something? =) Anyway, if anyone has some great interesting ideas for me I would welcome all suggestions.

Food related themes are always good too. There again I can't seem to think of something really good. Maybe a taco bar and then an ice cream bar? or maybe waffles/pancakes with heaps of different toppings? I don't know. HELP!!

I don't think the cement is going to be poured anytime soon. =( But look how green the grass is. =)

P.S. you think I like having batteries in my camera? 3 posts in one day all full of pics =)

Kids' chair from church

So, I re-covered this chair from church. We'll take it back to church tomorrow. I used a curtain from the clearance area at Spotlight. Before I could get the picture taken the girls had made it all wrinkly and Beka had drawn on it with a marker. (See the wet spots from trying to get the marker out.) Oh well, it looks better than it did.

Random Pics

Yellow and Orange Gerbera Daisies in my thrifted milk bottle. Cute, huh?
Catie's drawing of my flowers
The rest of my "art gallery"
Speaking of Catie, don't ya love the layered look? New leggings and new shirt paired with an older skirt.
Also speaking of Catie this is her turn to vacuum last night. They fight over who gets to have the first turn. Emma did last night but I didn't get the camera ready in time.

Kohl's

click here to get a Kohl's coupon for $5 off a $5 or more purchase. I so wish we had Kohl's here.

P.S. I almost posted it with "lick here" instead of "click here" HAHA!!

Update

still no concrete (GRRRRR!!!!!!) and no camera. Charged two batteries, put them in the camera, took one pic and now it's dead. Might have a problem with the charger, you think? Went to Bundaberg by myself today as a last minute kind of thing. Bought a couch cover for our sad looking couch and one for our mismatched chair. Bought a curtain on sale to re-cover a little kids' armchair for church. (re-covered it and gave myself a blister from the staple gun. but the chair looks cute) Bought a pair of jeans that was $45 marked down to $20!! Yay! That's about how exciting life is at the moment.

The girls were missing the Sauvageot's today. Catie and Emma drew pictures for them. Catie said something about Trevor being her favourite and Emma said, "Yeah, that's true. He is the funniest!" I thought he'd find that amusing. Catie drew a picture of the baby dancing. It made me think of those commercials a few years ago with the dancing baby. And wasn't it on the Ally McBeal show or something? Anyway, it gave me flashbacks.

Have a great day!

Books

I've been reading the book Love and Respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs. Although I'm only a couple chapters into the book I can already see how disrespectful I am to Josh sometimes. I don't intend to be disrespectful but I don't set out to be purposefully respectful therefore I end up being disrespectful. (Man, I had that all said out in my head in a much better way but when I went to write it I totally forgot what I was thinking) The book says to ask myself "Is what I am about to say or do going to feel disrespectful to Josh?" Maybe I should write that out about 50 times and put it all over the house. =)

This book is amazing. As I said I'm only a couple chapters into the book and I keep feeling like this guy is talking very specifically to me. and about me. and about Josh a little too. =)

Another book I read this week was "My Steve" by Terri Irwin. Good book. I laughed out loud at times and found out more about their lives than necessary at times but all in a bit of fun. Terri said that early on in her relationship with Steve she would always say yes to whatever he suggested. She said this led to some interesting adventures but she never regretted it. She did however regret that the one time she didn't say yes was just before he died. They had been on a holiday and he suggested extending it for two days. She didn't immediately say yes and the matter was dropped. The next day she and the children headed one way and Steve another and that was the last time they saw him alive.

That made me think, how often does Josh suggest things and I think of a million excuses why it won't work, shouldn't happen, etc. And there's the times where he suggests something and I think (and sometimes say) how ridiculous an idea that is and how in the world did he come up with such a stupid thing. Hmmmm.....disrespectful? I think so.

I have this little war that goes on inside me. A part of me loves to be organized and neat and tidy and a part of me is lazy and hates to clean. I really don't like to tidy up when things don't have a place. Everything must have a place and if it doesn't then I don't even know where to start and the mess accumulates. Anyway, the organized part of me is also a little...how should we say this...controlling. I like to know of plans way in advance and then I plan everything about it. If we are going somewhere over the holidays I want to know two weeks earlier so I can figure out exactly what we are doing, when we are leaving, what I need to pack and about 50 other little things. Josh on the other hand is a "throw a few things in the bag and she'll be right" kind of person. So often he'll give me a general idea "Let's go to Brisbane over the Easter holidays" and leave it at that. I on the other hand need to know exactly what we'll do each day, where we are going to stay, what clothes I need to bring and end up overpacking and over planning. That's me. This is just background to the whole me struggling with saying yes to what Josh suggests. But I think this is something I need to do. I need to let Josh lead our family. I need to learn to follow and respect. And it can all start by realizing that all my planning/controlling isn't the most important thing. Will the children remember the time we packed up and went Underwater World and Brisbane or will they remember that I had everything all planned and we had to do it in a certain time schedule and wear the clothes on the right days etc? (no, I'm not actually quite that controlling) They're gonna remember the times we went to the park and had pancakes for dinner and the times we went for a walk and had dinner late. I need to be better about telling Josh yes because that's what I want them to remember not some Mom that had to have everything done at the right time in the right order and all plans had to be okayed three weeks in advance.

Not to say that I am throwing out all routine. Just that changing things is good sometimes. And I need to let Josh lead.

Mom gave me the Anne of Green Gables books when I was there 2 years ago and I bought the Little House on the Prairie set last year. I've been looking for more books that I read when I was younger that are good books that I want on my bookshelf for the girls to read. So last week on Ebay I found some Happy Hollister books. Good memories reading those. I want to find some Bobbsey Twins books and also the original Boxcar Children book. From Christian Book Distributors I have recently bought Little Women and Little Men and I found The Secret Garden and Heidi at the discount bookstore in Brisbane. As far as picture books go I collect the Curious George books, Little Golden Books and Arch Books.

Do you have any recommendations for good kids' books? Or books for me?

Truely random

So, I've been a bit MIA with the real blog posts recently. I don't normally post on Sundays and then was a bit busy, unwell on Monday and Tuesday. So I'm back but no pics because the batteries need to be recharged and we need a new charger. And I haven't been able to drive to the store to buy just regular batteries because either Josh has been driving my car or it's had the trailer attached and I don't drive with trailers.

{Speaking of MIA and Josh, they signed the papers last Friday and except for the small matter of a little bit more money, Josh is officially done with MIA Gaming.}

It is 9:00 on Wednesday morning as I write this and the guys who were supposed to pour the concrete yesterday still aren't here to pour the concrete today. Frustrating!! Not very good business for them either. Anyhoo...

For some reason the girls have been waking up earlier and earlier this past few weeks. 7:00, 6:45, 6:37, 6:20, 6:17, 6:12, etc. Today they slept until 6:40. But boy are they cranky. Emma hasn't had a nap since Sunday. She lays down but refuses to sleep. Catie only sleeps once a month or so and I think she needs a nap. So hopefully today is the day for sleeping naps.

I've started pulling out the winter clothes to see who has what to wear. The nights are nice and cool and just abit chilly. The days however can still be hot. Well, very warm. Most days however are nice and breezy. So the sleeveless stuff needs to be put away and the pants and long sleeves brought out. The girls are pretty funny about their clothes. Yesterday Emma had a long sleeve shirt on with shorts while the other two had sleeveless shirts on part of the day. But letting them choose their own clothes and dress themselves makes up for the oddity of what they choose some days. 90% of the time the girls choose dresses or skirts so I need to buy some more leggings for them to put under them.

okay, i've rambled on long enough. I hope to have recharged batteries or new temporary batteries soon to post some photos. And hopefully the concrete will be done today. I'm tired of all the little (and big!) dirty footprints all through my house. My poor rug will never be the same. I am very grateful that we chose to put lino through the main room of the house. =)

Have a great day!

What do you think? True or False?

What Tamra Means You are a seeker. You often find yourself restless - and you have a lot of questions about life.
You tend to travel often, to fairly random locations. You're most comfortable when you're far away from home.
You are quite passionate and easily tempted. Your impulses sometimes get you into trouble.

You are usually the best at everything ... you strive for perfection.
You are confident, authoritative, and aggressive.
You have the classic "Type A" personality.

You are confident, self assured, and capable. You are not easily intimidated.
You master any and all skills easily. You don't have to work hard for what you want.
You make your life out to be exactly how you want it. And you'll knock down anyone who gets in your way!

You are wild, crazy, and a huge rebel. You're always up to something.
You have a ton of energy, and most people can't handle you. You're very intense.
You definitely are a handful, and you're likely to get in trouble. But your kind of trouble is a lot of fun.

Find out what your name means

Quote of the Day

The average, healthy, well-adjusted adult gets up at seven-thirty in the morning feeling just plain terrible.
- Jean Kerr

Ironic

Within 10 second of hitting "publish" Josh drove back into the driveway. He brought Catie into the house and said, "she just threw up in the car." and then in the midst of dealing with that Emma and Beka stuck their hands into the fishtank and got water everywhere and totally freaked the fish out.

Ha ha!

A good day

yep, today's a good day. As I sit here dinner is bubbling away on the stove, Josh has taken the girls for a quick drive and my house looks good. I wasn't ready to get up when the girls did at 6:30 this morning so Josh put "Curious George" on to play for them. When it finished at 10 to 8 I was ready to be up. The girls had already eaten a yogurt and a banana. So nice that they can get some stuff to eat for themselves. I made oatmeal which is the reigning favourite for breakfast around here. Then I changed all the sheets on all the beds. Catie and Emma dusted the bedrooms and the front room. Emma vacuumed the front room (her choice), I vacuumed the girls' rooms and Josh vacuumed our room. so far I have washed 3 loads of laundry, hung 4 loads on the line (1 from last night) taken 2 off the line (from yesterday) and about to take the other 4 off the line. I'll fold all that while watching something on tv tonight. Hopefully there is something good on. While making lunch today I got two mains and two desserts ready for tomorrow's fellowship lunch so there's no running around doing it before church in the morning. All the dishes are done. Josh and I got a chance to look at some houseplans and discuss that a bit. Then he was off to the computer and I to my graph paper to draw up some more. Catie and Emma joined me in houseplan drawing. The girls then played outside a little, long enough to eat some watermelon and decide it was cold enough for jumpers (sweaters). It's been peaceful and quiet and productive. Makes you say, Life is good! =)

Helping Daddy

So, I think this week we are having "Nature Studies" and "working with Daddy" for homeschool.

My kitchen

so, some random photos of my kitchen today. I made the toaster cover this morning, finishing it while the girls napped. I have some great velvety green ric rac to put on it but apparently misplaced it when I tidied up the craft room. Yes, I know it needs to be ironed but that's life.

I replaced my cute wire daisy utensil holders with this new green one. I liked my daisy ones but it was driving me crazy that the utensils would slip between the wires and be a pain to get out. And I love jars so have my pasta and rice in some and some cashews and lollies in the others.
My $1 basket has become my fruit basket. Cute, huh?

Those are my new cleaning schedules up on my fridge. I have a list of the daily chores that need to be done. And then a weekly schedule for chores that don't have to be daily. We're still in the trial stage.


That's dinner. Mrs. Morningstar's stew with changes. Instead of slicing everything I diced it. And I don't have a can of green beans. ( Get this, my grocery store quit carrying the green beans I like. How can they do that? The other canned green beans taste too sweet. so now I have to go find the ones I like at a different grocery store. Don't they know how annoying it is to go to several different grocery stores while you have three children with you? Seriously.) So back to dinner, it is just diced potatoes, kransky, salt, pepper, onions, and garlic. I'm serving it with mixed veggies and dinner rolls. YUMMY!! And for dessert we're having chocolate pudding and tapioca pudding. Because what else are you supposed to do when you have 5 litres of milk that have to be used by Friday. Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it! =)

Girls' Holidays

Gwen took such great pictures of the girls that I thought I would post some of each girl separately because I couldn't just pick a few to add to this post. They had so much fun with Grandma while they were gone and I think she had just as much fun. Here's an excerpt of Gwen's email she sent with some pics last night.

Well today we blew bubbles, went to the circus (but they wouldn't let us take photos inside, which was a shame as Catie & Emma had a pony ride at intermission - would have made such a cute photo - so just a couple of photos from a ride outside the tent) then we went for lunch to the Arkarra Tea Gardens and a 'bush walk around the ponds out there. The girls were all calling for naps by the time we got home at around 4:00pm, - really too late for a nap so we just lay down on my bed and watched a dvd. Seemed to perk everyone up enough to have dinner etc.
The girls enjoyed 'reliving the circus' with Uncle Matthew at dinner time, and insisted on putting hairbands in the little toy lions that we got in showbags at the circus when I was doing their hair after bathtime!!
Needless to say I have had just as much fun as the girls!!

I'm pretty sure the girls will have a bit of letdown after such a fun couple of days. I happened to see Gwen and the girls at the grocery store yesterday afternoon and Catie was quick to remind me that they still had one sleep at Grandma's! =) I am so thankful that one set of grandparents lives so close and the girls can spend time with them. Now, if we can just talk mom and dad into coming for an extended stay. =)

Catie

Emma

Beka Jane

Catie's 5th birthday

I decided that since I started blogging after Catie's birthday I would post some of the photos from her birthday. Catie's birthday is the day after Australia Day. This year her birthday was on Sunday so we had her party on Australia Day. Josh and I gave her a little stuffed wombat last year sometime and she had been asking for a wombat cake for her birthday for months. It suddenly dawned on me that a wombat cake would go beautifully with an Australian themed party. So she got her wombat cake. Very easy cake to do actually. We had an inflatable crocodile for them to "wrestle". That picture is Catie and Emma with their friend Rebekah. Beka Jane is behind Emma but you can't see her really. Catie got an eye-ball from Uncle Steve as part of her gift. And in the bottom picture you can see Catie using her gift from Grandma and Grandpa--a digital camera of her very own. That's her friend Rebekah behind her and her friend Leah beside her. We invited 4 families plus the Risser's. One family couldn't come and Grandpa and Uncle Jason were out of town. That left 28 people including us. very full house but lots of fun.

holidays

Sometimes Josh and I have differing opinions on what to do with holidays. Most of my holidays include still cooking and cleaning for my family so when I have some time without them I prefer not to do anything resembling those regular activities. So I like to do things like SHOP!!



These were from DFO (something Factory Outlets). The books were on sale and are The Secret Garden, Heidi and Young Learners Bible Stories. The dress is from Cotton On Kids and was $33 marked down to $10! How could I resist that?



Op shopping is good fun too. The basket was $1, the bottles were $3 for the lot (how cute is that boot?) and the denim dress was $5. I have plans for that dress but I'll share that some other time.



And fabric. I went to the best ever Spotlight on Monday. Loved it. Could've spent all day there except it was torture for Josh. =) Bought these fabrics for another project I have in mind. I'll share that later too.


Now this is Josh's idea of holidays. Get the jobs done that you've kept putting off. So he is cutting out the grass for us to have a back patio and also for his shed. He's hoping to have them poured by Friday. I can see him out the sliding door as I sit here and type. He's working hard and keeps asking if I'm going out to help. Ummmm....no! =) I'll keep encouraging and bringing cool drinks and stuff like that though.

The girls come home tomorrow. And I'll post photos of the fun time they've had while at Grandma's house.

Randomness

Well, I know I promised pictures from Emma's party but I don't have them. Gwen was the photographer that night and took some great photos. She sent them to me via email but for some reason I can't save them to my computer. So I will post them as soon as we get all this figured out. So instead I have pictures of the girls helping Daddy yesterday.


Technically, Beka wasn't helping but rather snooping in the garage but it's all the same thing right? =)



And when I took the picture of Beka I found the perfect excuse why I haven't vacuumed this week.


And last I have a pic of the suitcase I'm sending to the States with the Sauvageot's for Mom to fill up with goodies for me, Hey, before you get too jealous I did purchase some of it. The rest is because Mom loves me best!! HAHA, just joking! ;o)



And if you look at the right hand side? Those three ziploc bags? Christmas presents!! for this Christmas!! That's because I'm cheap and am trying to save postage. =) plus I'm sending some goodies to Mom and Dad, like Tim Tams. YUMMY!
Speaking of the Sauvageot's going to the States, Josh and I are taking them to Brisbane today and won't be back until Tuesday evening. Gwen is watching the girls so we are getting a mini holiday of our own!! YAY!!

**Just so nobody yells at me and tells me that I'm a horrible mother--Catie was not actually pushing the lawn mower while it was on. And I have told Josh he needs to not mow barefoot so they will learn to wear protective foot gear while mowing. **