Book Fair

I love books therefore volunteering at the Book Fair was right up my alley!  I got to assist with Mason's class during their library time.  Last year in Kindergarten I was able to volunteer in his class and I knew all the kids names by now and I am not able to do that this year.  I appreciated the book fair because I got to meet some of his new friends!

To the parent whose little boy came home with a Dodge Challenger poster instead of a book -- I gave it my best shot! Short of forcing him to buy a book I really did try! Apparently his daddy likes cars a lot and so he wanted a poster!

I volunteered yesterday and Mason was very proud to have me there; which I'm sure had nothing to do with the fact that he was able to load up on books!

One sweet new friend who I helped shop came up and gave me a big hug this morning and that makes it all worthwhile!

The Best Lunch Date

I have enjoyed my days home with Conner so much lately!  We have had a great time lately of reading together and playing and doing fun stuff! Tuesday was no different - I was busy cleaning out my car because I'm so embarrassed at car drop-off for the teachers to see my filthy car!

Conner came outside with a basket that had strawberry jelly in it and he asked for 5 pieces of white bread.  I abandoned the car and we came inside and made sandwiches and got chips and root beer and packed it all in our basket and headed to the treehouse. We had a lovely lunch of tuna fish (mine) and strawberry jelly (his) sandwiches and cheetos! It was the greatest!

I am so thankful for this time with him.  I know sometimes I get busy and overlook the simple things but I am glad he decided on a picnic for us today!  I am very fortunate to have the opportunity to be home with him and to be the mommy to such a fun, wild, crazy and incredibly sweet little boy!

The Joy of Giving

Last Friday I was on the prowl for Operation Christmas Child supplies! A sweet friend, Lindsey, called and had some bags for me to pick up. I was very excited about that!  Especially because she is collecting items for the local charity that she helps out with, The Learning Center, but yet she took time to shop for the other kiddos of this world!  She mentioned receiving an abundance of donations for TLC because people she knew were looking to support a local charity.

From reading some of the comments on the OCC Facebook page  I can tell that lots of people are passionate about the kids in America who go without so if you are one of those people then you should link up with Lindsey and I'm sure she'd appreciate your help!

I'm so grateful for the outpouring of support for OCC! I'm actually trying to decide where and how to spend all the money! I never expected to have more than I know what to do with!

In related news, I have been on the prowl for a lost cowboy boot for about two weeks and today I was getting serious about tearing my house apart to find it.  My mom mentioned looking in the OCC donations to see if I carried in one of those boxes and it got misplaced.  I headed upstairs this morning to look (it wasn't there) and I ventured over to the "shoe section" and I straightened them all out and was just in awe of my riches (in comparision to the rest of the world).  I am on a mission to find one shoe when Conner has about 5 pair of shoes so even without this one shoe he is not going barefoot.  I began to pray over those shoes and the little feet that one day will go in them and for that little heart to know how much God loves them! I am humbled by all He has blessed me with and in awe of what He will do with the 10 tiny shoes upstairs in my gameroom!  All the kids in America and abroad need to know is that God loves them and that can totally change their world!

The joy of giving - it's contagious!! Try it out!

Dixie Corn Maze Field Trip

Last Tuesday Conner's class had a field trip to the Dixie Corn Maze.  Last year I got to take Mason and so I was excited to take Conner this go around! The morning started off with a series of mishaps that made me wonder if we'd ever get there though!!

Our power went out around 3:30 a.m. and when I woke up around 6 a.m. it was still off.  Here in the country, no power = no water, therefore mornings like this are terrible! I called the power company again and they assured me my power would be back on by 6:45 a.m. After a few mental calculations I determined we would have enough time to wait until then to get moving and out the door by 7:20 - I was wrong!

First our power did not come back on as promised and secondly the overnight storm had dropped the temperatures drastically!  Everything I had set out for us to wear the night before was no longer needed and I was left digging through drawers with a flashlight looking for khaki pants! We were finally dressed - the kids in their uniforms and I in the clothes I had worn the night before to Mason's soccer game with no makeup and greasy hair - fabulous!

We were strapped into our car seats and I was quietly singing praises for Ryan remembering to manually open the garage for me . . . that is until I backed into it because it needed to be open about 4 inches more! By this time the power has come back on and I spent 10 minutes on the phone with Ryan trying to figure out how to get the door back on track and reset to automatic - nothing I do works.  We finally bail from the car into Ryan's truck and head to school - 20 minutes late.  Because we are late I in my disheveled state must first go in the office and then march the kids all the way through the school! By the time I get home I have 25 minutes to shower, pack Conner and I lunches and get on the road.  This does not happen in 25 minutes!

My dad comes to my rescue and fixes the garage door and I can take my car to Dixie and I am only 45 minutes late!! Luckily, because of parents like me, the buses are late too and I only arrive 5 minutes after them!  When I get there they have Conner wrapped in a blanket because his bad mother forgot to send a jacket to school - I redeemed myself however by bringing it with me on the field trip.  I should have packed one for myself though because it was freezing!!!! FREEZING! Another mom had an extra jacket that I borrowed - thank you!

Here is Conner with his pumpkin!

It was a muddy mess in the pumpkin patch!

The corn bin/box! The kids loved this and it was warm in there!

It was really hard to tell the kids apart because apparently all of them have navy sweatshirt jackets!

The 4-wheeler train

I think all the kids had the most fun on the trampoline thing!

The field trip ended early because of the cold weather.  We missed our picnic but I was happy to get out of the wind!

Busy Weekend of Fun

Of course, my Internet chose one of the busiest weeks of fall to go out! So I've been out of commission until I could get a technician w-a-y out here!  The weekend of the 15th we had a very busy Saturday! I kicked things off with Conner and the 3rd Annual Stonewall Long Haul 5k which benefited Circle of Hope this year!  All the Special Olympians did a great job - much better than me because I was late an did not run or walk anywhere! I did however partake in some of the Down Home Sausage and it was yummy!

Here are some actual athletes -- plus Conner!!

Conner & his precious most beloved Mimee who he loves more than ANYBODY (including me) in the whole world! At this moment he is steadily saying "my go with Mimee!"

Our next stop was the soccer fields for Mason's first ever soccer game! Mason was extremely anxious about this game and HE DID GREAT!!  He either scored one or two goals - Ryan & I say two but he said he only scored one. We are still undecided!! His coach is awesome and really helped boost his confidence by picking him up and swinging him around after his first goal!  He loves soccer now!!

Thanks to ReRe for coming out to watch Mason and bringing Conner to the game for me!

Practicing 

and he scores!

water break

going for the ball

HOORAY MASON!

After soccer Ryan took the boys to Chick-fil-a and I headed to Benton to help host a sip-n-see for Holly and sweet baby Max! I went into a slight panic attack because the other hostess, Elise, had three kids with the stomach flu and couldn't make it at the last minute.  Thankfully she had done much prep work beforehand and Holly's sweet mom and grandma came to my rescue as well!

The sip-n-see was fun!! Max never made a peep and was just so darn cute!!

Thanks also to Holly's mother-in-law and her mom (David's grandma) for helping me clean up!! And to Elise for leaving her sick kids to come vacuum!

Here is the precious one!

Elise got a super cute idea from a friend about having a coke float instead of punch and it was a hit!

We had water, coke float, and strawberry lemonade and all the grandma's loved the coke float - refilling their glasses a lot! So there's an idea for your next shower or sip-n-see or birthday party!

The foam looked sort of dirty but no one seemed to mind!

A busy but fun Saturday! If you're wondering I went to bed at 8:30 that night!

Date Night with the Hubs

Ryan and I had a very rare Monday night date!  My parents, who are super fabulous, took the boys camping for a few days.  The boys are on Fall Break and I have BIG deadlines for school so it worked out perfectly!

I laughed yesterday when my mom called to check in because after I heard her say "hi" then I heard . . . "Jay, watch him with that knife!!"  Conner has a great love affair with butter and apparently he found a knife in which to eat it with . . . which beats what he did Friday night - lick butter out of the tub until it was smeared all over his face.  So while I miss my babies it is a nice and welcome break! THANKS MOM & DAD!!

So Monday I told Ryan to be prepared to me to Longhorn Steakhouse when he got off work and away we went! We don't eat there often but I really like it and I like it even more because my dad's picture is hanging in the restaurant!  My dad takes his mom to eat lunch there every Wednesday afternoon and if you've ever been there you know most of the decor is Western/mountains/cowboy-ish and last year when my dad was going on his annual elk hunting trip to Colorado the manager told him to bring back a picture. Now next time you go to Longhorn in Shreveport . . . stand with your back to the hostess station and on the left front wall you'll see a ruggedly handsome man riding horseback down a CO mountain with a hat casting shadows on his face and THAT'S MY DAD!! It's a really big picture so you can't miss it!

But moving on - we had a great dinner and we didn't have to yell at anyone about butter or sugar packets or anything!!  Since our kids are never far from our thoughts we ended the night at Sam's to replace the trampoline that got destroyed in the April tornado.  They have been begging us to get a new one but its really been too hot to jump so this will be their big Halloween surprise when they get home this week!

A fun night!! Now I must stop procrastinating about this homework!!!

Operation Christmas Child, Part 5: Praise Report

If you have been keeping up with my Operation Christmas Child series then you know 100 shoeboxes was the goal for my church in it's first year of collecting gifts for OCC.  One of my concerns was the possibility of having 100 shoeboxes but not having the $700 for shipping and you know what??

WE HAVE $700 FOR SHIPPING!!!!

Know what else? We also have $100 to purchase 100 plastic shoeboxes that will be more durable for the children to keep their belongings!  You may ask if I still need your cardboard shoeboxes and the answer is YES -- I'm going to set my sights high and hope for more than enough stuff to fill the plastic shoeboxes!  And if that doesn't happen my mind is already geared for OCC 2012 and the church can store the extra boxes!

I also just got word that a local dentist office (Mrs. Dottie - could you comment and leave the name of the office?) has donated 150 TOOTHBRUSHES!!

Wow - isn't God good right here in small town Louisiana??

But with 150 toothbrushes and $700 for shipping and $100 for boxes we need STUFF to put in the boxes - like toothpaste, toys, colors, balls, slinky's, etch a sketch, dolls, etc!

Get to shopping and I'll see you on 11/5/11 for a fun morning of packing a shoebox that could lead to HOPE for a child in a hopeless world!