Deep Freeze

Our lives are in the school deep freeze right now, and there hasn't been much to blog about.  My brother in law Ben jokingly asked the other day when I was going to do a blogpost so I figured I needed to write something soon.

Karson had her first session at 212° Academy yesterday.  I have learned not to ask to many questions about school when she gets home because it's usually the LAST thing she wants to talk about.  I really wanted to know how her day was but after TWO short-answered questions, I didn't bother asking anymore.  I knew she would eventually start telling me about her day, and she did in bits and pieces throughout the afternoon.  She told me about the special interest areas they are going to be studying.  She was really excited about a couple, specifically book publishing, 3-dimesional drawing and the CSI lab.  She told me about lunch and recess where they got to walk over to the Lovers Lane Park and how once they were done with lunch, they could play.  "We got like 45 minutes, Mom."  Awesome.  I'm hoping I might be able to volunteer some and actually get to see what she's doing.  I'm thankful to WCPS for this opportunity.  The goal is to eventually have an advanced middle school for 6th, 7th & 8th grade students--they are actually looking for land and adequate funding.  Lorie Richey, the gifted supervisor, told us they are grooming these kids for Gatton Academy, which is at WKU and the nations top high school in America.

WCPS's article 212 and the students selected. 

Karson was also recently identified as having outstanding leadership skills and was recommended in the area of Leadership for The Summit.  She has to complete a leadership portfolio (which will be scored by a committee).  One of the requirements is to have three letters of recommendation.  Now, I can think of lots of people who are highly educated that I'm surrounded by daily but am related to, so I didn't want to ask them.  I wanted to find three people that had direct interaction with Karson, weren't related and would feel comfortable enough to write a letter on her behalf.  Here are the three wonderful letters I received:

I adore these people and am grateful for their influence in Karson's life.  This was just ONE piece (of seven) of the leadership portfolio. She is still working on her essays.  Karson is a natural born leader. We are thankful to be her parents and are continually amazed by her accomplishments.

Isaac is right on Karson's heels in the academic arena.  He is involved in the pull-out program at Plano for gifted students.  However, he didn't tell me about it.  I learned this information from my neighbor Jennie, who has a daughter named Mia, who is in Isaac's class and also involved in the program. Sheesh, my kids definitely leave school AT school.  Isaac has become a much more dedicated student this year.  He gets his homework done promptly and takes a little more pride in his work.  I received a kind email from his teacher last week stating that she is only going to give Isaac challenging words and not make him do 20+ spelling words that he already knows.  This is nice because his homework load isn't quite as much, and he's learning more difficult words.  Challenging Isaac is a challenge in itself.  I can totally see him programming his own iPod app. by the time he's in high school.  I've already been researching art institutes in Nashville for gaming instruction.  I'm not sure if Isaac will be as committed as Karson in the school programs (ex. Quick Recall, Academic Team, etc.), but I imagine he'll become involved in things like STLP and Robotics.  He loves being creative and using his talents to entertain or expand his thinking.  Keeping my fingers crossed that he'll one day be invited to participate in 212°. They'd be lucky to work with a brain like his =).

Miles is still very much my adorable 6-year old.  He loves getting kisses from his mama.  He loves playing dress up and romping through the house like a super hero, Mortal Kombat player or whatever he sees fit.  Time with his friends Trapper and Samuel are HIGH on his priority list.  He loves school and his new teacher Ms. Ferry.  I want to bottle up his preciousness because I know very soon he'll be just as big as Karson, and I won't be able to pick him up and snuggle with him.  It's amazing how quickly time passes especially once the school year starts.

Our children are the proud owners of three tiny kittens:  Castor, Golam and Buggy.  I have NO idea if I spelled those names right? or why our kids picked these peculiar names for the kittens?  I think they were trying to avoid the traditional names they've given other kittens like "kitty" or "gray kitty" =).  I guess I should praise them for being more creative with their naming skills.  The kittens don't live with us--Matt is highly allergic so cats are OUT.  They live with Pap and Nana about a minute away.  I think Karson has spent every afternoon there the last three weeks.  She loves those kittens and would probably sleep outside with them if she could.  We've taken them to get all their shots and plan to have them spayed soon. 

The month of August is coming to a close for us, and we almost have a complete month of school under our belts.  It's hard to believe that the orange tent is already up in B.G. and places are pulling out all of their Halloween decorum.  Enjoy these last little pieces of summer, looks like fall is rolling in.

And so the SCHOOL YEAR BEGINS

The dreaded day for most children across Warren County has arrived. It's the FIRST day of school!  No more staying up late.  No more sleeping in late.  No more carefree afternoons. No more staying in the same clothes for multiple days.  People always ask, "are you ready for the kids to start school?"  My answer is and always will be NO.  Routine is nice.  And, I like knowing the kids are with friends and learning new things, but what I don't like, is the fast and furious way time moves during the school year.  It seems like once it starts, we literally hit the ground running.  We have homework, schedules, sports, programs, fund raisers, school events, etc.  It's exhausting keeping up with it all.  I also feel a little more manic about clean hands, bath times and general cleanliness.  I know I sound like I'm complaining because I AM.  I just like the relaxed state of summer and am never quite ready for it to end.  I want my kids to stay little and naive and STOP.GROWING.UP!

Here is my precious 1st grader Miles and his new teacher Ms. Ferry.

Here is my creative 3rd grader Isaac and his new teacher Ms. Victery

Here is my disciplined 5th grader Karson and her teacher Ms. Strode.  Karson has had a relationship with Ms. Strode over the last two years.  Ms. Strode coaches the Academic Team for Plano.  I know she'll have lots of expectations from Karson and is very familiar with her abilities as a student. 

Up and ready to go, bright and early.  I decided to pack our car the night before.  I had an arsenal of supplies to deliver to Plano this morning.  Although I'm never quite ready for school, something about school supply shopping is enjoyable for me.  Most things cost less than $1, maybe that's why?  I was talking to a friend who told me she'd heard most parents spent around $600 per child on school things. 

Families with school-age children will spend an average of $634.78 on apparel, shoes, supplies and electronics, down from $688.62 in 2012, according to the National Retail Federation's 2013 Back-to-School Survey. Total back-to-school spending will reach $26.7 billion; back-to-school and back-to-college spending will reach $72.5 billion combined.

(from goerie.com)

 I don't think I spend quite that much but our bank account is pretty depleted after the first of school.  I think I average around $150 per child starting out with lunch accounts and supplies.  

Thanks goodness the Duck, Duck Goose sale is around the corner so I can start building the kids winter wardrobes. I'm a frugal shopper when it comes to clothes.  I buy used when I can.  I imagine the spending will become more increased as they begin those Jr. High/High School years.  Eeeeek!

I'm incredibly excited that Isaac and our neighbor Mia are in the same class this year for the first time.  What's even more bizarre is that her sister Laila is in Miles's class too!  Hooray, it's nice having buddies (especially next door neighbor buddies) in our class.

I was kind of shocked that Isaac was the only child who had an assignment after open house.  It seems like every year teachers ask the kids to come up with an "about me" bag, poster, box, etc.  Usually we just throw something together quickly for all three kids.  But since it was only Isaac, and his assignment involved a BOX, and he usually uses all of our SHOE boxes for miscellaneous projects, and the only box I had was an empty cereal box in our recycle bin, I figured (based on its shape) why not get crafty and turn it into an iPod? An iPod pretty much sums Isaac up.  The boy has had his own You Tube channel since age 7, check out his You Tube Channel, carries that iPod everywhere, texts, face times, emails, records, takes pics., you name it.  Really all he needed to take today was the box, but he filled it with "me" things like a Captain Underpants book, trash packs, a book he wrote, a picture of his family, a bag of Cheese-Its, and whatever other trinkets he decided to put in it.

I'm anxiously awaiting my kids return from school and know there will be lot of stories to tell.  We're looking for to the 2013-2014 school year!

Fear Factor Family Camp Edition

One of our summer highlights is FAMILY CAMP.  We've been doing family camp at our church for the last five years.  It's a unique experience and everyone gets to come and participate.  Our church isn't incredibly large so devoting an entire week to church camp is a bit taxing and costly.  Plus, our children can attend week-long camps with other congregations which is nice (and many of them do).  For us, a nice, long weekend of camp is do-able, and our church does it WELL.  

We have our camp at Whispering Pines in Castialian Springs, Tennessee.  Each year we have a theme, and this year's theme was FEAR FACTOR.  As you can tell from the picture above, Miles (not necessarily Karson) has a fear of getting his hair caked in shaving cream.  When we started our camp shopping, he told me he didn't want to get shaving cream and do the shaving cream fight this year because he didn't want to get it in his hair.  I told him we could solve that problem easily by getting some shower caps.  BEST. PURCHASE. EVER.  My kids have had more fun with those $1 shower caps this week.  I may have to buy them weekly from now on =).  After packing up our entire house, we took off for camp Friday afternoon.

Everyone usually arrives at camp in the late afternoon/early evening.  After dinner, we divide into teams and play our first team challenge.  I'll spare you ALL the details of the first challenge, but it basically involved phobias, reading clues that take you to the different areas of camp containing phobias and facing what the phobia consisted of--clowns, spiders, snakes, darkness, etc.

Karson and her "boy"friends playing some cards.  This four-pack went to a week-long church camp earlier in July with Greenwood Park. 

The girls all buried under the bunk beds with quilts, blankets and lots of sugary snacks.

I only took two pictures on Saturday (the one to the left and the one below).  I didn't want to keep up with my camera all day long.  My kids are constantly scattered in different directions, and I just want to plop down and relax, especially since I had gotten about 4-5 hours of sleep the night before.  Church camp = no sleep.  I grabbed my camera twice for two quick pics.  I really should've have taken more because our second team challenge would've provided some comic relief to you readers out there.  After lunch at the pavilion, we had another challenge which involved EATING.  It wasn't your normal kind of eating, it was FEAR FACTOR kind of eating.  In summary, Matt had marshmallows covered in mustard dropped in his mouth. I had to pick up whipped cream covered gummy worms and feed them to Miles.  Karson ate a variety of things:  bologna, M&M's covered in ketchup--with NO hands, a sour cream freeze dried cricket and a LIVE worm.  I want to hurl just thinking of it.  Isaac got to participate in the night crawlers challenge which involved searching through night crawlers to find hidden pennies.  The grossest challenge was called The Happy Meal.  This involved what we ate for lunch--a Diet Coke, bag of chips and a hot dog--all blended together into a drink.  Matt and his dad Colvin had signed up for this challenge.  It was D-I-S-G-U-S-T-I-N-G!  Matt said the mixture smelled (and looked) like vomit.  He and his dad only managed to drink about a 1/4 of it.  Only one team downed the entire cup.  YUCK!  The challenge also involved a gigantic slip-n-slide where you had to collect flags.  We had a blast on Saturday.

Andrew usually comes up for the day and brings some toys.  He took people out on the jet ski.  Somehow I ended up driving tubers around on the boat.  I think the men were ready for a break and wanted to do some fishing.  The kids weren't ready to stop tubing so I stepped up to the challenge.  I've driven boats before, but I don't do it often.  We had fun though, and no one got hurt thankfully =).  We ended Saturday with dinner and a campfire devotional down by the lake. On Saturday night, we like playing glow-in-the-dark dodgeball.  I'm not sure dodge ball and small children are necessarily a nice union, but the kids have a blast (tears and all).  I opted out of dodgeball and stayed close to the fire mainly because my brain shut off when smores were  mentioned.  Kids roasting marshmallows on a blazing hot fire isn't the best combination. We figured it would be good to let the fire die down and play dodgeball first.  However, I wasn't about to leave an area where SMORES where about to be assembled.  Are you kidding me?  I love smores! After eating not one, BUT TWO smores, I headed over to the dodgeball field and wanted to tell Miles and Karson I was heading up to the lodge.  I knew both of my lil chicks would want to come with me.  About the time we left the field, it started sprinkling outside.  We made our way over to grab some smores and headed up the hill to the lodge.  We hadn't been in the lodge 10 minutes before everyone started sprinting inside.  The clouds opened up and dumped gallons of rain water down on the camp.  We were nice and dry inside--AND we had gotten our yummy smores too.  Whew =)!

Sunday morning is usually a blur--breakfast, worship, camp clean-up.  Our kids are always super sad when the weekend is over and are wishing they had more time at camp.  I wish I agreed with them, but I'm usually worn completely out and ready to get home.  This year was so much fun though.  Each year gets better and better.  We're so thankful for such a wonderful church FAMILY.

First Tooth

This week has brought yet another milestone for MILES.  He lost his very first tooth on Thursday, July 25.  I thought he'd never lose one.  He was so excited about putting it under his pillow last night.  He peppered Matt with loads of questions about the tooth fairy.  She brought him a $5 dollar bill too (we usually give the kids "more than usual" for their first tooth).  

The cutest missing tooth ever! Love this boy!  

Along with going underwater and losing his first tooth, he also gained a fun little ear infection.  I'm not sure which caused it but am thinking it's water related.  I took him to see Dr. Chris on Friday because his right ear had been sensitive to the touch for two days AND we were heading to church camp that afternoon.  I wanted to make sure it wasn't serious.  The doc told me his eardrum looked fine, and that it was probably swimmers ear.  My little snaggle toothed fish has to stay above water for the the next few days and get ear drops.

July in Review

FUN FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY -- BEECH BEND PARK

Okay, so I know I titled this post JULY in review, but I HAVE to blog our trip to BB which was at the END of JUNE =).  Shannon, Lisa and I took the kids make the trek to BB.  We've had season passes in the past but have decided to nix that purchase the last two years.  Since the Maglingers have a beautiful pool for us to enjoy during the summer, we just hang out there most weeks.  Beech Bend has become a special summer treat for us.  We try to go at least once. I knew this year would be exciting because Isaac was tall enough to ride the Kentucky Rumbler--BB's huge wooden coaster.  Last year he rode his first roller coaster at Holiday World (The Raven) and was "shaken" when he got done.  I was surprised by his excitement to try the Rumbler.  

The bigger kids started out at the Tornado while the little kids rode on the motorcycles.  It's nice because these two rides are right next to each other.

After the kids got done with their first rides, the big kids headed over to the Flying Bobs, and the littles kids went behind the Bobs to Rainbow Rock (one of those climbing/sliding/tunneling free standing jungle gym of sorts).  I was keeping my eye on the older kids because I knew they would be heading to Rumbler which is about a football field length away from  Rainbow Rock.  When the Bobs was finished I couldn't really tell where the kids were--I was hoping they would get on the Sea Dragon Pirate Ship.  No luck, I saw them at quite a distance heading for the Rumbler running :/.  Yikes, I thought to myself.  I hadn't told Shannon that Isaac was wanting to ride, and it would be his first time.  I told my friend Lisa I need to get over there quick and start sprinting (swim bag, flip flops and all) toward them.  It was to late by the time I got up to the Rumbler.  The kids were already loaded in.  Thank goodness Karson was riding with him.  I didn't want him to ride alone (Evan doesn't do roller coasters).  I asked him if he was okay to ride, and he said yes.  The coaster didn't last long before they came back, and Isaac had that stunned look on his face again.  I asked him if he was okay again, he said no =).  The Rumbler is exciting, but it's super fast and wooden coasters beat you to death.  He wasn't about to go on it a SECOND time like the wild girls in our bunch.

Enjoying more rides at BB.  We like to pack a lunch and avoid eating at the park.  This year, BB stopped their free soft drink program which was a bummer.  Isaac loves infinite soft drinks. After lunch, we headed to the pool which was nice and refreshing.  We ran in to some friends there which was fun -- lots of our friends still have their BB passes.  

Season passes at BB are a really great deal for what you pay.  However, I think going once a summer is enough for me. BECAUSE....

Our family thoroughly enjoys Holiday World (as you can tell by our large group size) which is only an hour and a half from Bowling Green AND it costs about as much as BB AND there is WAY more to do. 

I decided not to load to pack my camera for the trip this year.  We spend a majority of the day at the waterpark, and I figured Matt could snap a couple of photos with his iPhone.

The little and big kids usually split up immediately because the big kids are ready to ride the coasters.  Matt took Miles to the lil' kids area, and I headed to The Raven to literally get beaten to death on the wooden coaster.  Isaac was a trooper and wanted to to ride it.  By the end of the day, he rode it three times.  I'm excited he likes roller coasters.  The older I get, the less my brain can keep up and I leave coasters feeling confused about what just happened.  It helps if I close my eyes and reopen them during the ride.  I'm sure it would look funny if someone saw me, but at 50 MPH who's looking right?  We spent about 1/4 of the day at the park rides and the rest of the day at the waterpark.  We usually end the night in Holidog's fun town.  We took off around 7 p.m. that night completely worn out.

We've frequented Chick Fil A for breakfast and lunch.  Nothing makes Isaac happier than a 12 count of nuggets and a Diet Dr. Pepper for breakfast or lunch.

We've celebrated lots of birthdays in July beginning with my brother-in-law's on July 2.  I never know how to shop for men, and Matt's usually zero help.  I figured since Paul's birthday was around the 4th, I'd go to the Thunderdome Fireworks tent and get him some fireworks.  Fireworks can be pricey little suckers, but I was able to get some of the ones that shoot up in the air and some parachute troopers for around $25, and I also picked up some lottery tickets for him.  When we went to celebrate that night, I think everyone was excited about the fireworks so a few people took off to Sam's Club to buy even more of them.  It was a fireworks extravaganza.  Speaking of fireworks, we took the kids to Alvaton Church's annual fireworks show.  What a wonderful ministry this church has for our community each year.  The show lasted over an hour, they had inflatables for the kids, there was free food, drinks, snow cones, popcorn, you name it.  We loved it and loved fellowshipping with our friends there.

One of Karson's dearest friends, Kaylee, also celebrated her birthday this month.  It was a nice opportunity for all of our girls to get together and hang out--what a sweet bunch.  Her birthday was at Spa Fabulous.  The girls decorated sleep masks, had facials, get mani/pedi's and then had a runway fashion show. Love this group!

The twins celebrated their 9th birthday on July 18.  I had to include the invitation since I designed it--love doing invites.  We took the kids to Nashville to the Aquarium and to see the movie Turbo.

Our lil creatures of the sea =).  I can't believe Evan and Elizabeth are already 9 years old.  Our kids are growing up in a flash.  It seems like yesterday when Shannon and I were both preggers with our three-pack.  Thankful our kids have such incredible cousins and their relationships are so strong.  They literally would spend every single day and night together if they could.

In other July news, I got rear-ended.  My poor "new" car has had more accidents than my old van every had.  I went to happy hour at Sonic one afternoon during my break at SKyPAC and was enjoying my mozzarella snack pack and 1/2 price cherry limeade when cars started merging into my lane on Louisville Road.  The truck that came over in front of me slammed on his brakes and almost came to a complete stop.  I almost ran into him but didn't.  Unfortunately I got the brunt of his wreckless driving and got rear ended.  I felt sorry for the poor teenager who ran into me.  It could've happened to anyone.  It was just poor timing especially during my HAPPY HOUR =(.  All of well though, and the car was fixed almost immediately.  Back to new and keeping my fingers and toes crossed that this will be the LAST big event to my bionic car.  Sheesh.