Happy 15th birthday!

Somehow, I blinked, and my firstborn went from being an 8 lb 5 oz little snuggle bug into a 15 year old man-child. I'm not quite certain how this happened. I can't say that I am pleased with how quickly those years have flown by.





As per our family tradition, he got to pick the restaurant he wanted for our one on one birthday dinner. This year he chose Longhorn Steakhouse.






This kid really really loves sweet potatoes! LOL

Happy Birthday to my firstborn love... My favorite 15 year old ... My favoritest TJ. <3 <3

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Where did summer go?

I think I blinked, and I missed summer....

Seriously. It just flew by. Although, really, we never really had a true Illinois summer. The local news station reported today about how our summer has been record-breakingly cold. We actually only reached temperatures over 90 degrees TWICE this year! That's unheard of! It was a pretty rotten summer, as far as swimming and camping are concerned. We managed only one camping trip, and while the temperature was comfortable, it was not July weather. Our trip to the water park was soured a bit by the colder temperatures (mostly it was me that was put out by the temperatures. I believe my children would have ridden ice cubes down the water slides!)

And so September is halfway over. The apple orchards are open, and I fully intend to make it there before it's too cold to go. Soon the pumpkin patch will be open as well. We've already had a few nights that were near freezing temperatures, so hopefully the fall harvest activities are not too affected. It seems strange that Halloween is just a few short weeks away, when it seems like it should still be summer. ::sigh::

I have finals tomorrow, which I am not remotely concerned about, and then have a lovely two week break before the next quarter begins. I have three clinical rotations left before I graduate in June. Yay! The end is finally in sight! I am so looking forward to being able to relax a bit, and work a little less. Not too much longer, now. ::breathe::

We had a foot injury a couple weeks ago, that warranted an ER visit and Xrays. Fortunately, nothing appeared to have been broken. Ella rocked some crutches for a bit to give her heel a chance to heal ::snort:: Getit? Heel.. heal?? I guess you had to be there....

As you can tell, the boys were super excited to spend the morning in the ER :)

Even with all the craziness of my schedule, we have managed to fit in some family time. Like dinner at some of our favorite restaurants, for example.

My children get their strange sense of humor from me, I'll admit it. Max bought a mask that looks like a giant baby head. It's a flat printed picture of a giant baby head, it is NOT a photoshopped picture LOL. It is quite creepy, particularly since he insists on wearing it when I'm least expecting it.... like when I'm sleeping and he comes in my room to say "Hey MOM!" There's nothing to wake you up quite so quickly as a giant baby head in your face ;-)

This is just me. Mostly trying to figure out how time keeps flying by so fast, and yet graduation seems like it will never get here. The kids have birthdays coming up way too soon. I can't believe they are going to be another year older. How did this happen??? I cannot explain it. It seems like they were just babies. ::sigh::

And this... this is our family motto. Nothing else quite sums it up quite so well. We're holding on for all we've got, and trying to enjoy the ride!

Busy, Busy, Busy!

Holy crow, time goes by too quickly. I have a whole ton of pictures I planned on uploading into a blog, but I just haven't had the time. I've been working stupid crazy hours off and on, and had school and clinicals, not to mention the chaos that goes with three busy kids. Yikes. I'm going to attempt to recap the past couple months, and at least put up some of the pictures I've been planning on uploading!



Kids Spot Cheer 2013-2014 Banquet!

Our cheer banquet was a big hit. The girls all look forward to the event, and getting all dressed up in fancy dresses and hair. This year, the banquet was held at Francesco's.

Ella loved wearing one of her pageant dresses again. All the girls were so gorgeous in all their fancy party wear. The dinner was great, and the dance party afterwards was a blast. They gave out a number of awards, and Ella was ecstatic when her name was called for most improved!

TJ "officially" graduated 8th grade this year. Our homeschool co-op had a graduation ceremony, as we had three 8th graders and one high school graduate. It was a very nice ceremony, and I'm so glad we celebrated our students. We don't really keep track of grades in our house, so I'm the mom that was left scrambling to get a cap and gown at the last minute when someone ELSE pointed out my son was one of the graduates LOL. Ooops!

As another "farewell" to junior high, TJ went on his last mission trip with his junior high youth group. The jr high students go to eastern Kentucky every summer to serve the communities in the mountains. They have two small churches they partner with, to run a VBS program for the local children, as well as provide some physical labor in cleaning and repainting and repairing around the area. This is his second trip there, and his final with his youth group. Next year he will go with the high school group to whatever location they are going to. I love seeing all the pictures of the area they are serving. It's gorgeous in the mountains! Next year will be Max's turn to go on his first trip there, and I know he will love going.



Perhaps TJ's least favorite part was that we had to get up SO early to head out! They packed the trailers with most of the supplies and equipment the night before, so when we arrived at dawn the day they left, they had only to put in their carryon bags and some blankets and pillows. After our goodbyes, and saying prayers over all the travellers, they headed out for the long long drive.

Cheer takes no breaks during the off season! If anything, they hit the gym harder to prepare for the upcoming season. Ella is in the gym six days a week, and up to five hours a day. It's not all work and no play though. She loves getting to walk in the local parades. We recently walked in the Belvidere Heritage Days parade. The picture of the lady on stilts was not from our group, but she was quite impressive, and I felt it was photo worthy LOL. I cannot imagine walking in those things, and she even lifted one leg up high and stood on only one peg!! It was nuts!

Girls just wanna have fun! :)

So our days are busy, and always moving way too fast. We're hoping the weather cooperates enough to fit a camping trip or two into the mix. We have a couple upcoming days at the water parks, and a number of days at day camp at church. My boys are volunteer leaders this year, and Ella is a camper. They're all having a great time. I start back to school in a couple days myself. (boo... hiss...) I know the rest of summer is going to fly by. Hopefully not so fast that we don't enjoy it as much as we can.

Resurrection Sunday!

We were blessed with an amazing Easter Sunday this year. The weather was absolutely perfect, which was an unexpected treat. We had a lovely service at church in the morning, followed by a family dinner and egg hunt in the afternoon. The food was fantastic, even the adults enjoyed the egg hunt, visiting with the extended family is always nice, and a good time was had by all.

My boys and I before service began at Church.

The sanctuary was beginning to fill up for Resurrection Sunday service. It was a pretty full house by the time the service began. It was a wonderful worship service, and Pastor Rusty always shares a powerful message.

Ella was ready to get to the egg hunt!


Egg hunting mayhem! The grown ups hid the eggs all over the place- some were tossed in the open lawn, and others were more elaborately hidden. Each of the children had their own assigned egg color, and there was one "wild" color that anyone could grab. This worked out to be the best idea ever, and ensured that all the kids had a good selection of eggs to find. We will definitely have to use the same methods next year. There was also an impromptu sword fight in the middle of the egg hunt. What is an Easter celebration without a sword fight? The egg hunt and sword fight were followed by a squirt gun fight, on account of the weather being so wonderful.

Ella was walking on the slide in an effort to reach a purple egg, and she slipped just as I snapped the picture. It's amazing that it didn't come out blurry, as it happened so fast!

All in all, I think everyone had a great time!

Almost spring... maybe?

The snow has finally melted. There have actually been a couple days that it has been gorgeous outside, and I could even open my house windows for a wee bit (although it still required that I wore a hoodie to be really comfortable). Who would have thought I'd be so ecstatic to hit 50 degrees?? Eight months ago, I would have felt like I was freezing when the temperatures dipped that low. After this frigid winter, I'm busting out the flip flops already at any chance I can get!

I love that I've been able to open the sunroof a couple days already. I'll admit that I'm guilty of opening it AND running the seat warmers at the same time to compensate, just because I was excited about the sunshine :) True to midwest fashion, we are given a gorgeous day one day, and thrust back into the frozen tundra the next. I just keep reminding myself that the winter weather can't go on forever. I mean, it can't... can it??

Weather aside, things are going great. I passed all my classes this past quarter. I'm halfway through my two week spring break, and I'm loving the time to just relax. My next quarter, the only class I have will be Nursing Fundamentals. It will be a lecture/lab as well as clinicals, but that will be the only class. Others that I go to school with are required to take additional classes as well. That makes me thankful I had worked on all those pre-req's previously!

We have one more competition this weekend, and then our cheer season is over. We have the big cheer banquet coming up in May, which she's looking forward to. It will give her a chance to wear a pageant dress again. She'll still have tumbling and cheer classes until the next season starts, so it won't be too different schedule-wise, except that we won't have to travel anywhere for a while. She will find out tomorrow what team she is going to be on next season. I'm praying she's happy with the decision. I know she's really stressed over it. It's too bad that the girls that are on our team this year won't all be together next year due to their ages and some being moved to a higher aged division and some down to mini division. I'm sure they'll stay in touch though- they've made some strong friendships!!

Overall, life is good. God is so good. Even the tragedy of my "old reliable" mini-van blowing up mid-competition weekend turned out to be a good thing in the end. I guess it's all about perspective. It's certainly not always easy to see the blessings in disguise at the time, but I have to remind myself that God is faithful and He always has a plan. I can't wait to see what the rest of the plan is!