Surprise!

This weekend we had our first party at our new house.

We had a surprise 25th wedding anniversary party for my Aunt and Uncle.

Their anniversary was actually in the spring, so my mom, other aunt and myself 

started talking about it then. But decided to wait to have the party

until we were moved into the new house.

My aunt and I have always been really close,

 so I was excited to make this our first official party.

The party went really well and they were really surprised.

The big kids hanging out in the living room.

I loved that everyone could hang out in the kitchen

and there was still plenty of room.

Love this picture of my cousin, yes I said my cousin, 

both him and his brother T are the same age as

my 2 oldest boys.

Bubbas and Buster always love talking to T.

Tator turns 8 and our thankful tree

Yesterday my parents took Tator and some of the other kids horse back riding for the first time. It worked out good because this gave me time to get ready for Tator's birthday party.

She did so good. I didn't tell her we were having the party when they got back. I just let her be surprised. She was a little wound up, but she did fine. With having a very over stimulating day I was prepared for the worst.

I was really proud of her. She's doing really well right now. As I type this she is playing upstairs with Bunny, which hasn't happened in a very long time. I hope this is the beginning of her healing.

..............................................................................................................................

We started a thankful tree tonight. Over the weekend Buc cut a tree out of construction paper and hung it in our dinning room. Today Buster and I cut out a bunch of
leaves. We're planning to write something we're thankful for on a leaf every night and hang it on the tree.

Today we are thankful for...........
Mom: Gods forgiveness
Dad: Shooting a Buck this morning and getting it on video
Duckie: The cross
Buc: That we live in the country
Bunny: Jesus
Tator: God
Bubbas: For my crossbow
Buster: God

Can you see where some of our priorities are right now?

What we do on warm November days........

We practice shooting our bow,

we do a lot of talking about hunting,

we get mad when mom interrupts us to take a picture

 on the way to our tree stand,

we practice shooing our BB gun,

we try to move daddy's targets around because

we think he'd like them somewhere else,

we jump,

we skate,

we swing,

we smile because we feel happy,

and some of us are so cute it doesn't

matter what we do.





Homecoming and other random stuff

Last week was supposed to be my get back on track week. I was going to get back into the routine of exercising everyday and trying to blog every other day.

Then life happened.

We had an appointment every morning last week.
Our Internet was down most of the time. Which made us get behind with school, also making it hard to blog.
Buster had the flu and kept me up all night one night while he threw up.
Buc had another migraine. You can read about them here and here. This one wasn't too bad and he never got confused, but they are really hard on me emotionally. I worry through the whole thing.
We started feeding the neighbor lady's farm animals while she's on vacation.

Also, as an accomplishment, I read an entire book in a week in a half. I don't know when I've ever done that.
  ................................................................................................

We had a really nice weekend. Duckie went to homecoming with Belle. Bunny and Bubbas ran another cross country meet and are doing super. They have both improved their times. I can't believe how well Bubbas is doing with only being in kindergarten. He's really enjoying being part of a team.

We did put Tator in respite this weekend. I wasn't sure what to do. We had worked it out that she go every other weekend, but since she went 2 weekends ago she has been doing some what better at home. But since we were supposed to have a cross country race on Saturday and she has found a way to sabotage almost all the races she's supposed to bein, we decided it would be a good idea if she went.

This week Bubbas and I are headed to Ireland. I can't wait!

Have a great week everyone!

Finally zoo pictures

Snack break

Sissy loved the fish

The coolest thing was a polar bear that jumped in the water
right above us.

Tator, Bunny, and Buster chillin with the Komodo dragon.

Yep, my husband and I actually sat on the turtle to get
our picture taken.

Last week and ORLANDO.

   Last week went pretty well for being the first week of summer vacation. We had a few appointments at the beginning of the week, but was still able to squeeze in some swimming time before Shawn and I had to spend three days in foster parent training.

   I've mentioned before that Tator has a hard time adjusting to change in routine, so we had really contemplated putting her in daycare a couple days a week while she's on summer vacation.  We decided to start out last week with 3 days a week and see how she adjusts. Then in July drop down to 2 days week. I've talked with all her therapists and even her psychiatrist and they think its ok even though we are working on her attachment to us. I can be a much better Mommy to her if I get respite from RAD (not her) a couple times a week.

  She did very well at daycare, but because she was so exhausted she ended up throwing a fit after supper and went to bed early both nights. Aside from the fits she has been more loving, hugging me more and being nicer to the other kids. She even asked me to lay with her for awhile when I put her to bed the other night.

   Thursday, Friday and Saturday Shawn and I took FP training classes all day. We came home having learned a lot of good information, but they were still very long days.

   Yesterday we surprised the kids by having a Family Fun Day and took them to the zoo. (pics coming soon) We didn't tell them until they got up and were eating breakfast. They had a blast. I'm sure they will all still be worn out today. They did alot of walking.

 Oh my gosh, I almost forgot to tell everyone. I'm going to Orlando! I can't wait! It's not until next spring so I'm sure you'll be hearing how excited I am for a long time. I'm already driving my kids nuts talking about it. They still don't believe I'm going. I have never flown before and said I never would. When I think about the flying part it terrifies me. But it will be so worth it. RAD makes you do crazy things and this will be my crazy thing. It's totally not like me to get in airplane and fly to another state to meet complete strangers. ALONE! But I've already meet most of the other "trauma mamas" on line that I'll be staying with and I look forward to meeting them in person when we get there.

   Well I've gotta go, I've got alot of house work to catch up on. Have a great week everyone!





Bird Banding

The other day we went to

a Wilderness Center and

watched them band birds.

The kids all got to hold a

baby bird.

They really enjoyed it.

Even though the baby birds

weren't very cute.



I'm still here

Hello everyone, I'm still here.

Just taking a break from blogging.

Any spare time I have is being used

toward getting ready for Duckies

graduation party. I'll be back soon.

I did take some time last week to

take the kids fishing. I just had to

share this picture of Buster holding

the little fish Bubbas caught.

Isn't he the cutest kid ever!



We Like Wednesday

We like to play games together.

 Last week one evening we didn't have

electricity so the kids decided to play charades.

Bubbas is acting out changing a diaper.

Tator is acting out lightning.





Finally Easter Pics

Finally got to post my Easter pictures. I haven't had internet for about

3 days so once again my blog has been neglected.

Maybe next week will go better.

Tator, Bubbas, Buc, Sissy, Bunny, Buster and Duckie

My gang with their cousins.

Coloring Easter Eggs

I have to admit I have never colored Easter eggs with my

kids until this year. I think maybe I did with my oldest when

he was real young, but it was so long ago I don't even

remember. It just seems so messy.

This year I thought I'd give it a try.

Can you tell how inexperienced I am?

Didn't even think about covering the table.

Buster wasn't to happy we wouldn't let him play

in the bowl of dye.

Not sure what color that is.

Everything was going fine, until Bunny decided to be

funny and crack an egg over Buc's head.

Busy and Drained

Oh my gosh what a week.

Monday we started by hitting school full force. I had a lot I wanted to accomplish at home this week. Plus many appointments on top of baseball games and softball practices.

Bunny is working on a report on Italy right now. This is her first report so it requires a lot of help from me making it hard for me to get house hold things done.  Buster has also had a cold so he has been up at night, making him very grouchy during the day. Not to mention me being more tired than usual.

Tuesday Buc came home with a migraine again. It was worse than usual. He started talking funny and the side of his mouth went numb again. I was really scared. He threw up right away and then his mouth went back to normal. He was in alot of pain all day. I ended up sitting by him watching him, making sure he never got confused or his mouth went numb again. That didn't happen, but his headache never let up until evening. 

Wednesday we spent all day at his neurologist. We actually had a follow-up appointment scheduled with her anyway so that worked out well. She's decided to increase the dose of his preventative medicine since it's not preventing his migraines. I hope this works because his headaches are getting really scary for me.

Thursday was filled with me running around trying to catch up on everything at home I didn't get done on Tuesday or Wednesday.

Friday I ran errands all day trying to get ready for Easter.

Because I was so busy and emotionally drained this week my blog was neglected. But I'm back and I've got alot of memories to record.

Have a great Easter everyone.

We Like Wednesday

Over Spring Break we went to COSI.

We had never been there before and the kids really enjoyed it.

We bought a family membership and plan on going back.