New Years Eve Party

Happy New Years everyone!! we had a fun party with all the kids and cousins and aunts, uncles, grandparents... it was fun! The kids and I blew up almost 200 balloons and stuffed some of them with confetti! I sewed one side of a fitted mattress sheet to the upstairs banister, then stuffed all the balloons in it and I used just one stitch on two corners to keep it up against the banister, then I sewed my bathrobe tie so it hung down, so at midnight all we had to do was pull hard enough to break the 2 stitches sending ballons and confetti raining down on the kids. It sounds silly but I have a lot of fun doing it, this was my best set up! Then we toasted with sparkling cider and had the house clean and the guests left all by 10:45!! Of course I will kiss Kirk happy new year at 12 and then leave right away to go get Matt from his first New Years party!! AHH the life of a teenagers parent!! Hope everyone else had a fun night and I hope and wish all the best for all of you!! May I get to see you all this year! Love!!

Christmas Chaos, I mean Morning

Ok i want to write a much more detailed accounting of our morning, but i have no time!! Living by family means holidays are not relaxing! We opened presents this morning around 7, and I went to bed around 2:30. then I made breakfast to take to the Hansens house at 10:30 came home at 1, roll out the dough I had rising, throw them into the oven, get a 5 minute shower and then race with the kids to movie theatre by 2:20 to see a 2;30 movie hoping I can still get seats since I know Susan and Tiff are usually late and now I am as well!! Then run to Johnstons for dinner, and I better remember Kirks inhaler because he already left for the "Guy" movie and 2 nights at his parents house is hell on his breathing. I won't excuse myself using that word, because that fits it the best. :-) So MErry Christmas and I will write better later, it was really fun this morning! Matt had NO idea what he was getting and it was priceless seeing his face!! Worth eating mac and cheese for the next month!! Lol

Christmas Quilts

There is no way I can write this witty enough, or with enough excitement or gratitude, all my words are unequal to the task! My kids were the lucky recipients of the most beautiful Christmas quilts ever!! The kids love them, they are soft fabric with darling bright prints!! On one side is a tree made out of different green fabrics and even little presents underneath!! Thanks mom these ROCK!!

Firm party

So we went to Kirks annual law firm party last night. It is always fun to get dressed up and go hang out downtown! Tradition goes that there is a football game that pits the partners against the associates, and of course the partners always win. Kirk last year left there with road rash all the way down one leg which made wearing a tuxedo very painful, this year his legs were fine but he got a cleat right through the palm of his hand! He came home and it had grass and mud in it, pretty gross. He put band aids on it but as people would greet us at the party we all shook hands and of course it's his right that's injured so he kept having to go to the bathroom to put new band aids on as it was bleeding everywhere. I told him to hold a drink and that stopped some people from offering their hands. The food was good, a steak the size of a golf ball, and a small piece of salmon, with 3 half stocks of asparagus and one carrot. The dessert was a compote of some type with raisins just dumped on the top, which was a bit odd. And instead of a bread basket it was a basket with warm buttery saltine crackers, I found it very funny. They had a live band and a few people go out and dance, but not as many as I would have liked. His last firm everyone went out and danced all together, maybe they drank more at the last firm... not sure. But all in all it was a fun night.

Book group

I had a really fun, after the stress of getting ready, time hosting the church book group at my house this week! We read Charles Dickens, the Christmas Carol. I was given the award of being the only person to finish the book, lol. It's a very short book, but unless you're used to ready that type of writing I guess it can be hard. I didn't find it nearly as hard to read as Tale of Two Cities, or the Robe, and I loved both of those. But everyone has seen at least one version of the Christmas Carol either book or movie, so we had fun discussing it. Of course my favorite movie version is Scrooged, with Bill Murray. I made cinnamon rolls and sweetie pie which is a apple pie made pizza style, very good!! And at 6:30 I still hadn't showered and it was supposed to start at 7, so I jumped in the shower and tried to figure out what to wear. Most of my favorite sweaters have gotten holes in them, and then I thought I bet I could dress up and look like the time period, so I did. Mostly because no one was there to stop me and it was fun, but I think several of the members didn't get that i was in costume. oh well. Anyway it was fun and I smiled the whole night every time I thought of Ken and Kristen's big news!!! I'm still smiling, it's like I'm going to be a parent or grandma myself!! My little Ken having a baby!! Well his wife and him! I do miss my old book group where we stayed up until 2 or 3 in the morning talking about books and life!! I miss Sheri and Leslie!! I'm afriad those of us who are left here just aren't strong enough to do it without them!

I joined a new book site called Shelfari. com. It's fun you put in all the books you've read and read reviews for other books. SO if anyone wants to join, please put me in as a friend so we can share book ideas, because I am always looking for books!! I've entered 216 books so far, and I think I have to admit most of them I read this year, I realize I have an addiction. Is there a spa I can go to for a week and try to cure myself?? And I will secretly cheat and read and have to go back again? Maybe one in Mexico???

Funny notes for a grey day

OK this is going to include some political stuff, thats all over so don't give me any flak, the story is funny. Matt has a friend at school who was asking him why he didn't vote for Obama, he's going to protect the middle class! and Matt says why I do I care I'm not middle class I'm high class! LOL Kirk and I got a huge kick out of that! Esp since this is the son who complains that his house isn't big enough his car doesn't look new enough, and yet he sees us as high class. And for those of you who read Gabaldon with me there is a way cool picture of what her new book will look like in Britan anyway if you want to see it's at, voyagesoftheartemis.blogspot.com/.
I like to read her blogs, and I admit I've left comments!! It's like we're friends! LOL... okay okay i'm on excedrin again, sheeesh.

SNOW!! It's cute today anyway

OK we got the craziest snow today! It was a total flurry all midafternoon while I was getting grocieries and I hoped it would last for the kids to get to see it after school, and it did! They loved it! The kids saw it when they were in the lunchroom and got so excited the teachers closed all the blinds and turned off all the lights so the students would be quiet, so retarded. But they had a fun afternoon, so it's all good! I have Christmas up because I am hosting the RS book club here and I want it to look nice. Although it just looks more crowded, and you can tell 4 kids decorated the tree, but they had fun. All I needed was a Bialetti hot chocolate maker from William Sonoma and the night would have been perfect, hah hah.

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving and brace yourselves everyone!! Don't know where the year has gone, remember when we were excited for it to be 2000? We are so close to 2010, and no aliens in sight, what a disappointment! We had a great Thanksgiving, but I missed my family! The bird was cooked by f-in-law, he cooks it in this green egg thing with alder wood chips which give it a smokey taste which isn't my favorite, but wasn't as bad as the year he used hickory. Apparently there are things better then a nice piece of hickory... anyone know that quote?? Think Eastwood people! Anyway I made rolls and the prerequistie Mormon jello salad. It was the raspberry one, and Susan was the first to scoop in and she pulls me aside and says, " Bonnie I think a stick fell into the jello, any idea how that happened?" It was hard to not laugh and look disdainful, but i explained that there are pretzels in the bottom of the jello, it's part of the deliciousness of it. Everyone got a good laugh out of that one. So now I am setting up the Christmas stuff. In church on Sunday they asked for any volunteers to host the December book club and I found my hand raising of it's own accord, it does that now and then. But it gives me a good reason to set up the decorations! I am remembering now, that I was promised a new prelit tree this year, and once again it will not happen. But that is okay, there are worse things. And more boring blogs I am quite sure.

Word vomit and other noxious stuff

It has not been one of my favorite 24 hours. However I have had much worse. And some of it was nice. Elle had a tummy ache yesterday morning and I had to do that mom thing where you figure out really fast if it's A. fake send 'em to school, B. real but not bad enough, send 'em to school, or C. real and keep 'em home. She was crying and she doesn't like to miss school so I kept her home. Which Connor of course hates being a envious older brother. SO I keep her home and she actually feels better enough later so I run some errands. About 1 o'clock she asks if school is almost over? I say Yes, and she says so can you take me back to school if I feel better? NO,it's too late to take you. Oh she says, that's too bad because I am feeling much better! Typical! So I went to bed a little late I got totally sucked into this book, Veil of Roses which I recommend. And then about midnight Connor wakes up and can't sleep for awhile and then I'm finally asleep when Elle comes in and doesn't feel well and so of COURSE, Kirk puts her in our bed. About 2:30 I feel her jerk up and vomit all over my back and the bed. Totally gross. Grosser is that I let her eat Cheetos all afternoon! Nuclear orange vomit all over my white sheets, white down comforter.. and it's still coming out! So I jump out of bed and grab whatever is on the floor so she can do it on that and not on my bed. Why? I don't know, it was already covered why involved another thing? Who knows I was tired and what do I grab?? my jeans that I had casually dropped there. Even better is since my surgery I am still uncomfortable carrying a purse no matter how small, so in my back pockets are credit cards and receipts I need to turn into the church. Nice. Why do I leave my clothes on the side of the bed? I have an (irrational perhaps) fear of an emergency like a earth quake or fire in which time I would really need to be able to out clothes on quickly. There are worse bad habits, right?? So all day I've been cleaning my bed and clothes, washing puke out of Elle's hair. But now she is dancing through the back yard to see if there are any ripe raspberries in our patch , so all is well with the world. Or will be when I can get some uninterrupted SLEEP! I realize this post is a bit chatty, but my friend who I will not mention by name has been workgin out this week or helping another friend in dire straights and has not been hanging out with me so I can up my words. And Mother is traveling and seeing other people, so I have a lot of pent up conversation!! And I did take an excedrin a few minutes ago.. ahem.

Birthday Season is OVER baby!

First off I will apologize. No i won't, i will claim that i still have anesthesia in my body and so I'm not on top of things as i wish I was. Matts Bday was last week and he is offically a teenager!! We had his party with all the Johnstons at Bucca de bepo, a great Italian place. I totally forgot my camera and so I don't have any pictures. He got money from all the aunts and uncles and Johnstons since he is saving up for a nano. Which I'm excited for because then I get his ipod and I really want one! From Parnell G's he got new bedding which he really needed. Mom and I wrapped his new pillows in a brown Yard waste bag, it was very cute! From Kirk and I he got night vision goggles which totally rock and the new Call of Duty game. AJ's 9th bday was yesterday and as happens every year I totally put it off until the last minute. Being the 4th bday in only 2 months he tends to get short changed. SO I ran around and got him legos and his own pair of night vision goggles since everyones loves them!! We made ice cream sundays and had cake. Then they were so hiper they wouldn't go to sleep and I was so tired I grounded them for life, so all in all it was a great night! I will take picts of the boys in their goggles. Matt took me down to our basement and turned off the lights and told me to stand in one place, and I knew he was sneaking around somewhere stalking me waiting to scare the crap out of me so I chickened out and ran for a light switch!

Calloway 2008

Ok here is our annual trip to Calloway. We go there once a year with Kirks law firm. All the attorneys bring their familes and we stay in cabins by each other. It's a fun way to get to meet the people Kirk works with and all the wives get to talk, and the kids consider each other good friends even though they only see each other once a year. We live so far from everyone else, sometimes I wish we lived closer. But even if we did most of them have 2 kids and so put their kids in private schools so I probably still wouldn't get my kids with theirs even if we lived closer. They have a big box lunch down at the lake on Saturday follwed by pinatas for the kids. Then we pretty much spilt up and do whatever until a BBQ dinner later that night. As tradition, that I am very willing to give up, we drive down to the animal safari with whatever other familes want to come. This year we went with a family who drove down from the NC office, they are LDS as well. We rented the biggest van they have and you drive through this park and feed various animals. There are Zebras, Giraffes, water buffalo, emu's, ostrichs, water buffalo, other buffalo/cow type animals, pig type things, goats, a rhino (which you don't feed). Anyway it's a lot of fun and we go through a 50 pound bag of animal pellets. Of course the kids get slimmed with drool and an occasional annimal snots and sneezes which is hilarious to everyone but the one it happened to. At the BBQ I brought a few bags of glowsticks that I got after halloween and gave them out to kids since the dinner is outside and that was a huge hit. Connor bailed in a ditch with his bike when he brakes either didn't work or he slid on leaves, luckily he wasn't too hurt. And one of the partners kids was asking Connor and AJ if MAtt likes her, so we told him to be very nice to her! All in all a good weekend, and now i need a vacation!

Halloween etc

The Johnstons and Hansens on our front porch before hitting the neighborhood. Matt was horribly, horribly sick the whole weekend, so he is not there. Then you can see that Connor loves to organize his candy, even the sucker sticks are crossed at an angle. Then I braided Elles hair last night and today it was so cute and curly! I totally remember mom doing that to my hair! Elle is a pink bunny. I really pushed for her to be a witch this year but one look at this incredibly soft bunny dress at target and it was over! one night she had the nose and whiskers but on halloween she had glitter makeup on, courtesy of Susan.

Pumkin carving

Ok here was our annual pumpkin carving night. The biggest weighed in at 97 pounds which is smaller then previous years believe it or not. It was hard for me to still be so weak from surgery I couldn't do very much but watch and encourage. Matt started to write the words suck it on his pumkin which we stopped after the S so that lead to his carving, don't know what he was thinking, I'm still debating about his pumkins teeth...?? They even carved those little mini pumkins and we stuck birthday candles in them. Elles pumkin isn't carved yet because her kindergarden class carves them with their dads before school on Wed and boy is she excited!!
Sad note, my mom goes home today and I am very bummed. There is no way my recovery would be going to smoothly without her and I'm gratiful she stayed! She even extended until I could get the *#**# catheter out. I dread driving and cooking and all the stuff she has helped me with. But I know Dad is anxious to have her home! And the worst part is I'm sending her home with a nasty cold, clearly I worked her to death! It hurts for me to sit for longer then 10 minutes, I barely made it through sacrament meeting on Sunday, Kirk had to almost carry me from the room. But it was the Primary program and Elle and AJ both had memorized parts and it was Connors last program! They were all wonderful!

Recovery

Well I'm sure most of you don't want to know the details of what I want to complain about. A catheter for a day or two in the hospital is one thing, coming home with one for TEN days is a whole different bag... hah hah joke. SO my kids have been fairly fascinated with this process, they like watching it empty and think it's cool that mom can pee standing up like a boy now. AJ was gracious enough to point out to everyone during family home evening look mom is peeing. I had to look down and sure enough the tubing was nice and busy. IS this too gross for anyone?? You can stop reading, because this is my blog and my rant! I am feeling a little better, one incision site still hurts quite a bit but I laughed a lot yesterday. I started laughing at a text from Ken and then a comment Elle made in FHE and I started laughing so hard it hurt like crazy!! I didn't look to see if it made me pee my bag, but I'm sure it did. But my stitches burned so bad and still could not stop laughing. Probably one of those really tired and slightly doped up laughs. I get tired so easy and can do so little. I'm afraid we are going to wear my mom out! Even AJ, once again the astute child he is, says grandma you don't usually look like that, your eyes are kinda closed and they look a little puffy! We had a nice laugh about that. The kids had mentioned their fear of seeing me when I came home from the hospital, they said mom you look terrible, you don't have nay makeup on and your hair is everywhere. And those are not the clothes you usually wear. It's nice to have kids around to keep us real right?? Talking about children, Kirk says "you know my dad had lapriscopic surgery on his knee and he was hiking a mountain the next week". OK kirk there are some differences between a knee and the abdomen, right?? I'm missing a organ that i previously got a lot of use out of, and a hole in a organ i have lots of use out of still, it's going to take time!

post-op

I am recovering thankyou everyone. It is a slow process especially since there was a slight complication during surgery. It was a risk I knew about before, because i've had soo many c-sections they couldn't predict what my uterus had fused itself to. And the lucky winner was the bladder so they poked a hole in it quite on accident. So I have the wonderful pleasure of wearing a pee bag for ten days. I won't know how that pans out for 8 more days. The kids love to tell me how full it's looking or that somethingnis stuck in the tube or even watch me empty the thing. NExt week i go in and the pump my bladder full of dye and give me a cat scan to seeif it's healed or still leaking, i imagine that will be boat loads of fun. The good news is, I made the right decision taking it out, the DR says there was something very wrong with it and no wonder I was having so many problems. THey will tell me exactly what was wrong with it on Monday after it's been run under a microscope. It is rather difficult to sit at the computer and type. so this is it for now. i just wanted to give ya'll a quick update and say thanks for your prayers and phone calls and texts!

Matthew is my best child he does every thing i ask him but some times he doesent feel like but other times he does

Bugs

Ok I thought I would give Kris a run for her money on big bugs! This is a spider, that Matt found wandering my HOUSE!! Oh but I'm sure there won't be spiders anywhere if you come for Thanksgiving Kris, so don't even give it a second thought!!

AJ project

This is Aj's pizza box book report. It was on Paul Revere and he had to put down five facts about him and then six objects that had to do with Revere and show the class and see if they could guess who his character was. I went and bought baby bottles and he glued 16 of them in there since he had that many kids, and then a horse and I found a tiny latern key chain that lit up, stars since he was patriotic, and a tea bag. The teacher actually emailed me she loved it so much with the clues written in the srtipes, and she asked AJ is she could rip off the latern after he presented so they could see it light up! Very cute and successful! By the way in back of AJ in the picture is the bear I discused in the earlier blog, the one who got in trouble because his head was in a cast. It's funny he ended up being in a picture, it's like seeing someone from a crime scene. Like the movie Monsters Inc where they accidentaly get a picture of Boo at the restraunt, anyway thought that was funny. AND again by the way, you see how dark it is in the background?? That is because we got to school at the butt-crack of dawn here, we are at school by 7:15, so ridiculous!!

Pumpkin patch Pictures

This was our crazy day at the pumkin farm. Kirk and Connor had to be at the stake center by 7:45 for a day camp for 11 yr old scouts, then I took Elle and AJ to our super sat of relief society. We met back at our house to go to the pumkin patch at 12:30. We go to one pumpkin patch that is about 30 mins away and go through their corn maze which was a fun design this year for the election. Then we drive another 20 minutes to a pumkin patch that has pumkins as big as Elle. They weren't actually as big as that this year, but they were still very large, the biggest we got weighs in at 97 pounds and we got 2 of them. AJ and Elle liked the smaller ones which Kirks back was grateful for. Last year with the pumkins we had to get out the power saw to carve them. Very fun stuff! Matt was not with us, he had a camporee that he spent the night at day at with the scouts. I then ended out the day babysitting for my friend, since she lovingly watched mine the night before!! Quite a weekend!

Tired

I am soo tired. This is nothing new, nothing to exclaim about or put into writing but I am. Had to have a few vials of blood taken today so they know my iron levels and what kind of blood i have in case i need a transfusion next week in my surgery. Odds are I won't need one, if all goes as I hope and pray it will i will in fact lose very little blood. But it does make me wish family were here to donate a little for the just in case scenario. Anyway it is silly how tired I am, they took so little. But the idea of doing homework, driving kids to scouts, making and cleaning dinner is a little daunting. Would I be remiss in hiring a cleaner just for the one month?? I'm sure a pioneer women wouldn't have had to! If I eat everything the kids eat and sleep when they sleep can i go and jump and flip on a trampoline like they do for hours on end??

Vent

OK let me know if I'm wrong, which I'm never wrong. Okay maybe occasionally. Aj got to take a stuffed animal into school today. He really only has 2 and one is the size of a chicken nugget and one is a big fluffy bear. So last weekend he and Connor covered the bear with paper casts. My boys have never had one and one of their church friends just got a arm cast so i figured they were curious and so they used all my tape and quite a bit of butcher paper making casts all over this bear. Now this morning they decided that his arms, legs and back were healed and that his head needed another week so they drew eyes and a mouth on it and off AJ went to school with his bear. Now the V Principal at school just called and wanted me to come see the disturbing bear that AJ brought to school and could i please bring a different animal. I said that how they were interpreting what was on the bear was wrong, it was a medical condition the bear had and not some threat to the school or anyone at it. I said if it was disturbing then to remove the offending cast because I don't have another animal to bring to school. She said AJ was upset and that he said Connor did it. I said they both put their animals in casts why don't we interpret it that they are interested in healing and medicine rather then something sinister. I am sure they took detailed photos of it and stuck in Connors personal file to show that he is disturbed, I am so sick of this school and this state. After all it's not as if the head cast was cone shaped.

whiskers on kittens and snake skin... not at my house!

Good news everyone!! I am no longer a snake owner!! I realize that it appears that I am dumping pets, have no fear the kids will not be next! And I do still have 2 geckos, 1 bearded dragon, 1 hamster and 2 cockatiels. And as I've mentioned before one of the cockatiels thinks it's a dog, as seen in the video I posted earlier. Matt was a little sad to see his snake go but he really hasn't held him since he was bitten a year or more ago so it was in the snakes best interest to move on. The college student who took him on loved him and wore him around his neck the rest of the day at the pet store, as seen by some friends later on. Mostly wanted to know if he got to stay home today and possibly the rest of the day so he could grieve properly. Yah not!

Another great 13 yr old son moment

OK funny one. I was telling Matt that he can't go somewhere if he doesn't get all of his stuff done. He being a typical new teen still learning to flex his muscles, says "you can't me, you don't have the right." To which my southern raised hackles say Oh Yeah?? Watch me! His dad calls and I told him what was going on and what Matt said to me, so he asks to speak to Matt. Matt says " NO dad it wasn't like that I was saying like how they said in the Pursuit of Happyness, no one has the right to stop me from getting what I want, I was speaking metaphorically". Nice save I think, he's not totally out of the woods but darn if he isn't close!

Girls Night

Since mom couldn't make it to Les Mis last night with me, I took 2 girl friends, Carmine and Janine and we had such a wonderful time! We went to dinner downtown at a place I haven't been to, very trendy and good! We barely walked to our seats as the lights dimmed which made me a nervous wreck! The cast was fabulous!! Every once in awhile I thought Fontine would clip a word to sound more like talking then singing but when she sang it was fabulous! Valjan and Javier were incredible and Eponine of course brought tears to my eye in her final song!! All in all a wonderful evening, I wanted to go right out and buy tickets for another night!!

Gas or rather Petrol problems

We are having the craziest gas shortest right now! I wanted to know if it was affecting anyone else I know accross the country. I went to 7 different gas stations today before I finally found gas and it was only the premium gas, which I didn't care I had to have gas! Even when Katrina went through we had people running for gas but I don't think the stations actually ran out.. did they? Kirk is in St Simons and the bottom of GA and he says there is gas down there. Very odd, anyone else??

Connors Bday

Connor had a wonderful birthday, marred only by the fact that he had to go to school. I tried to tell him whats it's like to have a summer bday, everyone forgets, no one is around... but to no avail. Still he got a new mattress which is back is grateful for! He got legos from lots of family members and money to spend and his very own DS lite that he doesn't have to share! He wanted Chilis for dinner which was fun and then we went next door to cold stone for ice cream! He even had a blue candle with a green flame on his breakfast! Now I have a month off before the next 2 birthdays!!

Turtle

Ok I have to send a quick message out about Swimmy. AJ has had a pet turtle for about 2 years, one of those water turtles. I have not liked the turtle for about a little less then 2 years! The pump never worked so his tank smells like a sewer and it was pain to clean he would eat half a fish and the other half would get stuck under a rock a decay it was all sorts of gross! So we were at the lake fishing and a boy and his dad were so excited to catch this little turtle who lives under the dock and the boy was very sad to let him go. I told him I was trying to give away a turtle and he jumped on the offer. The poor guy even came and picked him up himself! He has no idea what I just passed onto him! Sucker!! The great thing is AJ didn't mind, he was ready to move on. PLus the kid already has 2 lizards!

Elles Bday Party!

You can see my comments on the photos is you put the mouse over them. Elle turned 6 and it was a wonderful day! She started out with her favorite breakfast and then Grandma Judy and mom took her to American girl store and she choose an outfit and a new wardrobe to put it all in! Then she got to go with her brothers to a Primary activity where they ate ice cream for memorizing the Articles of Faith! Then we had all the family and a few friends over for messy ice cream sundaes and she opened some pretty wonderful presents! I would say it was a great day and she loved it! Hard to believe 6 years ago I was in the hospital with her! SO now Connors bday is in 3 days then I have a month off follwed by Matt and AJ's bdays within 4 days of each other! Crazy times!!

One more time for Me

Ok so Mom told me it's nice to share the lame things that happen to me so we can all laugh and they seem to happen to me a lot! SO Sunday I am leading the music in church, during the Sacrament song, the one that is supposed to be really reverent. I get this feeling like my bra strap is sliding off my shoulder. I think there's no way it can go down far enough for anyone to see, but then I think " self you are in a kinda short sleeve shirt today maybe you should glance down." So i glance down and sure enough there is my pink bra strap for the whole congregation to see. And in my defense it is a very pale pink, simply to mix it up! :-) So i casually reach my left hand across my body to try and tuck it while looking like i am merely scratching my shoulder. But it is impossible to push it all the way up with out looking like I am digging around in my shirt while leading music. SO I try to stuff it just inside the sleeve and then i stretch my right arm out to lead the music with a almost straight out arm so my shoulder doesn't bend and so it can stay in the halfway up position. Luckily for me it was a song we don't sing a lot so when I scanned the crowd I didn't see too many people smirking at me! However I think the older gentleman who still can't look at my from the woodpecker incident may have been shaking his head again!

facebook

Ok I joined facebook today, although I'm not sure what I'm doing! But since several friends and family are on it I thought I should as well. I guess thats just for keeping in contact with people where this blog is for actually giving everyone info and up to date details right?

Sweet Home, Georgia

Let me spend a moment thinking of why I like living in GA. HMMM ok let me keep thinking this is kinda a hard question. Well I have a very good friend here, Celeste, thats a good reason to live here. Ummm my kids really like living by their cousins thats a great reason. I like my raspberyy plants those are a nice reason. I do like my house here, expexcially my new carpet even if it broke my vaccum. I like that Kirk likes his job. Those are all perfectly good reason for me to live here right? Anyone want to join me?
A funny thing, they changed the 3rd grade curriculum this year so AJ is not going to be learning about GA history, instead he will be learning about Greece. Funny I think. Probably more exciting, but useful? Who knows.
PS anyone of you who are Diana Gabaldon readers, on her website is a link to her blog, which has a excerpt and a sample of writting from the next book!! It was so refreshing to read Claires "voice" again! Anyone who has not read the books, do not go to the page because it has spoilers! :-)

The Story lyrics

These are the lyrics to the first song on my player that I totally love right now!

All of these lines across my face
Tell you the story of who I am
So many stories of where I've been
And how I got to where I am

But these stories don't mean anything
When you've got no one to tell them to
It's true...I was made for you

I climbed across the mountain tops
Swam all across the ocean blue
I crossed all the lines and I broke all the rules
But baby I broke them all for you

Because even when I was flat broke
You made me feel like a million bucks
You do, I was made for you

You see the smile that's on my mouth
It's hiding the words that don't come out
And all of my friends who think that I'm blessed
They don't know my head is a mess

No, they don't know who I really am
And they don't know what
I've been through like you do
And I was made for you...

All of these lines across my face
Tell you the story of who I am
So many stories of where I've been
And how I got to where I am

But these stories don't mean anything
When you've got no one to tell them to
It's true...I was made for you
Yeah, I was made for you.

My name is Bonnie Johnston and I am a book addict

I have been informed that i sound like a psycho and so i will remove the evidence of this and keep it to myself. :-)

Notes from picture morning

Thankyou for all of your opinions and cracks about me being phsychotic. I think it was the whole idea of myonly girls first school pictures. And I didn't have a favorite outfit, everything was just average to me so everyones help was fun! Last night Elle decided she wanted to wear the ogg white shirt which was #1 so I said fine. But this morning she decided that the pink shirt went better with her freshly painted pink nails so we switched but it was a lot of pink so i put the black vest on. She liked until we were walking out the door and then began to sob that she didn't like the vest. I admit I was hasty and said Elle just get in the car we are late!! When I got in the car I saw she had taken it off and stuffed it under her carseat. I didn't say a word about it until we got out of the car at school and I said are you sure you don't want to wear the vest? I said Dad and Aunt Becky liked it... and then Aj says yah I like it too, adn then Connor agreed it thought it looked nice. So she gets these big eyes and coos in this flirt little girls voice, "You do? OK i'll wear it." and was thrilled to put it on once more. SO there you go. I thought that only happened like in Father of the Bride, but no it happens now.
Did anybody read on the Stephenie Meyer website? someone she let read her partially finished Midnight Sun novel leaked it on the web. SO she is so distraught over she doesn't know if she'll ever finish it. And she doesn't want her fans going to find the illegal copies so she went ahead and posted what was leaked so anyone can read it. I think thats sad, and I really hope she gets over it so we don't all lose out because of one person!

Connor earns Arrow of Light!

Raspberries

Ok I realize that most of you will not be as excited at this vision in red as I am. These are raspberries from my own garden! I have been trying to grow them for 4 years and I finally have success!! Much of this success is due to the fact that Kirk built me a raised garden bed in the backyard! He does not like that it is filled with food plants, he pictured it a neat orderly place with rows of flowers. But I am trying to show him how great it is with all the food we've grown this year. the raspberries being the highlight of course. However this is difficult to show him when he doesn't eat any of the things I grow. I have green beans, tomatoes, strawberries and several herbs. So anyway Goergia is filled with wild raspberry plants but none of them produce, I tried cutting them back to see if that helps but it is no use, such a tease! My mom and sister who live in WA spent the afternoon picking blackberries on the side of the raod to make jam, how fair is that I ask you?? I who would love wild berries on the side of the road have barren plants. But to my extreme happiness I have successfully started a raspberry patch and here is the first fruit of my labor! I look forward to yummy fruit for years to come! Guess I am stuck in this house forever!

Kids

Don't get me wrong, my kids are great! They do soo many things right, but occasionaly they do things that probably aren't right, but maybe funny. I don't put those things on my blog page to make fun of them or anything. But to share a smile with everyone, kinda like the smile or cry. If I smile maybe I won't cry, you know what I'm saying? So thats why only a few days after my Matt post here is one for Connor. I wish you could see the picture because it is exceptionaly funny! Connor got in trouble for burping in the lunch room. So the lunch room lady made him write an apology letter to her which I now have to sign, here it is...
Dear Ms Dorsey, I am sorry you don't understnd that I couldn't help it! I had to burp. The burp was loud so they taught me to say excuse me! And then you got mad at me for burping!
It then has a very funny picture of him burping and then saying hah hah. Nice one. I don't think i will send berry juice boxes to school with him again.

Matt

OK so i can't give you the exact wording so this may not sound as funny as it is, even though really it's probably disturbing... but i have to laugh. Matt has been begging to quit band at school, he is tired of the trumpet and his band teacher won't let him switch instruments and there really isn't a lot of fun incentive to be in band, they only play twice at school and never travel anywhere fun to play. I've been trying to keep him from quitting. One night he was having one of his drama mama meltdowns and tried to get kirk to let him quit Spanish, band and scouts. So he brought a paper to Kirk to have him write a note so he could quit. Kirk wrote really funny, maybe slightly rude letters that he and I laughed and laughed over. The Spanish one was like Buenus tardas, Matt is running for the border and thinks he knows enough Spanish to survive so he will not be needing Spanish class. the band one was something like we regret that Matt wants to quit band how we will miss his angelic trumpeting floating through the hallowed halls of your school. SOO Matt tells me after he gets home from school today that he got his new schedule, and I said why? it's not time to switch schedules? He Totally turned in the band note and quit!! He told the office I'm sorry my dad wrote kinda a funny note, and the secretary said they get a lot of odd notes, the accepted it and took him out of band! What can I do?? I said well I'm bummed you will miss out on the learning opportunity, I think you would have fun playing the trumpet and you are good at it, but if you don't want to play that's your choice. I called Kirk and of course he almost fell off his chair laughing when we remembered what things he wrote! Gotta respect the inititive right??

2 birds

OK here I am showing 2 items i mentioned in previous posts. First this is AJ's favorite outfit, the cute plaid shorts with the bright tye die shirt, he would wear it daily if he could! It is cute, and he does like it.... Next this is my carpet, you can see it is light but there are dark flecks in it. Kirk liked it as a sample but he can't get over the feeling that it looks dirty because of the flecks, so it will have to grow on him. I am loving it! Although I did clog my vacuum twice yesterday andmy kids get off the carpet looking like we have a tan cat!