Adam's first and second day!

Adam has 2 days of school under his belt. The first day was only for 1 hour, and i was there with him, so it wasn't a real day, but counted as one :)

Day 1:

He found his friend Ethan right away. An answer to prayer on the very first day!!!

Day 2: taking the bus. I love the short bus! There's no "special" reason why he's been assigned the short bus, in case anyone was wondering :)
He had show and tell already today. He took in a huge dead bee and a cicada. I'm sure the girls love him. No tears for mommy. Perhaps next year, as Adam will be doing full days and the twins will start K. But for this year, it's doable, and good. I'm impressed with the school, their organization, and Adam's wonderful teacher!

summer's end

Rod has the boys away camping again, he's wanting to take advantage to what's left of summer. It was another last minute thing. I got a call at 10:00am, asking to have them packed and fed by 12:00. So we ran errands, i packed the cooler, packed their clothes, fed them lunch and they were out the door! (Pretty sure it was closer to 1:00 though) and now i get to hear my own thoughts :)

Last night we went w/ Rod's cousin and family to the Barnstormers. The boys had free tickets from the summer reading program. Little did they know the tickets were no good, we picked the wrong eve. to go. But i asked the attendant to pretend to take their ticket and scan it and it worked out! hated to burst their little bubbles. On the way to the game Adam says "Mom, thanks for reading us all those books so we can go to the game!" Wow, that means a lot coming from him! He's not always very thoughtful.. Not that most 5 year old boys are. They had a good time watching parts of the game, playing on the playground, tracking down Cylo, and eating. It was nice to spend time with Rod's cousins. Next fall they leave for Hondurous on missions.

Sophia says "i don't mind that I'm the only girl" That's nice :)

Good seats. Small crowd. I'm fine with that!

The twins really wanted to visit Cylo, he played with Ben's new camo hat for awhile..We got rained out about 9:30, our 3rd straight year leaving a Barnstormers game in the rain! we're going for a record!

All kids walked away with a free Cylo t-shirt. And one of us adults, how did that happen?

Today...

Today Clay is the exact same age Adam was when the twins were born! 16 months, 14 days. I might be a day off but anyways, i am floored by this! I truly thought Adam was so grown up when the twins were born. I'm glad i was naive or it would have been even harder in those first months.
Speaking of Adam, he starts school on Monday. We got his teacher letter in the mail yesterday and he is getting the famous Mrs. Leonard, the teacher that "everyone" says he has to have. She's been there 30 years and is the sweetest lady. I tried not to hope and pray for her to be his teacher because it was more important to me that he be in with good kids, and my prayer has been that he'll be in a class with at least 1 or 2 christian boys and make good quality friends. He already knows one kid who will be in his class. He met him a couple weeks ago on the playground and they played so well together. The boy, Ethan is autistic and was already assigned his teacher. He will also have an aid in the class to help him one on one. I'm sure Adam never noticed there was anything "wrong" with him when he played with him that day on the playground. This could be a good teaching opportunity for me, that if Adam asks why he has a special teacher, etc., I can help him to see right away that even kids that are considered different, really aren't that different. He likes to do the same things Adam does- run around, laugh, and have fun.
I almost feel guilty about not being more sentimental about Adam starting school and such. I'm so ready to send him and i think he's ready too (he just might not totally realize it yet). I'm at peace with our decision and am believing God will be alongside him each day he steps foot in his new school.
I think him being away from the twins for some time each day will do him some good (and them). Can't wait to watch the growth in him this year as he rides out this new milestone, called Kindergarten. Did i spell that right?
I love you Adam, go get 'em!

Mini mini photo shoot...

...as in let's do this as quick as possible!

I've had white shirts sitting out for a few days now, waiting for a good time to get a few pictures of the boys. It's so extremely hard to get a shot of them all looking, eyes open, and smiling. I wonder if everyone else has the same problem.

Sunday after church was cloudy (actually it was raining a little) and i thought that's better then sunny as far as picture quality goes.
Here's a few pics, they cooperated nicely but still a challenge to get a good one.

yes brad, you have an outie-

my favorite:
i gave Clay the apple to distract him...that didn't work..

Rod took the boys to Camp Hebron Friday & Saturday, which gave me a chance to play in the kitchen a little. I made Rod's favorite soup- Roasted Mediterranean Vegeatable soup & i tried a recipe i had for Berry Pinwheel cake. They were both very good, but took some time to make, gotta love Clay's 3 hour naps!

Roasted Mediterranean Vegeatable Soup:
1.5 LB Tomatoes, skinned, cored and halved
3 Large yellow bell peppers, halved, cored and deseeded
3 Zucchini, halved lengthwise
1 small eggplant, halved lengthwise
4 garlic cloves, halved
2 onions, cut into eighths
thyme & basil
4 C. chicken broth
1/2 c. light cream

Brush baking sheets w/ oil. Laying them cut-side down, arrange the tomatoes, peppers, zucchini, and eggplant in one layer. Tuck the garlic and onion into gaps and drizzle veggies with oil. Season w/ salt and pepper, sprinkle with thyme. Place in oven @ 375, bake uncovered 30 minutes. Leave to cool, then scrape out the eggplant flesh and remove skin from peppers (i don't do this and never noticed the skin). In batches put the veggies in food processor and chop up until desired consistency. (i make mine pretty chunky, and usually chop up manually, as the food processor makes too mushy for us). Combine the chicken broth and chopped veggies into large pan and simmer about 20 minutes, stir in cream and basil.


Berry Pinwheel Cake:
4 egg yolks
2 eggs
1/2 c. sugar
4 1/2 teaspoons water
2 teaspoons veg. oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 c. flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
10x sugar

FILLING:
1 c. heavy whipping cream
1 T sugar
3 T lemon curd (you can buy this or you can find the recipe for it online)
2 c. chopped strawberries

In a large mixing bowl, beat the egg yolks, eggs, and sugar until thick and lemon-colored. Beat in the water, oil, and vanilla. Combine flour, baking powder, and salt. Gradually add to egg mixture. Grease a 15x10" baking pan and line with waxed paper. Grease and flour the paper. Spread batter into pan.

Bake at 375 for 10-12 minutes. Cool for 5 minutes. Turn cake onto a kitchen towel dusted with 10x sugar. Peel off waxed paper. Roll up cake in towel jelly-roll style, starting with the short side. Cool on a wire rack.

In a mixing bowl, beat cream until soft peaks form; add sugar, beating until stiff. Fold in lemon curd; gradually fold in strawberries. Unroll cake; spread filling evenly to within 1/2" of edges. Roll up again. Dust with 10x. Cover and chill for 1 hour before serving.

this week

We had a lot of things going on this week. creativity camp was this week, it's our church's version of bible school. The teachers each share a hobby/talent and the kids sign up for the class they want to take. Rod and i did Animals for a class and we had 6 - 7 kids. We took in different animals each night (or asked friends to bring in their animals) and talked about God's design of these animals, facts about the animals, then they held them and fed them. It was fun, but tiring to do 5 consecutive evenings. Rod also helped out in the flying class one night, he took in his parachutte and talked to the kids about it. not enough room to take off and fly. the boys enjoyed coming along each night but they were too young to sign up and be involved in it.
canned 14 qt. of tomato juice this week and 12 pints of diced tomatoes., also made 3 gallon of chicken corn soup, and several batches of meatloaf and chicken etti for the freezer. i love doing freezer meals ahead of time, i'm a little addicted to that.

Friday was a big night for Ben and Brad. They burned their blankets! I often tease them when i see them with their blankies that i'm going to burn them (i'm so kind). Well for a week now Brad's been saying he wants to throw his "gigi" into the campfire and burn it. So we had a blankie burning party. So glad to be rid of those stinky smelly things. They've been doing fine without them.

I planted a fall garden this week too. Excited to see how the broccoli, lettuce, and kale do this fall. I did a fall garden one other time, years ago. You can only plant the cool weather crops this time of year, to be ready before the first frost.

Freddie the cow is doing well. He isn't tied so one never knows where he'll be. Today it was the flower bed behind the house. Yesterday it was the front of the house. His leg is not doing so good, time will tell if it will get better or worse.

Adam got on a kick this week that he wanted to give away some toys. So they packed a large rubbermaid container with toys they didn't want and we went over to the Kmart parking lot and put them in the Salvation army boxes. I was happy to read that they accept toys at this one. I thought they might only accept clothes. They boys had the proudest smiles on their faces as they one by one put their toys into the slot.

That's our week in a nutshell. Now on to a relaxing Sunday afternoon~

more animals?!?!

once again we've added to the funny farm. we've been planning all along to get some guinea hens to go with our chickens. we had to wait for the peeps to be born. we got these a couple weeks ago. look like chickens for now, but guineas will look like a turkey when full grown. they lay eggs, 1/2 the size of a chicken egg. they appealed to us because 90% of their diet is bugs. that's awesome, go to town guineas, don't forget the ticks!

and a calf......we have a calf. crazy.
rod's uncle called and said he had a calf born with an injured leg, won't be able to sell him (it's a bull, he sells those right away). he asked rod if we wanted to keep him for awhile then butcher him. we'll see how this goes :)

some other recent animal pictures.

Spontaneous beach trip

Wed 3:30pm- Rod: "I don't have to paint any more cars this week, want to go to the beach for a few days?"
Thurs 11:00am: off to the beach for a few days
It was nice in so many ways. we had a 1st floor room, right next to the pool, i didn't have to cook, clay stayed home with my mom, the water was warm and the boys enjoyed it, it wasn't as crowded as i remember it being when i used to go the end of July......They were into jumping:
the birds got a feast because my boys eat like birds...a lot of stuffed characters on the boardwalk. taffy and monkey man were the favorites...the motel pool, a great way to get rid of the extra sand :) shrivers gives away free taffy balloons each night to the first 50 people in line. we missed it the first night but made sure we got them the 2nd night. fun times, i love the beach!

We were glad to make it back on time saturday for the annual smoker family ice cream party. when we got home that eve at 9:30 we discovered the bunnies had gotten out! nothing like chasing after rabbits in the dark!