Good-bye Training Wheels

Dalayna got a bicycle back in May because "tricycles just aren't fast enough!" She loves to ride her bicycle and we were able to ride all over our subdivision this summer. She also wore out the training wheels riding her bicycle in our cul-de-sac. She finally decided she was ready to go without training wheels, so here she is. She did fairly well. Unfortunately today is a rainy day, so the garage had to be the bicycle arena.

No training wheels, no help from Dad!!

Job Offer

I just wanted to let everyone know Terry has received a job from the company he is currently working for part-time. It is a bittersweet issue as we would love to stay here where we currently live, but also know we could not live here much past December with no job.So we will be relocating anytime in the next month if we can find a place to live. Please pray for our family as we search for a house to rent while ours is on the market, that our current home sells and that God would once again lead us to the church He wants us to be a part of. Please pray for my sanity as I pack again for the 3rd time in a year and a half, and this time we have more stuff!!
We are so thankful for the time we have had here in this area. God has blessed us with many wonderful friendships and it will be very hard to leave them behind. The good news is we won't live that far from here, and we plan on visiting whenever possible.

As my dear friend e-mailed me last night and stated, "God doesn't always work things out the way we think He should." How true it is. The Bible states this in Proverbs 16:9. It says, "In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps." As I have wondered how this move could possibly be good for us I remembered what Jeremiah 29:11 says,"For I know the plans I have for you", declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you...". I also know that God is always faithful in the lives of our family. One of my favorite verses has become Joshua 23:14. It says,"You know with all your heart and soul that not one of all the good promises the Lord your God gave you has failed. Every promise has been fulfilled; not one has failed." I know these promises, Iknow God will never fail me, but my selfish nature still allows the tears to fall for what I leave behind.

Field Trip: Pickle Factory Tour

Today was a field trip to a pickle factory. A special thank you to my friend Amy, who organized our day. It was very interesting. I do like pickles and the smell of vinegar, but if you don't, you are best to stay away. Everyone is required to wear hats during the tour. Here is our group:Ben, brother Joseph, being held by their sister Hannah, Colby, Grace(Ben,Joseph and Hannah's sister), Lauren is behind Grace and Abby is at the edge of the picture. Next to Dalayna is Lindsay, who is Lauren and Abby's sister. Except for my children, these are all cousins. They are just like my family in that boys are a bit outnumbered!! We had a beautiful day and a great time. It was a full day with the tour, a picnic and a visit to an ice cream shop.

These vats are used to store pickles for up to 11 months with rock salt. The pickles from these vats are mainly removed during the winter months.

This is a pickle separator used to separate them by size.

Vats for mixing and cooking. The tour guide we has was excellent and gave us a wealth of information, however, I think my brain's memory card is now full!!

These copper pots are used to mix sweet pickles. The copper helps pickles retain their green color.

To the top right, is a pile of pickles, getting ready to be poured into the jars below.

It is a little dark, but the pickles are in jars to the left, getting ready to get filled with pickle juice to the right.

This is a local covered bridge. I could not get a good picture of the bridge and the kids. The original bridge was built in the 1800's.

Inside the covered bridge.... thankfully no cars came through. People do use it.

At the park....Can you tell Colby loves to have his picture taken?

Study of China

Today was a day Dalayna looked forward to all week. We ordered Chinese and got dressed up in our Chinese clothes to eat dinner. She even dressed her baby doll in Chinese clothes. She wore them to pick up the food and the people were so happy to see the kids in their Chinese clothes they gave us free cookies!! We did this as part of our study of China. I know I should have cooked the meal myself, but it was just easier and realistically tasted much better than mine would have too!! I mixed up my pictures again, so to read more about our study scroll down to the bottom!!

Terry's dinner choice:Chicken with Szechuan sauce

Dalayna attempting to eat with chopsticks. That is one of the things that has fascinated her most as we have learned about China. This is the 2nd time this week she used chopsticks to eat her food. I even tried tonight and didn't do too bad.

For the beginning of our school year, using the "Five in a Row" curriculum, we read "The Story of Ping", a little duck who lives along the banks of the Yangtze River in China. I did the same with Colby in the fall of 2002. At the time we had no idea that we would stand along the banks of the Yangtze River in 2005 and that the country of China would become a part of our family's heritage. Obviously God knew and I believe even through our school curriculum He was preparing us for the journey still 2.5 years away. So here I am in 2009, teaching my daughter about the land of her birth. As you see in the picture, we are making a chart with facts about China as we read lots of books about China. I couldn't get the whole chart in the picture. We hope to lengthen the chart as we finish our study this week. On the map of China is a picture disk of Ping.

More Visitors

We were pleased to have my brother-in-law Jim and nephew Nathan visiting this weekend. We were able to take them to see the area we live in and to the town where Jim's grandfather was born, and to our favorite ice cream shop.

Dalayna's Lego masterpiece to show our guests.

Anyone for burned pizza? Would you think of me as being scatterbrained? If you say no, think again. We were in such a hurry to show our guests around that I forgot about the pizza in the oven for several hours. Thankfully, the oven was off, but the pizza still burned because it was in the oven the whole time it was cooling down. Whoops!! Thankfully 3 other pizzas didn't get burned!!

Watching things on YouTube. Dalayna said,"That is funny business!"

Flowers from home

I had to post pictures of these Hosta for my mother to see. They came from my Grandparent's yard and she and my dad transported them 6 hours to my house. She also helped plant them. They seem to like the soil here!!

The Definition of Family

I walked outside into the bright sunshine and heat to a sight that brought a smile to my eyes. It was the sight of familiar faces and voices laughing,visiting and enjoying one another's company. I saw my children in the midst with happy countenances, surrounded by people who care about them. A lump formed in my throat as I thought that this may be our first and last picnic with this family. Sounds much like a family reunion, but it is not. It is our church family. One of the definitions in the American Heritage Dictionary states that a family is"a group of things with common characteristics." Sounds like the perfect definition for a church family ,with the common characteristic being our Lord Jesus Christ. Being 6 hours from our families was hard, harder than anything I have ever experienced, yet God blessed us with this wonderful church family and proved Himself faithful yet again that He knows all our needs. This "family" took us in, even as strangers over a year ago, cared about us and have etched themselves upon our hearts. When Terry lost his job, the outpouring of support and prayers was unbelievable. Yes, the definition of family doesn't necessarily have to be about flesh and blood, but one that you praise and thank God for nonetheless!! On a more humorous note, Dalayna used to call them our "fake" family:)

Super Saturday

Today was a super busy Saturday. We ran errands, Terry finished some work on our patio doors, spent time with neighbors and ate supper with friends from church. It was a super good Saturday, even though we missed Colby ,since he was in another state at a youth conference with church. We enjoyed our day!! Dalayna looked forward to swimming with our neighbors Dale(we call him little Dale) and Matthew in their pool today. Also in the pool is their cousin Maddie. God has blessed us with wonderful neighbors and we are so thankful for them. Julie and her husband Dale truly act on God's command to love their neighbors.

Our new patio doors. A special thank you to our friend Ron, who stayed late last night to help Terry do the initial work of removing the old ones, and installing the new ones.

This was a very special day for Dalayna since she had her Daddy all to herself and she made big plans. Terry had much to do with putting the doors in, but he took the time to make sure his daughter's plans were accomplished. She said,"Everything I wished for happened today." This included playing in the sprinkler with Daddy, eating ice cream cones and going to Arby's for lunch. A special thank you to my neighbor Julie once again for letting us borrow this ball to hook up to the garden hose instead of our sprinkler. Dalayna (and Daddy too) had fun with this thing.

More info on comments

OK, so my 'Caveman" talk didn't help anyone. I have worked with my settings a little more to allow people to comment. Here is what you do step by step: 1. Click on comments. It will say profile. 2. A few choices will come up. One of those will say NAME/URL. Click on this. 3. Put your name in the NAME section. 4. After you do this, follow what it says in this box. You should then be able to type your comment. 5. Click on Post comment. Wait to see if it works!! Hope fully it will. Sorry this is so difficult!

Posting Comments

I e-mailed my cousin, Shannon, and she was kind enough to tell me what to do so that everyone can post comments on my blog if they want. I appreciate her help. Thanks to her I was also able to change the header on my blog and a more colorful, but basic template. Thank you, Shannon!! Between my cousins, Shannon and Amy, I may understand this blog thing yet!! I have changed my settings so that you don't have to have a password or anything. It should be much easier and now I know how to do it myself. Just click on the word comments and post them. If is doesn't work, e-mail me and we will figure out the problem. It makes me think of those goofy Geico commercials:"So easy a caveman can do it!!"

First Day of School

Today was our 1st day of school. I began taking pictures of Colby's 1st day of school when he started kindergarten at the suggestion of a friend. I thought it was a great idea. I skipped last year unfortunately and would love to post pictures from other years, but have no clue where they would be!! My children are smiling and I hope those smiles remain as the year progresses!!I am so thankful for the opportunity to teach them myself. If anyone is wondering about the background for this picture ,here it is: Our schoolroom overlooks our family room, which is great because you can always hear what is going on downstairs!!

Dalayna putting number words in order. She was so excited about school she didn't even want to eat breakfast today!!

Colby's 1st reading assignment. He was a speed reader today so he could go play ball with the neighbors.

Here is a pile of books checked out from the library to start our year. Using "Five in a Row" you have to have lots of books for research. I checked out 42 books total, the largest amount ever. I thought I had finally caught up to my friend Amy, who checks out a huge number of books, but not yet!! Terry just knew there had to be a limit to the # of books you check out. He was really wishing there were as we carried them out the door!!

colb

Black labs and sprinklers

My children love to run through the sprinkler. We would love to have a pool, but when you just want to cool off, anything will do, right? Our black lab Remington loves water as much as my kids. Notice he is in every picture somehow someway. This is HIS favorite activity!! Our beagle Ranger is nowhere to be found because he hates the water.

Does this dog love water or what?

Colby and Dalayna, comrades in water gun arms. This a cheap form of entertainment for my children!! Notice Remington heading back toward the water spray!!

This is an "action shot" of Remington, mouth open-wide, running after the water spray to capture it in his mouth. He sure moves fast for an 11-year old dog!!

Colby's artwork

I invite everyone to scroll down to the bottom of my blog. Colby loves to design things on the computer and he has offered to "paint" a picture for every month on my blog. I tried to use it as my template, but the computer wouldn't let me. If anyone knows how to do this, please let me know!! So, for now, his lovely art will grace the bottom of my blog. Thank you to my dear, sweet son!!

More pics from our weekend

Here are the rest of the pictures from our visit. I think it would be safe to say that "a good time was had by all." Notice today there are no repeat pictures!! Yeah!!

Aunt Ina almost had a hole in one!!

Dalayna's favorite place to sit was Aunt Ina's lap.

Even Grandma Jo got in on the fishing action, with a little help from her son.

Our visitors

At the mini-golf course. Sorry I have so many pictures twice!!

Colby takes his turn at the batting cages.

Terry takes a try at the batting cages. I wouldn't have minded trying them myself.

Roller coaster smiles....thank goodness instead of sickness!!

Our beagle Ranger, loves Aunt Ina. When she is here, he whines non-stop because he knows she will give him plenty of attention!!

Video games for all!!

Jordan and Dalayna take on Colby!!

OOPs!! I'm still new at this!!

Playing ball in the backyard.

Here is our delicious butterfly cupcake cake, compliments of Aunt Ina. I will be dieting this week after helping eat this cake. We eat well when we have visitors. Too well!!

Grandpa and Dalayna with another fish. They caught one right after another!!

Here is Colby fishing in one of the ponds in our subdivision. They caught enough for a fish fry.

We enjoy having visitors very much and this past weekend we had the pleasure of hosting my mother-in-law, father-in-law, my husband's aunt and cousin. We stayed busy and here are some pictures of our time together!!