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Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Report Card Time

Well today was report card day. The end of the first quarter. For the first time ever Larry made Honor Roll. He missed all A's by 1 B. They have also been having tryouts for the basketball team and he found out today he made the team. So over all he had a very good day!

Nicole had all A's. Which considering her class load was pretty cool. So that along with getting her license today she had a pretty good day as well. I am glad I decided to take them to Beef and Boards on Thursday since they are out of school Thurs & Fri. Now we have lots of things to celebrate. Now I am sure she will want to start looking for a car. All in due time!

I hope all of you and your families had a wonderful day as well!

Take care & God Bless!!

Watch out on the roads!!

Well it is official. Nicole is an official driver now. She went and took her drivers test today and passed first time. I asked her if she felt any different. "Nope" so now the fun begins. Well actually things won't change a whole lot until we are secure enough for her to go on her own. Just wait all of you, your turn will be coming before you know it. Overall she is a really good driver. She is looking forward to being able to go to play practice and all that fun stuff on her own. We will just have to wait and see. I know that we will have to let her at some point but there is not point in rushing it. At least school is only about 3 minutes away that helps! I tell her it is not her that we worry about it is everyone else. But it will be nice to have something else to hold over her head!

Take care & God Bless!

Monday, October 20, 2008

Getting with the times.....

Ok so here we go. We are getting with the program and now have "texting". If you do not know what texting is it is where you can "type" a message with your cell phone and send it to someone like an instant message. There have been so many times where I have needed to get a hold of Paul for something little but important and he does not answer his phone. (I know all of you ladies have no idea what I am talking about because all of your husbands answer their phones when you call them I am sure!) Or the kids go somewhere and all I want is a simple phone call to know that they got there and everything is good. (Sorry I am an overprotective parent! They will tell you that I am as well!) Anyway we made some changes with our cell phone plan so we added that to all of our phones for next to nothing. So we are officially a part of the "texting" world. So if any of you "text" let me know I know my kids are very excited about this new feature. My theory is that now they have absolutely no excuse to not get a hold of me. Plus they can text their friends without it being long distance or costing minutes.

Another thing we have done is added satellite TV. Where we live when the new changes happen in Feb. we will not have any TV. We tried the converter box but that eliminated all of the stations except 3. Needless to say 2 of them do not even carry anything decent. So we cut everything off our phone, went to an answering machine and added basic satellite. Just so the kids can watch their smallville and we can still see our desperate housewives and greys anatomy.

Technology - it is unreal how quickly things can change around you and you not even notice. I can't wait to see what happens in another 10 years. Now we just have to figure out DVR is and how to operate it. Paul has problems with the current remote I can't wait until wed when we get the new one.

Take care & God Bless!!

Thursday, October 16, 2008

One finished...One beginning...

Ok so I deleted all of my old blogs a few weeks ago. Kind of out of frustration more then anything. It seemed that things were just to negative and I do not like negative things. I was trying to decide if I was even going to do it any more when a friend of mine (you know who you are) asked me about it. She said she missed it and enjoyed reading it. She thought it was funny. I am glad my misery brings happiness to others! :O) So here we go again. I am going to focus more on the positive things and not the negative things! Not to say there won't be some negative stuff now and then because sometimes you just have to vent!

Well we finished up Cross Country this past weekend. We had the County meet and then we had the conference meet. Larry did well in both. In the County meet he finished 12th but he got a new time 12:56 that was his second best the whole season. There were 44 boys in this race. He had one that was 12:38 but we figured that everything must have been absolutly perfect that day. For the conference meet he finished 24th with a finish time of 13:03. There were about 62 kids in this meet just for the boys. He finished third for our school all season long. Every meet. However he improved his time almost every meet. Next week basketball tryouts start so we will only have this week for a break.

Nicole is working hard on the play we built the set a couple of days ago and it looks really cute. They are all getting so excited. Before we know it it will be here. She is thinking about being manager for the swimming team which will be good for her. She is not big on the actual swimming part but I think she will enjoy helping out still.

End of the semester is tomorrow which they are both ready for. They just added to the school web page a program where we can go see their grades this week. Both of them are looking pretty good. For those of you struggling with elementary school stuff have faith that Jr/Sr high will be better. Larry is 1 B away from straight A honor roll - which this is the first time every he will make honor roll. Nicole is all A's as well as of right now. Which is amazing with her class load. For once I think report card time will be good for all with no tears of frustration!

Anyway that is it for now. I hope everyone else is doing well. Take care & God Bless!!

New Blog...

Ok I have added a new blog. It is going to only be receipe's. I have had several that have asked me for a few of mine and I have several really quick and easy ones that I have collected over the years. So if you are interested in checking it out go to

http://receipesharing.blogspot.com

If you have a receipe that you would like to add send it to me and I will add it.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

ELECTION.............

I am not sure if anyone else feels this way or not, however since this is my blog and these are my thoughts I guess I get to vent a little. So if you don't want to know what I think about the upcoming election then stop reading now.

First off I still have no idea who I am going to vote for and I am not trying to endorse any candidate. As a matter of fact if you do not do your own research on each candidate yourself and pray about it and ask for God's help in making the decision then you should not even vote! I am sick and tired of getting the thousands of e-mails that tell me what a horrible person Obama is or how McCain is lying about this or that. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!!!

I am an adult and this is NOT my first election. I know how the process works and I do not need the 50 e-mails every day to try and pursued me to vote for "their" candidate. Last I knew it was still a free country and it was nobodies business who I vote for nor is it any of my business who you vote for.

I am sick of all the "debates" which are suppose to help us know more about each candidate, and where they stand on issues. All I seem to hear them saying is what their opponent is doing or not doing while they (both sides) twist and tweek things just a little for their favor. I am very glad that the news people are finally starting to check the facts on things both candidates are saying in these debates.

I want a President who will be honest and upfront about things - good or bad - just do not lie or stretch the truth. As a small business owner, parent of school age children, a small farm owner and American citizen we seem to keep getting hit with one tax after another. It is getting very frustrating. Our business gets hit with this tax and that tax and I think we are at the point that we pay the government more then we pay ourselves. Where is the American dream in that? We have prided ourselves is helping others when others would not only to get a new tax bill in the mail which over the last couple of years has forced us to raise our prices in order to pay Uncle Sam his.

I have several family members, including a brother and brother in law, who serve our country and fight for our freedom each and every day. (that is where the name for the blog came from) What do they get in return? They get little pay, lots of time away from their family and miss out on so many important and wonderful things with their families. They rarely get thanked or even a tiny bit of recognition for what they do....All for me and you and every other American in this country. It is unfortunate that my brothers are on opposite ends of the country (1 in CA 1 in IRAQ via NC) with their families. Most of you know that I am not real close with most of my family but my love and respect for them - regardless of family standing - is more then I can put into words. I so wish that we were closer in every sense of the word! My children have been brought up with the love and respect of the military and the sacrifice that they make without really knowing either one of their uncles. My husband told me the other day that the Flag did not mean nearly as much to him before we got married and saw how much it meant to me and my family. I was asked the other day how I would feel if one of my kids were in the military. My response is that I would love them all the more for the sacrifice that they would be giving and I would be so proud of them. (I would be equally proud of them not matter what they did.) I fully believe that no matter what your views are on the war you DO NOT abandon the soldier under any circumstances.

So if you are still reading this you are probably wondering ok I thought this was about the upcoming election. Well our military personnel will be affected by this upcoming election as well. There has been so much talk about the economy that our military, it seems, has been forgotten. Please do not forget them.

Also as far as who is a Christian (Muslim or not??) and who is not - just remember that Jesus dies on the cross for all of us. God sent his one and only son for us. Is Obama really a Christian - that is between him & God. All I know is that I have done so many things in my life that anyone from the outside looking in at who I use to be would say how dare I say that I am a Christian. However anyone that knows me now would not question my faith or that I am a Christian. I pray that no one passes judgement on you the way that others pass judgement on the candidates because of rumors or past events. That is where the BLOOD comes into play - he washed us white as snow and removes all of our sin, if we confess that Jesus Christ is the son of the living God - our Lord & Savior.

There are pro's and con's for both of the candidates. However as a Christian I will not pass along any thing about Obama being Muslim when he professes to be a Christian. And the truth of the matter is that most of the Muslims in this country want the same thing that Americans want peace. Actions speak louder then words. Watch, listen to what is said, and pray that God will have His way on Nov. 4th. No matter who that may be.

The only reason that I even mention this is because this is the biggest debate thing on the e-mail's that I receive. I am not endorsing him in any way. Just remember that he may be telling the truth that he is a Born again Christian. As a Christian that is not a judgement call that I am not willing to make - because it is not one I would want others to make of me!

Take care & may God Bless you all and your families.

May God's will be done on Nov. 4th