You Don't See That Every Day

This weekend was a winning weekend! On Saturday two of our girls, Dots and Squiggles, participated in the Awana Games. This is where teams from around the area get together at a local gym - a college in our case - and compete against each other in some fun games. There's the balloon volley, the 'marathon' - which is running in circles basically for 6 laps, the 3 legged-race, and some throwing-bean-bags competition. One of the fun ones is the Sparkies crawl - this is where the Sparkies, who are in grades K through 2, get down and crawl across the floor - not too hard, right? Except that there are 4 teams coming from 4 different directions, intersecting in the 'middle'. It's pretty much controlled chaos, and so fun to watch. Well, after all was said and done our church's teams won the games! Both girls' teams came in first, so that was pretty exciting. They each got to take home a medal, which is now hanging somewhere in their bedrooms. On Sunday the Mr...

It's a rainy Saturday in Oregon. I have a child who is still sick. So she and I and Little K. stayed home this morning while the other 3 kids and G. went to the Awana Games. Our sick girl was quite disappointed she was not able to go! It was her last year of competing and she was a key player. Unfortunately, her body didn't cooperate with her plans. So we stayed in and watched TV. Well, they watched while I cleaned and baked. We like to watch the Food channel; Chopped is one of our favorites. The only problem with that is ... I then go in the kitchen and crank out some kind of goodie, but tweak the recipe a little. (I guess that isn't really any different from any other time I cook.) This time I took my oatmeal muffin recipe*, the one from my awesome friend Debbie, and I added jam to the center. Wow! Such a little change, but so yummy! I've got the chili in the crockpot going, and I'm working on cinnamon roll from PW 's cookbook . Here's the thing ab...

 I'm so behind the times. A show will be all the rage for most people in America, and I won't see it for ... months; mostly because I rarely watch new TV shows. But then my sister gave me one to watch. I took it with me to Vegas, but due to the size and age of the TV in our room, I was unable to watch any DVD I brought. So we sat down to it this week, and we're hooked on it! We even sent the older kids to bed "early" so we could watch it without staying up too late. What has our attention? Well, I loved Foyle's War, from Masterpiece Theater, and various Jane Austen's. And now we have another one. You might be saying "Downtown Abbey!" but I haven't watched it. (Gasp! I know!) I have it waiting for me on the TV stand though. No, this one is Sherlock . Pure genius! I enjoy the logic he uses to deduce who did what. I love that there is no gore, no major violence, no nudity, no sex, and sprinkles of humor throughout the dialogue. It is almost l...

We're watching the Olympics! Oh did I tell you we joined the 21st century, and now have cable TV? For the first time in our married life, we have cable. It has been .. interesting. I wasn't thrilled with the idea initially. After all, we are trying to get away from electronics consuming all our time. But the Olympics! We can't miss those! But, no that is not the why of  why we got cable. That has more to do with lowering our phone and Internet bill. We 'cut a deal' with the provider, and it included cable TV. So anyway, seeing the sites of London on TV has been fun. My dear husband likes to say, "See that bridge? I've been there" or "I was on that bridge." Now it was fun to hear and think of the first time he pointed it out. But now that it has been about 500 times .. the kids groan when pictures of the famous bridges appear. I just laugh. And dream of the day he might take me there ;) This girl. She's my first girl. She ...

Can you guess what we are watching in our household tonight? My husband and I grew up watching Wild Kingdom, with Marlin Perkins. Remember that?? My kids have the Crikey! man - Steve Irwin. We love to watch his shows, "Croc Files" is the one for tonight. We get them from Netflix, and we all enjoy them. That guy was ... a piece of work. His wife is from Oregon, which is pretty cool itself. She reminds me a lot of one of my sister-in-laws, in looks and in demeanor, and adventure. We were all very saddened the day we heard the news of Steve Irwin;s death back in 2006. But we love watching the shows. I think I wrote about this once a few years back. My son had just watched some croc wrestling, and had gone outside to wrestle our huge Lab. And that dog didn't mind a bit; he didn't fight back like a croc, but the Boy had a good time anyway. The sickness has hit our household. Last week my oldest had a fever which transitioned into a bad cold. This week little K. had the ...

There's a show I like to watch. Probably the only show on TV now that I watch, besides my netflix movies. It's a reality show about racing around the world and having to take on different tasks. In my everyday world I like to imagine I am on that show, racing to complete certain tasks in a strange environment. Today was one of those days. It was time for our annual trek to Portland for an appointment and OHSU. My girl has scoliosis, like me, and we have to get it checked out every so often. So we had to follow directions to get there, because I certainly don't remember from last time. And we had a time crunch, because it's OK for a doctor to be late, but not the patient. Then we had to find out which floor and area to go to. That last part wasn't so hard thankfully. We were "training for the race." And then The Girl had to answer questions - basic ones, but I wanted her to answer for herself. There was a waiting period too. In various r...

My eyes have been opened to even more differences in my upbringing versus my kids'. This morning the Boy had a football game at 8:30 am, meaning he had to leave the house by 8. Now for most people this doesn't seem unreasonable. But if you home school and have an infant who does not sleep through the night, along with a 5 year old who often gets up in the middle of the night and needs help - well then leaving the house dressed and looking alive does seem unreasonable. So only the Boy and my husband went out in the rain to play/watch football. My oldest daughter asked me(out of the blue), "Can we watch Saturday Morning Cartoons?" (yes, in all caps, because it is an Event, unheard of in our household.) And then my 5 year old asks, "What are cartoons?" So naturally I let them watch cartoons while they ate breakfast this morning. And now she knows.