Our Pool!

A few weekends ago, Jeremy was taking a break after mowing the grass and before moving on to more yard work, when we started talking about our back yard.  He decided to get rid of the fire pit (it was well used and falling apart) and also to take down his log stand (which has been log-less for several months). Somehow we started talking about pools.

Fast forward a few hours, I run (ok, drive) to Target and happen upon the pools. The above ground pools were on clearance.  So, we did what we always impulsively do...we bought it (ok, well...I bought it, no one was with me).  Let me remind you that I've already bought a pool before.  About 3 years ago, I came home from Target with a huge above ground pool because it was like 75% off.  But, we didn't feel like we had anywhere to put it, so we took it back.  Aparantly, in the past 3 years, our yard has grown in size (it hasn't by the way...that would be crazy!).

So, here I am again...with another pool...this one with my husband's implusive blessing too (I did call first).  We knew the ground had to be level. So, after an entire afternoon of moving water pipes and a few other things...we felt like the ground was level.  It looked level.  So, we followed the instructions (which had a picture of a lady in a bathing suit setting the pool up all by herself...how hard could it be?). 

By this time, it was getting dark.  Nicole went to Grammy and Gramp's house to spend the night, and Nate and Hannah helped us fill the pool (didn't they do a great job?)

This is my new favorite picture of Nathan

Hannah was "swimming"

We filled it with water (can't wait to get That bill), shocked and chlorenated it...and jumped in that night.

Oh, what fun we had!

It's the perfect size.  Nicole and Hannah both can stand in it without water going over their heads...and they both were learning to swim in it.

We swam Monday night, Tuesday Night and Wednesday morning. Three fun filled days. 

Then....

A storm came.

A storm that brought lots of rain, strong winds...and collapsed our pool.  At this point, I should say that our ground was not as level as we thought.  Actually, it was really level until you got to one small part of the side that was probably an inch and half lower, and mostly sand.  I think the rain washed away the sand, filled the pool beyond the fill line and made it tople over.  Half the pool drained out during the storm...the other half we drained.  It is still laying in our yard because we can't seem to get fill sand except during business hours when Jeremy is working.  We still have hopes of using our pool.  We had so much fun in it!  Hopefully, more pictures will come soon.

Atlanta Braves

Every year, Jeremy asks to go to an Atanta Braves game.  We finally made it.  I think this is the first Braves game we've been to since the year we met in 2000 when we went with the college group on a trip to Tennessee. 

Jeremy "pitched" to see how fast he could throw while we waited for the rain delay to end

They played The Florida Marlins earlier this week.  We made it over on a rainy Tuesday afte work.  When we got there, the game had been delayed.  After waiting an hour (and being entertained by the employees at the stadium), the game finally started.

The field crew cleaning the field up for play.  They were actually using brooms and sweeping water into dust pans.

We had great seats, 11 rows up behind the third base dug out (got the tickets for $13 each...cheaper than going out to the movies!).  OK, to be honest, I was scared the first severa "at bats" that a ball would come rocketing off a bat and smack me in the face.  We didn't get any balls in our area, however a player did (acidentally) throw a bat far beyond us and almost hit a lady in the head.  Thankfullly, no one was injured, and I'm pretty sure Jeremy was a little bummed HE didn't get that bat ;)

I don't think there were even 3,000 at the stadium the night.  Between the Marlins not being a great team and the weather, no one was there.  And, there were certainly more Braves fans than Marlins fans (a little sad I suppose)...we even had a Buckeye sit behind us :)

Our seats....see how full the stadium was.

We had fun yelling for the players and doing the "wave".  We ended up moving further up the stands near the end of the game because the guys in front of us were getting to drunk and were yelling obsinities at the players. 

Chipper Jones leading off of first

Chipper's hit

We saw Dan Uggla make history by reaching 30 consecutive games with a hit (I believe he's beyond that record now too).  So, it was fun to chear for him. We saw some great home runs, and only one or two really good plays.  However, we thouroughly enjoyed our time.  The game went into extra innings until the Braves scored the winning run in the 11th.

Someone being interviewed after the game.

Good job on the win guys

Just before leaving, we went down to take a couple of pictures.  Afterwards, a player threw us a game ball which was exciting. 

Our after the game shot

Jeremy got a ball!

Since it was already midnight, we decided to go ahead and try to get the ball autographed.  We waited for about 30 minutes with a group of about 15 other fans.  When the players started coming out, most of them totally snubbed us.  We really wanted Chipper Jone's autograph, but he refused to come near.  I did snap one picture.  Kind of a bummer.  It'll probably be the last time we get to see him play in person.

Chipper Jones coming out of the locker room. This was a close as he got...and the camera is really zoomed in. To bad he couldn't show a little appreciation to his fans...however, it actually really exciting to stand there hoping someone would sign the ball :)

So, after a late start, extra innings and autographs hopes dashed, we left for our 2 hour drive home.  We got in bed a little after 3:00am (and had to wake at 6:30).  It was worth it though.  Jeremy got to see his baseball game and we had a super time!  We can not wait to take the kids, especially Nathan to a ball game one day.

Picture Post

The past several months have been interesting.  However, things are finally starting to slow down and I hope start to make more sense:)  The first major reason is because.....**drum roll please** Jeremy passed his state licensing exam! yay!!!! We are so super proud of him.  He has worked so hard the past several months studying and preparing for this very difficult exam.

However, now that his studying is over, we have our evenings and weekends back.  Where, now we can hang out, guilt free that he should be studying. 

Hopefully, with that big task completed and as I prepare for Nicole's Kindergarten year, I will be more conistent with this blog and update it a bit more.  But, until then...I will post some pictures from the past few weeks.

The girls thought they should give the birds a chance to live in a bird house...the put it right in front of the bird's nest.

Hannah was trying to "mow the grass" with her daddy.  Yes she is wearing a fancy dress.

Following her daddy

She gave up on the old plastic mower...now she's really helping daddy:)

Guess who....



The kids all fell down together.  I think both girls are "laying" on top of Nate hehehe.



Hannah girl!

My girls, Jessica and Elisa, after our "girls night" in Tampa last weekend.  We went to see Hillsong United in concert.  It was a lot of fun.

These two LOVE to play together:)

Nicole is putting lipstick on Hannah. So sweet.

Nathan man...what a cutie!

Hannah was being so sweet one night.  Just sitting in her chair, holding her baby. 

Nate is trying to roll.

5 Year old Handprint

I have been waiting more than 5 years for the moment we had on Wednesday.  I remember the first time I walked into our pediatrian's office when Nicole was a newborn and I was surrounded on every possible wall with handprints.  When a child turns 5, they are allowed to place their handprint on the wall of the office.  I remember thinking..."5?  5 years old...that is SO far away!"  And, now....we are here.  We have a 5 year old who finally got to put her handprint on the wall.

To be honest, I was way more excited than she was.  I literally had nightmares about two things happening - 1. That they would run out of room and my kids wouldn't get to print
2. That one day, I would walk in and the painted the walls white and erased over 15 years of memories. 

But...neither one happened:)

So, without further ado....Photos of Nicole's special moment.

This is the picture herself that Nicole chose.

Dr. Brown let Nicole have a purplish color...custom made (but it's a secret!)

Hannah was sad she couldn't put her hand on the wall:(  Two more years sweet girl.

E...Elephant

We are s.l.o.w.l.y. making our way through My Father's World this summer.  Hey...it's summer, right?

Well, over the past week or so, we have been learning around Elephants.  They key phrase is "I will remember what God has done for me".  However, to be honest, I have not made the girls memorize that or really much of anything lately.  We are gearing up though for a tough semester with lots of memorization...so, we need to start exercising our brains again. 

Anyway....we did have fun reading about elephants and doing some really fun activities.
Some of our favorite books were
Grandma Elephant's in Charge by Martin Jenkins
An Elephant Grows up by Anastasia Suen
and Elephants Can Paint Too! by Katya Arnold.

The last one was really interesting and created a morning of fun for us.  Elephants Can Paint Too! showed us about some Asian Elephants that are being taught to paint. Some just paint lines and dots...but some can even be taught to paint flowers!  So...inspired by the book...we decided to paint like elephants.  Although, instead of holding the brush with our trunk, we used our mouth (because we don't have a trunk, and there is no way our nose would work ;)



Can you hear Nicole giggling here?



They even dipped their paint brushes in the paint while holding it in their mouth. The girls really enjoyed this...they giggled almost the whole time.

 The last page of the book shows two elephants...one with his rear facing you with several paint streaks on his behind. the other with a paint brush in his hand.  It looks like they were being ornory and painting each other.  Well, that sort of happened to us.  Both girls were bent over to get more paint on their brush.  Nicole stood up, and painted Hannah's forehead as she stood.  Hannah was not happy, but Nicole and I giggled. 



My little elephant's masterpiece



My other little elephant's masterpiece.

We also made an elephant out of our hand prints.  I picked up Hand-Print Animal Art by Carolyn Carreiro at a garage sale a while ago.  In the back, it gave instructions on using our hands to paint an elephant.  Here are their works of art.

Nicole's hand print elephant with no help from me...just instructions

Hannah's hand print elephant...I had to help her a lot on this one.

We also made elephants masks from the template found here.



Hannah's elephant mask...she glued this herself.



Nicole's elephant mask..she cut and glued herself:)

We learned about the difference between African and Asian elephants from this website which also included other activities, poems and puzzles.  We even had to put together these two types of elephants and then label the correct one.

My Other Other little elephant.  He saw me taking pictures and said "Ma-Ma, Cheese" So, I snapped a picture of him. 

We used this as a time to have fun with a purpose.  The girls know the difference between African and Asian Elephants.  They insisted I call them "little elephant" while painting with their mouths and we practiced making noises like elephants. 

Sometimes, you disappoint

I know I have disappointed my children at various times in their lives.  They didn't get that extra cookie they wanted, or they didn't get to watch another TV show.  It doesn't bother me when I disapoint them that way.  That's a lesson for them in obedience or self control. 

However, this morning, I woke up to the sobbing, heart broken tears of my dear Hannah, and discovered I had greatly disapointed her. 

You see, for the past couple of days, she has been carrying around all kinds of stuffed animals and dolls, and calling them her "children".  She has an active imagination  and has spent hours caring for her children, feeding them, reading to them, teaching them song, and rocking them.  She is seriously adorable!

Yesterday when we quickly left for dinner and church, she asked me if she could bring a couple of her "children" along.  I allowed her to.  Well, she rode home from church with daddy and forgot to get her children out of the car. 


Hannah reading the Bible to her children, "and God made da whole ting"



Last night as we were tucking the girls in, she began to crying because her "children" were still in the car. At first, we playfully said, "Oh no...you can't leave your children in the car!  You may get arrested and go to jail"  Now, before you send me hate comments...we have joked abou that before...and we were smiling and laughing as we said it.  Well, Hannah was in no joking mood...this was serious to her!  So, immediately I gave her a huge hug and told her she wasn't going to jail and I would take care of her children.

Guess what....I forgot.  I didn't even think about it again!  This morning, a few minutes after six, I was awoken to the sobbings of a three year old.  When I finally figured out what was wrong, I told her that I was sorry...and I forgot to get her children for her.  Oh dear....wrong thing to say! She almost had ME crying.  I can't even call it crying, she was sobbing.  Big, heavy tears with shoulder quivering.  She was so sad that her children were in the car all night long.  Poor little thing. 

That, was one of the first times I felt like I really disappointed her.