My First Attempt at Video

I don't have a real video camera and M's broke. This is the last part of her dance. I didn't know how long my camera would take video and she was in the back row for the first part, so I videoed the second part. If you notice some of the girls are looking to the right a lot, it's because their assistant teacher is over there giving them the moves. I think they knew them, but they were used to looking at her.

Z fell in love with the stage. She wasn't nervous at all. She can't wait to dance on stage again. She was sooooo excited all weekend. She was still jumping on the bed at 10pm last night! She loved getting her picture taken and dressing up. She was excited about wearing makeup, but when it actually came to putting it on, she didn't like the way the eye makeup felt. I personally hope that next year she has more hair for me to work with. :) A lot of the girls had hair pieces, but I couldn't bring myself to buy one. Backstage, I felt a little bit like "Toddlers & Tiaras" with all the little girls in costumes, pantyhose, makeup and hairpieces. (I'm a little anti-pageant, so that was kinda weirding me out a little. Pageants, sororities and cheer leading--ew. That goes with fake boobs, tanning beds and over-blonding. Getting off track here. Sorry.)

Wish y'all could have been there! They were adorable! There were about 16 girls in her dance. I just mostly videoed her. :)

Proud Momma!

Today was picture day for dance class. I took some pictures of my own.

Her teacher was so excited about those gloves!

I thought about getting her a hair piece, but I think I did pretty well without one:

Adorable.

I don't know if she learned to dance, but she definitely learned to pose for a picture!

I guess everybody feels this way. . . but I think my baby is the prettiest bee!

What I've been doing today

Marathon Cardmaking

I made a mess.

I ran out of envelopes. I have to do 19 of those.

I found a computer game that I like. It's an interior design game. You are given clients and they give you clues to what they want. Sometimes the clues are in code and are difficult to dicipher. You are given a budget. Then you design the room. Floors, walls, and everything that goes in it. The only downside is that you only do living areas and dining rooms. No kitchen, baths or bedrooms. As you progress in the game, you have more choices and more money to work with. When your customer is satisfied and you put enough items in the room, you have a team to build the room for you. You have to manage who does what and keep them from getting too tired by giving them coffee. heehee! You keep them on task by handing them the necessary tools. There is a deadline and you don't meet it, you have to try again. This is way too much fun. It's like being in charge on Trading Spaces or Design on a Dime. :) Hours of wasted time!

I went to a new doctor today. I switched my PCP. I'm seeing an internal medicine doctor instead of a GP. He did a full work-up, which I haven't had done in a VERY long time. He's checking my thyroid and did an xray of my sinuses. He took some blood, too. Not sure what all he's looking at there. He gave me a Rx for my sinus infection. I actually had a fever (101.2) and didn't know it. The nurse checked twice because I was surprised that I had one. He's actually having me come back to make sure the infection is gone. This is great because, you know, they always come back 'cause they aren't completely gone.

Kudos to my neighbor for watching the kids. She took them to the park and ordered them pizza. Above and beyond. I would have been happy for her just to check in and make sure they weren't killing each other.

I'm skipping church tonight because of illness. Two of my kids have snot and cough, so they aren't supposed to go to the nursery anyway. The irony is that they are having a healing service tonight. I figure our immune systems are comprimised right now and we'd better steer clear of crowds of sick people. It was a tough call.

I will be watching Lost in about 10 minutes, so don't call me 'til it's over.

Happy Mother's Day

I hate it when people say, "How are you?" when they don't mean it. The only thing worse is saying, "I'll call you." or "Let's get together sometime." when they don't mean it. It's just like a habit: "Hi. How are you?" It doesn't even mean anything. I find it annoying, so I am usually honest instead of giving them the right response: "I'm fine, thank you. How are you?" I tell them if I'm tired or sick or whatever. I really should work on this and just be polite or at least try to think of something positive to say.

I went to the grocery store today to pick up some items to make chicken salad for a potluck. I get in line with my four kids. I am tired because I went to bed late and my younger kids have been waking me up at night. I have a hard time going to sleep after being awakened. I get grouchy when I haven't had enough sleep. . . you get the idea. The bagger asks me, "How are you?"
I say, "I'm o.k."
He says, "just o.k.?"
I say, "I'm tired."
He says, "Well, it's the weekend now. You can sleep whenever you want!"
(Is this guy for real? What does he think my life is like? He needs to go write his mother a thank you letter for all the sleep she sacrificed for him.)
I say, "Not when you have four kids, but that's a nice thought."
He got interrupted and it was dropped. I looked at the cashier (an older lady). She seemed to feel for me.
I need a Dr. Pepper.

Thank you, Mom, for all the times that you sacrificed sleep to take care of us. I know that you know that I know that you sacrificed a lot more than that. . . but that's the one that's on my mind today. So, thank you.

Can Lost get any crazier?! Whoa, Nellie. I don't even know what to think.

Kin Folk

The other night Allister went to his favorite coffee shop (It's what he does after I go to bed on his nights off.) Our friend, Katie, was there and she introduced him to a group of friends she was with. Another young lady approached the table and said, "Hello," to everyone, then turned to Allister and said, "I don't believe I know you." He introduced himself and she said that she liked his name. Then, she proceeded to tell him her great-grandfather's name. . . at which point Allister was in shock, because she gave him his full name. He showed her his driver's license to show her that he had the same name exactly. He asked her where her family was from. Well, as it turns out, her great-grandfather is Allister's great-uncle. . . the man he was named after. Her family lives here in town. . . so we've got kin folk here, y'all! Yee-haw! I'm so excited. She told Allister that there's a family reunion coming up and that'd he should come. She said that she'd get bonus points for bring him! haha I don't think we will go this year. It's a very long drive across Texas!

This has been a busy weekend! Yesterday was field day for our homeschool group. We spent most of the day participating in races and games and eating lunch with our friends. We had loads of fun. Then, last night we had some friends over for dinner and played for a couple of hours more!

This morning was the Mother-Daughter Brunch at our church. It is a fund raiser for missions. Next year maybe my mom and sisters can come. We ate and listened to some short and sweet inspirational messages about missions. I wore a dress:

The boys stayed at the church with us in "childcare" because Allister had to work (sleep). Afterwards, we went to Market Street and got something for them to eat and went back to the church to wrap potatoes. Tomorrow the church is having a fundraiser for the kids to go to camp. It is a baked potato lunch. I chose to wait until tomorrow to attend church services, since I have to drive out there anyway.

In other news. . . Allister bought a car. I'm not really excited about this because we have to pay for it. The transmission was going out quickly on his car and so he traded it in and got a 2007 Nissan Sentra. I guess he likes his job because he will be there a lot.