Rain gutter Regatta!

Mark beating his co-cub scout in the race!
Yay he won!
o.o.o. man, not this time buddy
And the winner is... Tucker in 1st and

MARK ROUNDS won 2nd prize.

And he actually did beat the champion once too!

They built their model boats with mom/dad and

then brought them to a cub scout mtg and

raced them in RAINGUTTERS!

(blowing them along with straws)

What a creative idea!

I was very impressed!

More of our sceeming PICS!

Some more of our drawers!
More of our drawers!
More added lately! Too!

Our goal is to not have to tell the kids to do their normal chores eventually! They are doing good with that so far really! Then as they get things like making their beds and such down without being told then they will get more responsibilities added!

Do any of you have a chore plan you would like to share?

Or any advice for me to make my system work better?

LMK!

Our New Plan!

Well we have sceemed and plotted and sceemed and plotted to try to come up with a plan to get the kids interested in doing chores and helping out around the house. So here is what we came up with!! This is Mark's Chore chart!Here is the Girls' Lex on top and Hannah on bottom!
And here is their reward! They will earn "money" that they can go "buy" stuff at our store! It is at a highly inflated price, like $1 = $5 of play money! So they get $10 at the beginning of the week and if they do all their chores they get to keep all that (they can also loose it for misbehaving) if they do over and above they can earn more $. You get the idea!

I think the best part about it is I have bought a lot of these things on clearance for next to nothing! So it really isn't costing us much!
My fave is the bottom drawer which is filled with "coupons" They get to use when THEY want to, within reason obviously not right before bed!
They can also get candy too! This is where we store the "money" too!
I am really excited about this, I got the idea from Miranda! It has really helped to motivate the kids to make their beds and clean up after theirselves too! One of the BIG ones for Lex is if she goes a whole day and doesn't suck her thumb at all she will get $5 and get to spend it that day! (if she wants to) We normally plan on having store time on Sunday's probably after lunch! I am very excited at the potential to really get these kids motivated!

Chess Tournament!

Lex trying Hard to beat someone obviously almost twice her age!

Lunch at the tourny!
Struggling to Place!
Alexis Got Highest unrated score!
Mark Got 3rd in his age bracket!

We all had a good time and the kids learn so much self discipline and love learning how to play better. They think it's funny that they know how to play something that Mommy doesn't!

Fishing in the HOUSE!

We thought we would go fishing in the
house since it is so cold outside.

No actually we had a major clog in our laundry

shoot! We had it clogged for about 6 feet or so and it was right in the center of the shoot(and our shoot is 3 stories long). So we couldn't reach it with a broom or anything to jam it down or pull it down anyway. So I called my good friend Larry (he's my best friends husband) he had the bright idea of using a treble hook to pull the stuff up. Well then we realized that the clog was more then just clothes. I had put something a while back down the shoot to help with weight to push stuff down and well it was too big and got jammed in there. So when we got all our clothes out either by the hook(which damaged a few things) or getting them loose and they fell, the toy I used was still jammed in there. Finally JR was able to reach it enough to get it turned and grab it with a pole and it dropped almost to the bottom. He was able to reach it with his hands and wiggle it out. So needless to say I am not putting anything accept clothes in the shoot again and only one thing at a time! Boy oh boy, was that a task? It took about 1-2 hours to do it all. Glad it is over!!!

Heaven's Nursery

In Heaven there must surely be

A special place, a nursery

Where 'little spirits' not fully grown

Go to live in their Heavenly home.

The angels must attend with love

Tiny spirits on wings of doves,

The choir of angels must sing lullabies

Maybe quieten their tiny cries.

The Father must come by each day

To cuddle and play in a special way

These tiny spirits left earth too soon

Little ones called Home from the womb.

These sparks of life did not perish

But came to the Father's love to cherish,

To grow and be taught in His own arms

Safely away from all earthly harm.

The comforter was sent to earth at once

To the parents who lost their little one

Their hearts so ache, their arms feel empty

The question 'why' seems so tempting.

Then all at once in the midst of tears

There comes a peace that stills the fears

The parents share the Father's own need

To hold their tiny spirit being.

They relinquish their own desperate hold

And release their baby to the Father's fold,

Then comes an angel to whisper the truth

Of a nursery in Heaven bearing rich fruit

Of tiny spirits chosen to worship the Father

A place that couldn't be filled by another,

Called to be spared from the struggles of earth,

Chosen to be one of Heaven's births.

So Father, whisper words of love from me

To our unborn 'life' in your nursery.

BY: Rebekah Milne

Written after her own miscarriage

I just thought this was very touching and wanted to share it for whoever wanted to read it on my blog. Hope it touches your hearts.

Alexis in the Newspaper!

My baby girl is in the paper! Here is the link!
http://www.crestonnewsadvertiser.com/special_section/30/

JR's Blog

I just wanted to put a plug in for my hubby's blog too! Hope you all enjoy it!

http://www.fightthegoodfightjeremy.blogspot.com/

More Organizing!

This is my sewing area! That will be a task!

Not as much as the scrapbook area was though!

This is our storage room for all the kids' too big clothes.

Many other things too.

This will take DAYS probably.

We still haven't put away our Christmas decorations etc.

Stacks and stacks
This is my changing table which is in the living room
This will be a little task really. Just have to do it.

Organizing my scrapbook table!

Well I have been working on organizing my home.

This is my first step. I forgot to take before pics.

Just imagine it piled high witk misc. stuff. Papers,

a container that had beeds in it spilled all over

everything, ummm lots of papers from the kids'

school, stuff they had drawn and many other things!

These are just other angles of the same area!

I can't wait to scrapbook now!

Anyone else scrapbook?

I will now be attacking a few other key areas over the next

few weeks. I plan on posting before and after pics on these.

Memorial for the Unborn

This Sunday in our town we have a memorial for the unborn. We are hoping to raise awareness for the millions of babies that are aborted every year. So if any of you think of it say a special prayer for the unborn this week. They need our prayers. Their mommies need our prayers. This nation needs to overturn Roe vs. Wade! The children need a chance to live their lives, they have done nothing wrong to deserve the fate they receive.

MARK'S NEW GLASSES

I thought you would like to see Mark's new glasses everyone! They match his hair very nicely! It's kinda hard to see that in the picture but they do.

Frugal Idea I got from a friend...

A dear friend of mine gave me this very neat idea that I would like to share with you all. Some ppl will spend lots of money on fabric softeners or dryer sheets and she shared with me how she deals with keeping her clothes soft and yet not spending near the money! She would soak an old holey T-shirt of her hubbies in fabric softener(the cheapest she could buy) like in the bathroom sink just get it drenched... then you dry it in the dryer so it sets the fabric softener in. You then leave it in the dryer all the time. The 1st time you use it you should use it with towels or something like that so the blue won't hurt if it gets on it either that or like jeans. Then after that you should be set. Just use it in the dryer, you DON'T WASH IT! Just leave it in the dryer and it will soften your clothes for months to come! I usually redo it every 6 months or so! Good way to use an old T-shirt and keep your clothes from getting all staticy too. LMK if any of you try it and what you think?

MIL having Surgery, Please PRAY!

My MIL is having surgery very soon and she needs our prayers, so I thought I would put out the word for you all to pray for her! She is an awesome women. I couldn't ask for a more loving wonderful MIL! So please pray for her. She will have to be put under and have a ventilator and everything. PRAY PRAY PRAY!?!?!?!?! PLEASE?!?!?!?! LUV YA MIL!

Mark's getting GLASSES!

Well we took 3 of the 4 kids to the eye DR and we discovered Mark is near-sighted. So needless to say he is getting glasses. It was good to find out. Not to say his grades had been hurting at all. He is a straight A student. But he will be able to see much better now. It was a fun experience at the DR. The lady who helped us choose frames asked him what his favorite color was and he said blue and yellow. So she handed him a pair of blue frames about the color of this typing and they clashed so bad with his RED hair! So needless to say again mom said NO to those. I said I wanted something more neutral. So we ended up finding one that almost matches his hair perfect. Stay tuned for pics of him in his new GLASSES! They said no more then a week!

Politics?!?!?!?!

OK, well we are getting ready to go to the big Caucus in IA! It will be the second time I have went and I am looking forward to it. My SIL is coming here to go and just sit in on it. She does not want to go alone so she wants to see what the process is like. But unfortunately I am still undecided! That is too bad for me, I need to figure out what I am doing huh???? Anyway if any of you have any things to sway me please let me know. My big issues that mean the most to me are Abortion, and other moral issues! LMK

Biggest Loser!

My SIL Lynzie set up this thing with our family for the Biggest loser and we all are pitching in $25 started Christmas this year and whoever loses the most percentage of body weight by Thanksgiving next year(so we can have the money for Christmas shopping) gets the whole kitty!!! I am so excited! It gives me an incentive to lose this "baby fat" I still have from Ethan. Wish I could say that is all what it is...anyway wish me luck!

New Years Eve

We went to our friends Ken and Abbi's for a New Years Eve party. We were all waiting for the midnight hour to chime, so we could go to bed. I guess it is starting to show our age a bit. LOL, We did have a blast though!

Alexis' first layered cut!

Cutting Alexis hair for the first time in a layered cut.
Taught by my friend Abbi from MN.