In homage to the rejected curtain!!

Bet you're curious now, eh?!! Well, you'll have to wait till I get to Saturday to hear about the subject mattter. This week was another busy week - we had school, visited with my sister-in-law and her two children a couple times, visited Dorothy, sewed, etc. Monday moring brought a very serious trip to the chiropractor. My last experience was a nightmare of colossal proportions (I have always wanted to say that but have never had the opportunity - until now!). They waaaaaay overcharged, tried to scare me, threatened me, and tried to manipulate and intimidate me. So, it was with great reservation that I would go again. Thankfully, a friend of ours mentioned that he and his wife had a good chiropractor. (I immediately conjured up images of some person dressed in tribal garb stirring a cauldron with snake eyes! Just kidding!) But I did cringe because of my previous experience. We had this conversation about a week prior to my accident. Or Sad Tale of Woe as I like to call my whining. It sounds rather romantic when I write that way. Last week I was at Dorothy's and my nephew and Kristinie the Great were playing right below me. Let me stop right here and say that when you are six feet tall and wearing skechers shape-ups (which make me 6'2") you don't see much below your elbow. I didn't see them and in order to keep from crushing them, because not only am I fairly tall, I'm also rather big (it spreads out nicely on a tall frame) I had to jump twist and stumble to keep from hurting them. I heard something pop but since it didn't hurt I didn't worry. Well, two days later, I was in some pain but not terrible. By Monday, (back to my story), I was in serious pain. So I decided to call said chiropractor. I got there, signed in, and they took me back. And boy, was I surprised!!! They were great. The doctor said she could fix my back in FOUR visits!! I couldn't believe it. They recommended a maintenance plan but said they would work with what I had the time for. AND she said if she didn't think they could fix it they would help me find someone who could help me!! After my first visit, I was significantly better. By this morning, I was in virtually NO pain! I was thanking the Lord for that.

 And here is the wonderful table that they used to fix me up!! AND since we have met our deductible it was extremely inexpensive. Praise the Lord!! :)

 Here is our little buddy Dagmar, the most spoiled dog in the world.

Here is John and Beatrice in the Adventure Bus. He and Rachel love riding with us. Tomorrow they are coming to our fall festival. I hope everyone stands still long enough for me to take photos!! I can't remember what day I did what but I believe this was Tuesday. All the pictures are in chronological order, though.

 This is my piece de resistance II!! (I think I have a lot of them!) This is Sparky, the K-2nd grade mascot for AWANA. If you can't tell, he is a firefly. (See the wings and the yellow bottom?) All handmade and machine satin stitched. Made by special request for one of my friends for her AWANA classroom.

 The first skirt for my Sister-friend I told you about last week. Thankfully, she loves it. And she wore the black one today to church, and it looked great on her, if I do say so myself.

 Our trip to the nursing home. Notice how great I am at centering photos!! I wanted a nice photo of everyone in front of their Fall display.

 This is one of the entries in the nursing home's pumpkin carving contest. This is a carving of a guy at the nursing home, named Hank Messink; hence, "Hank-enstein"!! He is a nice man and I figured since I haven't gotten a photo of him, I would post his look-a-like!

 Here is the skirt on my friend. Looks pretty good, eh?

 Here are Beatrice and Beaker doing school together.

 Friday was an exciting day. Our church rented a booth with Amazing Grace Missions and handed out Bible tracts and literature for people. It's an opportunity to give the Gospel in a very busy environment. Everyone I spoke to was very nice and polite. I love opportunities to serve the Lord like this. My two bestest buds and the one in the middles' husband. It was his idea to do this. What a terrific idea!!

 No explanation needed! Ha ha ah ha.. But if you want to know what God REALLY can not do, it's as follows: He can not lie - Titus 1:2; He can not change - Malachi 3:6; and He cannot let anyone into Heaven unless you are born again - John 3:3. I am not putting the verses on purpose. If you have a Bible you can read them in there. It's something to think about. Then read Romans 3:23, 6:23, 10;9-10 and 10:13.

 Here is a skirt I made for one of our bus kids at church. We have a van and a bus that picks up children and adults who otherwise couldn't get to church. It is a great way to get them to church and the young lady I made this for loves coming to church. She is such a sweet girl!

 Here is Beaker a.k.a Cubbie Bear. I guess I need to take my celebration banner down sometime.

 Ahhhhh, here we go!! Ode to the rejected curtain. I have a strange sense of humor and one of my friends and I sort of think alike. Someone decided to paint her AWANA room (my Sunday School classroom) what we affectionately call, gun metal gray. Blaaahhhh!! It was because they wanted to get it painted and it was all the leftover paint he had. He's too funny!! So he used that. Anyway, my friend showed our pastor this fabric and he summarily rejected it with a curt, "No, it looks like a clown." All it would have been was a valance! We thought it was quite humorous that he rejected it so quickly and I had told her it would make a great skirt. Soooooo, she got me the fabric (she works in a fabric store) and here it is!! :)

 And here is the rick-rack that she picked out!! Crazy, I know. It suits me perfect!! :)

 Waiting to get on the Adventure Bus for Sunday School and church this morning.

 Here are the Three Musketeeritos, as I call them!! I think they will be best buds!! They are waiting for the animals to be sent around in AWANA. It was Animal Kingdom Night tonight and everyone got to bring in their not-a-cat-or-dog pet. We had a gerbil, three birds, a snake, two ferrets, and a guinea pig.

 Here is the ferret being passed around. Lindsay is in the upper lefthand corner.

 Rachel is soooo excited to see the ferret. Upper right hand corner.

 Our Maddie holding the ferret.

Robert holding the albino corn snake that got nervous and "had an accident" on him.

Beatrice fascinated with the snake. Why? I don't know.......

Here is our T&T star!! Robert finished his book in EIGHT weeks!!! We are really proud of him!! :)

We have a new Sunday School teacher in our Sunday School class. He is going to be a great teacher. Except I really stressed him out today. He asked us to think about our first memory when we were children. I should have been first because my mind had only wandered back to living on good old Snake Den Road and running through the woods playing with my friends and cousins. Swinging from trees and having a great time! But as he went around the class, I remembered my first memories were not actually of Snake Den Road. So trying to sort things out in my head, he progressed around the class and I realized I could not say what I had to say without breaking down crying. I knew I could not even say it but I was able to calm myself down as he came around to our row. Taylor gave his first memories and he was pretty funny because he has such bad eyesight he is legally blind so he said he couldn't remember much visually because of his eyesight but he remembers his nanny telling him never to call someone a fool. So after he was done, I made a vain attempt to compose myself. I couldn't do it. And I think I ruined the class. My first memories were my last memories of my grandpa. He died when I was very young but I remember how much he loved us. Boy! Did he love us. He always had time for us and danced with us. I vaguely remember him playing his accordian and the piano. I remember when he and Grandma came home from Norway and we met them. It's not like it is now but they did have some security. I could see him coming and I flew under the ropes and jumped into his arms and wouldn't let go. He had all kinds of luggage in his hands!! I can't even remember if they came home by boat or plane but Dorothy has filled in my memory gaps with it because she tells that story a lot. I remember the rock wall he built and he let all of us put our handprints and footprints in it down by the road. I went back several years ago and the part where we had our handprints was gone. I guess I had never associated my memories of him with the time of his departure. Looking back it seems like only moments that I knew him. But it was really several years. I have the best family on the planet!

Whoa - was that a WEEK?

This week brought lots of busyness and excitement. Mr. Handsome took three days off!! We usually have to use his vacation to travel to his parents so it was great to stay here. We were considering a looooonnnnnggg trip to Raleigh (2 hrs.) but decided to save the money and stay home. Monday and Tuesday consisted of school and visiting Dorothy. We got to see my sister-in-law and my niece and nephew. That was a fun visit. And of course, we saw Dagmar the wonder puppy!

One of my FRIENDS (this is in caps because I always worry when one of my FRIENDS asks me to sew for them. Being a procrastinator, I am never sure what adequate time frame to do things is.) asked me to make her two skirts. This is the prototype. One of my Sister-Friends thought it was the final copy!! I can't laugh because it is rather similar to my skirts that I make for myself. Anyway, my FRIEND's skirt, who is also a Sister-Friend, is ecru. I know this because her zipper package had the color on it: ecru. It is all ecru. It was the hardest thing I've ever made because it would look so cute with a dark brown rick rack on it and some kind of frilly thing on the hem. But I restrained the Peg Bundy in me and kept it like she wanted it. It is, after all, HER skirt. Anyway, I will post photos this week. It's not quite done, two slits, and a hem. But it came out quite nice. I may make a couple for myself and buy some boots to go with them. OK, maybe not the boots.

I am told this is Snow's Cut. I don't know what that means, but I thought it was the Intracoastal waterway. Anyway, here we are on Wednesday, on our way to the Fort Fisher Aquarium.

We stopped to eat lunch at A&G Barbecue. Guy Fieri needs to come here for Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. But the only people that come to Wilmington are Jim Cantore and tourists. Yup. Too far from everything. It's at least a two hour drive everywhere. Well, everywhere but the ocean. That's a ten minute drive. Anyway, this place makes HOMEMADE onion rings. They fresh cut them, use their own BATTER, no bread crumbs here, and boy were they delicious. Our bill was outrageous. The drinks were about 35% of the bill!!!

This is my new motto. I think I will get some bright pink wall vinyl and cut it on my cricut to hang in my kitchen, put in my bathroom, tape on my phone.

Here we are at the aquarium. This is albino alligator happily behind a fence.

I don't know if you can see from this photo, but the turtle's head is out. They were quite frisky while we were there. Since this is a family blog, I will not post what my children thought was so funny about the turtles since it would involve discussing procreating. Use your imagination and then laugh at the children noticing this!!

Maddie and big alligator guy. Scccccarrrrryyyyyy....

Robert it the one big claw crab. I can't remember what they are called, fiddler crabs maybe? I don't know. Did I say I homeschool?! Just kidding... I mean, YES, I homeschool! Just kidding about the comment!

In the jaws of megaladon - 40,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 - oh phooey!! I don't know how many zeros they would put for years old. But he's really not more than 6,000 years old. Fossils are NOT made over millions of years. Let's think about this for a minute. If I bury something dead in the dirt, in due time, it will become, well, dirt. Fossils are made by a cataclysmic event that causes dirt and water to compress QUICKLY keeping any oxygen from getting near the dead thing, thus creating a fossil. This happens in a very short period of time in comparison to millions of years. There's your science lesson for the day. And think Noah's Ark and the Great Flood.

We saw a presentation on sea turtles and the teacher had a bag with things the turtles like to eat and were good for them and things the turtles liked to eat and were bad for them. Kristinie the Great pulled out a squid. And the teacher said, "Well, you've probably never had calamari but others of you might have." And our children, as well as myself, said, "OH NO!! She LOVES calamari (true statement)!!" The teacher was very surprised by this comical revelation.

Bags ARE NOT good for turtles.

Kid photo op!

Kid photo op AGAIN!

And AGAIN!

In the bubble at the BIG tank. Our aquarium, if you are really really slow, takes a whole, oh, I don't know, hour, to get through but it's perfect for our family.

Is that Robert swimming in the big tank.

Thankfully, it only took two times to get a good photo. NOt sure which one is the good photo, though.

In the front row, and grumpy: Kristinie the great; in the Back: Lindsay, Robert, Maddie, and Bea on the nose of the frog.

Here we are at Outback Steakhouse after the Aquarium. Mr. Handsome was given a reward at work and he can cash them in for gift cards. (I usually get Land's End but decided to be unselfish in a gratuitous sort of way!) So we got a restaurant we don't normally go to. Voila!! Here we are!

Waiting for Daddy.

Ah, the love of a brother and his sister!

Somewhat cooperative.

In hindsight, this was probably not a good idea, but on Thursday we went to Poplar Grove Plantation to walk on their walking trail and have a picnic. We forgot that they were set up for their Haunted Hayride. We saw a lot of spooky stuff!! After the first two or three, everyone was pretty calm. L to R - Lindsay, Maddie, Robert, Kristine, Beatrice

Cypress tree.

After we arrived home Thursday, we ate dinner and went to Robert's Pack meeting. The firemen were there!! Yay!

Ooops! This picture is out of order. After Poplar Grove, we went to the mall. Here is the ultimate couponing experience: I love, love, love, love, love Land's End. For just about every Christmas, I get something from someone from Land's End. Last year, I started returning it. Yes, you can return Land's End products at ANY TIME for ANY REASON. AND you can return them to Sear's now. So I returned a bunch of stuff and got $211.00 back!! They give you a gift card and you can use it at Land's End, Sears, OR K-mart!! I bought myself some shirts and I am saving the rest for Christmas presents. This is Kristinie the Great sanitizing the shopping stroller!

Back to the Fire Department.

Just about every night, we do our family devotion. Afterwards, the children pick songs they want to sing. Here is Beatrice and Beaker doing their action songs.

On Friday, we had co-op. I am teaching a class called  I Spy Jesus in the Old Testament. I invited one of our missionaries - whom we also count great friends - to come and give a presentation on Christ in the Passover. Of course since it's Old Testament it would be Messiah to a Jew. Preacher Symes and his wife, Mrs. Symes, are missionaries to the Jewish people in America. They travel all over, as they are able, and teach Christians how to witness to our Jewish brothers and sisters. If it were not for the Jews, we would not have Messiah, or Jesus Christ. God's chosen people, begot God's chosen One.  In both photos he is showing the children how a typical Jewish boy would dress for Passover.

Saturday was basketball sign-ups. Yay!! I hope the children enjoy it. We found a league that fits our budget, and most importantly, our schedule.

The silliness of being cross-eyed.

Since I could not get up with my FRIEND who I was making the skirt for, I decided to make Beaker and Beatrice jumpers. Here is Beaker's. And below is the little embellishment I did for the skirt of it.

Here they are with their jumpers. One of my OTHER Sister-Friends told me the name of Beatrice's pattern but I forgot. It was quite long, but it was WAVERLY! :)

And here is Maddie's quick skirt I made this afternoon. Of course, you can see where she gets her eye for color from!!

I would be remiss in forgetting to mention our very special event last Sunday at church. After each of our children are born, we have them dedicated. This is not to be confused with baptism. Baptism is something a person does after salvation. We bring the children before our church and let them know we plan to rasie them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Well, with Kristinie the Great, we forgot. Mr. Handsome mentioned it to our preacher after she was born and we never went any further. He decided to have a dedication service and there were eight babies, from 5 months to 3 yeras old. It was such a tremendous blessing to be a part of it. Kristinie the Great and her little friends were all dedicated together, too!!  A friend of ours took photos so I will post them when I get them from him.