My Son is a Rock Star

Our dear Son has found a new love: DRAMA!

I am not too sure if he knew what he was getting into when he volunteered to "help out" at our VBS this Summer. Turns out that he had many, many lines to memorize as the lead role. His character was hilarious: a man who is obsessed with Pandas and wishes that he was one, himself!

Well, he did an amazing job!! I have also heard from others that he was incredible working with all the Children in the Games events as well. (It's my Blog and I can brag if I want too!)

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Excitement

Dear Daughter made her school soccer team!!!! She is so pumped! I am so happy for her. She had to deliver papers and flyers in the pouring rain today for about an hour and a half (all by herself), yet nothing could ruin her happy mood! :) She smiled from ear to ear and is probably still smiling to herself as she falls asleep in her bed.

Not Exciting

Dear son and husband are both on strong meds to heal up nasty Sinus Infections. I feel like I may have one too but want to wait it out a bit longer...

"Our Boy" is looking mighty fine these days!

...all dressed up to serve treats at the premier of his Youth Night at our Church. The Band BREATH was there for the night and I think they all enjoyed the concert.

1st Day of School

Grade 8 for Our Girl and Grade 10 for Our Boy! :)

Aladdin Musical

Our girl did a fantastic job singing and acting the role of "narrator" in her school Musical this past week. Three nights in a row she preformed with a great cast. I think she is both beautiful and graceful, sings like an Angel and acts with magnificent talent!

Triple Jump!

Here is a series of pictures of Our Boy at his latest Track Meet. Those long legs are serving him well!! ~He will be attending his 3rd meet this week to do his Hurdle race. Hopefully, my Love and I will get to see him (run and jump)!


Our Girl has also made it to another Track meet with her long jump and High Jump. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures. She has long legs herself and she placed 1st for High Jump at her school.

Mother's like to brag, don't they? Well, I do anyway! :)

17th Wedding Celebration

Seventeen years ago, I said "I do" to this man! Time has flown by and our love is far richer than I had dreamed. Like fine wine is our love!


My love took this pic of me smelling my Anniversary Roses just this afternoon...


My love and I on our wedding day: 1993 April 24th Prince Edward Island

Wow!
Many years ago (17 to be exact) two young lovers were on their honeymoon. Dreaming of their life together they chose names for their "children to be". The girls name chosen was discovered while reading the Song of Solomon; it's meaning: pleasure, delight and beauty. The name: Tirzah.

Four years past in the newlyweds life and the lovely 9.5 pound baby Tirzah was born. What pleasure, delight and beauty she has brought into all our lives!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY 13th Birthday Tirzah!!!!

Happy Birthday to our dear Boy. Ahem...Young Man!
This past Monday, our young man turned 15 years old! The picture at the top of this post was taken 5 months ago. His hair style has all ready changed into something new. I will try and get a more recent picture up soon. :)
We are pretty proud of this young man!! He started High School this Fall and is taking an advanced curriculum. He just got a report card back days ago and has an over all average of 80% (great job, Joe)!
Joe stays busy with School Band -he plays percussion, is a member of a Christian Club, TV and film Club as well as a Junior Youth (I can't remember the correct name) that meets with the City Mayor once a month to talk about how to meet the needs of the teenagers in our City and other Political things.
Joe enjoys politics, shares his Faith freely as well as his strong Pro-life stance. He is a leader. He would tell you that his top 3 passions are: food, music and Reality Shows (like American Idol, Amazing Race, etc).

Happy Birthday Joe!

A new job...

...for Our Girl!! Only 2 days after she prayed for a job, she has landed one! A paper route! We are excited for her! It is a pretty small route, except one day a week she will have 44 papers to deliver. Normally, it is only 14 papers a day and she only has to "collect" from 4 houses.

Congrats Sweetie!

New Years is coming...

A dear lady at our Church died with great dignity after a long fight with Cancer. Her funeral is tomorrow (New Years Eve), which we will attend. ~We are making plans to have a quiet evening at home Celebrating the New Year. We are hoping to buy or rent a few movies and have a fun family Movie Marathon! :) 

Here are the list of movies that we may get:

• Ground Hog Day
• Pirates of the Caribbean
• Blast from the Past
• A Knights Tale
• October Sky
• The Day after tomorrow

We got these ideas from a great site called Plugged in on-line and these were recommendations for Teenagers.

Thinking back over the year 2009, I have to say it has been a VERY good year for our family. The words that describe the year the best would be:

• joy
• harvest
• filled

Did you have a good year? What are the words that would describe your 2009? What do you hope 2010 will bring? For me, I hope 2010 brings me a job! 

Christmas 2009

3 days until Christmas!

Early Christmas and a Junior Hight Talent Night

Less than 2 weeks until Christmas!

Wow...where is the time going?!!

Tomorrow we are having an early Christmas with my parents. Since my parents will be spending Christmas down south this year, with my sister and her family. It'll will be the 1st time the adopted boys get to meet their Nana and Poppa! I wish I could be there to witness all the excitement and love! We will have a quiet Christmas here at home, get together with our old friends (Jenny!!!!) and celebrate Shaun's big Birthday as well. :) It will be different this year but a good different, I think! *ahem* I wasn't saying that Jenny was old...was just saying that we have been friends for a long time!!!

There are less gifts this year and so many more are homemade. I still think it will be special. Maybe even more...

The kids have been getting ready for various parties and we have all decided that a little reindeer that "poops" out jelly beans is the greatest gift ever for their Gift Exchanges!! 

Other news...we have a young politician in our home...Last night Josiah met with the Mayor of our City with a handful of other Teens. He is applying to be in a Youth Advisory Council. He is pretty jazzed about it and we are trying to  encourage him in all his interests and dreams. He sure is amazing at being involved. I think both Shaun and I were kinda "hiding at home" at that age. Sure is a great thing to have such a confident kid!! And while I am bragging up my kids, I will continue: this evening Tirzah will be singing at a Talent Night at our Church. I will try and video a segment of it and post it later. She has a lovely sweet voice! 

Wishing you all peace, joy and love as the countdown to Christmas continues. 

SNOW DAY

In a few weeks Tirzah will be singing this Song at her Junior High Group's Talent Show. I just love this song, that we first heard sung by Jessica Issak, at a Beautiful Unique Girl even this past Fall. I especially love the last part of the song:

"You make me beautiful
You make me stand in awe
You step inside my heart, and I am amazed
I love to hear You say
Who I am is quite enough
You make me worthy of love and beautiful"

Christmas Budget?

It has been interesting to read on different Blogs thoughts and opinions on Christmas Gift budgets and things along that line.

Sheila at "To Love, a Honor and Vacuum" suggested doing (and I quote her): "the Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh ritual, where they each get three gifts, and nothing more. The gold gift is something they want. The frankincense gift is something they need, like socks. And the myrrh gift is something to nurture their souls. It could be a journal, or a book, or a CD, or a movie. It’s something that reminds them of their purpose here on earth, or encourages them to think, to write, and to pray about what’s important. It’s always the biggest challenge to find such a thing, but it’s a challenge I’m up for, since it reminds us of the reason for the season. And I’m pretty sure, despite what the flyers might say, that reason should not be greed. Pass it on."

What do you think? I thought this was an excellent idea. I had all ready got all the kid's their gifts at the time that I came across this but I applied it to the gifts that I bought my husband ($30-$50 limit). I think that he is also doing the same for me. I am excited to see what he comes up with as he is always very creative in his gift giving. I am considering doing this 3 gift things, for the kid's, next year. When I mentioned it to our daughter and she wasn't at all keen, thinking she would miss out, but our son thought it was cool. So we shall see. I like the idea of fighting against greed...and not going all crazy with so many gifts.

Our family decided on what i consider to be a very modest $100 budget for each child. Then an additional $30 each for stocking stuffers. This is a challenging budget to keep with kid's that are getting older (ie. asking for more expensive items) but I have been blessed to find great deals (ie. a bag at old Navy for our daughter that was .97 cents!!!) and I have not gone over on our agreed budget. They will have about 7-8 gifts, each to open under the tree.

So, that is what we are doing this year. What about you?

Happy (Early) Birthday to my Love!