Shopped 'till I dropped

Earlier this week, when the morning temp at the bus stop was hovering in the upper 30's and low 40's, I realized that the fab four had very little to wear in terms of warm clothes. So I spent the day shopping. I started out going to one of my favorite places called 'Kid Junction' in San Antonio. It is a re-sale shop that has mostly nicer stuff. I found each of them 5-6 shirts there and only spent about $25 a kid. That's pretty COOL (and for name brand stuff) !! Then I went to Target and spent WAY more than $25 per kid. With the exception of a couple of more pairs of jeans for Macie, they each now have what they need for the cooler weather. For all of you family members reading this- f.y.i. each of the kids is in between sizes at the moment. If you decide to give clothes for b-days or Christmas please send gift cards (esp for Macie and Holley) as I never buy any pants without having them there to try them on. They are different sizes in different brands, plus they are starting to get very ...ummm... particular in what they will actually wear. I've posted a couple of pics of the kiddies after I made them try on their clothes....never fun. Macie was at youth group so she's not in the pics but her bag of clothes is on the coffee table.

Awwww Mom!!!Please don't make us try on any more clothes!!!!
This is a shorter post than most....tune in later for a story about one neat little boy named Landry....Stay tuned....

A walk through Bethlehem

Three years ago and again last year our church had a neat Christmas experience for the community to enjoy. We hosted an event called 'Camels and Kings'. It was an elaborate set up meant to be a reenactment of sorts of the kings travelling by camels to find baby Jesus. The first year the camels truck broke down so they did not arrive until after 9pm when the program was pretty much over. The next year our new building was under construction so the event was not held, and last year we decided to try again. It was a huge success. The camels arrived early and were wonderful. The owners had to try to keep the kids from crawling all over them but the camels themselves were very docile and did not show much interest in the screaming children hanging all over them.

The fab four with one of the camels Dec 2007

Camels and Kings 2007.

This year we decided to try something even bigger as a community outreach project. We are hosting "A walk through Bethlehem". It will take place on Wed. Dec 17th so all of you Boerne friends need to come by and see us! There will be two programs- I will post more about times later but it should be really cool! You will get to enter Bethlehem and see what life was like back in the time when Jesus was born. There will be a marketplace and different craftsmen and tradesmen etc. There will be homes and all sorts of cool stuff. I can't give away all of the special details but it will definitely be an event not to miss!!! I normally don't get really excited about all of this kind of stuff (esp. when I will have to be working behind the scenes to set up, but I'm SUPER excited about this. I encourage you to come. This will not be the type of living nativity that you just drive through different scenes. It will be an authentic little town (as authentic as we can get in 2008) that you walk through and interact with the 'residents' and you become part of the story. (and yes the camels will be back again this year! as well as a host of other animals.)

The whole reason I am bringing this up is because I spent most of my day at the church working with the "props" committee to make sure we are on the our way to having everything we need for that night. It is going to be awesome and I hope you can all make it!!! I will post pictures after the event. Stay tuned....

Region update....

Just got in from work....Macie did well at her tryouts. She was 14th out of over 60 flute players trying out. Unfortunately they only take 12 for the region band. The first 6 made the symphonic band and the second 6 made the concert band. 14th is pretty darn good as far as I'm concerned. As far as I know....there were not any 7th graders who did any better than she did. She said the people who made it were all 8th graders. I'm sorry she did not make the band but I'm proud of her for trying out and doing so well. Now just imagine how good she could be if she actually spent some time practicing. She will only practice if we remind her and then it is never more than 30 min or so. Oh well, she has NONE of her mother' s and father's competitive spirit.

Region tomorrow.....

Tomorrow, starting at 830 am, Macie has region band tryouts. In case some of you have forgotten, she started playing the flute last year. She is in the symphonic band at school and seems to be doing very well. She attended a really neat band camp at the University of Houston last summer and learned so much neat new stuff and came back to her school's summer band last summer and impressed her directors with what she had learned and her new found confidence in playing. Thanks MA for sending her and thanks Rachel for looking after your cousin. She had a blast. So anyway, her tryout is at 0830, if she does well she will be asked to come back and play again. Then they do a third round and if they have any ties they will bring them back for a fourth round of sight-reading...meaning playing music they have never seen before for the judges. I have been asked to send out a prayer request that Macie will have peace and calmness tomorrow and remember the correct notes and fingerings and to play well. Good luck tomorrow Macie, I am already very proud of you whatever happens tomorrow. Love, Mom

Allie (and I) spent the morning hacking around in our pj's being lazy. I know that is SUCH a stretch of the imagination for some of you! (Ha-Ha) We watched a movie that I had never seen before, 'Meet the Robinson's'. It was so cute and the song that is playing on this blog was the song from the movie. Allie and I loved it ...it was a good, relaxing morning. She spent a long time cutting out her shapes and working on drawing them. Meme told me a funny story about Allie's MDO class. (Mothers Day Out). Allie came home from MDO on Tues and told us she had gotten in trouble with her teacher Mrs. Betty. She could not tell us exactly why....she tried but Meme and I had NO IDEA what she was talking about. So yesterday when Meme (my mom) picked Allie up (I was working) she asked Mrs. Betty what Allie had done so that we could work on the problem at home. Mrs. Betty said that basically, Allie is too smart. She was working on number recognition with the kids and Allie knew each number immediately and would blurt it out. Mrs. Betty said that she is ahead of the other kids in the class but she asked Allie several times to not blurt out the answers and to give the other kids a chance but Allie couldn't stand it- she had to blurt it out. So she ended up having Allie sit in a chair at another table to read books. Never thought I'd have a child in trouble for being smart. Being a smart-mouth yes, but knowing all of the answers, no. Anyway, we are now working on teaching Allie the importance of allowing the other kids to open their mouths and taking turns (a valid reason in my book for getting into trouble ).

Oh, and for those of you wondering...(and I know who you are ;).... Scott brought home a note from his Science teacher yesterday and showed it to me the minute he walked in from his Dad's....it said that the 85 avg was based on the ONLY assignment they had done that far this 9 week period and since then he has gotten 3 more grades, each being a 100, so now his avg is a 95. All is well in the world of Scott Browning.....work all weekend long...kids will be at Robert's....please pray for Macie.....will try to post results of region band tryouts as soon as I know anything, but won't be home from work until after 8pm on Sat.....Stay tuned....

Out of the mouths of babes....

Hello all, we had good news in our family yesterday regarding my sister's test results. You can check out her blog to get more details...(the link to Mary Austin's blog is on this site) but her brain MRI was normal and her neck MRI showed two herniated discs and two others that have arthritic changes. Yeah, it is no fun to have two herniated discs but that is better than the alternative of something being wrong in her brain. So for now she has some physical therapy to do but hopefully that will alleviate the numbness and tingling in her arms. Great news!!! Thank you Lord!!!

On to other family news....The funniest thing happened this afternoon. When I decided to start this blog my goal was to keep a record of our daily lives for the kids to be able to look back on someday. I thought hey, it's free and fun so why not? I don't have the extra time or energy to scrapbook, actually I could find the time if I wanted to, but it is not free, and I have no real desire to do it. Anyhooo...this is a story that Scott did not think was funny today....but someday may think is hysterical.

Several weeks ago, before the election...the kids (Scott specifically, the others were sitting at the table for the discussion)asked me what the difference is between Republicans and Democrats....not being overly politically savvy...I based my answer on an email my mom sent me. I told Scott.... Imagine that you are in high school and you are working SOOO hard to keep straight 'A's because you know that in order to be able to go to college that you have to have top notch grades...(this is true by the way)...you don't have the time to play sports or anything else because you are working so hard to keep your grades up... now imagine Jack (Scott's real-life friend) is having a great time in school, playing sports, having fun, going to football games, etc. His grades are not bad, but he gets 'B's and a few 'C's, .... Republicans would tell you Good job Scott, you worked hard and have EARNED a scholarship to any school you apply to. The Democrats would say everyone deserves to be treated equally so we are going to give some of your 'A's to Jack and give you some of his 'B's and 'C's.... Scott just looked at me dumbfounded....I said "what do you think about that?" He said "that wouldn't be fair..." EXACTLY.....

So on to the story from today.... this cracks me up... yesterday I worked. By the time I got home it was well after 9pm. I went straight to bed after sticking my head in to everyone's rooms to say goodnight. Well, progress reports came home. This morning I signed Scott's without really looking at it. After closer inspection...this afternoon, I realized that he has a 'B' average in Science. I asked him what was going on....why he had a 'B', etc. This is my child who always gets all 'A's (so far anyway), after the usual Hmms and I don't know's, I told him that I was surprised that he has a 'B' and doesn't know why.... he looked at me and said "It doesn't surprise me....I guess I'll have to get used to 'B's . I asked why and he said "because Barack Obama is the president now".

It took me a minute to figure out what he was talking about. I asked him what in the world he was talking about and he said "Well, a democrat is the president now and I guess they're already starting to give me someone else's 'B's." Now I ask you.... how do you get mad at that? I just cracked up... Poppy was there too and laughed so hard that Scott got very upset and ran out of the room. Sorry buddy, we weren't laughing at you, and we didn't mean to hurt your feelings...(yes we did apologize in person). ....Good one Scott! Work tomorrow.....Please pray for me, my back is starting to REALLY hurt and I don't have time available to be able to take off of work if it gets really bad.....Stay tuned...

Are you kidding me????

This was the phrase I muttered as I picked up the kiddies from the YMCA afterschool care today...Good grief....In my head I was thinking something not exactly 'G' rated. Apparently, after I thought he was already up this morning, my son went back to sleep. I was working on printing out some pictures for a Thanksgiving project for Allie's school so I was not on my 'A' game. My Dad apparently discovered Scott still in bed just minutes before the bus was due to pick them up for school. Needless to say he was in a big hurry to get dressed and out the door. This was the result... Are you ready???? Wait for it, wait for it... BAM

Here it is.....

I wanted to strangle him.... he just looked at me innocently and said "What???" Stay tuned....

Why the new background???

I know, I know, I didn't keep that old background for very long. As cute as it was, it drove me crazy looking at it and being distracted by all the little swirly designs that were under the writing. I thought it was too difficult to read. I guess my words of wisdom are you'd better get used to me changing....I'm TOTALLY addicted to this blogging stuff and finding new cute templates, and I'm sure I'll change several more times before Christmas.... Can't wait for the new Christmas backgrounds that will be coming out soon....stay tuned...