Balancing My Way Through Life

Saturday, March 21, 2015

Joel's Birthday

Happy Birthday to Joel....a little late. Let's just say - be glad you don't have a close up of the cake. It tasted good though but I am giving up on 2 layer cakes....sheet cakes for me from now on!

Joel got a Spiro for his birthday....pooling all of his money including some from Christmas. It is a remote controlled ball.....I guess you need to see it in person to understand the thrill. (and be young) He also bought the latest in a book series he likes, Unleashed. It is about a bunch of kids and their schemes and their pets. (The cover has a funny Doberman doing things related to the book theme.)

Here is Joel and his science fair buddy. The made a solar panel battery charger that can then be used to charge a cell phone or small electronic that has a USB connection. I don't think they understand the electronics perfectly and I KNOW we could have bought a bunch of electricity for the same price. That said, they did learn about circuits, etc. as well as team work and project planning etc.

Good news/bad news

The good news is that we watched the movie Annie and so now Anna is no longer endlessly singing Frozen songs.....I bet you can guess the bad news.

Yep. Now she is singing Annie songs endlessly......

Worst news is that I know all the Annie songs from when I was a kid and once Anna starts singing, I hum them forever. (Old Anna picture.....we are in spring baby!)

Friday, December 26, 2014

The Dresses

While visiting my parents over Thanksgiving, we looked through my mother's cedar chest. We found my old First Communion Dress and had to give it life again. Anna will wear her sister's First Communion Dress for the real day (since styles have changed a bit and a rust stain has appeared), but I love seeing Anna in my old dress. She also is taller than I was at her age, so it is SHORT! I remember being one of the smallest in my 2nd grade class, but clearly I caught up.

Anna 12/2014

Betsy Spring 1977

Carolyn (in this generation's dress) Spring 2010....a bit longer (Carolyn is older than Anna at the same grade level, so I may need to shorten this dress for Anna.)

Biggest Change for our Family (member) this year

Here is Matthew the day he interviewed for his job at HyVee grocery store. He got offered the job on the spot which made his day! He is a hard worker, which is good because he is sacking groceries and bringing in carts from the parking lot....manual labor. He makes great money for a 16 year old ($9/hour). Even I, his mother, would pay his inexperienced self only minimum wage, but HyVee is employee owned and CLEARLY takes care of its employees.

Extra picture is Matthew in his first tux. In "the world is crazy" fashion, our high school provides these concert band uniforms for the 10-12th graders. He also is in the Jazz band, which is great practice. I think he is very motivated to earn a Band letter, which you can't get without extra work (like Jazz band). It requires him to be at school at 7:00 am 2 days a week, so I give him a lot of credit.

Anna is Anna!

This is all I have for Halloween this year. In case it isn't obvious Anna is the the princess Anna from Frozen. Costume design by Aunt Debbie (reusing a dress she handed down), Carolyn (created the cape) and me (the blue gauze like sash that made the outfit seem more princessish to me).

It was Joel's last year of trick or treating and he wore some mask of Ken's, not really wanting to dress-up.

Carolyn, Matthew and I went trick-or-treating for canned goods again this year, easily one of my favorite events of our Youth Ministry. (Carolyn was a cat, Matthew was Mine-craft dude again, although he mentioned that "it was getting stale" or something like that.)

There are pictures, just none at my finger-tips and this is a power-blogging moment. (Someone sent me a photo and someone else has a shot on their phone....they may never see the light of day.) Oh well, Anna loved it best of all anyway!

Monday, September 1, 2014

True confessions - I have misplaced the flashdrive with our vacation pictures. 2nd confession - we didn't get that great of pictures anyway. I might find them soon, but it really isn't a top priority - so here you go.

Wisconsin Dells - July 2014 - without the personal photos (at least for now)

We stayed in NE Iowa on our way to the Dells. Our accommodations do not deserve a picture, but here is the river we canoed. If it doesn't look scary - it should - I got stuck on a tree, and under a tree and Ken had to yell "duck" more than once as we crashed into the side of the river. Lesson - don't canoe a river, especially a fast flowing river. (Yellow river is located in the only part of Iowa that isn't flat.) We should have waited and canoed at Devil's Lake - which despite its name was quite calm.

We stayed at Wilderness Lodge - did you know Wisconsin is the water park capital of the USA? (I am not sure that is official) It was interesting to note that Anna had the best time swimming at our [normal] hotel pool where we stayed the last night....I think because it wasn't crowded and she got to swim for a long time.....funny when you look at the other places she swam.

Tommy Bartlett Show - something Ken saw as a child and wanted the kids to see. It was pretty amazing.

Here is a picture of Devil's lake - we also should have waited to fish here, as fishing on Yellow lake was unsuccessful and we noticed people catching while we hiked around Devil's Lake and climbed rocks (not this one)

Last, but not least, we road in a DUCK ("amphibious land and water tour") . Ken did this as a kid too, it was pretty cool...the littles got to steer a bit. It was a pretty tour.