Catching up once again

Almost a month has since the last time I wrote in my blog, but I am not giving up on it! I will just keep plodding away. Mostly things have been pretty typical around here in the last weeks. There have been a few "extra" things that I want to write about though.

I have been doing a lot of research online about where we might go on vacation this year. The thought was that since this is Adam's senior year that we would let him have the majority of the decision so it could kind of be his senior trip. We just keep going back and forth. His original thought was going to Washington DC, which would be a great trip, but nothing any of us really want to do for a whole week. Then going west, to see Mt. Rushmore and Yellowstone National Park was considered. Next, and the best in my opinion, we thought about a Caribbean cruise! They really aren't nearly as expensive as I originally thought, but ultimately, Mark said that it still was going to be too much money. Cruises are cheapest in Jan. and money is always kinda tight after Christmas. I haven't given up the thought of a cruise, but it just won't be this year. Now, it looks like maybe we have settled on going to the beach again….Adam's suggestion…not mine, believe it or not. However, the *tentative* plans are to go to Washington DC for a couple of days and then for a week to rent a house at the beach. We are looking at some houses at Topsail Island which is about 30 minutes north of Wilmington, NC. This area will be perfect because the college that Adam ultimately hopes to attend is in Wilmington, (University of North Carolina- Wilmington), and while we are there, we hope to arrange a campus visit.

Thanksgiving is past and now Christmas is rushing quickly toward us. Wow, the time sure does fly! We had such a nice Thanksgiving. All of my side of the family came to our house, and Mark cooked our turkeys in the deep fryer. So yummy! In fact, tonight for dinner we have are having turkey noodle soup with some of the leftovers. He cooked extra turkeys for us to put in the freezer so we will be sure to have some good turkey related meals in the next weeks.

The day after Thanksgiving was the WOL Superbowl. It is such a fun night, but very tiring!

Of course the day after Thanksgiving is also shopping day too and I every year I go with Lori. This year though she called me Friday morning and said she was sick, so she wasn't able to go! L Jared decided he wanted to go with me, so we went and picked up Jill and the three of us shopped for a few hours until it was time to get to church for the Superbowl. Adam decided not to go this year since he enjoys his job and Martin's so much. Plus then he was able to stay home with Tucker. We left church about 2:30 Friday afternoon and went to Indy to a Pacers game. They played the Dallas Mavericks and it was a good game. The Pacers won by just a few points. After the game was the big WOL rally still at the Conseco Fieldhouse and then onto a new sports complex called, "Sports of All Sorts". The place is huge and has all kinda of places for different sports. Not really my kind of place, but the kids had fun there. Then around 2:30AM, we left to head to the bowling alley, where we bowled until 5:30. Wheww! I bowled terrible the first game…only an 80 something, but my 2^nd game was better with a 114, (which still isn't great, but hey it was about 3AM by that time!). We arrived back at church around 9AM Saturday morning. You can imagine we all slept a lot Saturday afternoon. We did take time to run into Martin's to see Adam though. He went to work Saturday morning before we got home and as soon as he got off there, he had to go work concession stand for a Central basketball game.

Our first session of homeschool bowling is almost over…only the party next week. Jared is very happy because it appears that his team is going to come in 2^nd. He has really improved over last year.

Oh, I almost forget... on Nov. 13^th, we got some sad news. Our friends the Chevalier's who go to our church and I used to babysit for Aric; their Bichon, Chloe, got hit and killed! We got Tucker because we fell in love with Chloe and we "babysat" for her several times when the Chevaliers were on vacation or away. It was very sad, of course for all of their family, and it really made me sad too. We always said that Chloe was Tucker's "girlfriend". We would even say to Tucker, "Where is Chloe??" and he would run to the door and look for her. Rosie, (the wife), was really torn up over it and I don't blame her a bit. I know I would be in BAD shape if something happened to Tucker. They had all ready considered getting another Bichon as a playmate for Chloe, and so they are going to go ahead with it and get her. Her name is Lucy and they are picking her up tomorrow. She sure won't replace Chloe, but I do think it will help all of them to have another dog in the house.

Life, one day at a time

Last Wednesday was Halloween, but as usual, for WOL, we went Track-n-Treating instead. The kids go around the neighborhood of the church and pass out bags of candy which include a tract as well as some info about our church. It was different having this on the same night as regular WOL club and it definitely rushed the rest of the night, but the kids always have fun.

Thursday I met mom in Nappanee so we could go shopping. We went to Borkholder's Dutch Village. They have a large building which includes all kinds of little booths with crafty type things to antiques. There is another building that has a restaurant where we ate lunch. We both had smoked chicken salad sandwiches and peanut butter pie for desert. YUM! It was a nice day with mom. It has been forever since just the two of us have done something together. A couple of weeks ago, a tornado came through Nappanee, but thankfully it was on the other side of town from Burkholders and Amish Acres. I really only hit on one corner, but did a lot of damage to some of the RV companies in the industrial park. Also Dairy Queen and Taco Bell got pretty hard hit as well.

The last few days I have been doing some research on where we might go on vacation next year. We told Adam that he can choose where he wants to go and that will be part of his graduation gift. We have been exploring some different ideas. Washington DC, going west to Mt. Rushmore & Yellowstone, or maybe even on a cruise!! A cruise would definitely be my top choice. I didn't even really think it would be a possibility, but after doing some looking online, they aren't nearly as expensive as I would have guessed. I found one site that even includes the airfare in with the cruise prices. But they are more like last minute cruises so nothing is available for the time when we can go yet. If we are able to go I am thinking late Jan. or maybe in March. Those are the time when the rates are lowest, (Feb. is low too, but we have a lot going on in Feb, so it would be harder to plan around. Who knows where we will really end up going, but when I talked to Adam about it he voted for a cruise. Now if we can just talk Mark into it. He is saying he would rather go west, but we will see!

It looks like this week is going to be a more relaxed week than last week, mostly just the normal weekly things so far…homeschool bowling, Bible Study, babysitting, WOL, etc.