Year 3, March 29th-31st, 2018: Holy Week

Ho, hum, the week is done! We had great homeschooling days on Thursday and Friday!  Towards the end on Friday though, Justin and Keturah were acting like they had spring fever, so I had to send them outside for a while.  I barely got a chapter of our read aloud read because Justin kept interrupting and being loud.  At one point, Abishai came in with a plastic hoe in his hand and whomped on Justin causing Justin to tears in pain.  He yelled, I yelled, and we both sent Abishai until tears.  I think Abishai thought he was going to be punished, and I would have if Justin and I hadn't started laughing at him.  Justin was simultaneously crying and laughing.  I finally did get Abishai to apologize but it had taken a bit to calm him down first.  We had worked on independent work in the morning.  Abishai had a bath while I went over the work.  Then we had to drop paperwork off at the health clinic (based on income, we get 50% the original price for a regular appointment, woot! Woot! and it was painless paperwork).  We came home, did our read alouds, then went back out for groceries.  Dinner, littles went with Grandpa to get Grandma from the airport, and the bigs with Bryce and Jared will go see Ready Player One for the late showing.  I'll have about 1 hr to myself before the littles come home.  Which leaves me to put littles to bed, which, if it's anything like last night when Jared was at church with Benaiah for worship practice, Abishai won't go to bed for me and he'll end up falling asleep in my bed.  Yes, it had been probably over a month ago that I had successfully gotten Abishai to sleep without Jared's help.  Jared does the final tucking in and everything.  Momma is spoiled!  But phew, it's been a long Friday!

We haven't done too much Holy Week/Easter talk this week, but that's probably because we talk about it often all year long.  I thought about shutting off all electronics and lights, and walking around in candlelight for an hour or so to represent the darkness over the land when Jesus was on the cross.  But the timing didn't work out for Friday and Saturday is super busy.  We plan on going to an Easter egg hunt, Benaiah goes to church at noon for worship practice, then a friend is doing pictures with her animals, so the rest of us will go to that.  Then church at 3pm, volunteer at the 4:30pm service, then finally home for dinner.  Sunday morning Jared, Abishai and I will stay home, while Benaiah serves in worship, Justin serves in Kidustrial Park, and Keturah will want to attend her normal class.  We'll have Easter Sunday dinner, probably with extra guests, with Gary and Leah, then back to church Gary, Leah, Jared, and Benaiah goes to serve again.  And that's how it goes in a pastor's family on Easter.  Gary actually isn't preaching this weekend because they are continuing to transition the pulpit over to Dan.  Gary will be there and do the "hosting" i.e. announcements, communion, and any other greetings/transitions, but it will be weird not to have him do the actual preaching.  I'm thinking it's probably his first Easter Sunday in over 30 years that he hasn't had to preach.  He probably is welcoming that break.  It will just be different for the rest of us.  I think he did get his Easter message in last week though because it was a powerful one.  And then we're back to Easter Monday, which Benaiah and Jared have off from Southside, but the rest of us have to work so I can go do a Lilla Rose event the rest of the week.  Busy, busy!  I'll try to sneak in a few Eastery things here and there like dying eggs and making Jell-O eggs.  Oh and resurrection rolls, so stay tuned for that.

Jared needed to put a new air filter into his truck so the younger kids decided they wanted to help!  What a good Daddy to let them!

Keturah watched and held Daddy's phone, which has a flashlight feature.

The daffodils survived the snow and like to open up in the evening.

How many different bowl for different foods does one preschooler need? The struggle is real, as they say!

"I don't wanna go to bed, Mom, I'm readin' "  Every night, the same books.  He tells us the stories now.

"I'm not sleepy!" he says as his eyes start to close.  He refused to stay in his own bed.

Well, that was pretty easy, except now Jared has to move him to his own bed when Jared gets home from rehearsal.  Little baby hand on my shoulder though.

Sometimes you multi task: giving little guy a bath while correcting big guy homework.

Gorgeous daffodils opening up just in time for Easter!

The boys went to see Ready Player one, which the time under the "standard format" and not the time under the Tyler Perry movie, ick!

Aldi's is awesome!  They now have ghee, which is butter with it's milk proteins removed, so no lactose and other stuff.  I still can't handle it though because I'm super sensitive to dairy.  But I'm always happy to see Aldi's following market trends and making sure they cater to those on special diets!  I'll always be a big fan of Aldi's!

Saturday! 3 more services on Sunday!  Dan preached today, which mean it was Gary's first Easter off in 30 years!  Great message!  Gary did "host" though.

The worship and creative arts team outdid themselves! They added several elements using lights, including some new permanent lights like you see in concerts.  Now, they won't be used as much as they were this weekend, but what a cool addition.  The choir sang as well.  I'm glad they took it up a notch.  We were sitting under the balcony and the sound felt muted, but that's because of the design of the room.

Both services on Saturday were full! They only used the main floor, but it was excellent to see so many take the staff's advice and leave room for guests on Sunday.  Wahoo!

They replaced the normal communion decor with these very pretty stick crosses, and since we were all there looking decent, I thought we'd take a quick pic.  Not perfect, but it usable!  They had just shut off the spotlight before we took the photo, so that's why it's so dark.

Grandpa and Grandpa Jr. chasing each other through the sanctuary.  Abishai was wired all day because of the activity (see below) and extra people at church.

Twinning.  Ethan didn't go to reChurch but I think he got the bag from his dad, who did.  BFFFs for life.

Abishai spotted Grandma's car and Grandma drove over to meet up with him.  Then he and Keturah rode back to our house in Grandma's car, while Benaiah and Ethan rode home to our house in Grandpa's car, leaving just Justin with us in our van.  It's a good thing we live so close!  Bryce stayed over last night and Ethan is staying over tonight.  Revolving door in our house!

Grandma car! Can I have a ride?

And Grandma took them through the old middle school's parking lot to see all the machinery.  They are tearing up and repaving the parking lot.

Yesterday, Abishai and Socks were trying to wake up Benaiah as always.  They snuggled him, too, and Abishai got right in his face, nose to nose.  Best alarm clock ever.

Oh so sweet a picture!  Abishai touched the daffodil and said, "I don't get my finger wet/dirty!" And he didn't.  He was very gentle.  I wish we all had the wonder of a child seeing things for the first time.

Stop and smell the flowers!

Waiting on Bryce to arrive I think.

Hanging out with Bryce on the pull out couch, that yes, we had just put away on Monday.  It will stay out for Ethan, too.  Sweet friends.

But vicious defender of something.  That gun is massive!

"Up head!"

We went to an Easter egg hunt at a nearby small church.  It looked to be mostly church members, but that's ok. They shared the resurrection story and the kids do a craft before they went outside.

Daddy and Mommy helped with Abishai's craft.  It was tomb with Jesus on a popsicle stick so he could slide in and out of it.  It was made with foam that had adhesive on the back.  It's pretty cute!

Time for hunting eggs!  Most weren't hidden that well, but the kids had a 30 egg limit. 

The hunt was only for 5th graders and under, so Benaiah, Justin, and Bryce climbed the playgrounds or hang around.

Abishai did not want to pick up many eggs.  He would rather slide and play on the playground, but we convinced him to pick up a couple.

He loves sliding.

There you go, now you understand.

Bored teenager.

A little basketball in their gym.  This is the same church that a local Classical Conversations group meets at.

I didn't know Jared knew how to raise and lower a basketball hoop like this with a long wrench type tool  Neat!

Pwease, Mom???  Yes, ok, just one!  And then he ended up sneaking a whole lot more at home.

After the Easter egg hunt, we went home for lunch and sent Benaiah with Grandpa to church.  The rest of us rested, and then we left early for church so we could stop by Julie's barn where she had a photo booth set up by a friend.  Here's her brand new, but imperfect barn.  It look great, but up close, the builder did a terrible job.  Despite being many, many feet above the flood plane, it doesn't sit perfectly on the dirt, and the roof wasn't put on right, so it leaks and they had a flood in the barn!  Crazy!  But there it is, ready to be fixed and the completed inside with stalls and tack rooms.

Abishai wasn't the least bit scared this time.  He LOVED the animals.  I'm going to wait until the barn is finished and Julie is feeling better until we attempt to go more regularly.  She doesn't mind us coming, but I know she has health issues and kids to keep track of.  Yeah for mini horses!

Petting the animals.  Fun times!

And she purchased baby chicks and ducks this week!  Yeah!

Beautiful bunny!  This is Julie's daughter in law, and she said that the bunny is very calm and just sits there all day.  She is going to be an excellent addition to Julie's barnyard parties!

Bryce loves horses, too!

Now that's almost a professional photo, ladies and gentleman, if you lighten it up a little.  The photographer will send me the pictures via email after he gets them loaded up, so you'll have to wait to see them.  I was just going to have Keturah and Abishai do it, like I had Justin and Keturah do it years ago, but Justin joined in for fun.  Benaiah was already at church with Grandpa.

Oh the poor pasture I rode in.  Lots of deep ruts from dump trucks bringing in the dirt and there's pooling water in another area.  Someday it will be all put together again, someday.  Thanks for the fun, Julie!

Happy Resurrection Weekend!!!!

Year 3, March 26th-28th: Life, Please Slow Down!

Castaway! Monday, Justin got his cast taken off, woot! Woot!  First, we thought Jared and Benaiah had the day off from school but they actually have next Monday off because it's Easter Monday.  Whoops.  I wanted to be there for the appointment, but I know that Jared was the one who had talked to all the doctors and knew his way around the buildings.  But he had to get to class soon after, so we ended up taking both vehicles.  It was a good thing because it took a little longer than I had anticipated.  I'm glad Jared was there for part of so he could take care of wiggly Abishai.  Justin and I went back to the room where they sawed off the cast.  No big deal there, and the nurse was quick. She also went ahead and washed his arm.  She used Johnson and Johnson baby wash and we noticed later that he had a rash from it.  Johnson and Johnson baby soap is actually very drying and full of ugly chemicals.  Oh well, that's why we don't use it much at home.

Then it was off to x-ray before the pins were pulled so the doctor could make sure that everything was healing nicely and she could pull them out.  (Screenshot of x-ray is below)  Yeah, these pins were 3 inches long and 1/8 inch thick!  Jeepers!  Anyway, back to the room, but I had to take Keturah and Abishai with me because Jared needed to leave.  The super nice, super young (younger than me) PA (physical assistant came in) and checked everything out.  She had Justin sit on the bed away from the kids partly because of the angle of the bed and partly so they wouldn't see, because they didn't need to witness all that.  She took a pair of pliers and carefully, but forcefully, pulled those pins right out of Justin's arm! There was some spurting of blood for a few moments, but not a whole lot.  Justin was super nervous about it and nearly cried before she pulled the first one.  But it didn't hurt hardly at all.  It just felt super weird he said.  They put a bit of gauze on the somewhat open wound, wrapped it up in a ace bandage and that was that.  They said maybe give it a day to scab over and then he could shower, but not soak it in a bath.  And of course the skip on his whole arm is now peeling because it couldn't flake off naturally when it was under the cast.  So he's been picking at that the past two days.  He doesn't have to keep it wrapped though.

We'll go back in 6 weeks for a final follow up, and hopefully, he won't need any physical therapy.  He has low tolerance for pain, so it will take both Jared and I forcing him to gentle stretch those muscles and nerves.  I'm really surprised at how stiff his arm is!  Jared was in Florida for a job for 3 months soon after the first time he broke his right forearm, so we didn't see him do his physical therapy then, and I think for the 2nd break, he knew what to do and just did it throughout the day at work.  Or I could have just been so busy with two kids (um, two kids busyness is not the same as 4 so really, it wasn't that busy) to notice his arm those first few weeks.  Anyway, our goal is to not have to take time for physical therapy appointments.  But we'll do what's necessary of course.  Justin was a bit weepy the rest of the day, but we managed to get some school done.

Tuesday was a full day of school.  Fairly quiet, although I was having some deep discussion on social media that completely drained me.  Thankfully, I didn't take it out on the kids too much.  I also spent a lot of time working on the blog and catching up on loading videos etc.  My laptop is full again and it's slow when it does that, so I had to first fix that so I could continue with blog stuff.  Anyway, as of tonight, I'm caught up, yeah!

On Wednesday, we spent the day at a new friend's house, enjoying her 3 very loud boys, aged 7 and younger.  Her daughter was away for the day with Grandma, so poor Keturah didn't have anyone to talk to.  Us moms talked about a lot of things, but she did invite me over mainly to talk about essential oils since I'm on her team.  I knew that from the get go and I did need some help.  We don't know each other well yet, so we did want to fellowship and feel each other out better.  She's going to be a great friend for me, although, she was kind of pushing the business thing again, and I'm not really ready for that yet, if at all.  Now we are all exhausted and needing some peace and quiet.

Jared took Abishai tonight to go back to Benaiah's school to pick him up because Benaiah spent the day in the space habitat!  I can't wait to hear all about that!  He had to do some physical fitness tests earlier this week and, as we knew he is, he is very out of shape.  He ran a 14 minute mile at home on Monday, and a 8 1/2 mile run/walk at school on Tuesday.  But now he's super sore.  I can't remember what he said about pushups per minute.  Maybe 22? And maybe the same for sit ups?  They went into the habitat about 8 am this morning and was supposed to be done at 8pm tonight but finished up early.  While in the habitat, they had missions to accomplish, like build robots and not be bored by playing card games and had to experience eating food from their non soil food growing thing (which didn't work so they ate PB and J, chips, crackers, and Gatorade).  They could leave the habitat to use the rest room but weren't allowed to talk to classmates (actually, they did say hi in passing) that were just outside the habitat eating lunch.  Fun times!  He did have to miss Bible Bowl tonight though.

This is NOT an Instagram or Snapchat filter!  This is one of those rainbows that come from the front door window!  This time, however, it made it all the way into the dining room!  Abishai loved it!

Last few minutes in the cast!  You can see his hand starting to peel here.

4 pins.  It's no joke!

Ew! But, it's technological advancement because it's better than screws, and they don't have to do surgery to remove them.  They weren't that tough to get out either.

I love elevators with windows!

Time to get little guy back out on the snow so the other two could have some peace and quiet to do their school work.  We spent a ton of time outside.  He kept bossing me around and telling me to shovel this or that.  At one point, he was shoveling out the flower bed.  I think he saw me clean leaves and junk out of that flower bed last week.

"Sigh. I take a rest, Mommy."

Have you ever raked snow before?! Me neither, but it was quite interesting!

1 momma duck, 4 baby ducks.  I had to create a new adult account so we could access YouTube because the men couldn't figure out the old account's password.  No why didn't I do this last week?  I prefer Abishai to be on the big screen because then he can't click on other videos and go down a rabbit trail of who knows what.  I've got more control when I have to change it when he wants it changed.

20 years ago this week!  Actually, these are the first two letters we wrote to each other and the dates are April 14th, 1998 and April 19th, 1998.  But, mine was written a day or two after Easter that year, and it's now Holy Week here, so close enough.  I read through them again this week, and wow, were they ever goofy!  First of all, I was 16 1/2.  I had never written anything to a guy, nor really talked to a guy before.  Jared was going to turn 19 a month later, and had had two short lived girlfriends before this.  He actually wrote 4 pages to my 2 pages.  I had to send the letter through my friend Chris Bilodeau because I knew they were in the same dorm/floor at college and I only knew Chris' last name.  It's a small college, so just having the name would get the letters there.  I had also written to a guy named Thaddeus because I thought he was cute.  Jared had rubbed my shoulders that week and it meant a lot to me because I had had a rough morning so I was thanking him for it.  So, you never know how a simple gesture like a neck rub and a simple thank you note will change your life!  I can't wait to reread all of these letters from that first year before we started to write emails and phone each other (long distance, expensive, and Gary paid them all.)  The hot sauce packets are sort of a joke from Jared to me, and those little sayings on them are things he thinks of me like "I do" and "caught you staring" and "you're my forever."  Anyway, here's to 20 years of friendship!  (and no, I won't stop talking about it from time to time because I think 20 years is a long time for a friendship turned marriage in our culture.  It's significant.)

Meanwhile, Abishai has all of a sudden wanted to be Mommy's helper in the kitchen.  In this case, he's doing Keturah's chore, but how cute!  He gathered up the utensils and put them away.

He can't do them perfectly, but he's close!

We finally made Justin sleep in his own bed after he got his cast off.  The fireside room feels so spacious when the spare bed is put away!  But now his bed is too comfortable and he's not getting up on time for breakfast and chores. Time to send in the preschooler alarm.  You can't sleep through that one!

"I cook with you, Mom."

Typical preschooler thing to do.

He kept digging out more pots and bowls and trasnferring frozen veggies between them all.  Normally you steam them in the bag, but this did keep him quiet and occupied for 20 minutes, no joke!  And he didn't spill a single vegetable!  He was very bossy and told us exactly how it's supposed to be done.

Back to DSLR pics of the morning sun on our creations.

Good-bye, Mr. Snowman.

The snow is starting to fade....

Blocking the hallway so the ball can roll down it and not go out.

Work, work, work.

We don't get to see many footprints in the snow here, so this is a nice treat.

A dog watching over his domain.

Superman in the snow.

I encouraged him to do it when he lost the nerve to do it.  Head first into snow!

Snuggling  his baby.

Scratchy kisses.

Daddy's been busy.

Much, much smaller.  Boo!

Keturah found this gnome in her room and set it up like this.  Now what do we do with it?

24 hrs after taking the bandage off and it already looks a ton better!  Kids heal fast!  The scabs are itchy of course, but so far so good!

Helping Daddy change the air filter on his truck!  The kids were thrilled to help!

That's a lot of stuff in there! - Keturah

These weren't open when we left for Bible Bowl a couple of hrs later.  Are daffodils one o those kinds of flowers that only upon at dusk and dawn?  I'm the glad the snow diddn't hurt then.