Brotherly Love?

Ross has fed Carson before and it went well but Carson was not in a cooperative mood today! I thought it was hysterical watching this!

The highlight of my childhood was making my brother laugh so hard that food came out his nose. ~Garrison Keillor

Siblings are the people we practice on, the people who teach us about fairness and cooperation and kindness and caring - quite often the hard way. ~Pamela Dugdale

As I have discovered by examining my past, I started out as a child. Coincidentally, so did my brother. My mother did not put all her eggs in one basket, so to speak: she gave me a younger brother named Russell, who taught me what was meant by "survival of the fittest."
Bill Cosby

Benjamin West and his Cat Grimalkin

I just finished reading Benjamin West and his Cat Grimalkin to the kids. They really enjoyed it. Gabriel said he never wanted the book to end. I was completely taken with it myself and it has risen to one of my favorite books!!! The story of how Benjamin came from humble beginnings to the royal court of England is FASCINATING and the lessons in the book never end . . . resourcefulness, kindness, faith in God, hard work, respect, etc. At the end of the book it jumps ahead to lets you know what happened in his adult life. The story of how he got his sweet heart over to Europe to marry is just a great story and TRUE. All I can say is it doesn't surprise me how Benjamin Franklin helped!! It is also neat that I saw Benjamin West's paintings hanging in Buckingham Palace when we lived over in England. The kids were able to see some of his paintings on the internet and learn how his paintings changed the course of how historical paintings would be painted. Back in that time they painted war scenes with the people wearing togas instead of their military uniforms and B.W. changed that and started painting as they looked. He also felt it important to paint historically accurate instead of imbellishing. I LOVED THIS BOOK! Now we are readying Brighty of the Grand Canyon another true story by the same author Marguerite Henry.

Mother's Day

It was a great Mother's Day with church and then in the afternoon going to Cannery Row in Monterey and shopping at the little shops and eating right by the water at Bubba Gumps while enjoying a super cheeseburger, onion rings, and chocolate chip cookie sundae!!! Fabulous, is there a better Mommy's Day lunch?!! I received Mother's Day cards and gifts. Gabriel and Annalina gave me glass jars filled with potporrie (however that's spelled) and lights! They are so pretty. I have one in a bathroom and one in the living room. Ross made me a foam art heart that was so cute. He was so excited to have it displayed which it is in the kitchen!

Just a Couple of Pictures of 2 of My 4 Sweet Kiddos

A Blessing Just In Time For Summer

I mentioned before that we had told the kids we would get them a play house and it hadn't yet worked out. This toy play center was GIVEN TO US from a fellow student of Babe's at the Naval Postgraduate School. He was going to trash it and now it is our new treasure!!! The kids LOVE it!!! They have been playing and playing in it and right now they are out there listening to Patch the Pirate as they finished up their lunch.

I KNOW this was the work of God and I am thankful. The kids have worked so very hard this year in school and I am glad to see this blessing for them to enjoy this summer in their time off.

Sweet Corn Garden

Babe's and Gabriel's sweet corn garden has started to grow. You can't see it real well in these pictures but the plants have sprouted and Gabriel is excited!! We'll have to see how it turns out or if the deer eat the corn up!! It will be fun to watch and see.

Bumps and Blessings

Today did not run completely smoothly and had some bumps in it . . .I have one kid that has checked out their brain to summer vacation a few weeks early and I sent another kid to the wrong swim class because I got my class days mixed up which created more difficulties but none the less I did accomplish reorganizing our pantry cabinet. I had Ross and Carson take everything out of the cabinet for me and then I went through everything and put it back in in an organized way. Ross and Carson seemed to enjoy their job of dismanteling something at Mommies request!!

But my day also had some blessings in it. Babe found out he got a 100% on his master's level physics test. I am very thankful for that, he works so hard. My other blessing was that a fellow student of Brian's at school said that he had a play house that his daughter had outgrown and he wanted to get rid of. We had told the kids awhile back that we were going to get them a play house but recently we have had extra expenses and we haven't been able to buy one yet. I am ashamed to say I never prayed about it but the Lord gave me a reminder today that he knows our thoughts and intentions and provided for us and we get it for FREE!!! I just thought that was the coolest how God provides like that and a great thing for the kids to see. God is good all the time.