My Favorite Thespian

This past Friday, my boy finished his third drama class with a local Children's Theater group. We have been so pleased with his progress under Mrs. Kim. He has had a ton of fun hamming it up!

At the end of each drama class they have had a recital. This time there were quite a few monologues, some short skits and a play written by the little girls. My boy got to do his monologue FIRST, and did it really, really well. We were all so proud of him. He actually learned this monologue completely in just under two weeks time. Cool!

He also got to participate in one of the skits. He had a blast. He is already wanting to write his own monologue for the summer day camp that won't be until the end of July.

Since our girl is already in several activities (tap and orchestra), we have let him have this activity all to himself. I did have a chuckle as we were waiting for the recital to start on Friday. Our girl, who has been on stage numerous times with the aforementioned activities and hardly been nervous at all, leaned over and said, "Mom, my tummy really hurts for my brother." Aww! She was nervous for him. And he didn't even appear to be nervous at all. Even having to go first.

He says he is a theological thespian. *giggle* Dad wanted to know if that means he ACTS like a Christian. But I know that my boy's heart is in the right spot.

Hill Country Anniversary

Yesterday was the 11th anniversary of our move to the Hill Country. Wow! 11 years! The Hill Country has been good to us.
I LOVE having seasons. Most of my family is within an hour drive, though my favorite sister is 3 hours away. We have been so blessed with a fabulous home school support group. And the activity base for my children has been really wonderful. We aren't huge sports people, but we are able to have tap dance, orchestra and children's theater besides Co-op, park and church.

My children have grown well here, too.

Here is my boy, sometime in the first month after we moved out to our Boonie place, and our little dog, Sugar.


And now he has a sister to play with. She has grown quite well, too. Here is a picture of them yesterday when I made them pause in their wrestling to say hi to the camera.



Yes, the Hill Country has been good to me.

I will lift up mine eyes to the hills
Whence comes my help
My help comes from the Lord
Who made heaven and earth.

Thank you Lord, for my abundant blessings.

Technology?

Yesterday was an interesting picture of our society. A major "trunk" or fiber optic line was cut accidentally by a guy on a backhoe around 1:30 p.m. All of the cell phone service and most of the telephone landlines were immediately wiped out for the entire small city with which we are associated, and all of its surrounding area.

Of course, the reports about where the line was cut were so widespread it is comical, but the guys knew what they did and where they did it. They were able to begin work on the repair pretty quickly. However, it was 8:30 p.m. before service was restored. 7 hours! Wow! And this is only a temporary fix. They will have to be doing massive work to do real repairs by tunneling under part of the river. I bet that guy wishes he could take those few minutes back. At least when I mess up, I don't have all of an entire county knowing about it.

The newspaper reported people flocking to the cell phone stores to learn the cause of the problem. Credit card machines were down. Stores had to go searching for the old-fashioned method of carbon copy imprints. Quotes from store managers were dreading how difficult it would be totaling the drawer at the end of the day. Banks even "resorted to pen and paper". I was laughing as I read the articles.

One source said it took the town back in time by 15 years. I don't think that is quite correct since I have only had a cell phone for the past 3 years and a debit card almost that long. I know I am behind times, but we are on a cash only basis at our house. Yes, I use my debit card at StuffMart, but I HAVE to have that cash available in order to use the debit card. Dave Ramsey has taught my honey and I well. We even pay for our gas and groceries with cash.....real cash.

Of course, all of this fun stuff occurred on the day before my honey got paid. That means our on hand cash was running to the end of the paycheck and I was a little concerned about the automatic deposit. However, things are running smoothly (at least in our limited knowledge) and the check is in the bank.

It was a bit strange to be heading out from the boy's theater class last night and not be able to call Nana to say we were on the way to pick up the girl. We also couldn't call Dad to say we were on the way home. A little strange, but not a big problem.

It did make me thankful that my prayer bill was paid in full and I was not left without the real Helper on which I can call, even when the backhoe strikes.

Life is Good

We have been taking a Spring Break this week. I thought we would use it for Mom to catch up on some things. We just moved 6 weeks ago, so how much can there be to catch up on? I did get those main jobs done, like switching out most of the winter clothes for springtime clothing. Here we are on Friday and I still feel like there are more THINGS to do. I guess that is what life is about. Get these things done so you can get to those other things.

One thing we got to do this week was visit the bookstores. The kids were given giftcards at Christmas they have been anxious to spend. Dad took the day off so we could all play together. Our idea of a great outing is hitting the bookstores. The giftcards were for one of the big name, new book kind of stores, so we went there first. Fun was had by all! The boy didn't find the EXACT book he wanted, but he is well pleased with the ones he found. The girl had trouble leaving some behind. :-D

Then we hit the used bookstore. Ooo, more fun! More books. We had listen to some music and a story on CD on the way to the big city, but on the way home there was quiet in the van. I did get them to look up for a couple of seconds.

And then, even Dad wanted his picture taken. What hams! This was a thing worth doing!

Friends

Our life here on the fringe of the Boonies is so blessed. We have so many things that we are privileged to part of that I wouldn't even know where to begin.

One thing that we have around us are some precious friends. The home school group that we are part of is growing, but there are families that have been with us since we started with them 9 years ago. We don't necessarily call each other and have coffee (since I don't like coffee), but we are so much a part of each others lives. Trust and encouragement surround this Christian group of families. What a blessing!

We have one treasured day where the kids get to be with their home school friends. Tuesday tends to be our favorite day of the week. After our home school Co-op classes in the morning, we all head out to the park. The kids take off and play and we feel safe. The moms get to spend the time with their friends sharing our hearts, our worries and our triumphs. Oh, so blessed.

My boy has several guys that he hangs out with and plays Bakugan (their own version) or whatever guy thing they come up with this week. They have lots of fun, but it doesn't spread into the rest of the week.

My girl, on the other hand, has several friends that she loves to play with, but she has one special friend that she spends extra time with. They call each other on the phone and have done several sleep overs. They get a bit upset with each other at times, but mostly they work well together.

This special friend got to spend Tuesday afternoon and most of Wednesday with us this week. I can't believe I didn't get any pictures, but they sure did have fun. She was good medicine for my girl. My girl's foot is getting better and better. She was able to get around on it at Co-op on Tuesday morning. Yesterday, my girl and her friend were outside running around for a couple of hours!! My girl was worn out since she hadn't used that foot much in the past 5 days, but she was so delighted to be outside in the sunshine.

Our new rent house has a huge yard, but I thought it had little entertainment. I was so wrong when it came to my girl and what she can find to do. She and her friend did so many scavenger hunts yesterday afternoon! The variety of tiny spring flowers, rocks, pebbles, dog food, and leaves was a bit staggering. What fun it was to watch from the inside the windows.

My Wounded Duck

Our Saturday started off nice and quiet. It was a pretty morning and the kids just didn't want to be inside. Mom smiled.
Dad was on call but had no reason to go in to work. Mom smiled. I decided it would be a great day to go get some of those budding thistles out of the yard. My girl decided to come and play with me. Mom smiled.

While my girl and I were working, she found some fire ants and was trying to get them out of her shoe. As she danced around getting them out, she accidentally stepped on the tool we were using to removed those thistles.


You can see the bottom prong is cleaner than the others. That is where it went an inch into the arch of her left foot.

I picked her up (she's a lot heavier than she used to be) and carried her in to the house to Dad. Of course, only 15 minutes before, Dad had gotten a call and was needing to go in to work. Dad proceeded to clean it up and proclaimed that we should take the ER room adventure.

Nana came to the ER and picked up my boy so he wouldn't have to just sit around. He was relieved. My girl and I ended up waiting over an hour just to see the triage nurse. They did some x-rays, soaked her foot and put some bandages on it.

She can hobble around using the side of her foot, but mostly she sits. This is a VERY difficult thing for her. She is pouting a little that it is spring break and she can't spend the whole time outside playing. She is being a pretty good sport, for the most part.


Now we will just enjoy our week off and be thankful it wasn't worse. We are also thankful that she has the week off from tap dancing, too. Of course, Co-op classes still have homework and the violin still needs practice.

Life took a pause, but we are back on track.

A New Beginning

This is a new venture for me. I have done my Boonie News off and on (more off than on) for my own family throughout the past 11 years. This is a bit more open and yet not quite as intrusive. I am hoping that I can just write to madam cyberspace and not have to feel like I am cramming family email boxes with email in which they are not interested.

The kids are very excited about having a blog in which they get to be the stars. Somehow they just knew that this would be all about THEM. Go figure!
They are so right!

We will see how this goes and how bold I can be hidden here behind a keyboard.