will I ever catch up?

Probably not. Behind on everything...school, reading, blog reading, cleaning, book reviews...

This is my "catch up" blog post. A quick mish mash of everything.

*The Southern Reading Challenge. Ended yesterday. I only read one of three books. But hey, it was a really good one!

*Never did write my final review for the Numbers Challenge. (A challenge I actually did finish on time...woohoo.) So here's the mini version:

The 6th Target by James Patterson.

Sixth book in the Women's Murder Club series. Typical James Patterson. Quick moving. Those short chapters that I love so much. Not the best in the series. While there was still some suspense, it was a tad predictable. Maybe it was just my mood or maybe my tastes are just changing, but I'm still kind of thinking that his recent books just don't live up to his earlier ones.

*Also have a couple of kids' book reviews to do. Again we'll go with the short and sweet version:

Little Bit & Big Byte by Craig T. Feigh.

Picture book with a computer theme. Pretty cute. Awesome, vibrant artwork. Lots of computer terminology thrown in, but not in a way overwhelming to a little one. Good message about careful use of the internet, but not written in a scary way. Boys both enjoyed it.

My Father's Dragon by Ruth Stiles Gannett.

This was our August read for the Celebrate the Author Challenge. Fairly cute, funny story. The boys enjoyed it. I usually don't enjoy books written at this level...you know that level between picture books and longer chapter books...but this one caught me by surprise. Certainly not among my favorites in children's literature, but enjoyable nonetheless.

And the artwork, oh my! Done by Ruth Crisman Gannett. Absolutely gorgeous! She did the cover, which I adore, but she also did the incredible black and white drawings that are scattered throughout the book. This dragon is probably my least favorite of the drawings in the book, but it was the only example I could find. Still you can see the absolute charm in her work.
















*We had a marvelous time on our mini-vacation! One of the highlights was finally getting to meet my incredibly cool cousin-in-law, Jean. (Unfortunately, the boys were in rare form...and not on the "good" end of the spectrum...during our time in Gettysburg, but hopefully Jean has recovered by now!) Anyway, here's a picture of Rich and Jean. Notice the big smiles, as they exit the microbrewery that was right next to our hotel.
























*Rich conquers the bucking seahorse on the playground in Gettysburg.
























*And some photos from the battlefield and cemetery...











































































































































*The Philadelphia Insectarium was somewhat of a disappointment. I just expected bigger and more exciting. But still we had fun.












































































*And just a shot of Rich and his Mom that I really like.

















*Okay, I think that about gets me caught up with posting. We're off again in the morning for a few days, so I'll be all the more behind on my blog reading. Oh well, that's what summer's are for, right?

a dose of useless rambling

How can it be that you work 18 hours a day and just get further and further behind?!! I'm sure you've all experienced that phenomenon at times, huh? We arrived home from our little trip Sunday evening, and I'm still nowhere near being caught up on my blog reading. I always feel bad when I get behind, like I'm ignoring friends when that really isn't the case.

I've been spending hours upon hours upon hours on school planning and prep. I tell you, it's hard to believe how much I have to relearn before I can even begin putting it all together. I don't really mean to complain though...it's actually pretty fun. I just wish it didn't take soooooo much time.

Our trip was supposed to be a three-parter...first to visit Rich's family, then to Gettysburg, and then to my family reunion. Unfortunately, we ended up having to skip Gettysburg because Rich's mom needed us there. Not that we minded spending the extra time with his mom, but we were extremely upset about "the reason" behind it. I really don't want to go airing family laundry, but let's just say we've got one of those "you can't pick your relatives" situations. (It's not Rich's mom I'm talking about though.) Anyway, we then headed straight from there to my aunt and uncle's house for our annual family reunion, which was fun and relaxing. And then spent most of the day Sunday driving home. So a fairly short, and frankly, fairly stressful, trip. The kids managed to have a blast the whole time though, so that made it worthwhile! Hopefully we'll be able to fit in a few fun weekend trips this summer since we're not really taking a big vacation. For one thing, we're hoping to get in a weekend trip to Gettysburg since we had to scrap it this time around.

The pool is always a highlight for the kids at Grandmother's house:





The kids also love playing with their cousins! And most of us got to enjoy the fireworks show...Rich had to take poor Gray back to Grandmother's house because of the noise. (We should have seen that one coming with his sensory issues.) And we all had fun catching fireflies and eating hot dogs and apple pie. The kids drank too much pop, something we rarely let them have at home. So despite the stress, there was a lot of fun going on, too.

A pile of cousins in a hammock:



Oh, and poor Baker somehow managed to fall in Grandmother's fish pond! He couldn't get himself out and had to be rescued!



In other news, we no longer have a "kinder shark" in the family. Max finally lost his first tooth! The tooth fairy came and collected that shark tooth last night and left Max $5.00. (The tooth fairy is always very generous for the first tooth.) Max was very excited to add it to his Nintendo DS fund...he's been saving for one ever since Gray got one for Christmas, and I must say, I've been very impressed with how well he's doing. Anyway, I hope once some of those other teeth fall out, those permanent ones will move into place on their own. Wishful thinking, perhaps.



Well, I suppose I've babbled on more than long enough here, and I've certainly managed to waste enough time. So I'll let you all off the hook now and head back to the Civil War.

a few days away

Sheesh...you go away for a few days, and you come back feeling inundated, huh? So much blog reading to catch up on. Not to mention laundry...ugh.

And speaking of laundry, it's finally spring-like enough that I got to hang my first load of the season outside this morning to dry. Pretty cool, especially considering that when we left home Sunday morning it was snowing.

We headed off to first visit my parents in the northwestern corner of PA...and then crossed the state to the southeastern corner to visit Rich's mom. I'd been dying to take the kids to the Philadelphia Museum of Art for ages. And when I found out that they were having a special Frida Kahlo exhibit, I knew we just had to make a trip down there. (Annie and I had been learning about her in school.)

I absolutely love this museum, and I hadn't been there in probably 20 years. So this was an amazing treat for all of us. Unfortunately, they're doing a lot of work on the outside of the building so I didn't really get any great shots of it. (And you were not allowed to photograph inside the Kahlo exhibit itself.) But here's a just a few pictures from elsewhere at the museum.







And, of course, we just had to let little boys who behaved exceedingly well in the museum, do the famous run up the stairs. (Yes, even Rich behaved himself.)

just 'fessin' up

Figured I might as well just confess...yes, I did join Katrina's Spring Reading Thing '08. No, I probably shouldn't have...I'm a little over-extended as is ;) But how could I not...this was the very first challenge I ever joined. Hard to believe that was only one year ago! But I kept my list short, so maybe, just maybe, I'll actually finish. And I put on books that I've really, really, really been wanting to read, but haven't got to because they aren't on any other challenge lists.

Will probably be out of the loop for a while. We're heading to Rich's Mom's early tomorrow afternoon for the weekend. Still need to pack, make a coffeecake, some Easter cupcakes, and get through a big day's worth of school today. But the good news is a total of almost 12 hours of reading time in the car. (Usually I work on "school stuff" during long car rides, but I decided I deserved a break this time. Okay, maybe I don't deserve a break, but I'm just so anxious to get started on my Once Upon a Time II reading!)

Hope everyone has a beautiful, joyous weekend!

just a few photos

Well, we're heading back out of town tomorrow. Probably won't be back on-line until Sunday. But figured I'd go ahead and post a few pics from our Canada trip last week.
(Yep, Rich figured out how to load them from our new camera...it's apparently so easy that I'll even be able to do it. lol)

On the shores of Lake Nippissing...















































































The monkeys at Marten River Prov. Park...



























Algonguin...
























And here's some photos of Annie's new room...




















































































































I'll miss checking in on everyone for the next few days, but I you all have a fabulous week!

withdrawal sucks

Okay, if someone had asked me two weeks ago how much I depend on our computer, I would have answered, "A lot." But I would not have realized just how much of an understatement that was. Now I know.

Being without this computer for nearly two weeks has been downright torturous, I tell you! I have so much of my homeschool prep stuff on here, not to mention that I use the computer to research a good bit of our homeschool lessons. I couldn't e-mail anyone (which cost me a chance to possibly meet Laura IRL. For that missed opportunity alone, I could throw this thing through a window! And blogging. Oh my, how I've missed everyone! It's been simply awful! I can't stand not knowing what's been going on with everyone. And I suspect it's going to take me a few days to get caught back up. (My mom is due here early this morning to help me with the redecorating and moving around of the kids rooms, so I probably won't have much time over the next few days.)

I have to say, there is one positive thing that happened because of our computer breakdown. Because I had no way to check our e-mail to see how Kara's surgery went, I got to hear the shock and joy in both Aaron's and Kara's voices over their surprising news when I called them. It was so much better finding out the news that way. Oh my gosh...I just can't calm myself down over the excitement of this one...a new little one to spoil!

No earth-shattering news from our little abode. We did take a mini-vacation up to North Bay, Canada. Went to Marten River Prov. Park and to Algonquian. Was a wonderful little get-away! We simply love Canada! It's so incredibly beautiful...and we've seen such a small bit of it. Someday, I hope we can see a lot more. I'll post some pictures in a few days. First I have to figure out how...we finally got a new camera...Rich has been saving his "review" money for almost a year (well, part of it has gone into the "braces for Annie" fund as well). Anyway, we haven't had time (or the computer!) to figure out how to load up pictures yet.

Hopefully in a few days, I'll be back in the swing of things here. But for now, I'm hoping to be able to catch up with a few of you this morning here before my mom arrives and the munchkins get up, etc. I've missed you all!

just another layout

Does that urge to create ever just get the better of you? That's what happened last night...I just wanted to scrapbook! So, I did. Despite the fact that I should have been working on homeschool stuff. Despite the fact that my old scrapbook room was in total disarray and my new one just wasn't ready yet. Despite the fact that I was in the midst of baking cookies for Annie's soccer party tonight. Despite all that, I just grabbed some pictures and set to work, running up and down the stairs between batches of cookies. And let me tell you...it felt good!



I admit the resulting layout is nothing spectacular, but that's okay. It was fun working with these pictures...they're from such a long time ago! Though I'm still not the best photographer around, it is nice to see that I've definitely improved since then. These pictures are from a trip Rich and I took in Sept. 1989, before we were married. Back in those days when we took our favorite kind of trip...the kind where we have a vague destination in mind, but we just sort of wander around on our way there and back. For this trip, we knew we wanted to end up in the Outer Banks, but we definitely took the long way there. Leaving from the Philadelphia area of PA, we went and camped in western MD, drove down Skyline Drive, and headed to Appomattox Courthouse before ever reaching our destination. And then Hurricane Hugo ended up chasing us out of the Outer Banks, so we headed up to the Baltimore Aquarium and then to visit some friends in NJ before heading home. Ahhhh...those carefree days.

Anyway, now that I got that out of my system, maybe I can get back to some of the things I "should" be doing.

long time, no see

We had such an incredibly fun weekend here! Our friends, Bill and Deborah, arrived late Friday afternoon. We hadn't seen them since we left Cleveland, TN almost four years ago. And they are just such wonderful, fun people...we've really missed them!

Friday evening, we ate a big supper and pretty much just sat around catching up. Saturday, we took them to Bill Gray's, Home of the World's Greatest Cheeseburger, for a taste of Rochester's finest. And then we headed up to Chimney Bluffs State Park on Lake Ontario. This was Deborah's first time to any of the Great Lakes.

Bill, Deborah, and Annie:


the bluffs:


Max with his prize find (a fish skull...just what Mommy wanted--more animal skulls in the house):


The long walk on the rocky beach pretty much tired us all out, so we just ordered in pizza for supper.

Sunday, we headed out to Niagara Falls. We've been here for nearly four years and this is the first time we've headed over there, despite the fact that it's only an hour away. I was there as a kid, but this was everyone else's first time. In fact, it was Deborah's first time out of the country. We all simply had the best time! We walked our poor legs to death, but it was definitely a good kind of exhaustion. And there's so much we didn't get to do and see that our family has decided that we're most definitely heading back again soon.

Bill and Deborah with their best game show hostess impressions:


My little gang waiting for the Maid of the Mist to "leave port":


Bill and Deborah traveling up the river:


Horseshoe Falls from the deck of the boat:


American Falls from the deck of the boat:


Bill and Rich after supper at the Hard Rock Cafe:


My beautiful family:


Two of my favorite guys when we stopped to watch a street juggler:


A rainbow at the falls:


Rich, Annie, Gray, and Bill on the Aerocar over the whirlpool (Deborah and I were too wimpy to go):


Early Monday afternoon, our wonderful friends took off heading out for new adventures. We're so grateful that they made us part of their vacation!