Semi-annual growth check

Nathan went back to the endocrinologist for his 6 month growth check. He grew 1.2 inches and gained almost 4 pounds. That's huge amounts in the Nate world! So far we have avoided the need for HGH, but the dr. said if he is still behind when the teen years approach we may have to give him a jump start.

For the past year, he's been becoming more and more aware that he is smaller than other kids so please keep praying daily for him to grow. Someone asked him the other day if he liked girls. His response: "No, because they always just look at me and say 'Are you sure you're supposed to be in this class?'" He just doesn't realize that this is his first introduction to girls wanting to be in charge of everything!

Next growth check is in February!

Just the facts

The past 2 weeks have been very busy at our house so I'll get you up to date on all the happenings then hopefully return to blogging on a regular basis with intentions of entertaining you with my wit and charm. But for today, it's just the facts.

*Zac and Kate have already completed 2 weeks of school. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is August 27 and they have been in school for 2 weeks. Remember the days of not starting till after Labor Day? Of course, that was back when bell bottoms and tie dye were acceptable but it just seems summer gets shorter and shorter every year.

*Zac and Kate are at different schools this year which totally messes up my simultaneous orthodontic appt. plans. Last year, I could drive to one school, get two kids and be on my way. This year, it's 2 schools for one kid each which requires an extra 30 minutes and some strategic planning to avoid pick-up traffic at all the other schools in between. Zac is enjoying high school but I don't think my brain has quite accepted that he is a freshman yet.

*Alyssa began her college classes last Monday. After I got over the shock of spending $313 on books which consisted of a paperback and a stack of shrink wrapped loose leaf papers, I am excited for her. She seems to be enjoying her classes. She even joined the Spanish club so she can practice conversing. There is the motivation of not having to take the final if you show up for a certain number of meetings but she actually wants to learn it, not just pass the class. Algebra has gone well so far with the exception of some of those pesky rate/time/distance problems that I would guess only 1% of America knows how to work. You would think the $100 calculator I had to buy would be able to do those for her.

*Nathan will start what will probably be his last year of homeschool next week. It is very strange here on M, W, and F mornings since it is just us at home now, but I'm enjoying the one on one time with him that I don't get very often.

Is your mama a Llama?

While we were in TX last week, Alyssa and her friend Caitlin talked Aunt Liz in to buying a llama cake pan. (And yes, we are aware that this isn't really a llama. It's a Swedish horse of some sort but somehow saying you were going to make llama cake was more fun.) This, of course, led to lots of jokes about who was going to get to eat the llama head and who was going to have to eat the..um..other end of the llama.



Nathan's prayer after having cake:
"Thank you God that Alyssa made llama cake. Thank you that it wasn't a real llama."

Who said summer was supposed to be relaxing?

Every year about May 15th, I have visions of grandeur of a relaxing summer where I have nothing to do but take kids to the pool and work on my tan. And every year about July 1st, I'm thinking 'I can't wait till school starts so my life will calm down to a normal schedule.' You would think I would learn, but year after year somewhere inside me there is a small glimmer of hope that this year's summer will be different. And if you could see my white legs you would know that this year isn't my year. (sigh)

School starts again in less than 3 weeks which means it's time to buy school clothes, schedule yearly check ups, and for the first time ever....buy college textbooks for Alyssa's dual credit classes. She's enrolled for Spanish I and College Algebra at the local community college and she'll receive high school and college credit for the classes. By the time she graduates high school, she'll have at least 24 hours college credit plus credits from CLEP tests hopefully saving us a year's worth of tuition. (Her tuition at the CC is covered by a scholarship. We just have to pay class fees and books...about $200 per class.)

So back to my summer drama...this week Alyssa, Zac and Katie are all participating in a mission camp with their youth group. They are going out in teams in our area and doing VBS, soccer camp, and basketball camps. Our youth pastor shared with us that Katie led someone to Christ all by herself today and there is just no greater feeling of pride (the good kind)for your child than knowing they are growing in their faith and sharing it with others. My shy child is very bold in her walk with Christ and shares with her friends at school constantly. Who knows, maybe that's why God led us to enroll her in public school!

The 'big 3' get home Saturday around 8 and Sunday morning at 9, the girls and I leave for our semi-annual must-go-to-a-real-mall-and-eat-at-La-Madeleine Dallas trip. That's 11 hours to do a whole lot of laundry and squeeze in a little sleep!Katie and I will return home on Wed. after seeing lots of old friends and fighting lots of temptation not to shop too much. Alyssa will fly back on Monday, Alone, which I'm not at all nervous about this year. I guess after letting my child spend 10 days in a South American country, a 45 minute flight from Dallas doesn't seem like such a big deal.

Final Flashback: All the birthdays

Aren't you glad this is the last flashback? I'm getting dizzy from all the time travel! Nate's birthday fell on the same day we needed to travel to Arkansas for the wedding so his birthday celebrations were spread out over an 11 day period. It would have just been a week but we had to postpone his outdoor birthday party thanks to 6" of snow!

So it all began with opening his gifts from us on the night before his birthday. He got Wii outdoor challenge, legos, a badmitton set, a nerf gun to torture his siblings with, and a sleeping bag for Jack.

The next night, his actual birthday, we were in AR. Kevin and I had to go to the rehearsal dinner so Papaw and Uncle Weve took him to get pizza and a shopping spree to Walmart--the only shopping option in town!

Finally, he got to have his party at the mini-golf course.

We had pizza (Nathan's fave food) and Transformer's cake. 3 of the 5 friends gave him Target gift cards, probably because of the new Target that opened up in our 'hood which I'm soooo excited about! No more 15 minute drives to Tar-jay!

I'm not sure what Alyssa and Zac were doing in this picture, something of a model pose? I'm just thankful my 16 and 13 year old kids are good friends and like to hang out together. How often does that happen?

Dot com shopping

Nathan's birthday was last Friday. My baby is now 9. So the birthday cards have been pouring in all week. Nate now has $50 practically burning a whole in his pocket (or my purse where I made him keep it.) Nathan is not a saver. As soon as he gets money, he wants to immediately go to Target to spend it. I've convinced (demanded) that he wait until after his party to buy anything.

So this morning I feel Nathan climb up in my bed and I hear these words: "Mom! I want to buy Rayman TV party. I looked on target.com and it was 49.99. But then I looked on Amazon.com and it was $39.99 and it has free super saver shipping and if we order in the next 8 hours it can be here by March 30."

I just want to know when this kid of mine learned to comparison shop online. And no, I didn't order the video game in the next 8 hours. I really was going to make him wait until after his party tomorrow night, but we had to postpone it due to a 90% chance of rain/snow this weekend. (Did you read that?....SNOW!...In the last weekend of March!) So I'll probably cave in and order it tomorrow.

My track champ

Warning: Mom Brag Ahead!

Zac's first track meet is Tuesday. He was chosen to run the 4x100 relay, 100m sprint, and short and long distance hurdles. He was also timed 2nd fastest 8th grader out of everyone from the 5 middle schools in our district. Go Zac!

My budding cartoonist

I never know what's going to be on the white board when I go upstairs in the morning for the start of school. There was the whole Tail incident. Then last week, I found this:

...courtesy of Zac.
Just in case you can't read it: The muffin on the left says 'Weew, it's hot in here.' The muffin on the right says 'Ahhh! A talking muffin!'

Grow, Nathan, Grow!

Most of you know we've been praying for Nathan to grow. For several years this has been a concern. He didn't grow at all between 2 1/2 and 5 or between 6 1/2 and 8. So we were really hoping for some progress at his 6 month check last week. My prayer was that he would grow enough that we wouldn't be forced to make a decision on whether or not to give him growth hormones. When you give kids HGH, it's not a one time shot, but a 2 to 4 year commitment of usually 2 shots a day. Not something we wanted him to have to go through.

A big Praise: Nate grew 2.5cm and gained 2 pounds. Not huge numbers but when you've been looking at no progress for a while, this was huge for him. And it was enough, that the endocrinologist didn't even want to discuss HGH shots! Woo hoo! Don't stop praying for him though. He'll have another check in 6 months and we want to see some big numbers on that scale!

p.s. I've taken the 'Pray for Harper' button off the sidebar since she's home and doing well. If you want to keep up with her progress, I addded her mommy's blog 'Kelly's Korner' in the links under 'Blogs I read'.

Upward Basketball

Nathan's playing his second season of Upward at our church. He's on the 3rd/4th grade team this year. Translation: As a short 3rd grader, he's pretty much the shortest kid in the league but he makes up for it in his agression on the court. He hears the whistle blown at him for fouling quite often. He scored 3 goals at last week's game!

A disadvantage of homeschooling

Most of the time, the advantages of homeschooling far outweigh the disadvantages. You can go on vacation any time of the year you want, stay in your jammies all day, and take a month off for Christmas vacation if you feel like it.

Today, UPS brought me a box containing 3 items: a cow heart, a cow eyeball and a fetal pig. So now I have this box sitting in my living room and it smells just like you remember your 9th grade biology class smelling.

Someday soon, Alyssa's going to need to actually open one of these vacuum sealed packages and perform the dissection for her Advanced Biology class. She was able to take Biology at a co-op and I got to miss all this the first time around. I'm actively looking for a tutor to talk her through the whole ordeal because I just don't think I can handle it. Any volunteers?

Twister Championship

I'm not sure how we've made it through almost 16 years of parenting without purchasing a Twister game but I decided we needed one and gave it to the kids for Christmas. All 4 kids played the first game.

Zac challenged Alyssa to a face off (or twist off?).

He was determined to beat the flexible dancer and managed to turn himself into a pretzel.

Zac won the game!

Crazy Christmas Chaos

There are some days, like today, that convince me I will never be bored with my life. I know...one day all the kids will be gone and I'll wish for this craziness back. But I don't think that's ever going to happen. By the time Nathan graduates, Alyssa will probably be married and dropping her kids off here so she can maintain her sanity, all the while overlooking that I lost mine a long time ago which is okay.

I am desperately trying to finish all of the Christmas shopping. This includes the children also shopping since they still need me to drive them everywhere. So today, we hit Dollar Tree and Target. But since 3 kids needed to shop for each other and me, we had to keep changing the combinations of people who were shopping together while avoiding running into the other group. Dollar Tree was definitely more challenging than Target, but when you're 8 and 12, $1 is the right price tag for gifts so we made it work. We finally made it home and everyone took turns wrapping in my room which now looks like the gift wrap center at Macy's exploded in it. And I still have to take Zac shopping!

After a short break, I took Alyssa to dance, came back home for a quick meal of leftovers, then it was back to church for everyone but me. I was running all over town looking for green tulle for Alyssa's dance costume for the Christmas production which is this weekend--all weekend--4 performances. You would think green tulle was the 'Tickle me Elmo' of this Christmas because there is none to be had in this town. After several stops I did finally find some green ribbon that should do the job.

I would like to think the crazy, running around, wild adventures of today are unusual and rare at our house, but they're not. The circumstances change but the chaos does not. And by the way, when Alyssa put her gifts under the tree today, she numbered them--just to spite me.

Guess the gifts

When I was a kid, my brother and I were terrible about finding out what our gifts were before Christmas. My mother had a habit of taking a Sunday afternoon nap, so while she was sleeping, we would open the presents under the tree to see what we were getting. She did figure it out one time and threatened to take the present she knew I had opened back to the store, but she didn't. And I'm not sure if before this exact moment while she is reading this post, if she knows that we were repeat offenders....several years in a row.

A few years ago, I instituted the code system of labeling gifts at our house, just to help keep the kids from temptation. You know..not passing the sins of the parents on to the next generation and all. Every year I come up with a new code just to make it a little more difficult. This year it's numbers...5, 20, 22, and 30. These are not random numbers; there is a method to the madness but I can't explain it to you now. My children read this blog, mainly to make sure I'm not telling anything embarrassing about them. Believe me, this blog would be hilarious if I didn't have any kid-imposed restrictions.

I put the first presents under the tree a few nights ago and guess who's giving me the most trouble? Alyssa--the oldest! She tried to convince me that she's responsible and can handle the knowledge of the 'code', but I refused to give in. Then she started trying to guess the different ways I could have assigned those numbers. I accused her of acting like she was 2 while I laughed at her and her curiosity. This may be more fun than the actual giving of the presents!

What about you? Did you peek at your presents when you were a kid?

A Parent's guide to video games

We subscribe to Blockbuster Online...you know, the home delivery service of movies with no late fees. (Thank goodness because I do not have the brain cell that tells me to get into the car, drive to Blockbuster, and return the movie. There must be at least one phone call from Blockbuster, threatening to charge my credit card on file for the full amount of the movie if I don't return it, before I can actually return it. We won't tell them that the credit card they have on file has since expired.)

Once a month, we get a free video game rental. Nathan knows that on the 2nd of every month the coupon resets and then precedes to bug anyone with a driver's license to take him to Blockbuster until one of us finally takes him just so he'll be quiet. As you know, there's a lot of inappropriate games out in the world so Nathan has had to learn the video game rating system, which in our world goes like this:
E = Excellent choice!
T = Tiny chance we'll say 'yes'
M = Mommy says "No!"
And if you ask Nathan what the "M" stands for on the box, he will say "Mommy says No" thanks to Kevin's tutelage.

IT

I knew IT would happen one day. I just wasn't expecting IT so soon. I thought we might have another year or so before IT occurred. I'm not even sure when IT happened, but I just noticed IT on Sunday.

I was finishing getting ready for church. Zac and Alyssa were standing in the doorway to my bathroom talking to me when I noticed their reflection in the mirror. Zac's head was higher than Alyssa's. I turned around to see if she was slouching and saw that she had on 3" heels and he was still taller than her! The little brother now looks down on the big sister! This also means he is taller than his mommy. Since I'm only 5'3", we'll count this as a good thing.