It’s National Poetry Month…and therefore I must share poetry. Some days I’ll share my own and some days I’ll share famous works and others I’ll share works of lesser fame. Who knows what the day will bring?
Today, because it’s on my mind, a poem about adoption (I’m an adoptee and a friend called tonight to ask about my experience): (click on the image to enbiggen)
I walked in and Mom said ” Rose is ignoring me.” And I was like “Since when does Rose have horns?” Mom was like “WHAT DO YOU MEAN?!?!”
This is a story from B. He’s been begging me to post it because he finds it super funny. 🙂
Our son was selected to be part of his school’s National Junior Honor Society for next year. (If you don’t know what that is, go here.)
I’ll be honest here: I was not an NJHS member in junior high. I got decent grades, but I was not leadership material at that time and I was so shy that I would literally run away if you talked to me and I didn’t want to talk to you. My husband wasn’t part of NJHS either, but his school was small enough that they didn’t offer it.
Anyhow, I could not be prouder of my son. (I’m tearing up again as I type this.) He is such a good, smart, wonderful boy.
The ceremony was beautiful, the gym looked lovely, and they had a wonderful, encouraging speaker, too. Getting cookies at the reception afterward was an adventure, but all three boys managed to get them AND get back to me without spilling a drop of punch. 🙂
So it’s four days until payday, I promised the kids muffins, and I’m out of everything I need. Items subbed: brown rice flour for regular white wheat (made them crumblier), yogurt for milk (made them tangier), baking soda+cream of tartar+corn starch for baking powder (I didn’t notice any difference), butter for oil (yum), and mini loaf pan for muffin pan (fun!). They practically aren’t muffins at all! But they’re yummy anyways. 🙂 BTW, I went here for help with the substitutions. Love that site!
I, personally, didn’t camp with them (David and I spent the night comfortably at Nana & Pa’s house and had dinner with the cousins), but Pack 369 went out to Gilmer this weekend and set up camp.
My husband forgot the camera AND his phone the first night and they all came home the second night because Nick and I had an ETSO performance to attend, but they got pictures this morning, finally, when they went back to pack everything up to bring home.
Getting back on The FlyLady bandwagon and getting my house/life/sanity under control. Spring Break was fabulous, but the cleanup is going to take a while. Have had a nice last few days at home. It is so good to finally be at home and get things done that need doing. I’ve updated my household notebook and finally put some of my lists in sleeves so I can use the dry erase marker on them. I love technology, but somehow my brain does not equate checking something off a digital list with crossing something out on a paper list. My brain wants paper. What can I say?
Also had a fantastic time having coffee with a sweet, uplifting friend of mine. Have I mentioned how much I love having coffee with people? And that I will continue to call it “coffee” til the end of time regardless of whether or not actual coffee is involved? Oh yes I will. BTW, I need more people to coffee with. I am available during the day and will even make time for coffee with dessert in the evenings for all you working gals because I still love you even though you’ve gone off and left me during the day (boo hoo. sniff-sniff.)
When we were planning Spring Break originally, Nick wasn’t taking time off. I’d thought about going to see my parents or staying here…and then at the weekend we had a Teen Regional Weekend for church. Plans changed.
Nick looked at the schedule and realized this was a great time to a) do our family vacation (a mini one this year due to other travel going on later in the year) and b) to go see the Magna Carta (on display in Houston). So we added that to the schedule.
Meanwhile I realized that my much postponed visit to see my bff needed to happen during that week, too.
So our break became one long car ride with interruptions here and there.
We started off our break with a Holcomb Family Dinner at Nick’s parents house.
Saturday, this happened:
Then on Sunday we started the first leg of our journey… to College Station, where I spent a lot of time sitting around while the kids went exciting places, like the ice skating rink.
I did break free and run off with Steph for a while to do some catching up and shopping. My favorite thing we saw:
While I was gone:
Then on Tuesday we drove down to Houston to tour the Houston Museum of Natural Science and to see the 1217 copy of the Magna Carta.
On Wednesday, we drove back to Tyler, dropped Nick off, then the kids and I drove to Quitman to visit the cousins at the park near their new house.
On Thursday, we did a bunch of laundry, repacked, and headed up to Colleyville to see Kay. Unfortunately, she was unexpectedly still in Houston. We spent several hours trying to amuse ourselves on our own before she made it back.
Then the girls had to go to gymnastics class (and yes, at this point we were wondering why we were even invited up, and by the end of the visit there was unpleasantness), so we took the kids to the park.
The next morning we had a muffin cook-off.
Our plan for the rest of the day involved the ginormous amount of books to go through and then take to sell at Half Price Books.
After Half Price, we went to Cost-co to celebrate Pi day the cheap way.
Then we went back to the house for movies and a frantic search for my debit card.
In the evening before bed we had one final bit of happy Pi-ness:
Saturday we got up and drove over to McKinney for the Dallas UCG Regional Teen Weekend.
We had church and a Bible study earlier in the day, then in the evening there were separate dinners for the pre-teens/families and for the teens. After dinner, the teens had a dance and the pre-teens/families were left on their own for entertainment.
The next morning we got up and had breakfast back at the Heard Museum before going for a little hike on the nature trails.
After the trail (which the kids didn’t go on because it was FREEZING!), we headed out to Garland to the Skatium.
After the skating, we had one last meal together before we left for home.
And that was the end of our Spring Break. 🙂
I’m giving the younger kids room a bit of a makeover because they had a bookshelf collapse under the weight of too many books (whee!) and because I stole their favorite chair (and am replacing it) and my parents gave them a sturdier table. But OH MY. I’m thinking I ought to have just gone in there with a rake and a giant bin to rake into. Who knew there was such a mess in there under all that furniture!?!? *sigh*
So, for those after pictures, here’s what happened: I used all of Nick’s fancy green grocery sacks and filled them with boy crap. Then I sat with them as they re-piled the piles into three categories: keep, toss, donate. Then we re-re-piled the piles into categories: pokemon, beyblade, my little pony, science kit, drawing stuff. Then we put them into cubbies and back on the shelves. Speaking of the shelves, I bought spray paint for that new shelf to make it match the old one and I was DENIED my spray paint joy altogether. Naughty children wanted to keep it black. So now I’m plotting to spray paint the red one black. (Must have my precious spray paint time. But what will I spray red now? Watch out.)
Dear Scout Pack 369,
I’m sorry I brought my 101 degree fever to your banquet. I didn’t know I had one after I baked the brownies and fed them all to you and rubbed my germy hands all over your scouts little fuzzy heads. So sorry. :*(
Love,
Me
David’s on day 3, Greg’s on day 1. If the cycle continues, I’ll probably have all three home tomorrow. I also have the sore throat and the cough is starting. Nick seems impervious. Yay for Nick!
Lisa Holcomb 