Church – Lisa Holcomb

Everywhere But Home, What I Love, Writing

What I’m doing this year

People are asking, so here we go:

I didn’t “quit” the PTA, despite how gleeful I might be about stepping down from President-status. I’m still going to Student Health Advisory Committee meetings and am acting as a Council Delegate for at least the middle school PTA (and I’ve offered to do the same for the elementary school, since I’m already going to be there and be writing up reports, may as well kill two birds with one stone, right?). I’m still on the Staff/Teacher Appreciation committees and bringing food up for those days and also doing the Flex Day and 93 and Up Party at the middle school, and heck, I’ll probably even chaperon some field trips and dances while I’m at it. But I’m not on any Executive Board this year and really, that is a lot of work/time/mental stress I’m “skipping out” on.
What am I doing? To sum it up quickly: writing and exercising and organizing.
Oh, you want details? Okay, here goes:
1. Writing: I have a few novels that are nearing the end of Draft One that I’d like to see actually finish Draft One and move on into Draft Two and Ready for Human Consumption/Editing sometime this year. Also a dozen or so poems that are probably finished, but need Eyes and Sending Off.
2. Exercising: I’m trying to lose about 90 pounds (a number which I find horrifying). I’m a stress eater/drinker. Boy, have the last few years been full of stress. (Joy, too, but still a lot of stress.) Plus I have been taking multiple medicines that have been shown to cause weight gain as a side effect. So I’m starting with restorative yoga one day a week, strength training a couple days, aerobics a couple days, and a couple days off because I can’t keep it up if I don’t take time off for rest.
3. Organizing: I’m a pseudo-hoarder. I occasionally watch those shows on TV and think “Oh, thank God I’m not THAT bad!” while I have boxes and boxes of things carefully labelled and awaiting sorting/filing/recycling. I love labeling things, but throwing things out or recycling them? AIE. I’d rather die. What if I need something out of that pile?!?!? No, really, I’d rather scrapbook them and move on, but barring time and energy to complete those tasks, I’ve labelled and boxed things up and now my house is impressively full. So my plan is to start going through the boxes and start tossing/recycling things that no longer have meaning to my family. Once that part is done, I’d like to get back into scrapbooking things again. I like scrapbooking; it’s just time consuming and I have been far too busy with working for money and working for the good of our schools and our church to get that kind of thing done. So part of my time this year will be catching up on that.
4. Extras: singing in the church choir & ladies ensemble, helping out on the kitchen crew one weekend a month, playing with the church ensemble and playing piano/clarinet solos/duets for Special Music or Offertory, helping out with kids crafts/social time at church, maybe starting up a book club again, helping out with Cub scouts and Boy scouts, helping people figure out their computers and smart phones, writing blog posts, and updating Facebook. You know, the usual. 🙂

Crafts, health

It’s been….TWO WEEKS!

Now I have that song stuck in my head.

*goes around dancing and singing for a while*

*****

Ok, I’m back now. Oh, it has been so crazy around here. The last time I posted I thought I was on my way to work, but NO, I had a small child feeling all explody in the belly, so we stayed home and snuggled and did laundry, which was good because it was really the last time I did a whole lot of laundry at once and we are now starting to feel that lack.

So the day after that was Teacher Appreciation. We had soup catered, but we had to set up and make and put out desserts and make the room pretty and keep the food going. It went really well, but it felt like a super long day.

We love our faculty & staff! :) — We love our faculty & staff! 🙂

The next night we had an early Valentine’s Day celebration with my family at their house here in town. Greg spent the night there, which he has longed to do for months and months now.

Early Valentine's Dinner with my family — Early Valentine’s Dinner with my family

Saturday we spent time gaming with my parents (yay Carcassone!) and then went off to church. We ended up having our Pre-teen meeting twice since only a few people showed up at the time we’d intended to do it and then the rest showed up later and were miffed that we hadn’t waited for them so we did it all over again. We stayed late for Open Gym Night and the kids ran around like mad things while Nick and I taught a new guy how to play Settlers of Catan.

Gaga Ball has nothing to do with Lady Gaga, I promise. One of the church elders taught it to the kids, having learnt it at another location. The kids LOVE it!

I totally can’t remember Sunday at all. I think we hung out with my parents, then cleaned house. Whee!

Mrs. A. put together a whole crime scene for the kids to explore bits from. It was very educational.

Monday was the start of Book Fair Week, which is extra crazy here. I spent the day at home resting up for the craziness to follow, then after school we went down to the library to participate in a Crime Scene Investigation with one of the teachers. It was super fun!

Tuesday I spent finishing up projects and then went up to set up for the school’s Fine Arts Night. PTA was serving a BBQ dinner and the book fair moved into the cafeteria for the night while the kids had all sorts of performances and things to do.

There was a segment in another room as well, but it was in the dark doing static experiments.

Wednesday I volunteered down in the book fair for 4 hours. I love talking to kids about books and helping them out. I went straight from there to the middle school to help work FLEX day. Wednesday after school was Mad Science with the Mysterious Master Morrow. That was a lot of fun, too!

Thursday I spent another 4 hours in the library helping with book fair, then headed off for a doctor’s appointment and to deliver Valentine’s to a few friends. I had an adventure with the van not starting and my friend E rescuing me. Later, the younger kids had ALL THE CANDY after school, but we managed to share some with David as well. Nick made me special Fried Pickles for dinner.

We started our day with cards and heart shaped French toast. :) — We started our day with cards and heart-shaped French toast. 🙂

Friday morning we got up and got ready for the Storybook Character Parade. I’d missed the note that came home saying the kindergarteners were not participating, so Greg was the only one that walked in the parade.

Greg went as Bob the Builder and Ben went as Jack from Magic Treehouse. Most of the rest of the kids went as Nerds.

After the parade was over, I headed downstairs to kindergarten, then onto the bus to chaperon their trip to the planetarium. We had a good time there. Well, most of us. I sat next to a kid who really thought the sun was going to burn him & started freaking out.

The museum had an exhibit on bivalves, a bone statue of the smallest T-Rex ever, a giant 3000 year old Mayan mask, and a bunch of blocks leftover from an Egyptian exhibit. It was quite trippy.

We also got to tour the museum and see a real moon rock.

Friday was also the start of the church’s regional weekend. There was a hymn sign that Nick and the kids went to. I was exhausted, so I spent the evening blissfully alone.

Saturday we had church early and our choir sang “Down By The River To Pray.” I think we did pretty well. Then there was a potluck. Nick taught Sabbath school while I helped the kids find verses. Then I led the kids in crafts while Nick helped. That night there was more dinner and then a variety show and dancing. I danced up a storm with my little nieces. 🙂 I hope someone posts photos later!

On Sunday there were sports for teens and adults. Nick lead the pre-teens in sports while I lead the ones that didn’t want to play in craft time. It was a really good weekend, but oh so busy!

These are all the photos I took this weekend. Yes: ALL. *sigh*

Around the House, health

Weeeeeeekend!

I guess I should catch up with the rest of the week first. All righty then!

Wednesday I went to the doctor for my physical. We talked about many things, like my meds (they’ve changed), my blood pressure (it’s happy), my anxiety (lessened by meds, yay!), weight loss (uh, yeah), and my heart condition, which was the surprise topic. Apparently I have one? Or might? In any case it led to more blood tests on Thursday. We’ll see what they say. As I was leaving there the nurse from the school called and said Greg’s shoes had exploded and could I bring new ones? I could not, so he borrowed some from her. My mom took him and Ben out and got them more shoes that afternoon while David was at meetings at school.

Thursday was a sick-kid-at-home day, but my mom watched him while I was out.

Pathetic Greg. This was in the morning while he was still feverish.

By mid afternoon he was doing all right and we watch Sofia the First on the Disney channel, which he loved, while snuggling. 🙂 That evening we went over to my parents house for dinner and a game of Cargo Noir, which went on for hours and hours. I don’t even remember who won. It went on so long that Ben and Greg both fell asleep, so Nick and I had to carry them home while David carried all our stuff. I’m sure we made quite a sight on the street.

Friday I had a sick Ben at home…or rather, at Grandma’s house in the morning so I wouldn’t have to miss my coffee date with the neighbor yet again (we’ve been back and forth and back and forth with changing dates due to sick kids. We live 4 houses away from each other and have not managed to see each other since Thanksgiving). It was a lovely morning with muffins made by a different neighbor. 🙂 Friday afternoon I brought Ben back home and he was much recovered.

We learned to play Bakugan, which he got as a post-Christmas present. :) — We learned to play Bakugan, which he got as a post-Christmas present. 🙂

Friday afternoon we had the Scouts over from our Pack and taught them Fire Safety in our side yard. It had rained enough this week (all week long) that everything was nice and wet and safe, but we still made them clear the ground cover before starting the fire.

Ben and S. work while M. reads the newspaper. How is this fair?!

Then they and their siblings all jumped on the trampoline until it was too dark to see anymore and the other mom dragged them all off. 🙂

See the children. See the children jump and play. Jump, children, jump!

Then that evening we had my parents over for dinner, as it was our last evening together before they had to go back home and my dad had to start teaching again.

Yummy yummy cheese platter. I'm getting good at throwing those suckers together. — Yummy yummy cheese platter. I’m getting good at throwing those suckers together.

Saturday morning we hung out with my parents again and made them play Creationary with us. We’ve discovered that it is supremely hard, even using just the basic cards. David’s the only one that’s any good at it. Our church had Teen Day that afternoon, with all the kids in the Teen Group serving in places that adults normally serve, like being Greeters, Ushers, Song Leader, Prayer Leader, and Pianist. It was pretty cool seeing all our kids do that stuff.

David is counting all the people in his section as part of his duties as Usher.

After services were over was our church’s Mexican Potluck and Variety Show. (I still need to offload videos, but some of them are pretty shaky.) Our congregation has been hit pretty hard with the flu, so two of our major performers/accompanists were out sick, which left us with some holes in our program.

The Pre-teen Group sang Old MacDonald. We had zero rehearsal time; this was just for fun! They’re even wearing flower pots on their heads as hats. One of the animals on our farm was a hippopotamus The snorting was SOOO cute!

Davidplaystrumpet — David played an excerpt from the William Tell Overture on his trumpet right after doing a skit with all the other kids. I don’t have a picture from that one, but it was a hilarious scout skit and the high point was David running off stage with a roll of toilet paper in his hand.

The Teen Group sang God Bless America as a finale. Photo Credit: Joanne Gonzalez — The Teen Group sang God Bless America as a finale. David waves the flag from our house that we put up at holidays. Photo Credit: Joanne Gonzalez

Right after the Variety Show, we headed straight out so David could make it to his friends birthday party/sleepover. He was sooo excited! 🙂 They stayed up all night and played the Wii and DS’s and had Nerf gun wars. He came home and pretty much went right to bed. 🙂

The rest of us have spent our day cleaning house and getting ready for the next week. And that is that. Hope y’all are having a great weekend!