Lightening strikes and the dead grass goes up!

Last night I was in the kitchen (mashing a banana for a PB and B sandwich) when a HUGE, I mean house shaking HUGE thunder booms. It literally made me jump and the boys came tearing down the hall. It was shortly after 10 pm (which is our normal bedtime). The "plan" was to have the kids in bed by normal time bc I had several things I wanted to accomplish before I went to bed. Well that was MY "plan" anyway. I kept having this nagging feeling...I can't place it, but it was weird that's for sure. The boys had checked out a batman movie at the library and it wasn't quite over, so I told myself (at 10pm) - I'll just let them fin

ish it. Well I know now that was God's hand on us. When that boom shook the house I went to open the back door and see the storm - about that time four little feet came tearing through the kitchen door "Mom did you hear that"? I notice the recycle bin is sitting there and think "Well that is going to blow all over the yard". So I step out to grab it and Bug steps out behind me to pet the dogs (who are freaking out and trying to fit themselves through the tiny holes in the screen door). At that moment a gigantic, I mean 1000 feet long bolt of lightening strikes a tree in the field behind us (well at the time it looked like it was in the immediate field behind us). And Woosh...it's flames - big ones - there is no rain at this point and of course like every field in Texas this one is huge and filled with fire fuel - DEAD grass. Bug is standing there eyes huge and says it's on fire. I grab his shoulders and say go get your pants. (They were both in their undies). They rush in the house in front of me to get pants. I go find the phone and call 911 - then we rush out. All the while trying to call Hubby (who I find out later was at the juvenile detention center and didn't have his phone on him - they aren't allowed to carry them in. Hubby of course was at work and his Sargent had called him and asked him to cover one of his extra jobs, so he was supposed to work even later than usual. :/ I end up calling his brother to ask him to call Hubby over and over until he answers. Then I take my cell to the car (where the kids and the dogs are and give Bug the same instructions. I moved the car facing out of the driveway and run to the neighbors and to tell them. The boys are in a panic and we leave the driveway. About this time it's starts raining - big rain - cold, huge drenching drops. Needless to say I was a completely wet by the time I made it to the car. After coming back from the neighbors I looked across the back field and it looked as if the orange of the fire was all gone (PTL) but I could see huge smoke every time the sky lit up and I could see the firetruck lights. I ran to the car. Bug was so scared and wanted to leave the house so badly that we did - we slowly (through driving rain) drove into town and then very very slowly back out toward our house (we live about 20 minutes from town). As I was driving away from the house I finally got Hubby on the phone - who is in a panic himself and trying to get back to the station and his car. What a night! Needless to say after our 10:30 drive to town, we got back to the house and all was quiet. Bug was so freaked out that he wouldn't get out of the car so I went in and called Hubby again. I ended up driving the boys along the road that borders the pasture behind our house so they could see there was no fire. We were able to see the firetrucks still out there, but no fire, Thank Goodness. We also came across a huge tree that had fallen across the road.

As we were driving, Red fell asleep - poor kid - I think that adrenaline rush left him and he just couldn't go any further. When we got back home we unloaded began to the little dogs. Sadie had taken refuge in Bug's booster seat - crazy girl and Scamp was pretty much in Bug's lap. The rain had dwindled to practically nothing by this point. I took Sadie in first and went back for Scamp. Bug had put his leash on and helped get him into the gate.

Lady Bug squished in the front floorboard.

Well as we enter the gate I hear Sadie bark ont the porch and look up to see a precious Armadillo guy sniffing around. Well Scamp had to join the fun of course and they were barking and trying to sniff the creature. About this time Red wakes up and comes through the gate. As he steps onto the porch the armadillo is running his way and the two pretty much collide...it was quite funny as Red (half asleep) doesn't know what is going on and the poor armadillo, well he was just beside himself. So he ends up over by the fence running back and forth as the dogs are barking and trying to figure out what in the world it is. Then I remember Lady (the German Shepherd), who had been laying across the front floor board was stuck and patiently waiting - poor gal - had to help her wiggle her way out. Of course she had to come check it out to. He ended up under the box hedge by the fence digging a hole. It was quite funny b/c the dogs would go up to sniff him and he'd throw dirt in their face. LOL

I love this pic - "Hey Mom, what's that thing?"

Sadie: "Hold on I'll check it out". Scamp: "Girl you better be careful it looks vicious!"

Here he is digging - but there is a concrete slab right here (not to mention the limestone just beneath the surface - so he didn't get far.

Below you will see the smoke (barely) and the cows high-tailing it to the other end of the pasture - the next day. Ugh...here we go again! A field in the same general direction caught fire the next afternoon. We walked outside to see huge clouds of black smoke rising. Not again! Hubby was home (TYL) so he ran to alert the neighbors and I shooed the boys inside so I'd know where they were. It was a large grass fire and several surrounding fire depts. responded - thank goodness they got it under control and stayed with it all night.

By the time I actually got to the picture taking the smoke had diminished quite a bit, but you can still see the black haze above the cows.

Two fires in one weekend - crazy stuff. Thank You Lord for keeping us safe.

Girls in Action!

Woo-Hoo! LOL - We've had three meetings so far and let me tell you it just gets better and better. I love working with these girls! They are just such a blessing!!!

We decorated leaves with pretty rhinestones and had a great discussion about how every one of us is unique...just like the leaves we created!

Publish Post

I put up a new bulletin board at church for GA's.

What a blessing these girls are to me! This Sunday we are going to be handing out "holiday helper" bags to the church-goers! During the month of October the children's ministry (along with the GA's) will be collecting non-perishable food goods for needy families. The girls are working on their World Hunger badges. They will participate in various activities like handing out bags, decorating basket tags, sorting the food items, and packing the baskets. We had a discussion about World Hunger that included visuals this last Tuesday night. I showed the girls what one cup of plain cooked rice looks like, they got to taste the rice while we brainstormed ideas of how to help the hungry. The girls were very insightful and I was impressed with the ideas they came up with. I love these girls!

This is my second week school review...okay okay so I am a week late - so sue me! LOL

While the week in itself went well overall and we got a lot done - this picture defines my Tuesdays these days...lol...or perhaps I should laugh - AUGH I don't know anymore! Okay now I am laughing myself! hehe
Tuesday is my crazy busy day. In order not to lose a school day we work in the morning then we head out to wal-mart, swim team practice and RA's/GA's. This sounds simple enough - right? Humph. It never seems to fail that the school day doesn't go as smoothly as I would like and we end up dropping things or moving them - which I know I know we home school, this is fine right - but I tend to let it stress me out. I am working on that. I am working really hard to not leave the house any more than possible (thus the reason I put wm shopping on Tuesday. We shop in Midlothian. Well that is the only day that we go that direction. Sunday we are in Wax. Thursday we are in Wax. - the other days of the week I refuse to leave the house unless absolutely necessary or life threatening if we stay. Does that make sense. I am trying to get us on a every two weeks wm schedule so we don't have to go every week...but I am not there yet. I think this next week I will be (it'll be the skip wm week - so we'll see how I do - lol). I really covet my Mondays and Wednesdays and just flat refuse to leave the house. Most Fridays/Saturdays unless the family has plans we don't go anywhere either. Swim Team practice goes another two weeks, so I figure by the time I have it perfected that will be over. :P But that's okay I suppose then we won't have to leave for wm until later. I find myself repeating breathe, breathe, breathe to myself and trying not to be snippy.

But enough about crazy Tuesdays! I began my week early (actually last Friday) planning out what we were going to work on and such...the fun part! ;)

Red listened to The Runaway Pancake by John Lithgow - have you ever listened to this book. If not you gotta get it. The Wax. library has it and let me tell ya - it is so funny! John Lithgow is just a hoot - he actually reads the book and boy oh boy do we LoVe it!







The tag team duo is always a source of excitement around here. The boys get really excited when they see "play with dogs" on their schedule books.

Bug was play "stick" with them...the two fight over the stick - it's quite funny to watch. They'll take it away from the other and run off with it. LOL

"I'm the winner, I got the stick"!





















"Gimme that stick back"!















We continued our Farm Animal Drawing with Draw Write Now - we did a pig this week.

Here you can see Bug's pig.

My pig was quite a porker! LOL











For Red's "file folder" game time he chose the color game - fun!

Red also continued working on his reading...he is doing sooooo well, I am very proud of him!

















Last week I searched and searched for dice - well I forgot my new phone has a tumbling dice game...so the last time we used dice in math I broke out the phone - let me tell you Bug was excited!!!

Red decided to cash in some tokens. I was surprised, but his first "cash-in" was for pancakes. My kids adore pancakes...I mean really really adore them! He counted out 100 tokens and then just before lunch we headed to the kitchen for "cooking school". He was so excited to see it on his chart. I think it helped him to work harder on his school work so he would get to that tag. He picked blue for the color (yes we rarely eat plain pancakes around here!)



I was very proud of him because he asked his brother, Bug, to help him make the pancakes. Of course that very sweet question was followed by "But you don't get to pick the color, because I paid for it with my tokens". LOL I was proud of him for not leaving his Bubba out though.

We made some simple syrup flavored with maple to go with our yummy scrummy blue pancakes!

I did the actual cooking in the pan part - but the Bubba's measured, sifted and mixed the ingredients.












How sweet is that...pancakes and syrup for lunch! Yum-O!










We also did our first art project from the art for the very young book. I really like that book - great for the "not so artistic" like me.

We started with a project about Eric Carle called shapes shapes shapes. We discussed Eric Carle's illustrations and looked through some books to see what we noticed about his art.






Using tissue paper shapes the boys made pictures with their shapes.











The we painted the shapes with white vinegar and set them aside to dry.











Here is Bug's - finished and still wet.












After they dried the shapes came right off and left color behind. Not as much as I would've thought - but I suppose tissue paper is made to "not bleed" these days. The pink didn't show up on Red's at all. :( But he thought the green and blue were very cool.

Bug's did a little better - the yellow was very very light - he said that the heart was God because he lives in our heart. ((tear)) I love his love of art...

Red and I were working on "some some more" and "some some went away" stories in math and it was funny to hear his "stories". The bears went to the park, to the library, they even went to a football game. Love it!

Another project for Red was "Rhyming Words". He did a color, cut, paste project.










Oh I have to share this...Isn't this the cutest bottle of lotion you've ever seen! Ha! I love it!

And coupons - can't beat those. Red told me "People are always sending you coupons". LOL

I also got a new fall cookbook in the mail that week - score!















Free Pizza! Who's in? We are! Yippee! We got in our Book It! Stuff so I got us on the minute tracker and the kids are excited to work towards their "free pizza"! Woo-Hoo! Bug jumped right in reading reading reading!















So what do you think of my eye! I did good - right??? In science Bug is studying the eye and what it does, how it works, etc. I figured I'd draw it once and reuse the poster rather than attempting to draw it over and over.







Who doesn't love post-it's? I certainly do!














After our lesson Bug answered some questions in his science journal.


















Bug finished his first unit in Building Spelling Skills - I really like this program. He took a "pre-test" on Wednesday and scored a 100%, so he didn't have to take the "real" test! He was very excited!!! LOL

Here is Bug's spelling book and his first test - 100! Woo-Hoo! God Buggy!

Whew...what a week! LOL - it was a good one for sure! We ended our home school week on Thursday because Friday we had our co-op classes at ECCHO - more about that soon. I gotta go get in the shower it's Mom's Night Out! Woo-Hoo!

Until next time, we-

I almost forgot the geocaching! LOL - while we were junkin' in Sand Flat, Texas we stopped at the local cemetery to find the cache stash! LOL We had lunch at the local cafe - yum-o! I think it's called Ella's - if you are ever out 916 in Sand Flat - you can't miss it. I mean seriously it's the only thing around! Right next to the general store - great food! Anyway we stopped to grab some lunch there on Saturday and decided to cross over to the cemetery and find a cache. Love the geocaching.com app for iphone! Bug had us headed in the wrong direction, but we got him turned around and headed to the other
corner. LOL This one took a little digging as the fallen leaves had it well concealed. Let me just tell you if you hunt for this one be prepared to look long and low, but the treasure is there to be found! Momma grabbed this one, but the boys were quick to dig through it's treasures!

Well our "I did it!" chore charts are working out very well. I have to say that I am quite pleased with efforts of the boys to earn tokens. Red is especially excited to "see how much he earned" each evening! Yeah! Bug was the first to cash in some tokens to get a "reward" from the list. He cashed in 50 tokens to play in shave cream. I was surprised that this way his first choice, but hey whatever gets the shoes put away, right? LOL He was very excited. Bug is my artist at heart and doesn't mind getting his hands sticky, dirty, messy...you get the idea. I put this "reward" on there with him in mind. He counted out 50 tokens while I gather his supplies.






I gave him a placemat - but I figured it would end up all over the table without a doubt! LOL - thank goodness it's covered. :)










The joys of childhood...












A volcano!

I remembered a recipe for "puff-paint" and decided to let him try that out when he finished playing.

He decided he wanted purple so we added some food color and some glue to give the shave cream some stability.


Mix, Mix, Mix - with a spatula so as to NOT dye his hands! LOL

After it was mixed he used his hands and the spatula to play with it on paper. When it dries it has a "puffy" or raised appearance. Very cool!









My Bug-a-roni turns 8! Can you believe that! 8! Oh my goodness where has time gone? Bug decided he wanted to go to Fire Mountain (his fav!) after church so we took a present for him to open while he was there. Let me tell you he was excited! LOL He scarfed down his food quickly so he could open his presents!


Yes, that is a plate of black-eyed peas. Bug loves them, he was letting them "cool" while he opened his presents! I know - gross - dirt on a plate, but he loves them - just like his daddy! ;)




And he got....an MP3 player...boy oh boy was he excited! I put a case in there for him so he can "carry" it easier. Oh man the smile was ear to ear!


That evening the party went on!

Bug got a blue dog pillow pet from Daddy and I. He also got a bucket of army men (with big and small guys - that was the big deal) from Red. Red also found him a huge Odie - it's a pillow like thing and Bug just loves it!

When we talked about what sort of cake he wanted, Bug told me he waned a blue cake with camo icing. Okay...ummm, why did I ask? LOL

But it turned out to be not so difficult. I just dyed the white cake mix blue and then the icing I did in 4 shades of blue/green for the camo. Bug was very impressed so that's all that matters to me! LOL

It was a great evening of fun with family and wrestling! Bug's birthday just happened to be WWE's pay-per-view Night of Champions. Of course we had to get if for Bug - he was absolutely beside himself when he found out we'd be watching! LOL - it was one of those priceless moments!

I can't believe my Bug is 8 - where did time go? He is such a blessing...

Okay well I had better sign this update off so I can move on...I can do this, I can do this, I can do this...lol. Until later, we-