Christmas is over, but I'm still happy.

It seems like there's usually a let down after Christmas is over and the excitement and extreme busy-ness has died down. Not this year. I love it. We really had a good time enjoying this Christmas season and celebrating Jesus and what God did for us. Sheldon and I shopped together more than in recent years, and it's always fun shopping with him. Even on Christmas Eve, when we were supposed to be spending time at home doing things, we snuck out for Starbucks and light grocery shopping at the wonderful new Super Target. At one point, I even found some teenage store employees who were talking to each other about different religions while setting up a display of clearance items. What joy to be able to tell Sheldon about it and direct him over there to discuss with them the truth of Jesus. They were very open to discussion with him, and I didn't even mind picking up the rest of the groceries alone while they talked for a long time. Only when the managers closed in did they stop talking, but he was able to give them the Good News!

Today I'm hoping to clean up around the house. There is always a mess after Christmas toys are opened until we clear out some of the old and make homes for the new. We'll be taking down the tree and decorations and restoring order before it's back to the routine of school and work, when I really won't have time to clean like I plan to this weekend. Of course, Sheldon's off too, so we may end up scrapping those plans and going to the grocery store together alone. It's so nice to be able to leave the littles with the teens.

Taking time to enjoy the anticipation

I've been so busy and sleep-deprived lately that I haven't taken time to post anything because I'm trying to get "everything" done. I'm so sure.

I know I'll never get "everything" done. So why not just enjoy the busy time and anticipation everyone feels at Christmas. Soon it will be all over, and it will be a time of rest for a little bit until we start school again.

I'm sure I'll have the presents wrapped just in the "nick" of time for Christmas. I'm not so worried about Christmas cards because I'm sending them anyway, even if they're late.

Now I've got to make this blog short because I've got to get "everything" done.

Is Santa Claus real?

The other day while decorating the mantle with stockings and lights, Alex asked me if Mrs. Claus was real. I hesitated before answering because this was a delicate topic. Delicate because I have changed my mind repeatedly about how to handle this tradition that I loved as a child and new parent.

It seems that my children are way more inquisitive than I ever was. I NEVER asked my mom if Santa was real. Secretly, I knew he couldn't be, but I didn't ever want that confirmed, and more importantly, I didn't want him to stop coming to my house with presents.

Aaron used to make up stuff and tell Sydni as if it were true. Like the way Santa knows if you've been bad or good. He told her that elves hid everywhere to watch them. If you ever see a glimpse of something out of the corner of your eye, it's an elf, checking on you. I never told him these things. I have no idea where he got it. They had elaborate ways for him to come down the chimney and get into houses, too, but that memory escapes me.

It was only a matter of time before they questioned the logic of it all. I knew they were asking because it didn't make sense to them, but I also knew that they didn't really want to know. (I know there's no way they believed a giant bunny snuck in the house to leave baskets of candy and a tooth "fairy"? come on!) With Sydni, it was always like walking on eggshells to keep from making her burst into tears over things like that. I knew I better have some kind of answer ready. That's when I made up this answer that became my standard response to their many questions: "If you start questioning Santa Claus, he might stop coming, so you better not ask."

Well, eventually, they figured it out. It was becoming more and more difficult to hide the wrapping paper that "Santa" was going to use so they wouldn't recognize it and to disguise the handwriting on the gift tags from Santa so they wouldn't figure it out. I did all this to protect their fragile emotions. I just noticed that "Santa" has all the same letters as "Satan", and I don't think this is any coincidence.

Well, fast forward to 2007. All these memories must have flashed through my mind (and the heartache) when Alex asked, "Is Mrs. Claus real?" I said, "No." Then he said, "Oh, it's just someone dressed up?" Then a few minutes later, "So does the fake Santa Claus bring us presents?" I said, "No." He said, "Oh. You and Dad just sneak downstairs and pretend like you're Santa Claus giving us presents?" I said, "Yeah." There were no tears at all.

Five minutes later, Savanna came in from outside where she had been helping Daddy put lights up. Immediately, Alex said, "Santa's not real. Mom and Dad just sneak downstairs and give us presents." No response from her. It was like she must have known and wasn't all that surprised. Later she asked me about it, and I told her he wasn't real, but that it was fun to pretend and so we would just pretend. She was fine with that.

As you know, I have daycare kids during the day. Monday morning, I heard Alex telling Sejal (almost 4 years old--only 9 days older than Alex) that Santa wasn't real and Mom and Dad sneak downstairs . . . I had to intervene right away. Now I have a whole other set of problems I didn't foresee. At least I don't have the guilt of lying to my kids. My conscience just wouldn't let me rest about the fact that I was lying every time they asked me.

Now Alex is driving me crazy wanting to know when we can go see Santa at the mall. He calls him the fake Santa.

Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Thanksgiving again

I guess there was something very exciting that happened in November. Thanksgiving, which is always something to look forward to (unless you're limiting yourself on food and desserts, which I never do on holidays). We had all of our shopping done for Thanksgiving by Monday night date night. Then on Wednesday evening I unexpectedly had to run out to our new SuperTarget (which is way more convenient than Wal-Mart) to buy a new hand mixer. I guess the kids used it Monday to make something and failed to tell me it was acting funny. So, I got a new one. It was the first day it was super cold outside, so it was very festive.

I just remembered something else exciting that happened! I made two new very good friends. We had to get a new washer and dryer, and I LOVE them. I loved doing laundry anyway, but with my new friends, it brings a whole new joy I never knew I was missing! And not just because I don't have to run the spin cycle 3 times for each load and run the dryer 2 times for each load.

Something very sad (and happy, I guess) also happened. Eric, our kids' good friend, and our good friends' kid, went on a 5-month mission trip to Ecuador. It was a very emotional few days before Thanksgiving when he left us all crying at home while he went off to make a difference in the world. His blog is Eric in Ecuador on my blog home page. He has been really diligent about posting updates, so it's like we're still in touch even though he's so far away.

Back to Thanksgiving. We had Sheldon's family over to our house, where we quickly discovered that we weren't the only ones who secretly made sweet potatoes. His mom and sister-in-law both made them too. They weren't on the menu, so they both decided to bring them. Sheldon's was going to be a surprise, which was surprising! We decided to save Sheldon's for my mom's house on Sunday. (Which we forgot and left at home when Sunday came around. That's funny, too, because it's still in the fridge, and I don't like sweet potatoes.)

Sheldon's brother announced their mom's Christmas present to us, which is a 4-day cruise out of Galveston to Cozumel. She's paying the basic fare for us and the 3 oldest kids, so a lot of us will be going as a giant group next September. That gives us time to save up and buy $100 passports for each of us. (She's actually buying Aaron's and Sydni's, which helps a lot.) That should be fun, as it's something we're excited about doing, but we wouldn't have done it on our own for quite a few more years, I'm sure.

After Thanksgiving was over, we took the kids to Aunt Jill's house to spend the night. Black Friday morning, 3:50 am came quickly. We (Sheldon, Sydni, and I) drove by Target at 4:45, and their were people standing in line outside the front doors in the freezing cold waiting for the 6:00 opening. (I could easily drive by them and think they were crazy, not at all putting myself in the same category as them.) We picked up Jill and went straight to our first destination. I started getting that nervous sick feeling in my stomach that I always get when I'm afraid my special deal will be all snatched up. Luckily, they had everything we went out for. We got some great deals.

One thing I noticed is that an amazing lack of sleep really messes up your brain. We only had about 5 hours of sleep before our 19 1/2 hours of being awake (most of those hours spent shopping). We were delirious by the time it was over. Jill even started getting mean. I know it's hard to believe. MEAN! I know for a fact she only got 4 hours of sleep, so I guess she's forgiven.

Sheldon made the shopping so much more fun. He videotaped quite a bit of the adventures, and even passed out million dollar bills to the sales clerks (after we'd paid for our purchases). I can't wait to watch the video, but I'm afraid he may have accidentally recorded some of our purchases, so they can't be watched by the family until after Christmas.

Homeschool Homecoming

Wow. My last post was November 8. I'm sure lots of things have happened since then that I can write about. Saturday, November 10, was the Homeschool Homecoming dance. My kids went to it with their friends from church, and they were all very stunning.











Sydni and Eric won second place in the swing dance competition. I guess those ballroom dance classes at Calico are helping.



Too bad Eric is her only loyal, capable dance partner since he's now on a 5-month mission trip to Ecuador. (Read all about his adventures here.)

There are too many pictures in this blog, so I'm going to have to spend a little time formatting and thinking of the next exciting thing we did.

Poo Shoes Are Better Than No Shoes, I Guess

Well, last night a sad realization hit me. Here's the story:

Saturday night we went to a surprise birthday party for a friend who turned 50. While there, Austin stepped in dog poo while playing in the back yard. So, we brought home his tennis shoes in a plastic grocery sack (to be cleaned later). When we got home, Sheldon put the sack of shoes on the front porch (to be cleaned later at a more decent hour).

Sunday the shoes also sat there while we were busy all day, then Monday, same story. Then sometime Tuesday, I noticed they were gone, and I was so glad someone brought them (to the garage? to the back yard?) to be cleaned. I briefly wondered where they were sitting to dry, but didn't think much past that.

Well, last night when Sheldon and Austin were discussing what happened to the shoes, I realized that the two people who would have touched them did not know what happened to them. All of a sudden, the light dawned. I realized that the donation center didn't make a mistake when they left a receipt for the items I forgot to leave out for them. Instead of circling "sorry we missed you", it said "thank you for your donation". Oh, how sad. The "donation" they got was dog poo shoes. We all had a really good laugh over that. Except Austin who didn't realize how funny it was until much later after I promised him 2 new pairs of shoes instead of one.

My beautiful children

	.. www.myheritage.com

	.. www.myheritage.com

My look-alikes

This is pretty good for a person's self-esteem!

Pumpkin Patch 2007

Well, we went for our annual pictures at the pumpkin patch last week. Here are all the kids we took: (Left to Right) Seth, Andrew, Presley, Austin, Donovan, Eden, Aaron, Alex, Savanna, Sydni, Sejal, and Summer. Sadly, procrastination made going during the week the only option for this year, so we made it into a fun little field trip for the daycare kids. Once I got into the van with everyone, I quickly decided that I would NEVER do anything like this again. It took an hour longer than I planned just to get out of the house. There was a poop explosion I did not anticipate, along with only shorts to change her into, which didn't work well with the cold front. So, I had to rummage through some of my own kids' outgrown clothes for pants. I wanted to document that I was not doing this again in case time has a way of erasing the trouble it took, and I somehow think I want to do this again next year. Next year must be on the weekend. I repeat, the weekend. I must plan better.

I've been neglecting my blog because, well, you know there just isn't much going on with people's blogs lately, so not much reason to even look, much less post anything. My blog friends have almost successfully discouraged me by their sad lack of participation. Thanks to Aaron, Scott, and Michele (and lately Jill) for regularly putting new meat on there for me.

Actually, and unfortunately, I'm not on the computer any less because I'm now logged onto facebook and myspace more often. I'm actually playing several games of scrabble simultaneously with some of my facebook friends. (Kids' friends is more accurate.) You all should get a facebook too. It's silly fun. (And it's fun, silly.)

Maybe later I'll post some pics from our Reformation Day celebration or the karate Halloween party.

Another reason we homeschool

We have various reasons why we homeschool. Some of them are here. Usually, if I watch or read the news, I can find other reasons that completely confirm for me that I'm doing the right thing. Yesterday I saw this news story that made me so mad, I decided to blog it.

Maine school board approves contraceptives for middle schoolers

Here is a small part of what the article said and my reaction:

"Pupils at a city middle school will be able to get birth control pills and patches at their student health center after the local school board approved the proposal Wednesday evening. The plan, offered by city health officials, makes King Middle School the first middle school in Maine to make a full range of contraception available to students in grades 6 through 8."

"Condoms have been available since 2002 to King students who have parental permission to be treated at its student health center."

"Chairman John Coynie voted against it, saying he felt providing the birth control was a parental responsibility. The other no vote came from Ben Meiklejohn, who said the consent form does not clearly define the services being offered."

So, pretty much, if I sign a consent form for my 11-year-old to be treated at the clinic ("student health center"), I am also giving unknown consent for them to offer my baby birth control, in several varieties. If I don't sign the consent form, does that mean my kid doesn't get treated if he breaks an arm or pukes in class? Then does the school sue me because I was negligent in the medical safety of my child? How can parents let this happen? Are we letting the public schools dictate to us what our kids should or shouldn't be doing? Is no one putting up a fight against this garbage?

"A supporter, Richard Verrier, said it's not enough to depend on parents to protect their children because there may be students who can't discuss things with their parents."

There may be students who can't discuss things with their parents? They don't even know? I wonder what that percentage would be if there were any.

"At King Middle School, birth control prescriptions will be given after a student undergoes a physical exam by a physician or nurse practitioner, said Lisa Belanger, who oversees Portland's student health centers. Students treated at the centers must first get written parental permission, but under state law such treatment is confidential, and students decide for themselves whether to tell their parents about the services they receive."

So the school is saying that my 11-year-old is perfectly capable of deciding whether or not to tell me about something as important as premarital sex. What's next? We might as well let them go ahead and move out and start making all their own decisions since we parents are not really necessary.

"Five of the 134 students who visited King's health center during the 2006-07 school year reported having sexual intercourse, said Amanda Rowe, lead nurse in Portland's school health centers."

That's 3.7%!! I wonder if the numbers would be much lower if they weren't already passing out condoms to those students.

State Fair of Texas

Well, we went to the Fair. It was very fun. I wish we had taken more pictures, but it's so hard to take a bunch of pictures in the middle of having fun with so many little kids, so many strollers, wagons, and various "baggage" that comes with a group of 17 people at the Fair. I want to add a picture of Andrew and Austin because they were there too, but Uncle Steve took them off to have separate fun (rides) for awhile, and I think he may have taken some pics.

Luckily, the teenagers took some of their own pictures, so I copied this one from facebook. (Thanks Austin McD). Next year we'll be ordering free tickets for our private school, so hopefully we can save even the $3 and case of Dr. Pepper that it cost us to get in.

Disappointing TV

Well, I tried to watch Saturday Night Live this past weekend. I thought I wanted to see it because Jon Bon Jovi was hosting.

The first skit was straight from the 80's, and it was sort of funny. I didn't really laugh, and there was no cursing, but the 2 or 3 blasphemies by Amy Poehler really disturbed me.

When Richie Sambora forgot his lines, and Jon had to help him out, that was pretty funny.

The next skit was a game show, and that's when I had to turn it off. It made me remember why we quit watching that show in the first place. If it's not cursing, it's blasphemy. If it's not either, it's sex or adultery.

Sorry, Jill. It really lowered my opinion of Jon Bon Jovi to see that he would accept these roles. It was a disappointment to me. But, he is still cute. (That's not "lusting", just stating the obvious.)

Love your neighbor as you love yourself.

I think sometimes we are our own worst critic. When we don't stick with a new habit that we want so badly to do, we beat ourselves up. For example, diet and exercise. When we stop doing it because we give in to that little voice (that some of us have) that says, "You're too tired today. You should sleep in instead." Well, I know how hard it is and how disciplined you have to be to make yourself keep doing what you know you should be doing not because you want to (by any means) but because you MUST. Like brushing your teeth or going to the bathroom. Some of these things are obviously more urgent than others, but you know what I mean. I find that since I've been on a regular exercise routine for at least 4 straight weeks, my voice starts speaking to me at night as I'm getting ready for bed. "You're getting to bed so late. You're sleep-deprived, and you know what they say about the hormones that your body makes when you don't get enough sleep. You won't lose weight anyway if you're not sleeping enough. It's a waste of time to even workout." I find it is a physical effort to ignore that negative self-talk.

We're supposed to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. I think we love our neighbors but don't really love ourselves very much at all. I would never say the things to a friend struggling with the exact same things because I know how hard it is to always follow through. I would be encouraging and uplifting. I would empathize with them. I would say, "It's ok if you can't exercise one day or one week. Just start again. Just keep starting again. Drink your water if that's all you can do that day." But to myself, I'm such a loser. I think we need to forgive ourselves.

Look what Donovan has done. . .

This is the lizard cage from tonight with 6 lizards and one tail.









This is the toad cage from tonight with 5 toads.

This crazy week

Well, Austin enjoyed the fair even though he didn't get to ride on any rides. Tuesday night we went to the homeschool meeting to have the kids' yearbook pictures taken. When the photographer tried to get Savanna to smile, he made the mistake of saying, "Can I see your mad face? How about your sad face? Can you make a sad face?" Little did he know, that's all you have to do to bring on the tears. She immediately started wailing. We let Andrew and Donovan go next while Sheldon talked to her and the woman in charge of yearbook bribed her with brownies from the bake sale table. Well, something worked because she finally cooperated. Which is more than we can say for Donovan's smile, right Jill?

I've been very busy this week. It seems some of the kids are already falling behind in schoolwork, and I must fix that.

Fair Day?

Well, I discovered that today is Fair Day for the public schools. I could have gotten free tickets for my kids and one adult, but I didn't request them back in May or something. I really didn't think we'd be going because it costs so much. And while we do have lots of million dollar bills, they don't buy rides. Austin was invited to go with a friend from church, and that's where he is today. So now everyone thinks he's our favorite.

Forget about the fact that the older kids get to do fun things all the time with their friends, never giving a care in the world about the fact that Austin's missing out. I'm glad he gets to go. He has to stay home and watch them leave to go swim and hang out with their friends every weekend.

It is depressing to check people's blogs and find the same picture or blog title from last week. Not everyone, but enough. Come on, people. I know you did something this weekend. Maybe you even went to the fair.

Kids' quotes

When you run out of topics to blog about to keep your readers (stalkers) happy, you can always turn to your kids for fun ideas. Last night Summer was trying to avoid being bored on the way to Mimi's house. She said she was just sitting in the seat trying to make her legs fall asleep. ? Weird.

Then, this morning on the way to the karate show in Wylie, we passed by an airsoft and paintball store. Andrew wanted to go in really badly, but I said, "Let's not and say we did." He came back with, "Let's do and say we didn't." Now I think he gets that from his mom. "No, Steve, I haven't been to Starbucks all week." Anyway, it was pretty funny.

"In your face"

Tonight I gave "Donny Doo" a million dollar bill. He ran to show his mom and said, "In your face. I got a million bucks!" Later when we were picking up the kids from karate, he said he wanted to buy "Season of the year" and that he finally had enough money. I told him she wasn't for sale. At any price. He was a little disappointed.



Ok. Here's the schoolroom. I think it's about finished. I'm really happy with it. I guess this Ikea table and chairs is my new coffee table. It works really well to pull up to the couch (where I sit) to help the littles do their school. I couldn't fit all the toys in the closet under the stairs, so I just left them there. I can't wait till my friend with a gift and ministry of interior design comes over next week to help me decorate the living room. (Not really decorate, just help me decide what stays and what goes and where what stays goes. Get it?) Sheldon painted the canvases over the tv. Way cheaper than pre-made artwork. And we like it.

Sheldon's blog and my darling angel

Alex drew an A, then asked me how to make a B. I gave him an alphabet chart, and he proceeded to fill the whole page with the letters. Then he got a new sheet of paper and continued with the numbers and lowercase letters. I was so proud of him. I guess he's ready to start school too.

You absolutely must read Sheldon's blog today. I was in tears laughing so hard.

Coven Dragonlair -- this is a long, scary one

Well, I was informed that last Saturday night was our date night, but I don't think so. Last Saturday we went to Coven Dragonlair for a wiccan open circle ritual celebrating the autumn equinox. This would not have been a voluntary choice for date night in any circumstance; however, there are certain sacrifices that we must make if we are married and love our husband. First of all, he was going. They need the gospel, and he has a bold faith that the wiccan leaders can repent and trust Christ. While that may be true, I was afraid for him to go alone, (everyone at church had something suddenly come up) so once I found out Aaron and Sydni were going with him, I decided to go too. I needed to be there to "protect" them with my prayers.

Before it began, we met the "leader", whose name was Dragon Slaymaker. He explained a lot of the beliefs and reasons for the different things we would be seeing.

Once they started the ritual (with doors locked to keep anyone from going in or out), the high priestess walked around the circle of people with a large scary dagger held over everyone's heads and started telling the spirits of negativity to leave. I just knew she'd be stopping by me to plunge that thing into my heart. Somehow she didn't pick up my negativity towards what she was doing, and she got back to the table at the beginning of the circle and started carving a star (pentagram) out of the air over the candle-lit table.

I think next came the "wine blessing" where they "blessed" the "wine" and passed it around in a chalice for everyone to drink from. The high priest got down on his knees in front of the high priestess with the chalice in his hands. The high priestess then plunged the dagger into the chalice to symbolize the union of god and goddess. The high priestess drank the wine, passionately kissed the high priest, Hawk, then passed him the wine. {During the kiss, we were all starting to panic that there would be some inappropriate acts right on the floor in the middle of the circle. (We knew we were locked in.) The thought also did cross my mind that I needed to have a plan in case we witnessed a murder/sacrifice soon. The knife really scared me.} He drank it, went over to the next woman standing in the middle of the circle, kissed her on the mouth, and passed her the chalice. This went on for all of the 5 or 6 people standing in the middle of the circle before they went to the first person sitting in the giant circle. I know Aaron said he was thinking I am not kissing anyone! and luckily, the kissing stopped at that point. We let the chalice pass right on by us. No way were we swallowing that stuff. What if it was blood?

Anyway, next came the grapes. These were also "blessed", and the whole wine/grape thing was like their communion to celebrate the union of the god and goddess. He explained that the only difference in our religions was that we leave out the goddess. That their god and our heavenly father are the same--that all gods of all religions are the same god--but we just all call him by the different names we know him by. It was sad to me that they really believed this. Or they were trying to convince themselves just as much as they were trying to convince us. We skipped the grapes too.

They went around the circle sprinkling "holy water" on everyone, which we hoped didn't get on us, and fanning incense smoke at us. These represented the union of elements water/earth (saltwater) and air/fire (incense). Then they put "holy water" and incense smoke on some wheat and passed it around to everyone. We were supposed to focus on a short-term goal and stare at the wheat while they hypnotized us with their crazy-talk. Then they declared the wheat a magic talisman that when we looked at it, it would help us achieve our short-term goal by November 1.

Next came the Coven Dragonlair Witch's Hymnal that they passed out. They jokingly said you could call it a "her'mnal if you wanted (since they also worship a goddess). As Sydni and I were looking at the words in this book, we were so saddened by these people and also completely creeped out. They changed the words to several Christian Christmas carols, too. "Silent night, solstice night", "gods rest ye merry pagan folk", Joy to the World, Santa Claus is coming to town, and others. They started chanting their little witch tunes, and you'll be happy to know we didn't sing along or even mouth the words. I told Sydni that I could guarantee they wouldn't let us leave with the songbooks. I was so right!

During this time, we discovered that everything that lives (that we eat) sacrifices itself for us that we might live. For example, when you pluck a carrot up out of the ground, it dies so we can eat it and live.

They also kept mentioning their annual campout coming soon, called Witchstock. They had the artwork for the t-shirts for this event that the artist donated to them. It had a picture of a woman with flowing long hair covering herself. I have since found out that at this family-friendly event, clothing is optional. Nice.

We all came away desiring more of God. We had a deeper appreciation for the worship music at our church which has truth in the lyrics. I think we all sang with a little more feeling at church the next morning. But we have also come away with a deep sadness for what they are too far gone into their sins to know. They don't know Jesus. Sure, they know the Jesus that they think was a great Rabbi. But they don't understand their sin and their need for a saviour. They choose not to believe in Hell, so they don't fear it. I can't shake the sadness for them.

Now that I have gone to this with Sheldon, I figure he owes me big time.