Choir concert, weekend update and life

Life is marching on full speed ahead. I blinked and it is October 21! How is that possible? I promise that I think about writing on this here space but then time gets away from me, other things take priority and I am left with maybe once a week posting. It is what it is I guess. 

Anyhow, what has been going on this past week? 

Well, Rebecca had her first choir concert as a 7th grader. They did an awesome job and you can definitely hear the improvement from last year. She was one of 6 in the entire 7th grade choir chosen to do a group solo. (Her choir teacher also singled her out for a one day honor's choir workshop, however she already has a commitment that day for her AHG troop so is unable to do it. I think it is cool though that her teacher thinks that highly of her voice.)

Unfortunately, on Tuesday both Rebecca and I woke up sick. Rebecca had a fever and stayed home from school (apparently a few people from the choir concert were sick on Tuesday including the choir teacher, with similar symptoms). I just felt like I had been run over by a truck. Thankfully, I didn't have any tutoring that day-- just babysitting for a little bit. I did cancel my AHG commitment, which meant only Jacob went to his Trail Life meeting as Ben was being punished for writing ALL over his wall on Sunday night after his bath. I have no idea what possessed him to do that, but we went through 4 magic erasers getting it all off. It looks horrible as it took some of the paint off as well, but at least the pen isn't there. 

He also got in trouble later in the week as we caught him stealing money out of a coffee cup on Bill's dresser and putting it in his own piggy bank. That kid is going to be the death of me. LOL 

The rest of the week was kind of crazy. Wednesday I had my niece and nephew for the day as my mom had to work and I am one of the few people that knows how to check Ethan's blood sugar and give him his insulin. 

Friday, my kiddos didn't have school. We went to the grocery stores and I finally got the last of the apples processed from our apple picking trip a couple of weeks ago. 

Also on Friday, Rebecca had to get ready for her AHG campout. She was going on this one by herself as she is now in the Pioneer/Patriot level and they don't have to have a parent going. She froze on Friday night as there was frost on the ground. She came home Sunday very tired, ready for a hot shower and her own bed. LOL

While Rebecca was camping, Bill, the boys and I walked down the street to a fall festival that a local church was putting on. We got the invitation in the mail on Friday (as it is the same church the kids play Upward basketball through-- and the invite included a reminder to sign up for Upward this year!). The kids had a blast. Everything was free! We got to take a wagon hay ride, play pumpkin baseball, the kids played games, painted pumpkins, went in a bounce house, got treats, and we were able to have a free lunch of hot dog, chips, hot chocolate, cotton candy, popcorn and apple slices and caramel. 

Sunday, was kind of a blah day. We went to 8am Mass as Jacob was singing in the kids' choir. Then I taught PSR-- I found a Rosary Bingo game online that was a huge hit. The rest of Sunday was spent doing laundry, trying to get ready for another busy week, etc. 

I will say this past week the trees are starting to turn and Autumn is showing it's full glory. The sunsets have been spectacular as well. Makes the long days a little more bearable as I appreciate the scenes of nature so much more. 

Now we are back to Monday. I have a long week of babysitting (as in my kiddo that normally is 1:30pm arrival is a 5:30AM arrival this week as her dad is out of town for business). I also have to take a CPR/ First Aid class 2 nights this week and I babysit my niece and nephew on Friday (as they again don't have school) and all day Saturday. Oh and as I was typing this up I just added another tutoring client for this week via Facebook. It is going to make for a long week but I will get through it and hopefully be smiling at the end! Hope everyone has a great week!  

Jacob's birthday weekend

Happy Tuesday! I am feeling a little under the weather today so am taking today nice and easy...which gives me time to update this here space of mine. LOL Actually Rebecca is home from school today as she woke up with a headache, sore throat and fever. My stomach is upset and I just feel rather run down and blah. :( Anyhow, enough complaining, let's see what craziness my family has been up to lately. 

Friday was Jacob's birthday. He says thank you for the birthday wishes on my post on Friday. He loves that others who don't even know him will take the time to wish him happy birthday! Friday night Bill had to work so I told him we would celebrate on Saturday night. I still wanted to make it special for him though, so we ordered pizza in (typically I make frozen pizzas). I had gotten a gift certificate to Dominoes good for a Free large 3 topping pizza and an order of brownies from the owner as a thank you for letting him use my garden hose one morning for like 10 minutes (he owns the rental next door apparently). So we let Jacob chose the toppings-- he wanted pepperoni, Italian sausage and bacon. We also got a large thin crust pepperoni that was on special that day for $7.99. So I call that a frugal dinner.

After dinner, Jacob wanted to play outside which we did for almost 2 hours until after it was dark. Then he chose to watch "The Lego Movie" for Friday night movie night. 

On Saturday, Rebecca and I had to volunteer at a Fall Harvest Festival that the non-profit that I am on the board of was hosting. That was a grueling 8 hours on my feet. I was in the concession stand the whole time but thankfully the 2 adults I was working with were hilarious and time flew by as we laughed and talked (and made hot dogs, chicken sandwiches and too many loaded nachos). LOL After we got home, we took Jacob out to his requested place for dinner-- Fiesta Mexicana. We had an enjoyable dinner and they came out and sang to Jacob which he enjoyed. (I had to laugh because Sunday night Bill came into the living room and said we went to Fiesta last night and I just found this $5 off coupon we could have used. I told him I did use one, didn't he know me better than that? LOL) 

When we got home we gave him his birthday gifts of 3 new wrestling figures which he loved. 

Sunday woke up to our first frost. I actually had to scrape my van windows before going to PSR. 

After PSR, we had a mini birthday celebration here at the house. My mom, sister, niece and nephew came over. My brother also showed up. My dad, who had been away for the weekend visiting my other brother at college down at Marietta, came home early and surprised Jacob by showing up. I made vegetarian minestrone in the crockpot and baked up some dinosaur chicken nuggets that I had gotten on clearance at Aldi's and a bag of French fries and that was lunch. 

We also snacked on chocolate lasagna as well (which was Jacob's request rather than a birthday cake.) Jacob then spent a lot of time playing outside.

Overall, I think he had a great birthday weekend celebrating turning 10 years old.  

Happy 10th birthday Jacob!

As of today I now have two kids in the double digits in ages. Jacob turns 10 today! I can't believe how much he has grown in the last 10 years. It is truly a miracle to be able to watch him (and his sister and brother) grow up. 

This morning he got a special breakfast of waffles and bacon. Tonight we are getting Dominoes Pizza and brownie (using a free promotional card that the owner gave me a couple weeks ago for letting him use my hose for about 10 minutes outside as he owns the rental house next to ours) as a treat for Jacob. He will also be allowed to choose our Friday night movie. 

Tomorrow night I think he wants to go out to Fiesta for dinner (our local Mexican restaurant) and it looks like maybe Sunday we will be doing another birthday celebration after church with my parents and sister and niece and nephew. We will be celebrating all weekend it seems! He deserves it though. 

I thought it would be fun to do another birthday questionnaire. So here is Jacob at 10 years old. 

1. Who is your favorite person in the whole world?

Daddy

2. What is your favorite color? 

Blue

3. What is your favorite television show?

Good Mythical Morning

4. What's your favorite outfit?

Short sleeve shirt and sweatpants

5. What sport do you like the best? 

Football

6. What song is your favorite?

"Roar" by Katy Perry

7. What is your favorite cereal?

Honey Nut Cheerios

8. Who is your best friend?

Claire

9. What do you want to be when you grow up?

A father

10. What is your favorite book?

"WWE Ultimate Superstars Guide"

11. What are you really good at?

Remembering quarterbacks

12. Where do you wish you could go on vacation?

Florida, where Memaw and Pepaw live

13. What is your best memory?

Going to North Carolina

 

14. What would you buy if you had $1000?

A house 

15. What vegetable do you hate the most?

Asparagus

16. If you could have a wish, what would it be?

To meet Tom Brady

17. What is your favorite flavor of ice cream?

Brookie

18. Who is your biggest hero?

John Cena

19. What do you like to do best with your friends?

Play kickball

20. What do you hope you'll get to do before your next birthday?

Meet a NFL player. 

Happy birthday Jacob! We love you! You are a great little brother and big brother and son. You love ALL things that have to do with sports (your favorites being football and WWE wrestling). You love the Seattle Seahawks. You have developed a love of singing and are enjoying choir. You go, go, go and love to talk. You are very imaginative and are always coming up with scenarios and sports talk in your head. We love you Jacob! 

To do list heading into Friday

Here it is Thursday.... I have a busy weekend planned (no surprise right? LOL) and need to get some things done before hand so I thought I would write out my list and see how productive I can be. 
Yesterday I got a few things done but not a lot as I wasn't feeling good most of the day. My biggest accomplishment was setting the mantel up for Halloween. I am loving how simple it turned out this year. 

So back to today. I have a lot to do so here is what I need to do:

• lesson plan for E, S and M tutoring sessions next week.
• plan for church PSR lesson on Sunday
• figure out what we are doing for Jacob's birthday (can't believe he will be 10 tomorrow!)
• make pancakes or waffles tonight to heat up for birthday breakfast for Jacob tomorrow. (Ask him what his final decision is first)
• Laundry 2 loads
• preschool plan for A for next week
• pay bills
• take a bike ride
• menu plan for next week
• make out grocery list based on menu plan
• babysit A

So there you have it. That is what I need to accomplish today. It is already 11 am and I have only accomplished 1 thing on that list. I had better get cracking. 

What are you up to today? Any big plans. 

Another busy but very productive weekend

Another busy weekend has come and gone. Not really busy because I had a lot of places to be, but busy because I got a TON done at home. I actually had NOTHING scheduled on Saturday and it was GLORIOUS! I was able to sleep in until 8:30 and then just go about my day on my own schedule. This is a rare occurrence so I decided to take full advantage of it to get some stuff done.

So Saturday I: 

• did all the laundry! I ended up doing like 6 loads to get caught up.
• had Rebecca go through ALL her clothes and she culled a trash bag full to donate. I also had the boys try on ALL of their clothes that were in the closet of doom (winter clothes) and figured out what was needed for winter. I also culled a whole trash bag full to be given to my mom and dad for my nephew that they have custody of. (This was a MAJOR project and took several hours)
• cleaned up the kitchen, mud room and living room. Showed/ supervised Jacob cleaning out the game closet.
• took a family hike. We went out to Wolf Run and walked for an hour and a half. The weather was glorious! Sunshine, low 60s, and just perfect. Felt so good to get out and walk. We ended up hiking close to 3 miles.  

• cooked a homemade meal for dinner-- spaghetti and meat sauce (put leftovers in the freezer for a future baked spaghetti meal)

Sunday was a continuation of trying to get stuff done. 

On Sunday, I : 

• Co-taught 5th grade PSR. I have a new teacher helping me out this year and I let her take the lead this week, but still was there to interject and highlight some points with the class. 
• Went to Mass and then gave my dad the clothes for Ethan
• Went to Walmart to pick up Jacob's medicine and to pick up a couple of things needed 
• Once home, I made the kids lunch and then processed a batch of apples into homemade crockpot applesauce. I also made an apple pie. 

• Figured out all my tutoring lessons for this week and started on my PSR lesson for next Sunday. 
• Watched a little bit of NFL football with Bill and the boys.
• Supervised Rebecca weeding the side flower bed. (We have started a new system where she has to earn the money for her extra stuff--- IE. dance ticket money, she wants to buy a download of Minecraft onto her phone, camping money for AHG, etc.)
• I menu planned for the week as well! 

Overall, it was a good weekend. I felt like I got a TON done and even though I am fighting a head cold it felt really good to get some things accomplished. 

What about you? Did you get anything accomplished this weekend? 

Here's to a good week!