Quinceanera!

 

As of today, Nadia is fifteen years old! She completed her first year of high school last month and last week started her first job. After she came home from her first day of work, she selected a one-year-old girl named Abi from the Philippines to sponsor through Compassion. Last month she was in a production of Mary Poppins, and she's trying out next month to be in a performance of The Sound of Music in November. Recently she has been spending more time doing jigsaw puzzles and playing chess. As a family, we recently completed two 1,000-piece puzzles. She's been playing chess more often because she knows that a chess club will be part of our homeschool co-op in the fall. Since she began reading independently, she has read mostly fiction as well as some biographies. Recently she has begun reading nonfiction library books about animals since she is planning to study zoology and wildlife biology in college. In the last month she got rid of all her Disney Barbie dolls and also the large collection of fabric that she used to make new clothes for the dolls. Very recently she started sitting in the front passenger seat of the minivan when she and I are the only two people in the vehicle. In another year she'll be able to be in a driver's seat! She's had a cell phone for one year but not a phone number because we haven't been paying for a cell phone plan for her. She can only use it on WIFI. She's excited about getting cell service next month. 

That's Nadia sitting next to the pilot. She enjoyed the free flight! 

We began her birthday celebrations last Saturday. The Seiberts were already scheduled to come over for dinner, and because it was a day that Faith is with her mom, I also invited Faith and Macey to join us for dinner. Jill, Faith, and Macey had a sleepover with Nadia, and they went to church with us on Sunday morning. Nadia requested that we have fruit pizza for her dessert on the 17th and s'mores pizza today on her actual birthday. I made two fruit pizzas last Saturday which lasted through June 20, and I made a third one on June 21 since I had purchased enough strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries to do so. Nadia worked an 8-hour shift on Monday and then had Tuesday through Friday off which worked out well due to our plans for Montage Mountain and then helping out with VBS at our church on Wednesday through Friday. Nadia is working a 7-hour shift at Reptiland today on her birthday. 

I sometimes think that food could be one of Nadia's love languages. So I've tried to include treats for her over the past month including the following: she and I had a dinner date at Olive Garden last month, string cheese, two big boxes of hot pockets, Pizza Hut pizza last week and today, one gallon of peanut butter Oreo ice cream from Old Mill Creamery (1/2 gallon has already been consumed by the kids and I), fruit pizza (x3), a box of Wheat Thins and a bag of Sun Chips were in her gift bag that she opened this morning, scalloped potatoes last week with lots of cheese, frozen yogurt from Sweet Frog today, and tomorrow morning we'll have donuts for breakfast. 

Here are fifteen of her favorite things:

1. Her pets - Milo and Peppa

2. Her friends - Rachel (cousin), Macey, Faith, and Jillian are her closest friends right now

3. Ice skating and skiing in the snow - She's wanted to try water skiing for several years. Hopefully that will happen before she turns sixteen! 

4. Listening to Christian music - She gets a LOT of use out of her earbuds. Some of her current favorite artists include Matthew West, Cain, For King and Country, Ann Wilson, Stephen Curtis Chapman, and Mercy Me. She loves to attend their concerts and has a growing collection of t-shirts and sweatshirts from her favorite artists. Nadia is looking forward to hearing Matthew West, Ann Wilson, Cain, Katy Nichole, We are Messengers, and We the Kingdom at the music festival we plan to attend at the of July. She's never seen Mercy Me or Toby Mac in person, so she's also excited about attending a concert featuring those two artists and also Zach Williams in November in Buffalo. Nadia is determined to improve my skill at being able to identify artists when we are listening to a Christian radio station in the van. 

5. Produce - blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, cherries, plums, peaches, nectarines, red grapes, and romaine lettuce. One of her favorite things about Camp Susque is that she typically has a salad at both lunch and dinner. Her idea of the perfect salad is one that contains romaine lettuce, croutons, cheddar cheese, and ranch dressing. 

6. Snacks - Wheat Thins, Cool Ranch Doritos, Nacho Cheese Doritos, Sun Chips, potato chips, pretzels, tortilla chips, Motts fruit snacks, and string cheese.

7. Candy - Tropical Twist Trident gum, Sweet Watermelon Extra gum, Swedish fish, gummies

8. Staying up late and sleeping in the next day

9. Authors - Karen Kingsbury, Karina Yan Glaser, Kate Albus, and Chris Grabenstein

10. Color - blue

11. Language - Most of the last year she was learning Spanish on Duolingo, but for the last few months she's been learning some French.

12. Restaurants - Red Robin (macaroni and cheese), Pizza Hut (stuffed crust pizza), Old Mill Creamery (peanut butter Oreo ice cream), and Olive Garden (five cheese ziti al forno, salad, and breadsticks)

13. Activities - She enjoys reading, drawing, riding roller coasters, visiting zoos and aquariums, going to camp, singing in a choir, participating in drama, playing Quiplash, and zip lining. She has already requested to go sky diving when she turns eighteen. 

14. TV shows - The Cosby Show, Full House, Wonder Years, Saved by the Bell, Sabrina, Family Ties, Boy Meets World, Brady Bunch, and 7th Heaven

15. Games - her two favorites at the moment are Quiplash and Spontuneous 

Thankful Thursday

1. Nadia had her first day of work at her first job on June 12. She worked 17 hours last week over three days, and she worked from 8:45-5:00 this week on Monday. She's scheduled to work seven more hours on Saturday. 

2. I hadn't had routine blood work done in quite a few years. I took care of that on June 15, and I'm thankful that even with us paying cash (no insurance) the bill was less than $30 and all of my results were normal. 

3. Oliver attended a birthday party at a trampoline park on June 16. Nadia and I did some shopping together and picked up some pizza from Pizza Hut, which we typically only visit in June each year as it's a birthday treat to get stuffed crust pizza from Pizza Hut for Nadia's birthday.

4. All three kids were able to participate in a free Young Eagles flight on June 17. Ian flew in a red airplane from the 1950's that is similar to my grandpa's airplane which I flew in many times. Oliver went up in a helicopter, and Nadia flew in a sleek airplane. 

5. We had nine people join us for dinner at our home on June 17. Three of the girls spent the night with Nadia, and we took them to church with us in the morning on the 18th. 

6. Paul's dad came up to spend several hours with us on Father's Day. Ian, Nadia, Paul, and Pop Pop had steak for dinner.

7. I took my three kids plus three of their friends to Montage Mountain water park on Tuesday. Our admission was free due to our WVIA membership. 

8. Yesterday and today Ian and Nadia helped with the 2nd graders at our church's VBS, and I helped with the four-year-old girls. Tomorrow morning will be the last day of VBS. Oliver has been attending as a participant. 

9. On Tuesday Margie decided to do one more radiation treatment to try to alleviate the pain in her ribs. Today she began three new medications that she will take as long as they help with the quality of her life. If they don't help, she will switch to hospice. One of the drugs (Ibrance) would have cost them $2,643 every month out of pocket, but they have been approved to receive the medication for free!

10. They recommend having your first colonoscopy when you turn 50. Paul had his first in 2020. I "should" have had my first one last year. I didn't because of our gigantic ankle surgery bill. The Christian medical sharing program doesn't allow members to request reimbursement for screening measures. We had to pay in full for the mammogram I had last year.  Because I don't have a family history of colon cancer and a colonoscopy costs thousands of dollars, I opted to go the Cologuard route instead. The test is much easier to complete than a colonoscopy (no prep for one thing!), and because we prepaid, the company gave me a $299 discount which brought the cost down to $381. It's definitely not the most exciting way to spend money, but I'm thankful for the prompt pay discount and as long as I get good results from the Cologuard analysis, I won't need to have a colonoscopy. 

11. Things are still progressing well for Paul at work. Closing is supposed to happen the week of July 10. PTL! 

12. The drought has ended! The grass is green again! 

13. I made a LOT of pulled pork last Saturday. Five pounds of potatoes wasn't enough for leftovers on Father's Day, but I've been enjoying leftover pulled pork. I make a salad that rivals the one I love at Panera. Mine contains their poppyseed dressing, strawberries, blueberries, romaine lettuce, pulled pork, and sometimes I also add pineapple. YUM!!!

14. I've seen a lot of animals on my walks lately! I usually see birds, chipmunks, rabbits, squirrels, and groundhogs. Lately I've seen a black bear, deer (that allowed me to walk rather close to them), and a mink! 

Ian was in this airplane.

13.5 years old!

Ian's shirt was white when he arrived at church last night.

Ian has been a teenager for six months (and three days)! Here is a brief description of what he's been up to lately. 

1. He finished Algebra I at the end of May, took one week off, and then started Algebra II. I decided to have him take Algebra II before Geometry so that he and Nadia would both be doing Algebra II this coming school year. Since the beginning of Algebra II is just a review of Algebra I, he has already completed eight lessons and the first test. 

2. For a few months he had been studying German on Duolingo, but I asked him to switch back to Spanish for the time being because we're planning to visit Ecuador in less than eight months. 

3. He has been waiting for more than a year for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom to come out on the Switch. He purchased it as soon as it came out. Oliver chipped in $20 toward the game. 

4. Although most of his screen time is used to play on the Switch, he also plays Brawl Stars on the iPad.

5. Not counting the books that he read for school, over the last six months he read three Harry Potter books (two of which were 752 and 896 pages long) as well as The Winter War by Priscilla Shirer and the newest Diary of a Wimpy Kid book. Ian listens to far more audiobooks than his siblings do. 

6. He enjoyed learning more about coding (Python) over the last few months. 

7. In March Ian had four baby teeth extracted by the dentist at the request of the orthodontist. He's been wearing his retainer for two years now. 

8. He took a weekly art class at the homeschool co-op from January through May and ten weeks of ice-skating lessons from January through March. He spends a fair amount of time drawing each week.

9. He has continued to attend the youth group on Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights and Bible quizzing on Wednesday afternoons. The Bible quizzing team is headed to Indiana in two weeks for the national competition over the book of Acts. Ian did very well at the practice quiz in Indiana last month. 

10. I think Ian is now willing to ride any ride at an amusement park as he rode the Impulse at Knoebels for the first-time last month.

11. Currently, his favorite musical artist is Toby Mac. 

12. He's gained two pounds over the last five months. I looked online, and he's still underweight, as his BMI is at the 2nd percentile. The doctor wants his BMI to be at least at the 5th percentile. He's currently 5 feet tall and weighs 78 pounds. Hopefully we can get more weight on him before his next physical.

13. Recently he has been enjoying creating rules for new games using Lego minifigures and existing game boards such as Sorry, Clue, and Labyrinth. Oliver and Paul have played some of his new games with him. 

Thankful Thursday

Life is full of twists and turns. Some represent little bumps in the road, and other times major changes. Rolling with the punches is an important skill to have, and we had more opportunities to refine that skill than usual in 2020. Awhile back I had signed my kids up for a (free) 4-hour fishing/kayaking trip. They were originally scheduled to do this from 1-5pm next Monday. The director of the program emailed me last week and asked if they could come on June 6 from 8:00-12:00 instead. We had very little snow this past winter, and then the last few weeks we've been in a significant drought. The lawns around here usually look lush in June, but now they mostly are brown. The historic low water level wasn't helpful for kayaking, but the kids still had a good time. On Monday and Wednesday, I took five kids to the Kid's Cafe (free lunch) in our town's park. One of our neighbors is teaching summer school so I also took her two kids with us. Her kids also hung out at our house for a few hours this week on those two days.

Today I thought that I'd be driving those 5 kids plus Cheri and myself to a field trip located one hour west of us. This morning as I was walking Milo around 7am, I received a text from one mom who was backing out because of the poor air quality due to the fires in Canada. I called another mom who I knew was on the fence because of the same issue. When she also decided to back out, I decided to reschedule the trip because those 11 people represented half of the group. Cheri was on her way out of her driveway when I texted her to tell her that we were going to reschedule. She had lined up an aide to watch her uncle and really wanted to go somewhere with us today. As I ate my breakfast, I tried to come up with another idea. I remembered that the Rodale Institute offered tours on Thursdays in the summer. I went on their website and paid for a tour at 11:00 for the five of us. Cheri had also mentioned a couple of weeks ago that she hadn't toured a cave since she was a child (and she's 66 years old). She asked that we schedule a tour of a cavern. I had previously taken the kids to two other caverns in Pennsylvania, but we hadn't been to Crystal Cave which is about 15 minutes from Rodale Institute. These places are 2 hours from our home. To be honest I wasn't thrilled with the idea of driving for more than 4 hours today, but my friend has been dealing with some really challenging situations as the primary caregiver of her uncle who has Alzheimer's. The kids and I left our home at 8:45 and picked her up at a meeting spot at 9:10. A little after 10:00 we found out from the Rodale Institute that they had cancelled the tours for today because of the air quality. At that point we were only about 20 minutes away from the site, so we opted go in the Visitor Center to get a map and take the self-guided tour. Several other individuals showed up for the 11:00 tour, but it didn't happen today. Air quality was not an issue in an underground cave. I wasn't impressed with Crystal Cave. It definitely wasn't a great field trip, but Cheri was very grateful, and I enjoyed having hours to talk with her in the van. I also am very grateful that we plan to stay at home sweet home tomorrow and Saturday. Actually, over the next seven days I don't plan to drive farther than 15 minutes away from our home which is fine with me! Since Paul enjoys history, I've decided to reschedule the tour of Curtin Village for some time when he will be able to join the group. 

Nadia is starting her job at Reptiland on Monday at 10:00am. We only found that out a little before 5pm today. The school district is closed on Fridays in the summer, and I need to get her a work permit. Hopefully I can get that taken care of prior to 10:00 on Monday morning. I'm hoping that this will be a good experience for her! It's much easier to get a job when you are sixteen years old. I am grateful the manager was willing to hire her albeit she will only be turning fifteen on June 24. 

Margie had an appointment with her oncologist today. She had planned to request to be switched to hospice, but she changed her mind and is going to have one more radiation treatment and try some other medications. We are praying that these will not result in difficult side effects and will be helpful in improving both her quality of life and possibly extending the length of her life here on earth.

Last August I purchased four tickets for a Christian music festival to be held at a Six Flags in NY in July. I purchased four at first because Nadia was at camp, and I didn't know if she wanted to go. At first, she said she didn't want to go because she thought she had a schedule conflict, but then she changed her mind, and I bought a fifth ticket (and there actually wasn't a schedule conflict). Then a few months later Paul found out that he won't be able to attend with us as his brother will be on vacation that week. Cheri was telling me today how she really wanted to be able to get away with someone for 3 days. She had tried to work something out with one of her sisters. Long story short, she found someone who will care for her uncle and her dogs for the three days of the music festival, and she is going to use Paul's ticket! She hasn't been able to travel away from home for quite a while because she is her uncle's caregiver. I am thankful that she will be able to enjoy the Christian music and also the rides with us for three days in July!

Although Paul can't go with us to Darien Lake, it seems he will be able to travel with us a lot more in the future. He is scheduled to sell the company to someone at the end of this month. This is a HUGE answer to prayer. It feels like a miracle to us. Provided this actually comes to fruition in three weeks, he will continue to work FT until the end of July and then will work PT for the new owner for an undetermined length of time, but the end goal will be for him to transition to a job that he can do from home which will be fabulous because he currently drives 100 miles a day (round trip) to work six days a week. He also will have more flexibility in terms of taking a day off for a field trip or taking a week or two off for a vacation. The kids and I are very excited about the idea of spending more time with Paul starting in August!!! Thank you, Lord!

Cousins and a concert

Ian is 18 months older than Joel, but Joel is much taller than Ian!

 Although May 8th was officially our final day of school, in some ways it didn't feel like summer started until after Nadia's play was over at the co-op. We definitely felt like we were on summer break last week as we spent about 74 hours at Great Wolf Lodge with my sister's family. The only other times we've been to Great Wolf Lodge it has been in December which means we've never been in their outdoor pool or used the high ropes course. That is still a true statement because the resort is undergoing massive construction, and the outdoor activities were closed. In the past we've only stayed one night, which typically translates to us being there for about 29 hours. Just as we have done in the past, we went with a homeschooling group from New Jersey because we pay less than half of the usual rate. Another family from the co-op where Nadia did drama was also at Great Wolf Lodge last week. Paul didn't join us on the trip, but Jenna's boyfriend did. The Towfighis paid for two rooms, and we paid for a third room. There were fifteen of us altogether. Five females shared one room, and the ten males shared the other two rooms. I shared a bed with ten-year-old Julianna. We ate breakfast and lunch before we arrived on Tuesday, and we all went to Taco Bell for dinner that night. Because it was Joel's 12th birthday, I made him a carrot cake with cream cheese icing which everyone ate for dessert. Some kids spent a lot of time in the indoor water park. Some of them spent very little time in the water park although between the hours of 11-4 on Friday they didn't have many options because we had to check out of our rooms by 11:00. Nathan broke his nose and two bones in his arm on Memorial Day, so he was unable to get wet the first two days we were there. He was wearing a splint on his arm and saw an orthopedic doctor today to get a cast. We're praying he won't need to have a surgery on his arm. Toby wasn't feeling well for a majority of the time, and Yvonne and Joe were dealing with unpleasant cases of poison ivy, but the rest of us were doing well physically. We had brought food from home to eat for our breakfasts and lunches on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Yvonne and I ran to Domino's for pizza on Wednesday and to Subway and Dunkin' for subs and donuts on Thursday. My kids and I got food from Wendy's for dinner on Friday during our drive back home. Milo wasn't a fan of our trip to Great Wolf Lodge because he was home alone by himself far more hours than usual, and Paul was the only one here at home in the evenings. My kids love to spend time with their cousins, and that was the main reason we spent a few days at Great Wolf Lodge! I had promised the kids a special treat once we listened to 1,000 books together. This was their reward albeit we still have five more books to go to reach our goal. 

Yesterday Nadia spent six hours at Faith's house, and her brother, Xandir, spent 4.5 hours at our home. Today was a normal Sunday with the exception that we attended a free outdoor concert by the Williamsport Symphony Orchestra this evening. They performed music from a variety of movies such as Star Wars, Frozen, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Spiderman, etc. The vast majority of the concerts we have attended as a family have been of Christian contemporary music. I'm grateful for opportunities to expose them to some other types of music. Naturally I was thinking of my favorite violinist, Wendy.