My middle schooler!

Miss Angie, who has been Nadia's Sunday School teacher the past two years, organized a special time for the girls this morning since today was the fifth graders last morning in Kidzway. Nadia enjoyed drinking a fruit smoothie and eating a cookie. Since she enjoys helping in the two-year-old and also three-year-old classrooms, I'm sure it wasn't her last morning in Kidzway, but it was her last time there as a student. From nine months through fifth grade the kids have to wear name tags as a security measure. She's grateful that starting in June she doesn't need to wear a name tag! I bought her a ticket for Creation, which means she'll be sleeping in a tent for three nights at the music festival in late June. She's attending that event with the youth group at our church. Thankfully I didn't have any trouble moving her 11 year old physical up to an earlier time slot after I found out the youth will be leaving at noon on the 26th. Today was the last time my choir will sing until the fall. I'll be helping in Kidzway this summer on the Sundays we aren't elsewhere. Paul and the

kids went to the second service while I was in an adult Sunday School class. Paul tells me that Oliver needs to work on his behavior in a worship service. Most weeks the kids will be with us in the first service and go to Sunday School during the second service, but Nadia wanted to attend the first service class for the last time today.

Paul is exhausted. From April 22 through May 25 he was at the plant 31 out of 34 days. The only three days he had off during that time span were April 30, May 2, and May 7. Each of those three days he was home with the kids while I was at work. In hindsight, he could have gone to work on May 7 and the kids could have been at their grandparents. I thought someone needed to be at home because the contractor started working on our deck on May 7, but I was wrong. From May 8-25 he worked 18 days straight at the plant. Today was the first day since April 21 that he stayed home even though I was also home. He's working tomorrow and then taking a much needed 13 day vacation.

I have been working on our vacation plans the past couple of days. A few months ago I bought the Lion King tickets and booked our lodging. I had a basic plan sketched out, but once I started working out the details I made changes. I eliminated four science or children's museums from the schedule. We won't be using our ASTC membership as much as usual on this trip. At the moment I only have us using it once on the trip - at Nauticus and Battleship Wisconsin in Norfolk. I have included earning four Junior Ranger badges in our itinerary - Jamestown, Yorktown, Wright Brother's Memorial, and Fort Raleigh (Lost Colony). I'm sure we'll come home with many more magnets. We started collecting magnets last August and already have a growing collection on our refrigerator! I think the two that are the most special to me are the two we got with my brother in November. Speaking of him, they had a presentation this morning not just for those who died serving in the military but family members in church who died in the past year in general. They asked us to stand when our family member's name was on the screen. In the first service I stood for Maurice Harton V and the kids and Paul did the same in the second service. I teared up both during that time as well as when we sang "It is Well" this morning. I love that hymn, but the last few years I have a hard time not crying when I sing it.

The two recent changes to the plan that I am most excited about are the addition of a visit to Roanoke Island and homeschool activities in Jamestown and Yorktown. We had planned to do homeschool activities at those places plus Williamsburg in September but didn't go due to a hurricane. Colonial Williamsburg and the National Park part of Jamestown don't have any homeschool events right now (only in September and February), but I have signed us up for homeschool tours in Yorktown and the Jamestown Settlement. In addition to the national park on Roanoke Island, we also have tickets to see a play about the Lost Colony. There are five days that don't have any plans aside from seeing Aladdin at the movie theater one afternoon. Those five days will be very relaxed - time at the beach, swimming in pools, etc. I want to go miniature golfing at least once.

Four more days!

Today through Monday the kids and I aren't traveling farther than 20 minutes from our house. On Tuesday morning we plan to drive to Jamestown, Virginia and begin our vacation! I have been mowing the lawn each Friday lately. The grass is tall enough to mow today, but I'm going to wait until Monday to mow because it won't be mowed again until June 10th. Here's to hoping it won't be ridiculously tall when we return. Similarly, I'm going to wait until Monday to clean out the guinea pig cage. I'd like to start packing on Sunday because that gives me time on Monday to remember things I might  have forgotten to pack. I bought some food and drinks at the grocery store today that I'm planning to take on our trip.

The homeschool gym class ends next Friday, but today was the last class for my kiddos for this school year. Today was also Nadia's last art class. Last night I placed an order through Walmart for some food plus a few other random items we had run out of like band-aids and AA batteries. This morning I dropped the kids off at gym

class, went to Walmart and someone brought what I had ordered out to my vehicle. Very nice! Then I went to the library before going back to the gym class. Since they were doing flag football today and it was a gorgeous day, I thought they'd be outside. I brought my camera, but for some reason they were doing it inside. Nadia helped her team score more than one touchdown! While Nadia was in gym class the boys and I went to the grocery store in our town because they were having an amazing one day sale. Oi vey was the store crowded! It was an accomplishment to get a parking space and a shopping cart!

Aside from church on Sunday (and youth group for Nadia Sunday night), the only other places we *might* go during the next three days are Reptiland and to see the new Aladdin movie. I'm leaning toward just staying home and going to Reptiland later this summer (it's only 10 minutes from our house). We shall see. I need to put some time into ironing out some more details for our upcoming vacation! Nadia wanted to go with the middle schoolers at our church to HersheyPark this summer, but the date they are going didn't work for us this year. She was very happy though that I bought her a ticket to the Creation music festival. She'll be going with our church's youth group (grades 6-12). I've never been. I won free tickets in 2008 through our local Christian radio station and planned to go with my friend, Cheri, but Nadia came early and I gave my tickets to Uncle Al instead. I hope she has a great time!

Thankful Thursday

1. Last Thursday the kids and I had a delightful day long field trip. It was a beautiful day in terms of the weather. We saw a production about Aesop's Fables, earned Junior Range badges at Steamtown, played at Bee's Backyard, and jumped on the trampolines at Sky Zone. We packed a lunch and used a gift card for dinner. Our only expenditure for this outing was the money spent on gasoline to drive there and back plus the quarters I put in the meter for our time watching Aesop's Fables.

2. I enjoyed walking with Cheri for about an hour last Friday while the kids were in a dress rehearsal. She also met up with us at Lake Tobias on Tuesday! The past  almost 11 years typically months pass in between the times we see each other in person. This was a treat!

3. The kids did well on Sunday night in their musical. I was thankful that Paul's parents came as well as Tab and her husband.

4. The kids loved swimming at the pool party on Saturday! They would have liked to have

stayed more than five hours, ha ha!

5. I enjoyed teaching the 3rd-5th grade girl's class on Sunday morning.

6. The kids and I enjoyed seeing Mulan, Jr at the Dutch Apple Dinner Theatre on Tuesday in Lancaster and seeing animals at Lake Tobias that afternoon. It was another gorgeous day!

7. Yesterday the kids and I learned a lot at the homeschool day at Valley Forge. The kids also earned another Junior Ranger Badge.

8. I really like the canvases that I put up this week on each of their bedroom walls to display their growing collections of Junior Ranger badges!

9. It was a treat to spend the night at Carol's house last night. We had dinner with Carol and her husband last night and breakfast with Carol this morning. She and I became friends in Annapolis in 1994.

10. The kids and I were able to visit the Crayola Experience in

Easton this morning. The kids had been there in 2014. None of them remembered their previous visit. Ian said it was one of the best field trips this year. After we were done there, we had a free one hour guided tour of the Martin Guitar factory. I learned a lot! Our next to last stop was the Da Vinci Science Center, and our last stop was dinner at Red Robin. Gettysburg, the science museum, and the guitar factory tour didn't cost us a penny aside from the gas to get out there and back. I got the tickets for Crayola for 50% off because I bought them on Black Friday. We were gone from the house for five meals but thanks to eating two meals at Carol's house, packing two lunches, and a gift card covering almost our whole dinner, it was a very economical trip.

A princess and a safari

Today I made my third visit to the Dutch Apple Dinner Theater in Lancaster. My first time was when I was traveling with my HS band (from MD). We played at an amusement park and saw Fiddler on the Roof at Dutch Apple. My second time was with Paul. I can't recall if it was when we were dating or after we were married, but I remember going with him to see Annie Get Your Gun at Dutch Apple Dinner Theater. Today I took the kids for a luncheon performance of Mulan, Jr. Lunch started at 10:30. The buffet was very kid friendly. It included ziti, pizza, hotdogs, tacos, chicken, fries, applesauce, yogurt, salad, jello, cookies, and cupcakes. The show started at 11:30. I knew that Disney Jr. productions are usually 60 minutes long so I had planned to take the kids on the 1pm tour of Wheatland since it was only a 9 minute drive from Dutch Apple. But after 45 minutes of the show they took a 15 minute intermission before the last 15 minutes of the show. Then they had a Q and A time. So we didn't leave until 1pm. Wheatland was the home of President Buchanan who happens to be the only President (thus far) from the state of Pennsylvania. This year we read about the first fifteen Presidents (Washington through Buchanan). We are planning to read about Lincoln through Trump during the next school year. I'm thinking when we see Esther at Sight and Sound next spring we can tour Wheatland on that same day.

Since we didn't visit Wheatland, we went straight to Lake Tobias which is about half way in between our house and Lancaster. The highlight of that is the one hour long safari ride. My friend, Cheri, met us there which was a treat! The weather was gorgeous. A good time was had by all!

If you give a ....

I haven't read the books lately. I should make it a point to read them to Oliver this summer, but years ago I read the book If you give a mouse a cookie and others by the same author many times to Ian and Nadia. Although the cycle may not typically bring us back right where we started as it does in those circular books, it does seem in life that many times one change leads to many other changes. I was thinking about that in reference to our deck. Installing a new deck meant that first of all we needed to remove the previous deck. While working on that project Paul had two accidents. First, he cut the line to the air conditioner outside. Secondly he got his Dad's pick-up truck stuck in our yard. A neighbor who had a vehicle with four wheel drive had to pull the pick-up out of our yard while the kids and I were at church. This past weekend Paul repaired the line to the air conditioner. Thankfully we hadn't needed to use it while it was out of commission for the last two weeks. The long, deep trenches in our yard have made mowing the lawn more difficult for me the past two weeks as it was hard to get the lawn mower over the trenches. On Sunday on our way home from church I bought some topsoil. Yesterday and today I spread 320 pounds of top soil. 280 of those went into the trenches. I haven't filled all of them yet, but it should be much easier to mow the lawn later this week than it was the past two weeks. I used the other 40 pounds to fill in where we had removed a square stone that had been at the bottom of the steps of the old deck. Because our new deck is a few feet shorter than the old one, it meant I needed to spread grass seed and fertilizer and such in the hopes that grass will start growing in what is now bare dirt. Also, there had been a large forsythia bush at corner of one of the ends of the old deck. With a shorter deck that bush looked like it was sitting in the middle of nowhere. I hacked it down and started the process of digging out the roots. Paul finished digging out the roots on Saturday night.

Since I knew that Paul would need to borrow his Dad's truck again to haul away the last few pieces of lumber from the old deck plus the forsythia bush, I decided to clean out the shed and also trim one branch off of a tree in the front yard that was in my way when I was mowing the lawn. Some things that the previous owner had left in the shed (ex. stain for the deck and  privacy lattice for the deck) are now loaded in Paul's dad's truck for Paul to dispose of along with the wood and bush. Since our grill was flipped over when a tornado was in our area earlier this spring, Paul felt we should also dispose of the grill. We also loaded that into his dad's truck. I was hoping to add the red truck to the load, but there wasn't room. It hasn't worked for more than two years. I'd like to say that the projects that are happening because we got a new deck are complete, but that's probably not the case. I am trying to decide what to do about the areas on the right and left side of the deck. I'm considering buying some stone to put down. Partially it will depend on what we decide to do with the shed. I'd like to get rid of it. The estimate to replace the shingles on the shed was $700. Nope. Not happening. It hit me today I should have asked him for an estimate on repairing the one window that has been broken for a year as he does windows. If we got rid of the shed, I'd  move the trampoline to where the shed is now and then I wouldn't put any stone down as I'd just have that be grass. If we are keeping our dilapidated shed, then I think I'll get stone as I don't want to try to mow in between the deck and trampoline.

Some of the projects I worked on today had nothing to do with the fact we recently got a new deck. I finished weed whacking (the battery had died on Saturday before I was finished), power washed the fence, cleaned the outside of the mailbox, made a batch of chocolate chip cookies, stained some windowsills, cooked dinner, etc. Two years ago I cleared a patch of grass by the swing set so that I could plant blueberry bushes and strawberry plants. A neighbor also gave me some tomato plants. Some animal ate all our blueberries the past two years. The strawberry plants didn't come back in 2018 so we never ate any blueberries or strawberries from our yard. The tomato plants did come back last year. The guinea pigs and I were the only ones eating the tomatoes as Paul and the kids don't like tomatoes. So today I dug up a bank of dirt I had created when I made that garden bed in 2017 so I could put dirt on top of the mulch. I'm hoping grass will grow there again. As I was digging I accidently started to dig up a burrow for some small animals. I am not sure if they were baby moles, voles, rabbits, or ??? I didn't injure them and tried not to destroy their home. I had the kids come out and see what animals I had uncovered. I was wanting to take a picture and text it to Maurice to ask him what they were, but of course I couldn't actually do that. So sad.

I also put up the Junior Range badge displays in each of the kids' bedrooms today. I saw that the National Park website sold a canvas for this purpose, but I bought one on Amazon that was half the price but was just a plain canvas (same size but no logo on it). I glued the large Junior Ranger patch in the middle that they were given at Steamtown, and now the canvas looks even more similar to the one the National Park sells! I dug out the badges the kids have earned and put them on each canvas. There is a LOT of empty space on each one for additional badges! I added a few other pins to each one that were not from national parks such as the pin they got at Disneyland for doing Jedi Training, a pin from the 2017 Little League World Series, a tag from Fort George in Canada, etc. I got out a hammer and nails and hung them from the walls. There was a space for a dowel rod, but I just nailed them up to keep the cost down. I look forward to seeing those canvases fill up with badges from a wide variety of National Parks over the coming years! They should be earning another one this Wednesday at Valley Forge.

She's graduating...

I remember being in four graduations ceremonies - eighth grade (1986), college (1992), master's degree (1994), and doctorate (2002). From pictures of myself, I know that I also participated in a graduation from Kindergarten in Birmingham, Alabama (1978). I don't remember that one. Paul didn't attend the commencement ceremonies when he completed his BS, MS, or PhD. Since our kids our homeschooled, they haven't participated in any graduation ceremonies, but it does feel like Nadia is in the process of graduating at church. She's been in the Soul Patrol kids' choir for five years (the length of time we've attended this particular church). This morning she had her last rehearsal, and this evening her last Soul Patrol performance. After the second service today they had a picnic for the fifth graders to introduce them to the youth group. The Kidzway program is for infants through fifth grade. She can continue to volunteer as a helper in Kidzway (she helped in a three-year-old class during the first service this morning), but her days as a student in Kidzway are coming to a close. All of the other classes have their promotion in September, but the fifth graders are allowed to move up to the middle school Sunday School class in June if they so choose. I told her that starting next week I want her to attend the worship service with us in the first service, and then she can choose whether she wants to attend the middle school class or serve as a helper in Kidzway. I think she'll probably choose to split her time and serve some weeks and attend the MS class other weeks.

Oliver had his very first solo tonight. Thus far he exhibits the most interest in dancing of our three kids and the least interest in singing. He's improved over the past three years, but his experience in the choir is VERY different than his siblings when they were his age. Ian and Nadia both had speaking parts. Nadia also had solos. They don't have a choir at our church for middle schoolers. At some point during high school she could join the adult choir that I'm in if she wanted to. There's a local chorale that I am planning to have her audition for in the fall. During the fall semester the rehearsals are 20 minutes from our house on Monday nights. During the spring the rehearsals are 45 minutes from our house so I am only planning on signing her up for the fall semester. I'm thinking Oliver can take gymnastics on Monday nights in the fall (5 minutes from the church where the choir rehearses). I am going to give Ian the choice of either being in a choir or gymnastics. He would only be eligible for the younger choir (they have three different choirs for children in grades 3-12). Nadia is old enough to be in the middle choir. I am planning on working with her to prepare her for the audition. I know she'd rather be in a choir for grades 5-9 than one for grades 3-6. They also have a music camp each summer that is only ten minutes from our house. I'm thinking of sending Nadia and Ian to that camp next summer. You can attend either half-day (9-12) or full day (9-4). I took pictures and videos this evening but haven't uploaded them to my computer yet.

 I have to admit I really, really missed my mom this evening. She was always my #1 fan when it came to musical performances. If I was on stage with school or at church whether I was playing the flute or singing or playing the handbells, her face was the one I most longed to see in the audience. She had the most beautiful smile. It was so reassuring to see her face from the platform. She gave very encouraging and specific feedback afterwards. I can think of no one else in my life who has ever come close to giving me such meaningful feedback. When she was alive, it was a top priority for her to drive up here to attend a program that my children were in. Sometimes she would drive 3.5 hours, attend the one hour program, and drive 3.5 hours back. That is true love. I remember balling my eyes out so badly in August 2016 outside the church building a little bit before the kids' musical because it was the first one she was going to miss as she died in July 2016. I didn't know if I could bear to attend the program it was so very painful to me that my mom wasn't there. I remember

calling my aunt on the phone in the parking lot and sobbing my heart out to her. She helped me get it together enough to go in and be there for my kids. I wish my mom could have been there tonight. I have no idea if while she's in Heaven she was able to hear them sing or not. I know she'd have been proud of them if she had been able to attend. Her grandchildren were such a VERY important part of her life. I missed her a little on Mother's Day, but I missed her far more tonight. Now that Soul Patrol is on break until September, it means Oliver will be sitting in the worship service each week and then going to his 1st/2nd grade boys' class for the second service. I taught the 3rd-5th grade girl's class in the second service today because my choir didn't sing today. Oliver needs to work on his behavior in sitting through a service that typically lasts at least 75 minutes and sometimes lasts 90 minutes. He'd rather attend the Kidzway class two services in a row, but I'm not giving him that option! At least one of our kids participated in the summer musical at the Alliance Church from 2012-2017, but they have discontinued that program which they had run for decades. So the kids won't be in a choir this summer. Hopefully there will be some new recruits for the Soul Patrol choir in the fall because Nadia and Grace are graduating out of the choir and three other kids are moving this summer (one as far away as Florida). So that means at least 1/3 of the choir won't be returning in the fall, and Ian will be the oldest one in the choir (and the only 4th grader in the choir).

Pool Party!

Yesterday morning the kids had gym class and Nadia had art class. We were home for about 2.5 hours. I mowed the lawn before we returned to church for their first dress rehearsal. After I dropped them off, I met my friend Cheri at a walking path in Danville, and we walked for about an hour. This morning the kids and I left the house a little after 8:00 to return for their second dress rehearsal. I walked for about an hour on roads near the church and then worked through part of a photography class during their rehearsal. Once that was done, we drove to one of Nadia's friends' house for a pool party. I have known this mom since 2004. We went to the same church from 2004-2008 and were at Bible studies together more recently than that. This was their third year of hosting a pool party in May. Their pool is heated. The weather wasn't as cooperative the last two years, but it was a beautiful day for a pool party today. It's supposed to be even warmer tomorrow. It's basically a 40 degree temperature swing over the course of the week as the highs were in the 40's last Sunday and it's supposed to be in the 80's tomorrow. Neither the 40's nor the 80's are normal for Pennsylvania in May. We were wearing long sleeve shirts and winter coats last Sunday-Tuesday, and today the kids were wearing bathing suits! Unfortunately I forgot to bring sunscreen. OOPS!!! Oliver only had a small spot of sunburn on his face, but the other two really got burned on their faces. I feel terrible about this. Hopefully I'll do better the rest of the summer with remembering to use sunscreen. I surely don't want them to get skin cancer some day because I forgot to use sunscreen. We were at the party for five hours, and we only left because I was exhausted and ready to go home. The kids had a blast!