Fun weekend

This was waiting for us in the hotel room when we got there. Michael's aunt and uncle Tony and Virginia) had gone and checked into our room and left us the goodies.
Here we are at the concert. It was better than amazingly fabulous!!! It was like a dream. We had so much fun. There was even a surprise guest appearance by STEVIE WONDER! We were glad that hadn't announced that or there wouldn't have been all the empty seats around us. We were about 12 rows from the stage. We could see Kenny G's fingers flying all over his saxophone. As amazing as his recordings are, live and in person is 100xs more so! The weather was perfect-star filled night about 65 degrees, light breeze. What a WONDERFUL way to celebrate 18 years together. I'm so thankful to the Lord for so sweetly working out all the details. And to Tony and Gin for all they did to make the weekend so sweet and special. It sounds goofy, but I'd specifically prayed that there wouldn't be an earthquake while we were there. I didn't think it was a prayer that meant too much until I heard today there was one in LA today!!

The fun side of being frugal

Ok, I've actually found that being frugal and finding deals and providing for my family for little $$ is fun in and of itself-almost additictive as a matter of fact. However, today Michael and I get to reap the benefits practically of saving dollars here and there, as well as revel in the faithfulness of God to provide for us. This month someone moved into our lovely house in TN. Michael and I had decided to still live on the budget that we had created with 2 house payments, 2 utlitity bills, yard/pool maintenance in TN, etc. just to save the money and learn to live way below our means. We were able to do that this month-praise God- and with the money we have not spent this month, I'm surprising Michael for our anniversary (which is this coming up Monday) and flying us out to Los Angelos to see Kenny G (one of our favorites for our whole married life) in concert. I told him about the surprise on Monday and he's been pumped all week. Amamzingly, the boys kept the secret for weeks! The boys are going to stay at my mom and dad's house. (It's SOOOO great having them close enough to be able to keep the boys. ) Michael's amazing aunt and uncle that live in the LA area are going to let us borrow one of their cars AND are paying for us to stay at a hotel as their anniversary present to us. That was a wonderful blessing and surprise that will certainly keep the cost of the west coast jaunt down! Couple that with great airfare on Southwest Airlines (even on a direct flight) and I was able to get tickets in the best section of the theatre and the whole price is still hundreds of dollars less than what we saved this month! I'm so excited! The theatre is open air, so it'll be a "concert under the stars" with Kenny G in the deliciously cool southern California evening (like it's supposed to be in the 60s!!!) So, we leave tonight and return on Sunday evening. It's so worth it to save money-and to reinvest your savings in making memories!

cute cousins

Here's a picture of Josiah with David, Katie and Lauren right after bathtime eating a bedtime snack. Julie and Mike just bought a new table that has a bench seat. It was so fun because lots of little cousin bottoms could fit on it at the same time! BTW, David looks SOOO much like Josiah did when Josiah was 1.

A day at our house

Just wanted to take a moment to share the moments of my day that make me think, "I love mylife!" Right now, Jeffrey and Josiah just got back from Vacation Bible School at First Baptist Castroville. We decided at the last minute yesterday to go and they've both had a really fun time. This morning while they were gone Jonathan and Jeremy were doing science experiements for their science and left in the sink the test tubes they used. Well, when Jeffrey got home and was unloading the dishwasher, he noticed the test tubes and his mind started going. Immediately he and Josiah started rummaging through the pantry to see what kinds of things they could mix together to make a cool concoction, preferably one that bubbles up over the top like a "mad scientist". So, while they're singing Bible school songs, they are dumping all kinds of things into test tubes. With a little prompting from me to "Try vinegar with the baking soda" they've been trying to get an equally "bubbly" reaction. Jeffrey's favorite so far was baking soda, vinegar and lemon extract. Josiah's currently working on one that involves peanut butter, curry powder, soap, lemon extract, vinegar and drops from his juicy drop candy. HMMM, sure smells interesting!
Meanwhile, I'm slowly proding through an online defensive driving course. Welcome to Texas, here's a speeding ticket! So maybe I don't love that part of life so much, but at least I'm in my kitchen watching my boys have fun!

"You mean girls don't play like this?"

Of all the great things that happened last week at my sister's house, the highlight of which was the birth of Daniel James Turner on July 14 at 9:23pm (more details and pics to come), one of the most fun (and funny) was watching all the cousins play together. It started the first day we got there with a rousing game of kickball with the dads and all the cousins. I don't think Josiah even went in the house until we'd been at Julie's for hours...straight outside to play with Lauren. It was hilarious to watch Lauren and Josiah play, especially in ways that Josiah NEVER plays at home with a bunch of brothers. For example, the first night, Lauren had Josiah playing "wedding". They were getting married and Lauren had it all planned out. It's just hilarious. Girls even come up with pretend names while they play!!! Lauren's name was Layla and she made Josiah come up with a name. I think it was Lucas or something like that. Because he so loves playing with Lauren, he played wedding that whole night, they even had wedding cake (strawberry shortcake from dessert) and went on a honeymoon, quickly followed by a trip to the hospital to have a baby. Thank goodness they're 6 and 7, it keeps it all totally innocent!! Well the next day Lauren was ready to pick up the wedding pretend. "Josiah, let's turn on music and dance. It'll be like our wedding dance". Enough! Josiah said "I don't want to have a wedding dance. Let's just turn the music on and spin around until we fall down"-boy style is back!! There was still plenty of playing "store" and using pretend names, but Josiah had drawn a line at the wedding. I'm still laughing about that!
So then a couple of days later the boys were outside playing with Cole, a friend who lives behind Julie. Julie had been having a problem with hornets outside. Well, enter boys in all their boy-ness. They decided to do what Jeffrey called "Conquering the tormentors". They were taking plastic baseball bats and hitting and swatting at the hornets trying to kill them. They actually hit a couple and knocked them out. Then they ran into Julie and asked for a paper plate and some tweezers to dissect the victims. Of course, all the boys are totally involved and intent on the pursuit and quest. Lauren had long since given up understanding this game and had come inside. The boys proceeded to pull the stinger out of the hornets (one of the hornets was about an inch long-these are big bugs!). Julie was trying to gently and tactfully tell them that they were being pretty dumb and that they could very easily get stung. But what do females understand of this male conquering desire??? Jonathan said it all when he said "You mean girls don't play like this?"
In case we were wondering...boys and girls are not and will never be the same!!!

The boy brain

My sister and I were laughing a couple of weeks ago following an ultrasound she had of her baby who will make his debut next week. The technician had asked if she knew the sex of the baby and when Julie said she knew it was supposed to be a boy, the technician confirmed it and then turned the screen closer to Julie. She (the tech) said, "I want to show you clearly that he does have a brain. There will be days coming where you will wonder". We laughed about that and I kinda thought to myself, "That's true, but I don't remember the last time the boys did something totally wacko." Until yesterday. They all went out exploring to their favorite spot, which isn't even on our property. 10 acres no longer has the sense of enormity it used to. So there's a lake and what the boys call a gorge about 1 mile away. It's a pretty area and really quiet. No one has ever asked them not to walk around or play around there, so they do. Well, near this lake are t wo BIG longhorn cattle. I had the boys take me one day last week to show me where they explore, just so I'll know. I saw these cows (albeit at a distance) and was pretty impressed by them. There are two of them. Well in the post-exploration debrief yesterday (which almost always is filled with fun stories and adventures that they're beginning to put into a book) I found out that Jeremy and Jeffrey decided it would be really cool to get close to the longhorns. Jeremy told me that he was close enough that he could have reached out and pet it if he wanted to, while Jeffrey was crouched down in some tall grass staring at it eye to eye. WHAT???? I'm for the most part pretty laid back about boy-ness, but that was just plain dumb! So needless to say, there will be a strong refresher course on respecting animals and nature VERY soon-like today! And I'm on my way to find my baby books and look at the ultrasound pictures!

Back at blogging

After a very long hiatus, I'm back at blogging! Mostly because the boys keep saying "Mom, you should blog this". One (big) problem is finding/making the time to do it. The other is that I can't find my camera, cord to charge the camera battery, or the cord to connect the camera to the computer. I did get a very nifty and fast laptop for my birthday (thanks to my dear wonderful husband) so I'll bet I could load the pics on REALLY fast if only I had my camera. The joys of moving! So until then, the posts will be text only, as boring as that may be. But, it's better than nothing! Remember the story in the Bible when Elijah prayed and threw a stick into water and made anax head float to the top of a lake (2 Kings 6:5), well several times since our move I've prayed that God would help certain things "float to the surface" that have been lost, and they've shown up. So now, I'm praying that for the camera!

Several more posts will come up soon to give the latest adventures of our lives here in Texas.
Jennie