Abdelnor Family

2009-03-25T08:29:00.002-05:00

If you have a Harris Teeter near by, this week is the week to go. We do not usually shop at HT because generally their prices are a little higher than Wal-Mart or Food Lion, but there are alot of great things you can get for FREE or for less than $2 with their triple coupon week so I made the trip last night. Go here for a list of items on sale and coupons that match and see the great deals you can get. The sale ends on 3/31 so make your list and plan a trip. My total before coupons was 45.76 then after the coupons it came to 22.52! That is a huge savings in my book, I was thrilled! I will post tomorrow about how I did at Walgreens this week.

CVS Deals

2009-03-10T16:42:00.002-05:00

As I mentioned yesterday, I have come across a great website that has helped me find some awesome deals this week. Today I went to CVS and here is what I got:

Transaction #1-
(1) Crest Pro Health Toothpaste $2.99
(2) Hydralicious products $2.88 ea
Use:
(1) -$1 off Pro Health PG 2/08
(1) -$3/2 off Herbal Essences PG 2/08
Total Due: $4.75
pay with $4 ECB and 1.07
Get Back: $4 ECB

ECB's are coupons that print out at the end of your receipt when you purchase certain items that qualify for them. I had $4 ECB's from last week.

Transaction #2
Buy:
(1) Cheerios Cereal 3.34
(1) Lucky Charms Cereal 3.34
(1) Fiber One Bars 3.34
Use:
(1)-.55 off Lucky Charms
(1)-.55 off Cheerios
(1)-.60 off Fiber One Bars
Total Due: $7.75
pay with $4 ECB from #1 and $4.50
Get Back: $5 ECB to use next week!
This week the deal was, when you buy any 3 of General Mills items, you get back $5 ECB's
Total spent for both transactions $5.57!!! And I have $5 ECB for next week!!!

My New Hobby

2009-03-09T11:19:00.004-05:00

I have discovered the GREATEST website EVER and wanted to share it with you and show you how much I saved when doing what "Jenny" (the lady who finds all the deals) said to do. This site tells you about all the sales at various stores and where you can find coupons for the same items to make the item VERY cheap or even FREE!
Here is what I got today at Walgreens-

3 Huggies- $10 each

2 Glade Lasting Impressions- $7.99 each

2 Glade Sense & Spray- $7.99 each

2 Coffemate Creamer- $2.49 B1G1

2 Colgate Total Toothpaste- $3.49 each

1 Garnier Fructis Shampoo, 1 Garnier Fructis Conditioner- 2.99 each

3 pks. Orbit gum- .66 each

Wal-Zyr Tablets(allgery medicine)- 3.99

Headache Medicine 20 ct. (WG brand Excedrin)- 2.99

TOTAL W/ TAX--- 92.80

Then I used these coupons:

3) -$5 off Huggies printable (will work for any type)

(2) Glade B1G1 printable

(2)-$4 off Glade Manufacturer coupon

(4) -$4 off Glade Walgreens coupon (only need one, computer will take it off x 4)

(2)-$1.50 off Coffee Mate printable

-$2 Garnier Walgreens coupon

-$1 Garnier RP 2/08

-$1.50 Colgate Walgreens coupon

-$1 Colgate Coupon

-3/.99 for Orbit Gum Walgreens coupon

MY NEW TOTAL: 32.60

I also got $10 back in Register Rewards which you get for purchasing $25 or more of Huggies products, and you can use that on your next purchase.

Now I could have split up my items into 2 different transactions and used the $10 RR in the 2nd transaction and saved even more money, but I didn't want people behind me to have to wait too long, so I will just use it next time.

Also, Walgreens has a rebate program and every month there are new deals, some items during the month will go on sale and they will end up being free after the rebate. The Wal-Zyr(3.99) and the Headache Medicine(2.99) I will get for free when I submit my rebates for the month. I will do a post on that later this month so you can see how using the rebate system can actually make you a little money.

So after RR's and Rebates- I only end up spending- $15!!!!

Now, here is the link to this awesome site to whome all credit is due,

www.southernsavers.com

Check back tomorrow for how I did at CVS, more great buys!!

Winter Happenings

2009-02-19T11:15:00.002-05:00

Well, alot has happened since I last posted. I guess the biggest news is that my step-daughter Kysia(Ki-sa), has come to live with us. She is 15 and is expecting a baby in April. We are blessed to be able to assist her during this hard time in her life. We believe that the Lord has brought her here for a reason.
We had a nice Christmas, my other step-daughter Alison came for two weeks and Al's mom came for a few days. Here is a nice family shot. You will have to excuse me, I got so carried away with the excitement of the morning, that I forgot to put on makeup or do my hair.

Kysia, Sam and I went to my mom's in Charlotte for a few days in December too. Here is Kysia holding my brother's baby, TJ.

We had a Christmas play at church and here is Caleb, Sam and Andrew doing their part. We will leave out pictures of Al and I playing Mom and Dad. How we got picked out of the church to do the adult roles, I don't know, but I bet we won't be picked again!

And here are pictures of the big January snow we had. It was beautiful! I do love the snow, but I was glad to get out again after it was gone.

I will try and be a little more diligent at posting, my goal is to post once a week even if I have no pictures to post. Have a good weekend!

Nan-Nan comes for a visit

2008-10-11T18:01:00.003-05:00

My mom came Friday and we went to Hill Ridge Farms in Youngsville, it was so cute! Sam had a blast running to this and that. We also enjoyed a hayride and got to pick out a pumpkin. The weather was perfect until it rained a little, but it shooed most people home so we had the place almost to ourselves. Thanks mom for the eventful weekend, we enjoyed visiting with you!

New Music!!!

2008-09-29T14:50:00.001-05:00

Make sure your speakers are turn on and up, I loaded some new musice to my playlist and this time it is the full song, not just a clip. I didn't realize that until after I had loaded the last playlist, sorry about that.

More on Sam the Ice Skater

2008-09-29T10:22:00.002-05:00

Ok, so lessons are going pretty well, I am surprised at how well he is picking up on new thigs. I think by the end of the 8 weeks he will be a pro. Ok, well not really, but he should be almost ready for hockey. I think one more class then in Jan we will be ready to learn hockey skills. I am just going to continue to post my videos on YouTube cause it is easy so check them out I have posted two more from this past weekend.

Ice Skating Lessons

2008-09-20T18:56:00.002-05:00

Well most of you probably already know that Sam is in his second week of ice skating. He absolutely loves it! He is determined to be on a hockey team, so we will see how all this plays out. It is quite funny to watch him skate, he doesn't really skate, he walks real fast, so hopefully he will grasp the concept of gliding soon. Here is a little clip I was able to capture on my camera, hope it turns out ok. I had problems uploading to Blogger, so I had to upload it to YouTube and then imbed it here. Enjoy!
OK well I am going to just post the link to watch it on YouTube, cause it won't let me copy and paste the code and I am not sure I understand why, html, boggles my mind!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTlGBbhM2dM

2008-08-26T07:51:00.002-05:00

Yesterday I turned 28, oh my goodness, I do not like the sound of that. I am not too thrilled about approaching 30, but I can't do anything to stop it so I need to learn to love my birthdays I guess. We did have a good time as a family. When Al got home from work he brought me a dozen roses and all day Sam kept making me things. We went out to Kanki for dinner and then walked around the mall which Al did with no complaints. Thank you to all of you for the birthday wishes and the gifts/cards, it really did make my day special.

Renovated Porch

2008-08-24T14:48:00.004-05:00

We are FINALLY done with our screened in porch that we have been working on slowly for the past month. I am so tickled, I just love it! Now if it would just get a bit cooler so I can enjoy it. I could only find this one before shot(I forgot to take one) and this is from like 2 yrs. ago. The rocking chairs were dwindled down from 4 to 2 and also a stray cat took residence in there last winter so there was misc. cat stuff everywhere. It was in bad need of some TLC.

Before: Notice the carpet, this is newly installed here, it did not look this good after Mr. Kitty moved out.

AFTER!!! Pulled up carpet, stained floors and raillings, install new ceiling fan, new furniture, new rug, plants and of course you can't leave out the decor.

I love this lighthouse canvas I found at Carolina Pottery, great store for those of you who have never been. On the table sits a rock with a lighthouse on it with Psalm 119:105 , a reed diffuser, and a bowl of seashells underneath.

New Home!!

2008-08-17T13:57:00.004-05:00

Well, not really in the sense that you may be thinking, but we have made some changes around here that make things look a little new to us. First of all I worked on our school area for two days to get everything organized and get rid of last years stuff(I know-- I should have done that at the end of the year). We have new decorations and I got rid of the piano in that room to give us a little more space in our little school niche. Sam is so thrilled about the look of the new school stuff he was begging me to start school on Friday. Strange child, but I love him anyways! When I moved the piano, I then had to move lots of other things so every room got a new look. And yes I did say "I", Al was at work when I decided to do all of this so he came home at 2 am Friday morning and was shocked! Needless to say I was moving furniture for about 3 hrs. We have way too much furniture for our little home, but anyways, here are some pictures!

Here is the living room/school area. I moved the longest couch to the right, the loveseat is turned a little to give me more room for my easel, and found a perfect spot for that little table behind the couch
I guess you can tell what this is. On the big wall it says Welcome to 1st Grade and the other wall says Learning is Fun. When I am teaching I bring over my rolly chair from the computer area and that little table beside Sam's desk is my "desk" that easily folds away.
The dining area has a sideboard in it now on the other side of the table. The table used to sit by its lonesome right under the light, but I kaddy-kornered(is that a word?) it and made room for the sideboard or buffet, whatever you call it. This is an inherited piece from Al's dad that we will never be rid of, along with many other things.
And the den-- Here is where I moved the piano--I know it is on an outside wall and that is a big no-no, but I really have no choice unless it goes back to its orginal home. The long couch on the right used to sit in front of the window and I like the openness of the window much better.
The couch is used as kind of a wall to separate the dining room and the den.

Birthday Week

2008-08-11T09:53:00.003-05:00

Wow, what a week we have had! We had a birthday boy who had lots of fun! I tried to do a post with some baby pictures earlier in the week, but the lady at Rite-Aid messed up when scanning my pictures, so I wasn't able to load them. So here's what's been going on. Tuesday was his actual birthday, so in the morning we went to the Greene's and hung out there for a while then headed to Sam's favorite, Red Robin for lunch. We spent some time at The Factory watching people ice skate, then headed home. We opened presents then did our usual, yard work and house cleaning. On Friday and Sat. we spent 6 hours or so at church putting together John/Romans booklets in Spanish to send to the Canary Islands. Sat. evening we headed to the Buffalo Lanes North for Sam's birthday party. All the kids had a blast and even the adults bowled. My mom and her husband came up as well as Al's mom and Jim. Sam got to open even more presents when we got home. You should see all this stuff he got, it looks like Christmas around here. Boy we really do need another child so he won't be so spoiled!

New Recipes

2008-08-02T19:11:00.003-05:00

Boy do I have some yummy new dishes for you all to try out! For those of you who do not know, I have been doing weight watchers now for about 7 weeks. I have been trying to come up with new and a little healthier options for dinner. Al is not dieting with me so I have to still be able to come up with things that are palatable for him as well as figure friendly for me. Most times I have to just forego one of the side items I have prepared for him. So anyways, I have a hard time trying to figure out the Points value of some of the things that I make, so I am always looking for recipes that have the nutrition information included. I found this one at the grocery store by Pillsbury and so far the two dishes I have made are wonderful, which is thrilling to me cause the past two weeks I have made some real bombers! Yuck! So here they are:

Chicken Saltimbocca- 4 servings

4 boneless skinless chicken breasts- the thin kind if you don't want to pound it thin

1/3 cup flour

2 tbsp. grated parmesan cheese

1 tsp. italian seasoning

1/2 tsp. salt

2 tbsp. olive oil

4 slices prosciutto- pronounced pro-shoe-toe

4 slices mozzarella cheese

1 tsp. chopped sage- optional

3/4 cup chicken broth

1 tbsp. butter

1. If you didn't buy the thin breasts, then first pound the meat with a mallet between two sheets of wax paper or plastic wrap.

2. Mix flour, parmesan cheese, italian seasoning and salt.

3. Coat each piece of chicken with flour mixture, shake off excess.

4. Heat olive oil in a non-stick skillet over medium-high heat. Add chicken, cook about 8 min., turning once, until browned and no longer pink inside.

5. Top each chicken breast with 1 slice of prosciutto and 1 slice of mozzarella, cover skillet and cook 1 to 2 min, or until cheese is melted. Remove chicken from skillet and place on serving platter.

6. Increase heat to high. Add broth to skillet. Heat to a boiling, scraping up any browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Boil for about 3 min or until broth is reduced to about 1/4 cup. Remove from heat and add butter, after it melts, give a good stir and then spoon this over the chicken. Top with freshly chopped sage if you wish.

Per Serving: Calories 460, Total Fat 24g, Sodium 1130 mg, Fiber 0g-Points value 11

The prosciutto gives the chicken a nice flavor. This is not particularly a low fat dish but if you pair it with some healthy sides as I did with the green beans and roasted potatoes it only adds 2 more points to the meal.

Chicken Florentine Skillet- 6 servings

8 oz. farfalle noodles or some sort of short noodle the orginal recipe called for wagon wheels

1 1/4 cups half and half

2 tbsp. flour

1 tsp salt

1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg

1 tbsp. butter

1 pkg. of chicken breast tenders cut into bite-sized pieces

1 (14.5oz.)can diced tomatoes, drained

1 cup fresh mushrooms, sliced

1 bag fresh baby spinach leaves

1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

1. Cook and drain pasta.

2. While pasta is cooking, stir 1/4 cup of half and half, flour, salt and nutmeg until smooth; set aside.

3. In a large skillet melt butter over medium-high heat. Add chicken; cook 6 to 8 mins. stirring occasionally, until browned. Stir in tomatoes, mushrooms and spinach. Cook about 5 min. stirring occasionally until mushrooms are tender.

4. Reduce heat to low. Stir in half and half mixture from earlier. Then mix in pasta. Cook about 1 min. Stir in remaining 1 cup of half and half. Sprinkle with cheese and cover. Serve after cheese is melted.

Serving Size: 1 1/3 cup

Per Serving: Calories 400, Total Fat 13g, Sodium 880 mg, Fiber 3g-Points Value 8

This one is the best out of the two and you can sneak in some spinach for those picky eaters. I served this with a ceaser salad and it was delicious!

2008-07-21T11:28:00.003-05:00

OK, so here is the funny story. It might not be so funny reading it but it was hilarious at the time! So we were at Ober Gatlinburg, which is this ski and amusement park on top of a mountain over looking Gatlinburg. They have a bunch of water slides and a huge bob sledding track and a pirate ship ride. Well Sam knew about the pirate ship and had been planning to ride it. When we got there we saw that is was a pretty big one, now it didn't go upside down and flip over like some do but it did go up pretty high. Al didn't think Sam should ride it but he really want to ride. I convinced him to let him try it, cause he was above the height requirement so it couldn't be that bad. So they get on, Al, Sam, Alison and my brother George. It goes back and forth 2 times then the third time up Sam had this horrified look on his face.

Then the 4th time this is what I saw:

Can you find Sam? Here I will zoom in so you can see better.

Did you see him under the bar? Alison is laughing about as hard as I am right now. I had tears running down my cheeks and was about to wet my pants.

Here is another one, now this time it is going even higher. You can see Sam's shirt a little bit under the bar. And check out Al's face.

And this the smile after the ride.

Mom: Sam, how was it? You want to ride it again with Mom?

Sam: It was great!! Oh No, I'm not riding that thing again!!

Vacation Pictures

2008-07-16T10:52:00.004-05:00

OK..... Well I have finally gotten with the program and found the time to post. We had a great time in the mountains, it was nice to get away from home for a bit, but very nice to get home, I am not sure I know which feeling is better. But anyways, like Sara M. I have tons and tons of pictures I want to post so bear with me, I will try not to bore all of you. Today I will just post some of my favs and tomorrow I will share a funny story and more pictures.

At an ol'timey diner

A bunch of sleepy kids on the way home

On the chair lift in Gatlinburg

My handsome brother George on the trolley

Enjoying the hot tub

Miss Alison hanging out on the deck

Grandma and Sam down by the creek

Al and I atop the mtn. at Ober Gatlinburg

Panning for gold in Cherokee

This is my favorite of all the pictures we took. We stopped at an overlook in the Smokey Mtn. National Park and took this one.

Good Times in Charlotte

2008-06-07T18:47:00.004-05:00

Sam and I went to visit my Mom for a few days. We got in thursday late afternoon and came home today. Yesterday we got to ride the new light rail, called the Lynx, into uptown. It was very nice and classy, you know sometimes you feel kind of creeped out on those things, but it wasn't at all like that. We went to ImaginOn, a childrens library that has alot of hands on activites, like dress up areas, little cushion seats shaped like puzzles that the kids can play around with, and lots of video game corners, which seemed odd to me to be in a library, but kids were there instead of getting into trouble. The Taste of Charlotte was going on as well which is just where alot of restuarants have samples of foods for a fee of course, but the idea is you go around and try lots of different things. We didn't do that, but they did have a kids area with all sorts of inflatables that were free. It was only like 102 outside, but Sam managed to enjoy them a little. He was one worn out little man afterwards. So here are some pictures of our events.

The Kindergarten Graduate

2008-05-16T11:23:00.005-05:00

Last night we had Sam and his buddy Caleb's Kindergarten graduation. They were so cute in their little caps and gowns! I am very glad everything was a success, everyone remembered their parts for the program and he is officially done with Kindergarten. Well not really, we won't be done until the end of the month or maybe first week of June. Al's mom and Jim came up for the ceremony and we went out to dinner at Sam's favorite place, Red Robin. It was a great day for all of us I would have to say! I am going to post lots of pictures for those who missed it.

Sam and Caleb

With Grandmama and Grandaddy

Dad and Sam

Doing the Pledge to the Flag and the Bible

Reading

Turning their tassels

Sam and Caleb are the presidents telling King Darius about Daniel praying

Taking Daniel to the Lion's Den

Singing

His cake minus the decorations

Here is one of the decorations

Daddy, oh how we love him!!

Favorite Pastime

2008-05-06T17:41:00.002-05:00

I don't know if you would call this a pastime or not since we have only been doing it since we moved into this house, but one of our most favorite things to do is to sit on our front porch. Especially on Mon. or Tues. evenings when the whole family is home, after working in the yard all day and after dinner we will sit out there and just chat for an hour or two. Or until the bats start flying... Al is terrified of the bats, it is pretty funny actually. I am laughing just thinking about it! He will push anyone out of his way to get to the door so you better watch out. Here are a few pictures of Sam hanging out on the front porch last night.

Food

2008-04-29T12:20:00.003-05:00

Usually when we have a service during the week at church we end up eating dinner at like 9:30 and I know that is horrible to do. So since I have decided for the umpteenth time to go on some sort of diet, I thought we should start trying to eat dinner before church. Well last night before revival Sam and I ate hamburgers, but Al was napping and said he would eat after church. It was funny cause usually I do most of the cooking at home, so I offered to cook while he put Sam to bed and he said and I quote, "Let me show you how to make a REAL burger!" As I was finishing up reading to Sam when Al came in very excited about his creation and holding it like it was a prized possesion. I just had to take a picture of this monster burger, and thought, Oh, I can have something to blog! So here he is saying, "This is what's really going on!" I had to remind him that you can hear no sound in pictures. He is a funny man.

I sure am glad he doesn't do all the cooking at home. He is a wonderful cook, but I would never be able to lose weight!

My Hair Dilemma Updated

2008-04-07T09:25:00.003-05:00

I am very frustrated with my hair right now and something has to be done! I had been thinking of letting it grow out but I end up wearing it put up half of the time when it is long. I just don't know what would look best on me and I need some help. I am going to post some old photos of my hair when it is longer and then some of how it was last summer cut short with alot of layers and you will have to give me your opinion. I will post the pictures later on today after I have a chance to scan them.

Sorry it took an entire day to get these pictures on here. So now tell me what you think.
BTW- the picture of Sam and I to the right is what my hair looks like right now.

This is like almost 2 years ago

This is last summer- I really like this style but it is so much maintenence, but I guess it might take some work to look presentable

This is from about 4 yrs. ago- as you can see I am alot thinner so my face is not a fat, I think that makes a huge difference in the hairstyle I can wear.

We're Ba-ack!

2008-03-22T14:53:00.005-05:00

Ok, well I think I have ended my blog sabatacal(sp?), so I will give a little update on what has been going on the past few months. Let's see since the last time I posted was Nov., I guess I should mention that we had a great Christmas. We had decided to not spend much money for gifts and such, but that somehow got thrown out the window. Alison came for about a week during that time as well. Sam was a shepard in a play at church, it was so cute!! Too late for me to post pictures now, but just take my word for it. We have been on quite a few field trips with the homeschool group, to the NC Natural Sciences Museum, NC History Museum, and to the NC Aquarium in Roanoke Island. Sam loves getting together with his friends each week for chapel. Al and I cooked for our church's Valentines Banquet and it went rather well, I think. Oh, and we had our first Missions Conference a few weeks ago which was great. School has not been so challenging anymore, granted it does take up 2 hrs. sometimes to get through phonics, but I have just come to accept that fact now. We should be done right on time as of right now. Sam is reading pretty well and can write anything you tell him to (you have to spell it too) and is doing very well in math.
So today we went to Sears cause I had a coupon, to get some Easter pictures taken. I wasn't too thrilled with the staff, but I wanted to try somewhere new. I have always taken him to the picture people and I think I may go back there next time.
Hope everyone has a wonderful Resurrection Sunday!!

Thanksgiving Trip

2007-11-30T19:41:00.000-05:00

Well now that it is a week later I guess it is time I showed you some pictures of our little trip last week. Al had to work on Thanksgivng Day so rather than be at home alone, Sam and I went to my mom's in Charlotte on Wed. then after we had dinner with her on Thursday we headed to to the mountains to see my dad's family. Ever since I was born we always went to my Grandaddy's for Thanksgiving, so it was nice to be able to go again. Since I have been married things haven't been quite the same when it comes to holiday traditions, but I am sure you all know how that goes.

Here is my beautiful mother taking a small break from cooking.
It snowed Thursday night at at my dad's place! Very exciting!!
Here is Sam and his one and only cousin William
My dad playing pool at Aunt Marias (used to be grandaddy's house)
Brother George, Brother Thomas and new sister-in-law Sarah
Sister Grace and little William
Since all my dad's kids were in the same place for once in a very long time we decided to have an early surprise birthday party for him. He was very surprised and it was alot of fun getting ready for it.

When Sam grows up...

2007-11-26T10:00:00.000-05:00

On Sat. when we were driving back from the mtns. Sam was telling me all about how his life was gonna be when he is "all growed up" as he puts it. He is going to marry a girl at our church, we will leave her unnamed for now and they are going to have 6 kids. They will have an all blue house, inside and out, everything except the furniture will be blue. Everyone in the family will share a room, all 6 kids and him and his wife, one great big room with a bunch of beds(your poor wife). He them tells me that his wife is gonna go to work at Taco Bell while he stays at home and cleans the house(again, your poor, poor wife). After a little lesson from myself he then decides that his wife can stay at home but he is going to find a job that is easy like taking peoples money at the store. He is going to take his kids to do fun stuff all the time like go to the fair and the circus and the go-cart place. They will eat popcorn and fruit roll-ups at the fair and ride all the rides. But some of the kids will have to just watch because there will only be enough room for one kid to ride with him. I thought it was so cute him thinking about all of this, but kind of scary at the same time. He adds a little more to the story everyday now as well.

Thanksgiving Program

2007-11-21T08:23:00.000-05:00

Yesterday Sam had his first little program in school. His homeschool group did a program at church in the morningThey all dressed up as Indians and Pilgrims. Most of us moms got together and made their outfits. I was really proud of how Sam's turned out, it was my first sewing project ever completed. Much thanks goes to Kelly F and Kelly G for their assistance! My mom even came up to spend the day and watch Sam. Sam went back with her last night and I am headed to her house today. I will leave there tomorrow to head to my dad's where I will see all of my siblings and my little nephew. I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving!

2007-11-16T07:12:00.000-05:00

Here is a latest picture of my little man. He is so funny when I try to take pictures of him, he trys to make all these different poses and faces. I know it has been forever since I blogged last, I haven't really been in the mood for it. But we are all doing well. School has been a little bumpy this past couple of weeks, so I will be gald for a little break next week. Sam and I are headed to my dad's in the mountains of NC on Wed. , we will be home on Sat. I am looking forward to seeing all of my siblings again, we haven't all been together in a long time. Today we are going on a field trip with the homeschool group to the Museum of Natural Sciences. We have been there probably a dozen times in the past 2 years, but I know Sam will enjoy being with his little buddies and I will definitely enjoy the fellowship with the other mom's. After the field trip we are going to work on our indian costumes for our kids thanksgiving program next week. This will be Sam's first program ever, I am so excited to watch him. We are also preparing for a Christmas one he has in Dec. I really do love the little homeschool group because it gives him the chance to do things that he would kind of miss out on if we didn't have it.

Fall Funtasia Slide Show!

2007-10-27T19:47:00.001-05:00

Fall Funtasia

2007-10-27T19:37:00.000-05:00

Today we had our big fall outing with our sending church, Calvary Baptist, at William B. Umstead State Park. The these was hillbilly, so everyone was dressed up in their hillbilly clothes, it was really quite funny. Al had to work so Sam and I went at it alone and got lost. We were an hour late, but that's ok, we made it. Sam had lots of fun playing with all the kids. There was fun little games and good food too. Although I am on a diet, I did have to splurge and have some dirt cake. I was good though, I took along my salad with grilled chicken and it was quite good too. Anyways, I am pooped from such a long day. Hope everyone has a wonderful Lord's Day!

It's our Anniversary!

2007-10-22T20:31:00.000-05:00

Today we celebrated our 4 yr. anniversary. We had someone watch Sam and we went out to dinner at Outback, then we went to Lowe's, sounds like fun huh? You know you are getting old when going to home improvement stores has become good times. Anyways, we enjoyed getting out alone. Here are a few pictures Aunt Seece snapped before we headed out. Don't mind the one with Al's head chopped off, it was a good one of me so I had to include it.

2007-10-13T19:48:00.000-05:00

Here is Sam watering the plants for me. These little monkey grass things we have out front have been planted for over a year now and still have not gotten any bigger, so I thought I would start watering them at least 3 times a week and we will see if that helps. Below are the pictures of the house with the newly painted shutters and front door. I couldn't find any good pics of before, so you will just have to imagine. The door was white and the shutters were black. Although, the blue isn't quite how I had hoped, it looks better than before.

2007-10-11T21:14:00.000-05:00

I was going to post a few pictures of some school activities, but blogger will not let me today for some reason. Oh, well your not missing much, just Sam finger painting and riding on his 4-wheeler. We have been just busy busy busy around here! Al's mom came last weekend and we took Sam to Railroad Days in Slema, which was a big flop, I wouldn't waste your time going there next year. We had our monthly ladies mtg. tonight and we had a surprise birthday party for Kelly, the pastor's wife. We had alot of fun and I believe she was at least a little surprised!Anyways, I will let her post pictures of that one, so check out her blog (there is a link in my friends list, Kelly Greene). We are meeting up with her and Pastor and their kids bright and early to head to the fair for the day. Hopefully we can get school done after we get home, but if I know my son, he will be beat and will need a nap, and I probably will too. Oh, I don't know if I have mentioned this before, but Sam is getting baptised. We are excited that he realized he needed to do this, he has been saved for over a year now and we decided to let him come to us and let us know when he was ready. It was evident that the Holy Spirit was dealing with him about it, so he has talked with Pastor and he will be baptised on the 21st of the month.
Well, it's late and 6:30 is going to come way too early. Have a nice weekend!

Marbles

2007-10-02T09:07:00.000-05:00

On Sat we went to a new children's museum called, Marbles. They were having their grand opening and it was free all day and they had alot of cool things going on. So I decided to take Sam and let him play for a while. It was really a cute little place, all about using your imagination. Here are a few pictures of the adventures he had.

Goin' Fishin'
Ahoy Maties!!

Building a tower
Not too sure what this is but I thought it was cool

My Two Favorite Men

2007-09-27T08:13:00.000-05:00

Aww, aren't they cute in their matching outfits!! I just couldn't resist yesterday when I was getting their clothes ready for church. We were finally feeling well enough to go to church last night and it sure was nice to be there. I am so thankful that we have such a loving church family. I feel so close to each and every one of them, that I hate even missing one service there. I am supposed to be going out of town tomorrow to visit my mom and some of her family, but I am thinking I will not go unless I start to feel alot better. I still have this horrible cough and my throat hurts. Oh,, I got my shutters and door painted finally, it looks so good! I will post a picture next week maybe after I get my flowers potted and everything looks complete. No, piano lesson today since Sam's teacher has got so much going on right now, so another day for me to work on my sewing I guess. School is still going very well, i am very impressed with how well his writing is improving. He is not struggling in any area really, I would have to say that writing is his worst subject(although it is his favorite), only because it is very sloppy, but that could be just because he is a boy. We are working on that though.

2007-09-24T07:10:00.000-05:00

Well so much for trying to get alot of things done on Sat. I got a horrible cold Friday night and have been pretty much down since then. Besides playing around with my sewing machine I haven't done much. Yesterday we all stayed home from church and layed around all day. Al is one day ahead of me with his cold and poor thing has been working with it, good thing I don't have an outside of the house job cause I would probably be fired. Today I woke up with a sore throat and coughing so I guess I won't be getting better any time soon like I thought. Oh, I did finish my little home decor thing I was telling you about in a previous blog. I saw this on Martha Stewart a long time ago and thought it looked simple enough for me to tackle. So here is the finished product. The arrangement looks kind of bare, I think it needs some leaves or something. I set it on top of the piano on a fabric mat that I also sewed together. It is not how I thought it was going to look because I couldn't find any orange glitter, so I was stuck using orange glitter glue, so the result was not as sparkly as the other two. It was fun making them though, I felt like a kid using glitter and all. Hope everyone has a great week with school and otherwise. I am going to attempt to do school today so please say a prayer for me, I surely need it.

2007-09-19T18:49:00.000-05:00

Today we had our first field trip for the school year and we went to the Rolesville Fire Dept. It was really neat, they got to see all of the "living" quarters as well as the trucks and all the special equipment. They gave the kids lots of goodies afterwards and they were all excited about that. We had a good time. We ate lunch out and then went and got some fabric so I can get to sewing this weekend. For those of you who don't know, I am attempting to learn to make some of my own clothes. I think I can save alot of money and create some unique things as well. After spending so much time looking at fabric and all the craft ideas, I am thinking about becoming a little more crafty. I have never been to big on homemade things and have always thought that I was the most non-creative person in the world. But the creative person inside of me is about to be unleashed, now we will just have to see how brave she is!! I have my first home decor item in the works right now and will post a picture when I am done with it. I am starting very basic so don't laugh!
School update-Things are still going great for us. He had his first oral evaluation last week and made a 100% on both the phonics and the numbers. I was so happy for him!! You know some days he knows his stuff very well then other days, he looks at me like I am speaking another language. So I was very pleased that on this day he retained everything.
No plans for the weekend, just working on my skirt and oh, I forgot to mention that I am in the process of painting my shutters and front door, I will post pictures of that very soon.

Church Family

2007-09-15T09:11:00.000-05:00

Here are a few pictures I had taken from our anniversay service last Sunday. We had a great service with alot of visitors. This is our little choir practicing before the service.
This is my good friend Melissa and her daughter Madilyn. I am watching Madilyn and her brother, Sam's friend, John Henry tonight.
This is another friend, Amy, and her husband, Jason.
This one is from our Ladies Meeting Thursday night. You know us Baptists have to have food at all events!!

2007-09-10T06:49:00.000-05:00

Today will start Week 3 for school. Thnigs are still going very well for us, I think it is the schedule more than anything else. I am able to still keep up with the house and run my errands around his school. My body is still adjusting to this schedule though, so I am very tired by the time the sun goes down, I barely have enough energy to put Sam to bed, but I am hoping that will get better. We did not go to VA on Sat. like I had said. I stayed at home and relaxed most of the day and spent some time with Sam. We have his 5-yr. check-up today at a new doctor. I wanted to find something a little closer than Garner, so we are go to this place in Zebulon. He also has his first dentist appt. this week, so poor guy is going to be poked and prodded all week. I don't have the pictures I promised of the weekend, I gave Pastor the memory card so he could do what he wanted with them.

2007-09-06T10:20:00.000-05:00

So, yesterday we met for our first time with the homeschool group at church. It was kind of a trial run for us because I had no idea how I would fit in all of his lessons with being gone for 3 hrs. Needless to say we didn't get half of school done. I did Bible before we left and then tried to do the rest after we got home and it was not working out. He and I were both tired so I decided before we got irritated with each other we better stop. But now I know, next week we will do his other lessons before we leave and not do Bible, seeing as he is going to chapel anyways. We will make that our day to eat lunch out, Sam loves to go to Sonic and sit in the front seat and eat together.
This Sat we are going to VA with some other families at church to help out at a church there with their John/Romans Ministry. I am glad that I will be able to go, I think it will be fun and even the kids can get involved. I just love to do things with people from our church, I really enjoy the fellowship, but who doesn't! Yesterday while the kids were in chapel, us ladies went canvassing 2 neighborhoods and it was fun. I was pooped when we got home but I was glad for the fellowship as well as being able to serve the Lord!
Our 1-yr. anniversary at our church is this Sunday so we will have a special day. Dinner on the grounds then the evening service will be moved up to right after we eat. Just more time for us to fellowship, I just LOVE my church family!! I am now the official picture taker at church for all events so I will post some of our weekend fun on Monday.

The Weekend!!!!

2007-09-01T09:33:00.000-05:00

I am so happy it is Sat.!! I got to sleep until about 9am and it is very nice to not have to be on a schedule today. School has went very well this week, having classroom rules to follow and a reward system has helped alot I think. Last year was kind of like, OK turn on the video and do what the teacher says, ( I supervised from somewhere in the house :) ). I think he really enjoys the time spent together too, and I have to admit I am really enjoying teaching him. So today we are going to go up to the Factory in Wake Forest. They have a Jumpin Beans there and he just loves that place and then we might do a little shopping and have some lunch or dinner, depends on when we leave. I am putting up pictures of one of our days during recess, we played tee-ball, and it was quite a hoot. He was running the wrong way and carrying the bat with him along the way. I wish his daddy could have been home to see it, I was laughing so hard. Anyways, we had good times this week and I am looking forward to next week! We start meeting with our homeschool group every Wed. next week too, so that should be exciting as well.

First Day of School

2007-08-28T06:28:00.000-05:00

Well today began our first of many rise up early, schedule oriented days. I don't particularly enjoy getting up by the sound of an alarm, but I think after we are both adjusted, we will find that schedules are not so bad. Sam did very well listening in school (although there are a few problem areas). When he remembers his goal of trying to keep all his points for a treasure from the treasure chest, he tries alot harder. Here he is hard at work coloring capital I and the Indian.
After dads short day at work we went to his favorite store, Lowes. We then went to Applebee's to have dinner to celebrate both of our birthdays. Al will be 35 on Wed., wow, I am married to an old man!! Then we took Sam to his favorite little playground at the mall nearby. It was nice to spend some time together outside of the house.

Here is Al supervising in the cushy chairs drinking coffee.

Happy Birthday to Me!!

2007-08-25T17:53:00.000-05:00

Well, another year older today. I am 27 and I can't believe I am approaching 30!! Today we didn't really do much celebrating, Al had to work all day, but Al's mom did come up for the day. She and Sam went swimming and I worked on the school area, trying to prepare for Mon. Yesterday I met my mom in Cary and we both got pedicures and manicures. She took me out to eat at this fabulous place called Baba Gannouj, it is middle eastern food. Then we went shopping at Stein Mart and Hallmark. I got a new Vera Bradley bag with this cute little cell phone holder that clips onto the outside of the bag, so when my phone rings, I don't have to dig around in my purse looking for it. I LOVE it!! I have this thing for purses now, I just can't get enough of them. Here is Sam enjoying his time in the pool, since it has been so long since we were able to swim.

Here is our cute little school area. I don't have too much room, but this will work well for us. I also have a flannelboard I can put on the easel when I want to use it.
This is probably the best $10 spent on school stuff! I got this little chart at Target. The pieces are magnetic and you can swap out different "Goals", there are 16 to choose from, like "Make my bed", "Say please and thank you", "No whining", then there are little magnets you put by each job for that day, and at the end of the week there is a result magnet you put on to show them how they did. It even comes with a few blank magnets you can write on to create your own goal or result.
So this is our Treasure Box!! Thanks to my friend and Pastor's wife, Kelly, I have a reward system for good behavior and following the rules. Using the chart above, he will gain pionts by completeing each task every day. There are 280 pts. possible at 5 pts. each, so if he can get 240, then at the end of the week he will get to pick a prize from the treasure box. He is so excited about all of the things in the box. I went to Michaels and AC Moore and got alot of .50 and 1.00 items and filled it up. He can also loose pts. by doing things he isn't supposed to do during class time. He can try to earn extra pts. by doing extra chores around the house. I think this system will be great for him. He needs soemthing to work towards. Thank you Kelly for this great idea.

Fantastic Friday!!!

2007-08-17T23:12:00.000-05:00

Well it is technically Sat. am as I am writing this blog, but today has been a GREAT day. I have probably been complaining alot my husband about how hot it is and how tired I am but now that I sit and relax getting ready for bed, it was a very productive day. I have been finalizing my yard sale stuff all day and fianlly got it over to Melissa's this evening. Since all the men and boys are camping out tonight, Melissa had all us ladies over to watch movies and eat dinner. I always love hanging out with my friends from church. I am staying over tonight so it will be alot easier for me to be up and ready for the yard sale. It has been fun to have some girl time, geez, I don't think I have stayed the night with a friend since, umm, college? I forgot my camera so I have no pictures of our events and I am sure Al will not have any of camping and fishing, so this will have to be a picture free blog. I hope all my hard work will have paid off and I make alot of money tomorrow! Oh and by the way, Maxi LOVES her new dog food. She is always wanting to eat (because I am such a good cook)! It is kind of irrating her always looking at her bowl, but hey at least we know she is happy. Ok, off to bed now, 5:30 is going to come real soon.

Call me Crazy

2007-08-11T08:34:00.000-05:00

I have begun cooking our dogs food! Maxi has never been quite satisfied with her food. Everytime she runs out of food I would try something new. Sometimes I would mix dry and wet food, or semi-moist food by itself. So it has really been a guessing game. She is such a spoiled dog I guess. Sometimes she will gobble it up like she is starving and then the next day with the same food she will let it sit there all day long. So anyways, I began looking around online for some recipes and found some really great and inexpensive ideas. In the process I ran across so many sites that talk about how awful store bought dog food is. Here if you are interested check this out, http://www.thedogfoodconspiracy.com/dog-food-secretsii.php It is really crazy what they put in dog food. So last night I cooked up a huge batch of brown rice and then with half of it mixed in cooked ground turkey and greenbeans, sounds good huh, I could have saved some out for Al for dinner! Maxi is going to become a healthy dog whether she likes it or not! Now I just need to work on the rest of the family, starting with me!!

Here is my adorable poochy right now, lounging away!

2007-08-08T08:27:00.000-05:00

Well today I am rearranging my bedroom and getting our school area together. I am finally going to order Sam's school material this week so hopefully we can start before the end of the month. I have decided not to use the videos this year, so we will see how that goes. I think we will both like it better. We are getting ready to go have breakfast at McD's and then go to the grocery store before it hits 100. I really dred getting out in this heat, but guess I will have to endure it for a little while.
So here they are, some photos from our trip finally. I have about 200, so I went through them and found some that I really liked.

At a fountain in Milwaukee

At Medieval Times of course

Downtown Chicago

At the riverwalk in Naiperville

Our Red Knight

On the train

View from up top on the Navy Pier Ferris Wheel

Hanging out in the Detroit airport

Birthday Party

2007-08-06T09:27:00.000-05:00

I am going to post alot of pictures on this blog so that the ones who were not able to make it can see what they missed out on. We had alot of fun even though it was 98 degrees!! Sam got way too many gifts, thank you to everyone who got him something. I know I still haven't posted my Chicago pictures other than the wedding ones, and now I am thinking I will just post a few of my favorites. If you would like to view then on another site I have, you can go here www.myspace.com/jabdelnor . I have this myspace to keep in touch with alot of my high school and college friends as well as some of my cousins.

Chicago Trip

2007-07-30T10:13:00.000-05:00

WOW, it has been so long since I blogged, I forgot how to sign in. Duh!! Anyways, I just wanted to share a little with you guys about our trip to Chicago. We had great fun touring the city and seeing all of my family I hadn't seen in a long time. The wedding was absolutely beautiful, I am so happy for my brother, Thomas and Sarah. I am only going to post wedding pictures in todays post becasue I am still working on a slideshow with my other pictures. So here they are, come back tomorrow for another one.

2007-05-06T14:19:00.000-05:00

Things are going very well in the Abdelnor household. We have been staying busy with church and school as usual. We had a Ladies luncheon yesterday afternoon at church so there was a couple days of helping out with that. I really enjoyed the fellowship, it was much needed!! I have been kind of in the dumps lately, but I won't throw a pity party for myself right now. The Lord has been really working on me and trying to teach me somethings at this point in my life, which I am thankful for. I realize now after hearing from our speaker, Mrs. Webb, that my trials are tailor made just for me from the Lord to change me in some way. I am very thankful for the new friends I have made and how all the ladies at church are so kind and warm to me. This transition to a new church has been alot easier than I anticipated. I praise the Lord for his goodness to me.
Aunt Seece celebrated her 90th birthday yesterday, I can hardly believe it. She seems to be in her 70's to me. I do hope I live to see 90 and hope I am in as good of health as she is too.
Sam and I are headed to Columbia to visit with Al's mom this weekend and I am doing a skin care class with her. Then I will get to spend some time with my mom for Mother's Day and hopefully get to visit my grandmother who is in a rehabilitation center right now. Sam will probably miss his last game of soccer, but it is well worth it to me to visit with my mom and grandmother. He could really care less if he went or not too.
A bunch of our trees in our yard have a disease called fireblight and they are looking terrible. They got it last year and we tried to treat them this year before they bloomed and they still look bad. So we will be cutting down about 8 pear trees tomorrow and Tues. Fun, fun.
Theses pictures are from my friend Kelly's wedding in Cherokee a few weeks ago. Actually these two are from the rehersal, I will post more as I get some.

Fun Day

2007-04-28T15:20:00.000-05:00

So today Sam and I got up at 6am to go to a bunch of yard sales in Clayton. We did find some neat things for great prices, but I am not sure this kind of thing is for me. I mean unless I have a particular item I am looking for. I am not an early riser either, I was really debating with myself about going or not. It felt really wierd to be up so early. After our yard slae hoppin', we checked out the Strawberry festival. That was really fun! Sam did a bunch of the things they had for kids including this bungee trampoline thing. I was surprised he wanted to do it. He is getting very brave the older he gets. I didn't have my camera with me, so I had to capture some on my phone, so they are not that great but at least you can see him. It was cool to walk around and get a bunch of free stuff and of course we bought some strawberries, and yyyyuuuuuummmm, they are good. I don't think I ahve ever had strawberries that tasted so good. Anyways, I was so tired when we got home I had to take a nap.

Soccer Pictures

2007-04-26T09:50:00.000-05:00

I am going to just post some pics today of Sam playing soccer on Monday. He is getting better at it, at least he is trying to follow the ball now and not just follow the crowd. Thursdays are generally a big day for us, Weight Watchers meeting, bank, weekly McDonalds trip to let Sam play, and grocery shopping for the week. I generally don't get home until around 4. And tonight is Rhonda's debut, with Mary Kay. For those who don't know, Rhonda Hanks is my first team member! YAY for her!! We are going to work it tonight and get her some classes scheduled and make great things happen for her.

Whew!!

2007-04-23T12:44:00.000-05:00

Boy, we are wore slap out!! We have been going, going, going for the past few days. Thursday after Al got home from work we headed for Cherokee. We stopped for dinner and didn't get on the road until 9pm, sooo we got into our hotel at 3:20! I couldn't sleep, cause I was thinking about all the things to come so I didn't get to sleep until 5:30 and had to be up at 7am. I spent the entire day with the bride-to-be and her maid of honor doing all of our pampering, nails and feet. I was fun, but I was so exhausted. We had the rehersal that night and then the dinner to follow of course. Sat was the wedding day so again I was up very early to go get our hair done and makeup and take care of the bride. After the wedding we headed home, we got home at 1am, which wasn't too bad. Sunday was crazy too but that is normal for us. Al's mom and stepdad met us for lunch after church and then we had Sam's piano recital. He was so good!! It is so neat to watch him on stage. It is hard to believe my little man is old enough to play the piano. We went to evening service after that then finaly came home. I felt like my house was in disarray since I hadn't been home in so long. So today I have been trying to catch up. We have a soccer game tonight and Al's mom is staying to watch that too. We took the day off school today so that he could enjoy his grandparents so that is always nice. I don't know why I didn't get any pictures taken of us at the wedding. But I do have some of the recital and of Sam and his grandmama.

Hideous Picture

2007-04-18T18:12:00.000-05:00

Well, here it is folks! That awful picture I was telling you about that is hanging above my head every night as I sleep. Isn't it terrible!! I mean, I know I could never paint anything this well, I am not trying to be cruel, I just don't want it in my house! It is just so ugly! And it ruins ANY look I try to create in my bedroom. Well at least he agreed to put it in the bedroom and not some well seen place in the house. And oh, believe me Al has more than one of these hamy down things that he insists is staying with us until he dies. Do your husbands have an item or two that they just will not let you throw away and you just hate it? I am curious as to what you have to "hide" in your house, away from all your visitors, but at the same time, appeasing them in finding that perfect spot for it.

Baseball Fever

2007-04-17T22:19:00.000-05:00

Tonight we went to a Mudcats game and they won, it was great! They hit a homerun at the bottom of the 9th to win the game. They do fireworks if they win, so Sam got a kick out of that. It was a great night for a game, we took our blankets and relaxed while watchin some baseball. We used to go alot last season so it was nice to go out there again. We had a busy day around the house again, I didn't quite finish my screened-in porch, so I will not share a picture of that yet, but it should be complete tomorrow. I still need to make some final touches.

Getting ready for Spring

2007-04-16T21:59:00.000-05:00

I know the beginning of Spring was a few weeks ago, but it hasn't really felt like it too me, with this crazy weather we have been having. I decided to redo our bedroom in a more "springy" decor. If you hadn't seen the room before, we had these thick brown drapes with roman shades underneath, and a white down comforter on the bed with brown sheets and brown throw pillows. Very wintry and cozy in there before. We have this bedding that was a wedding gift and I absolutely love it!! Also for a wedding gift we got the curtains to match. I didn't take a before picture but here is after. Be on the look out for more spring renditions, tomorrow, I am working on the screened in porch, it is in bad shape!!

This is what Al and Sam were doing while I worked on the inside

From the doorway

Now if I could only convince Al to let me get rid of that hidious picture above the bed! I'll show that in more detail in a later post. Yuck!!!

From the bathroom doorway

2007-04-15T14:03:00.000-05:00

Today we visited a new church for the second time, Lighthouse Baptist in Rolesville, which is near Wake Forest. We went last Wed. night for prayer meeting and it was a disaster because Sam was not well behaved and it was so embarassing to go somewhere for the first time and have your child act that way. Anyways, we went back this morning and we REALLY liked it! It is very exciting because this is a new church plant also, so would be able to get our hands dirty and do whatever needs to be done. Thank you to all of you who have been praying for us, that we would find where the Lord wants us. We truely do believe we may have found it. Lord willing we will meet with the pastor this week and we shall see. I am very excited, although it is never too fun being the "new" person anywhere, I will be happy to have found a new home and meet some more of our brothers and sisters in Christ.
After service we went to Micro to pick up our pictures we had taken a few months ago. We donated some money to the EMS and they gave us a free family portrait certificate. So of course, you get the free one, but they take lots of others and try to get you to buy those too. Al had this grand idea to all wear our knited hats that Aunt Seece made us in the picture. Of course I wanted a nice picture and put up a fight but he won, we wore the hats. But then we took more without the hats. Since I don't have a scanner the only way to capture them was to hold them up and snap a shot. So here are a few of them!

B _ _ _ Shower! (you had to be there)

2007-04-14T18:03:00.000-05:00

Today was a fantaboulous day! I got to see alot of the ladies from the church we used to attend at a baby shower for my good friend Sarah P. It was alot of fun! The teens from the church organized a bunch of games to entertain us and Sarah got so many cute things for baby Trey. Sam behaved very well while we were there, which is always a plus!! I haven't been taking any pictures lately I guess because I haven't been in blogger mode, so I haven't really been thinking about it. From now on I am going to take my camera EVERYWHERE! This one picture is from Opening Day for the baseball season which was April 2nd. Al is a huge Cincinnati Reds fan and Opening Day is really big in Ohio. We grilled out and Sam and Al listened to the game on the internet.

This other was taken on Easter Sunday outside my brother's little church in Kings Mountain, NC. Doesn't he look so handsome! I think so!

??????

2007-04-02T08:16:00.000-05:00

I haven't felt like blogging in a REALLY long time, so I thought I would share a little bit about what God has been teaching me the last couple of days. We have been attending a different church the last 3 Sundays and the first Sunday there, we found out that the Pastor had, had a seizure and then soon found out that he has a stage 4 tumor on his brain. The tumor has been removed and he will start chemotherapy tomorrow along with radiation, to try and keep it from coming back. Throughout the past 2 weeks as we have been watching these events unfold, we have been reminded periodically of God's sovereignty. He is not surprised about what is going on in this pastors life and is also in charge of everything that happens in my life. I have been asking myself, 'What are you trying to teach me through this'? Although we are not related to the pastor or even a member of his church, an evangelist who preached a couple of weeks ago at this church said that the Lord is going to use this in everyones life who this touches, and I have been thinking alot about it, so I believe he is right.
Yesterday for the evening service the pastor gave us the message. I was in aww at how he was more concerned with Christ being glorified through his infirmities, rather than being worried about himself wondering what is going to happen. I can already see the Lord being glorified through this, he was able to get up there and preach in less than 2 weeks after brain surgery, and this man and his wife's spirits are lifted up. God has given them His abundant grace to be able to be where they are right now.
I realize now even more than ever, that no one is promised even the next ten minutes of their life. Whether you are someone whose life is devoted to the Lord, serving others everyday or if you are a lost soul caught up in the pleasures of this world, anything can happen to us at anytime. But we as Christians can rest in the assurance that He is in control of our lives.

We had a little photo shoot the other day and I am going to post one of the pictures of Sam.

2007-03-07T16:58:00.000-05:00

I don't have much time to write, gotta get ready for church tonight, but I wanted to post something. I am trying to do better at posting. I have some friends who post everyday, well 2 to be exact, and they both have 3 kids. Their life is alot more exciting than mine. You 2 know who you are. I heard from my Grandaddy today via email, which was very nice, to say the least. He sent me a picture of myself that he says is his favorite one he ever took of me. He is a great photographer! I will post it here. You can check out some of his pictures at www.grembert.com . I have done a bunch of cleaning today but haven't left the house and it was kind of nice. My back had been hurting me again lately, so no walking for me today :( Weigh-in tomorrow, I am kind of scared to go, but I must. Well I am rambling, I better get to ironing!

2007-03-05T19:06:00.000-05:00

Today has been a lazy Monday for me. I was supposed to go to the dentist this morning, but had to cancel and I sure am glad I did. I haven't felt like doing much cleaning at all, actually I haven't done any cleaning at all except make my bed. We went out to IHOP for lunch since Al is working tonight. I am sure I used all of my weekly bonus pts there. I am still sticking with my diet, just kind of keep alot of the point tracking in my head, instead of logging it in. I would have to say it is getting alot easier, I find that I do not want to eat alot of the same things I used to want, for instance last night we watch a movie and everyone would normally have a candy of their choice, popcorn and soda. Al and Sam ate their hearts content and was fine with my diet root beer. Usually I would have been coveting their junk food. I am going to walk with the dog tomorrow afternoon and with Jenn on Wed. so my exercising can be kicked up a bit. I have been really struggling in that area. I am going to include some pictures of Sam and his grandma playing soccer on Sat while I was at the baby shower and some pics from the nursery yesterday. Al and I kept the kids yesterday evening and really had a good time.

Trip to Florida!!

2007-02-19T23:53:00.000-05:00

Well, it is so good to be Home! I missed all of my friends so much, I felt so left out with not being able to nose around on your sites for a whole week! I am glad to be back with Al too, he was so lost without us here, just kidding. I had a good trip, it was really nice to see all of my family and spend some time with the newest edition of the family, William. I miss him already, I really do, I wish we weren't so far apart. I did realize somethings on this trip that I hadn't noticed before, not really sure why, but I am still thinking on those things. Oh, some great news, I started my own business with Mary Kay while I was there! I am very excited about what the future holds for me in this business, I really do believe that the sky is the limit, if I work at it. I know everyone is wanting to see some pictures so I will post and stop writing. Good night or I guess I should say good morning since I am sure most of you are not up this late and will not see this until tomorrow.

Awww, I'm an Auntie!

So sweet!

Wow, I am a pretty good photographer, this picture is AWESOME!

Grandma Carol, Grandpa Lee and William

So I have to share this little story about my family. Both of these people used to be my step-parents. A little confusing but you will get it. Carol used to be married to my dad for a really long time, that is how my little sis Grace came about and youngest brother George IV(named after my dad, the long haired kid you will see below.) Lee was married to my mom for a really long time, but not quite long as my dad and Carol. They did not have any kids together, but Lee did have a son(Kyle, pictured below too) who lived with us and we are a year apart. Lee and Carol of course knew each other. I primarily lived with my mom and Lee until I was about 15 so for many, many years, there were the kid swaps at a gas station half way between Charlotte and Asheville. At Sam's 2nd birthday party in Charlotte, Lee was coming to see Sam for the first time and Carol was coming to pick up Grace and George, they had been staying some time with us during the summer, and of course to be at Sam's party. So it was a little reunion for the both of them. They had both been divored from my parents for quite a while and needless to say, sparks flew. Well at least for Lee they did. He couldn't stop thinking about her after he went home to FL and I urged him to send her a card, and the rest is history. They are really great for each other and I am so happy that they are both happy. They both played such instrumental roles in my life. So I know it sounds a little wierd and I guess it is, but I absolutely love it and it makes it alot easier to keep intouch with all the should I say ex-step parents and ex-step siblings. Although they are anything but ex, to me. Just thought you might want to know a little strange family fact.

George and Sam, enjoying our Valentines dinner at a Japanese Steakhouse, MMMM!

Grandma Carol, Grace and baby

Kyle and William

Just a Phlog

2007-02-03T12:34:00.000-05:00

I don't know why this came out so blurry, but I like the picture anyways

Al playing swords with the dog this morning

"I'll get you too, Blogger!!"

Sam enjoying his hot cocoa while we watched a movie about King David this morning

My little brother George with baby William

My not so little brother Kyle with little William

Grace and baby

William Scott Redman

2007-02-02T08:54:00.000-05:00

So I finally got some pictures of my sister and her baby. Here they are!! William weighed 7lbs. and 19.75 in. long. Which is way bigger than they thought he would be. I want to thank all of you who prayed for my sister and her baby.

Yay, Snow

2007-02-01T17:15:00.000-05:00

Well this is my 3rd attempt at posting today because of the weather, I am sure. So it will be short and sweet now.

The snow was just great, we love snow at our house. I was kind of bummed because Sam didn't stay out long enough for me to get dressed and go out with him. I was looking forward to building a little snowman. I have never done that before, can you believe it.

The BIG news is that my sister had her baby this afternoon around 3:15. I have been elated all day just waiting for the next update. I am very proud of her and excited for her. I know she is just basking in so much joy with that little one in her arms. There is no other feeling like it in the whole world. I will be visiting her next weekend and get to see my little nephew for a week or so. I will try to post a picture later of them, hopefully I will get one tonight.

Preggo days

2007-01-31T10:15:00.000-05:00

I don't have much to blog about so I thought I would copy Sara and post some pictures of myself with child. I don't have any of me posing but here are a few from both of my showers.

ABC's

2007-01-27T10:36:00.000-05:00

Well, it is my turn now to do this. I have been tagged by Jenn M. and now I will tag, Sarah P. So here goes....

A-available or single? No, married to the man of my dreams
B-best friend? I would have to say Al
C-cake or pie? definitely cake, any kind with cream cheese icing
D-drink of choice? Well, I love my sweet tea, but lately it's been mainly water :(
E-essential item I use everyday? computer, points calculator
F-favorite color? pink or black if it is clothes
G-gummy bears or gummy worms? bears
H-hometown? Charlotte, NC
I-indlugence? Chocolate and sweet tea now
J-January or Feburary? Feburary
K-kids and names? 1, Sam
L-life is incomplete without? God, family, friends
M-marriage date? October 23, 2003
N-number of siblings? 5
O-oranges or apples? apples
P-phobias or fears? spiders and being buried alive
Q-favorite quote? not too sure about that one!
R-reason to smile? I'm saved!!!
S-season? spring
T-tag 3 or 4 people- Sara P.
U-unknown fact about me? I used to make teeth for a living
V-vegetable you don't like? asparagus
W-worst habit? interupting people
Y-your favorite food? anything mexican
Z- zodiac? virgo

Week 3 Weigh-In

2007-01-25T18:20:00.000-05:00

Well, today was a very tiring day as are most Thursdays. We have to rush, rush, rush through school, and then make it out of the house by 11:30. My weight watchers meeting is over at 1:00. Which by the way, I have lost another 5.4 lbs, that brings my total to 11.8!! I was really shocked to say the least, I didn't expect such a huge loss. The first two weeks, I didn't use any of my weekly bonus pts. but this past week I used like 15 of them, so I really thought it would be closer to 1 lb. I am very excited about this journey I am on to a healthier and happier me. I have alwasy dreded diets in the past, but this one is wonderful! After my meeting I always take Sam to McDonalds for lunch so he can play for a bit, while I read. It is probably the most relaxing part of my day. Another highlight of the WW plan, you can still eat things you like, I had Chicken Nuggets and Apple Dippers, which are delicious and only cost $1. I have learned alot the past few weeks about making better food choices, and have really felt alot better because I know I am eating healthy, no more guilty feelings after a meal! We got our oli changed while we shopped at Wal-Mart and then came home to prepare dinner. Al had to go to Fayettville today to take a sanitation class for work. He had to sit in there for 8 hrs.! I feel so bad for him. He does so much for our family and never complains one bit. I am truely blessed to be able to stay at home and take care of the home while he does the money making. I am going to post a picture of Sam, I took yesterday. He is just learning to do things on the computer and I thought it was cute him sitting there using the computer.

Day with Dad!

2007-01-23T09:04:00.000-05:00

We got to spend some much needed time with dad yesterday. We got some things done outside together and went to dinner in Wilson. Sam got some one on one time before bedtime. I think his daddy is his favorite playmate!

Day at the park

2007-01-20T18:31:00.000-05:00

Sam and I had a nice relaxing day. We spent the better part of the day lounging around and cleaning up a bit, then we headed out to have a picnic and play at the park. It was a little too cold to eat outside so we stayed in the car and ate. After Sam got done playing, we walked around this little track that goes around the soccer fields. That is a nice park, thanks, Jenn for telling me about it. We took the dog with us and it is funny to see how many people are afraid of her. I guess she does look like she would be a mean dog, but she is actually very sweet. I am going to finish painting my bathroom in a few min. Believe it or not, it has been half done for over a year now. I am tired of looking at those ugly walls. I have a bunch of stuff to do for the church after Sam goes to bed, but it should be a nice evening as well. See most of you all tomorrow.

Weigh -in

2007-01-18T17:52:00.000-05:00

YAY for me!! I unexpectedly lost another 2.8 lbs. this past week. That puts me at a total of 6.4 lbs. gone, to never be seen again!! I am very excited about that seeing as I thought I wasn't doing so well last week. I am more motivated to stick with it as well. I really can't vouch for this program enough, even though I should wait until I have reached my goal weight to brag on them. But seriously, I htink this is the best weight loss program out there. Just when I was kind of getting down on myslef for not exercising as much as I planned or drinking all my water, I go weigh-in and I had lost anyways. It is very encouraging, to see your weight loss every week, that is what keeps me going. I know I have a long way to go, but I am just taking baby steps. Thank you to all of you who support me.

Awwww, No Snow, Bummer!

2007-01-18T10:57:00.000-05:00

Well, I was kind of bummed when I woke up this morning to see green grass. I love it when all the schools close and we are trapped in the house together, I think it is fun. All we have is some ice on the decks and in some areas of the yard. I sure do miss getting at least one snow fall during the winter, but it's not over yet so maybe it will come. I am headed to my 2nd weigh-in in a few minutes. I also have to go to Wal-Mart, and I get to go alone. WOW, it has been a long time since that has happened! I will update later on today and let you know of my progress, if any. I am kind of expecting no weight loss this week, even though I did stick within my points ranges everyday. i just haven't been drinking all the water I am supposed to and I also only got to exercise 2 times this week. Thursday is also a day I have been going to the track, but I guess that's not happening today. I guess I may just have to get on that wretched ol' treadmill!

Field Trip Day

2007-01-16T19:56:00.000-05:00

Today was a very busy day. After school we went shopping for a bridesmaids dress and of course that took forever. We found this great resturant on Capital Blvd. It is a Mediterranean style resturant. You may not know this but Al is Lebonese and so he loves this kind of food. I have really came to like it alot myself. So anyways we were thrilled withour new find. My diet has been challenging this week, more so than last week. I did not exercise today because it took so long with our errands. I even had to cancel Sam's piano lesson at the last minute.

Yesterday we went to the Museum of Natural Sciences with our friends from church. Sara, has Wes, Wil and Skye and then Jennifer has Josh, Jake and Jenna. So we had quite a crew running through the place all giddy with excitement. We took them to Chick-fil-a afterwards and I know my Sam enjoyed that. Being an only child he is so happy to play with other kids. When we go to a place like that usually we have to wait around for another kid to get done eating so he can play with them. I feel kind of bad for him, but maybe the Lord will see fit to bless us with another child for him to help out with and enjoy.

I honestly didn't even notice this sign, until after I looked at the pictures at home. What good role models we are!

Notice what a nice boy, my son is being, trying to stick his foot in my camera!

We really enjoyed the Meet the Animals class, but no one wanted to pet this one!

I know, I know

2007-01-13T11:24:00.000-05:00

It has been forever since I posted anything, mainly because I just haven't really been in to it lately. Don't get me wrong, I love looking at everyone else's blogs, every day in fact. It's just I haven't had much to write about and haven't been taking pictures like I usually do. Well, the main thing going on in my life right now is my new challenge to loose ALOT of weight. I joined Weight Watchers on Jan 4th. I have only had one weigh-in and I actually surprised myself by dropping 3.6 lbs. I have been walking 3 times a week, but I am working up to 5. My goal weight is about 200lbs away so I have a long way to go, but I know I can do it. I have been really encouraged by some of the women on the WW message boards. And of course my husband is a major motivator. He is trying to slim down as well, though he is doing things much differently than I am. He is going strictly vegetarian, except one day a week, he has to have his steak. So Monday nights we will be dining at some steak resturant, which is fine by me, cause with my diet I can eat basically whatever I want, just as long as I don't go over my points value for the day. Which is a GREAT thing for me, I couldn't ahndle having to give up chocolate or bread or anything for tht matter. This is a good thing for me. I am very proud of myself for getting started. I know I couldn't do it without the Lord helping me though, I have tried and tried in the past and failed. I think that is where I was lacking before, I wasn't relying on Him to help me. So now that I have came out with my challenge, I am going to be held accountable by all of you I know.

A funny thing happened to me yesterday(well not really, but I am sure most of you would have laughed, Al did when I told him). I figured since I wasn't going for a walk, I would get onthe trampoline and jump with Sam for a while. We had alot of fun, let me tell you, that thing is a workout! Well when I was done, I was trying to get off and there is this little space in the enclosure, where you get out. And this thing is like kid-size, mind you, so I couldn't get turned around in the opening to let my legs hang off then just jump off, so I had to turn around backwards. I put one leg down on this tiny little chair tha goes with one of Sam's little tables, and the other leg was still onthe trampoline, I was trying to pull my leg down. So I got one leg on the chair and one leg still up and apparently I was standing on the edge of the chair and it tipped over! I fell on right down on my side. I felt like such a big idiot! There was this couple talking in the pasture behind our property and I hope that they didn't see me. Sam was laughing and I was totally emabrrassed. But it was kind of funny now that I look back at it.

Since I don't have any pictures of me falling off the trampoline, I will post some of Sam I took around new years.

Here, he decided that he wanted to have a picnic outside even though I told him he was going to freeze

And here he is after he figured out I was right, it was too cold, but that wasn't gonna ruin his picnic!

New Year's Day

2007-01-02T15:43:00.000-05:00

Yesterday morning when we got up, Al had a great idea for us to go to the Charlotte Bobcats basketball game. It is about a 3 hr. drive, so we got ready and left as soon as we could. We both love Charlotte!! It is my hometown and Al wishes it was his, although he did live there for a while. It was nice to get to see the uptown area and how much it has changed. I tried taking a picture of the skyline from in the car but couldn't get a good shot because of the trees and stuff. So here are some pics from that. Hope everyone had a nice day to spend with their families as well.

Shame on us for keeping the mans out so late last night!!

Home Sweet Home!!!

2006-12-27T10:09:00.000-05:00

Whew! What a long few days this has been. On Christmas Eve we left right from church and headed to my mom's in Charlotte. We had a nice dinner with her and her husband, Gator, and then walked around the neighborhood looking at Christmas lights. We let Sam open his gifts before he went to bed since we needed to head out kind of early to get to Columbia.

On Christmas Day we headed out to Columbia and had lunch at Aunt Trisha's (Al's step-sister). We ate like pigs and opened more presents and Trisha's husband, William, the assistant chief at the volunteer fire dept. nearby arranged for us to take Sam to see all the fire trucks. This definitely was the highlight of his Christmas this year. He was loving every minute of it, he had the run of the place, getting in one fire engine after another. Thank you William for doing this for us and thank you F.H for taking time to show us around.

We went over to Al's moms after all this excitement and opened more presents!! Al's mother got Sam a 14ft. trampoline. She is bringing it up with her on Sat, so if anyone wants to come over and help put this thing together, come on! I would have to say this is probably been the biggest Christmas Sam has ever had. We had alot of fun getting to see everyone, but as always was really nice to get home. Thank you Mom, Debbie and Trisha for the great hospitality and to everyone, thanks for all the gifts.

Birthday Party!

2006-12-22T00:02:00.000-05:00

Tonight we had a little party for Alison, her birthday is on Saturday and she is leaving tomorrow morning so we had to have it a little early. We had hamburgers and hotdogs and I made a giant cookie cake. I attempted to decorated it and as you may be able to tell in the picture, but it didn't look so great. Oh well, it tasted good. We got her a digital camera for Christmas and let her open that too, she seemd to like it. We had a nice family night tonight. I have to get up early had take her to back to meet her mom. So I will be having another day on the road tomorrow. Hope everyone has a nice weekend.

Day Trip

2006-12-20T09:35:00.000-05:00

We spent the day yesterday driving to the South of the Border to meet to pick up Al's daughter, Alison. She is staying with us until Friday, to celebrate her birthday and an early Christmas. We took her shopping for clothes for her B-day at Crossroads in Cary and then we had dinner at Olive Garden. Mmmmm, it was delicious! We let Sam open a Christmas present that he got in the mail yesterday and he has been enthralled with it. At this very moment he is doing school but is anxiously awaiting breaktime, so he can get at it again. It is this really cute thing made by Leap Frog, called a Leapster. I am hoping he gets some more of the different cartridges for Christmas cause they are so educational. He is learning exactly what he is learning in school. Thank you Lee, Carol, Kyle, Grace and George for this awesome gift!!!

Livingroom Makeover

2006-12-18T14:39:00.000-05:00

Here is just a sample of what my child has been up to all day. I wish I had taken pictures of the previous messes.

Just another day

2006-12-18T13:00:00.000-05:00

I am having what I would call a Blah Day, today. I just feel like lying in bed, reading and dozing. But instead I am sitting at the computer for way too long and trying to manage a unusally roudy child. Everytime I turn around he has pulled out all of his toys from his room, closed all the curtains in the house, and trying to kill the dog with his swords. I am thinking about getting rid of all the toys that are weapons, they are beginning to annoy me terribly. It seems like all the time he is pretending to be fighting some giant or dinosaur with his swords. So do all boys do this? Is it a phase?

Anyways, I have been trying to get my family all together and dressed nicely for a family picture for like 3 weeks now. My plans were to get those cute picture Christmas cards made, but we didn't get the picture done until Sat after the recital. It took about 10 takes and I am still not too thrilled about the best one. So since it is like 6 days until Christmas, I guess it is too late to get my cards done. That will have to wait until next year I guess. So I will have it on here for you all to see. And yes I do have video of the recital, so as soon as I figure out how to get it on my pc and edit it so you don't have to watch all the other cute kids, I will post it. Hope everyone has a great start to their week before Christmas.

This is just another picture I took last week that I thought was just too cute!

Thankful Heart

2006-12-12T12:28:00.000-05:00

During our school snack/break time, I usually take a shower while Sam plays. When I got out of the shower today I overheard Sam in his room singing, so I went to his door to "spy" on him. He was dusting all the surfaces in his room and singing, "On my way to Heaven, I shall not be moved, on my way to Heaven I shall not be moved. Like a tree planted by the water, I shall not be moved!" It was soo cute. The other day he was singing, "Thank you Lord, for saving my soul" over and over. Today I was just thinking about how thankful I am that the Lord saved my husband and I while Sam was still so young. We have truely been blessed to be able to raise him up to love and serve the Lord. I am also rejoicing that Sam has accepted Christ and we have really just begun to see him learn and grow in the Lord.

Kids!!

2006-12-11T13:55:00.000-05:00

When Sam got up this morning he noticed that there were more presents added to the pile, he got soo excited. I took some pictures of him acting crazy. Our Monday has went rather well so far, school was nice and easy and I am almost done with all of my cleaning. Al and Sam are going to cut the grass, Sam loves to ride with his daddy on the mower. Dad gets the day off today so we are going to spend some much needed time together. Steaks on the grill later and maybe even a movie, hope everyone else's day is going to be just as wonderful as mine!

Finally! a new post!

2006-12-10T22:55:00.000-05:00

I know it's been a while since I have been on, but things have been pretty busy around here. I have been doing some more Christmas shopping and spent some good quality time with Sam on Friday. After lunch we cuddled on the couch together with a big bowl of popcorn and watched Dinotopia which is a 3 hr. movie, but it was really good, if your kids like dinosaurs they would enjoy it. But I would have to say, you should have a tv guardian because there are a few words that we could have done without hearing, nothing too bad, but bad enough. We also watch The Sword in the Stone, which I have always liked, so that was fun to just lounge with him for a while. Today was pretty hectic as most of you experienced yourself, with church then a baptism then church again. We ate with the Knights and the Eberharts after the Cantata, so the fellowship was nice. We also got to go out with a couple we haven't really gotten to know yet for lunch, so that was also refreshing. I had a hair disaster this weekend. I wanted to color my hair a dark auburn, but it ended up a bright orange, so Sat. I had to run to the drug store and get another box of something darker. It is still not what I wanted, I feel like I look like a punk rocker. But I am kind of stuck right now with this crazy hair because I certainly don't want my hair to fall out. We are looking forward to both sets of grandparents coming in town this weekend for Sam's piano recital. I am hoping to have my video camera by then and I will try to post a video of him playing. I do have an unspoken prayer request that I would appreciate your prayers about. Hope everyone has a Happy Monday!

Caffeine

2006-12-07T01:26:00.000-05:00

So, yeah, it is like 1:30 am and I drank a glass of tea at dinner and I can't sleep. I am so tired, my eyes are burning but my body won't let me sleep..... so very frustrating! And of course I have a ton of things to do tomorrow so I guess I will just put a smile on and drink some more caffeine to get me through the day.... and the cycle will continue. Two of my good friends from high school are coming over for dinner tomorrow(or should I say today) so I will be pushing myself like a crazy woman to make sure things are "just right". Most people tell me I am a neat freak so it is not like my house is messy to begin with, but I always find all these little things that don't get done daily to tackle on days like tomorrow. I don't know why I do it to myself, I know no one is coming over criticing (sp?) my house. Am I the only one who totally stresses out when having company over? And I love entertaining, that is the wierd part. I love to cook a big meal and to play games or just talk for hours with friends. Well I did get some of my wrapping done this evening, so I am happy about that, now hopefully the dog will not eat the gifts! I took some cute pictures of Sam today just posing for me. I haven't forgot about being tagged, Sara, I am just waiting until I have more time to devote to writing it all down, hopefully Friday.

Weekend Report

2006-12-04T13:20:00.000-05:00

OK, so I am finally posting again. Cut me some slack Dave, will ya! My life is not that exciting really to be putting something new up everyday, unless of course you would like to hear about how many loads of laundry I had to fold and how many times I had to yell at Sam to "Leave, the dog alone!" We had a really nice weekend. On Friday, we had our church Cantata, which was beautiful. All of our people and the people from Bethany Hills Baptist did a fantastic job. The gospel was clearly presented and nearly 400 people heard it. 10 people raised their hands that they had just accepted Christ. Which is exactly what we had been praying for! Saturday I got some Christmas shopping done and was planning on wrapping the gifts I have accumilated already, but I forgot to get tape, as usual. It seems like every year I have to make a special trip to get the TAPE! I did have some duck tape so I wrapped Al's in that, I don't think he will mind. I couldn't risk him finding his gifts, so they had to be done before he got home. Sunday was very busy as ususal. After church we did get to go to lunch with our good friends at a mexican resturant(my fav!). Sunday evening I was in the nursery with Sara M. then we had a birthday party for Pastor after the service. Here are some nursery photos:

Night Night Time

2006-12-01T11:03:00.000-05:00

Every night when I am putting Sam to bed, we lie there and he tells me all these wild and crazy things he imagines. Sometimes he says he is going to take mom and dad on a submarine ride where we will fight off giant "steamies" ,which are similar to jellyfish, with our spears. Other times he tells me about how we are going to go into the woods and catch a baby deer for him to have as a pet. The deer will sleep on his bed and it will have leash and he will take him to use the bathroom when he tells him that he needs to go. Well last night he said the funniest thing, at least I thought so. He was praying for all the things he usually prays for then he said, "Please bring the dinosaurs back to the earth" while he is saying this he put his hand on my mouth so I couldn't say anything. After he was done, I tried to explain to him that dinosaurs and humans can't live together and he said, " Well, I will have to pray for a gun then, to shoot them in case they try to eat us." I just have to wonder where kids get all this stuff from. I love how their little minds are so nieve at times. I do hope our Heavenly Father has a sense of humor, and if so, I believe He would have been laughing at this one. I love my little man and his vivid imagination.

Blogging

2006-11-29T12:40:00.000-05:00

W.....ell, I don't even know where to start. I have never blogged before, but have been looking at some cute blogs of my friends Sarah and Sara and I thought I would give it a shot. I have never kept any sort of diary so I don't know how well I will be at keeping up with it. But I am looking forward to this new experience. Please bear with me as I learn how to make my site interesting. Stay tuned for hopefully some exciting things to come in the Abdelnor household. I will post some photos soon.