It's Marching Band Season

Where does the time go? So much to blog, so little time. We are currently about mid-point through the marching band season. Life is very busy for Alec. He survived band camp this summer and came home glad that he signed up. He just didn't expect to have such sore feet. They have performed at 2 football games and 2 competitions so far. The competitions are broken down into classes. Alec's groups class is a 2A. So far, they have come in last at both competitions, but I don't think they have done badly. It's fun to go and watch all of the bands compete. Last week, there were 36 bands, we did not stay to see them all. We have been getting home after 1am....very long days. We have 5 more competitions, 3 games and 2 parades left. After that, they are done until April when they go to NY City to compete.

The band has an ongoing fundraiser of Scrip cards. You buy gift cards and use them as cash. There are oodles available. The band & Alec get a cut from the proceeds which helps fund his NY trip. If you're interested, let us know!

Alec on the move

Happy Birthday to ME!!

Well, it has been such an eventful summer and we haven't blogged about any of it!!! We will try to get some updates of the summer done very soon. The blog is just another unaccomplished thing on the "to-do-list".

Today has been a busy day! The morning began with us all bustling about getting ready for church. Rich and the kids were downstairs making breakfast and birthday cake. We had very large cinnamon rolls with apple chunks in them, yummy!!! The cake was yellow with dark chocolate fudge frosting, oh my! I could eat just the frosting. Since the commissary doesn't sell it, I didn't know there was such an item available. Now that I know, we're in trouble. (I've been struggling to keep my exercise routine going and this isn't helping!)

Rich is painting our bathroom as my gift....I'll post pictures when it is all done.

I am 29, thanks for asking! Rich will always be older than me, I'll be sure to remind him next week on his birthday :)

Here are a few pictures of the day:

Mel & the kids : it's so hard to get a good picture!!

Our Budding Artist

Kaitlin took art lessons from her school art teacher. She took lessons twice a month from January to May. Here are some the projects she has completed.

This was her first project. She had to grid a photo of herself and transfer it to a larger grided paper. It had to be traced onto tracing paper and transferred to the finished paper. It was a lenghty process.

The squirrel was a shading technique she learned. The one on the right, is her shoe that she had to draw and then overlap the same design around the whole page.

Kaitlin painted this as her last project. She was so pleased with how it turned out. We are very proud of all she has learned. She hopes to continue when school starts later this month.

May 25, 2008

Here it is, nearly a month late, oh well. I dated this post with Alec's actual birthday.

My, my, where has the time gone?? 13, I say! Alec is growing up into a fine young man. He has such a brain for facts and reading. He has been this way as long as I can remember. He reads everything he can get his hands on; books, cereal boxes, etc. It is neat to see how the Lord is growing Alec. I look forward to the next few years.

For the big day, we went to One Stop Family Fun in Leonardtown. It is a new place with go karts, inflatables and paintball. We went to paintball! He had three friends plus Rich and Uncle Scott to play with. All of the others were inside on the inflatables. I bounced between in and outdoors taking photos. Let's say that paintball looks fun but can leave one a little battered and bruised.

Time to Catch Up!!

We have fallen a little bit behind in the blogging. My mom flew in a few days ago to surprise Alec for his birthday, so we have been a little bit busy.

This was birthday 9. This was the year of the spy toys. He was interested in spying on everything!! It was a fun year.

Here is age 10 in the photo with the Legos. We had a computer problem this year and lost lots of digitals. Therefore, we do not have a picture from birthday #10. Naturally, the year of double digits are the ones to be lost forever.

Age 11...another new bike. We still have this one, although it has needed a major overhaul!

Birthday 12. The last year of being a tween...the next one is a big one! We managed to survive the first year of middle school. It was actually a very good year and we didn't have any issues with Alec or school. He is growing into a fine young man.

More later on the 13th birthday celebration. We are going paintballing!!

Birthdays # 7 & 8

Here is a picture of Alec with his friend Becca at his 7th Birthday Party. They have both grown so much over the years. She now towers over him by a couple of inches.

He received a new bike for his 8th birthday. This one lasted a couple of years before it bit the dust. He was pretty excited.

The countdown is getting closer...what will do with a teen in the house???

Birthday #6

It has been a busy couple of days having the Zoo back in town, hence the delay in posting more countdown pictures. We are hoping to get caught up tomorrow. Enjoy this one for now. Isn't he the cutest?!!

Birthdays 2, 3, 4 and 5

Here are a few more pictures down the birthday memory lane. Enjoy!/


1997--This is Alec's 2nd year picture. He really loved Pooh Bear at this age. We had a plethera of Pooh videos, books and his room was decorated in Pooh.

1998--Alec is a few days short of 3 in this photo. We were in transition from CA to MD. We were jsut ending a 3 week stay in KY with family while R was out house hunting and working in MD.

Both kids loved this chair. It was a sad day when it broke.









Birthday #4. It is 1999. He is growing up and getting cuter every day. Later this same year, he starts Pre-K.

















2000--Alec is 5! This picture is taken on his birthday at school near the end of the school year. He has grown a lot this year and learned so much being in school.

Countdown to 13!!

Well, the countdown to the upcoming 13th birthday has been going on for a while at our house. I thought it would be fun to post a picture of Alec from every year until his birthday. Since I just thought of this, I'll have to do double duty for a few days to get us caught up. The first few years are before the digital age, so I am having to take apart scrapbooks and scan them. It has been difficult to get a nice quality on the scan, so bear with us!

This is Birthday 1, it is 1996. Can you tell whom he favors here?? Alec has been a joy. I loved his first year. When you have only one, you can spend so much time playing! He is a cutie!

How about that awesome base housing in the background? China Lake's finest!

(Still working on the next one, scanning. Hopefully, it will be up later)

Growing Up Part 2

Alec has done his share of growing this year too. As you can see, he has joined the fad of growing out his hair. Although, after a couple of hot weekends spent outdoors, he has announced he will be cutting it off (once school it out).

Alec has worked very hard this year in school. He had some problems with Algebra early on, but seems to be doing well now. His Algebra course is a high school course that he is taking as a 7th grader. As an 8th grader next year, he will be taking geometry.

Alec is involved with the puppet ministry team at our church. They perform using black lights and the puppets are neon colors. It is really cool to watch. They recently went to competition in Virginia and brought home a gold medal. The whole team has worked very hard. We were able to watch them perform this weekend at the Disciple Now Weekend. It's a youth event between three local churches. He had a great time with very little sleep this weekend. I'm glad to see him finally joining groups and interacting with his peers. He is a bit of a loner and that isn't easy for him to do.

Alec's big news is that as an 8th grader next year, he will be part of the high school marching band. There are going to be six 8th graders participating. He will be practicing three nights per week, Sept-Nov, attend Friday night games and be gone each Saturday to competitions. Many days, they will be returning in the wee hours of Sunday mornings. Sundays are going to become rough for him. He'll just sleep the day away after church.

He has to do a two week camp this summer and it will be 10 hour days. It's a huge committment, but the kids have a blast. The director is cool and the kids love him. One thing they will be doing this year is marching to Michael Jackson's "Thriller". It is the 25th anniversary of that song. (Those of you reading, yes, you really are that old and so are we!) The kids have to learn all of the moves from the video. It should be coo to watch!!

Growing Up

Our kids sure are growing up! Why must they do that?

It's been a while since I've blogged, so I thought I'd post some recent photos of the kids and mention what the've been up to lately.












Kailtin's first year of Girl Scouts is about to come to an end (for the school year). She has really enjoyed it. Everything has to be her idea, you can't convince her how much fun something is going to be...she just doesn't listen. She has learned a lot and gotten to know some fun, sweet girls. The first photo is from a recent ceremony officially welcoming her as a Girl Scout.

This picture shows Kaitlin with some of the patches she has worked hard for this year. They were awarded 'medals' with all of their patches attached.

Today, Kaitlin competed in a Math Challenge Competition. She was one of seven on the 4th grade team and the 5th grade had eight members. Every elementary school in the county competed. There were 17 math teams represented. They worked as a 4th grade team, 5th grade team and as individuals. No one from our school placed in the individual round, but our school took 3rd place for both grades, 1st-5th place plaques were awarded. Everyone was so excited. This was her math coach's first year coaching. She did a fabulous job!! We are all so proud of all the kids. They were so happy! Kaitlin competed against 2 of our neighbors and several other kids we know at other schools.

I believe everyone is looking at a different camera. Happy faces!!

Spring Break Begins

Well, Spring Break is here. We had plans to go to KY but the Navy had other plans for hubby. He is currently in Japan. So what are the plans for the kids and I? A came home from school sick on Friday. He had chills, a headache and bodyaches. It was very mild and he is better today. K started having symptoms yesterday afternoon. I pray it will skip me.

We have a mini Girl Scout camp Mon-Wed this week. A is accompaning us tomorrow to go ice skating for the day. I am not sure what we will do with the rest of our week. Having the camp, eats up a lot of our time.

I decided to take the first day of my spring break and go for a run. I haven't run since October. I guess I am a fair weather runner just like hubby. I only ran about 4 months last year. I never thought I would be interested in it, but I really like it. When I stopped last year, I was able to run 2 miles without stopping. I was running about an 11 minute mile. Those of you that know my physical health issues know that is pretty huge for me. I went out for my same 2 mile stretch yesterday. I stopped just short of my 1 mile mark and still managed to keep my 11 minute pace. Not too bad. Unfortunately, I didn't run as far on the return. Those of you that have lived in Southern MD, know that the wind can blow at any time. Not conducive to running!! I wasn't able to run into the wind easily. Needless to say, I am quite sore today. The beginning of the day wasn't a big deal, but the soreness has progressed as the day has gone on.

I hope to get a couple of more runs in this week.

Have a great week everyone!

KY Visit

Well, I have been home for a few days trying to get back into housework. Yuck!! I had such fun being at "home". K and I got to celebrate my dad's birthday with him. We are never home for his birthday so that was nice. We went out for a wonderful dinner at a place called Rafferty's. Thanks for the dinner dad!! He had fun getting to aggravate K. She like to wrestle and pick and so does Papaw!

I mostly spent time with my brother, SIL and Hannah. She is beautiful little girl! I miss her terribly. I tried to bring her back with me but they weren't interested. It's been since the Zoo lived here since I've gotten to play with and cuddle a baby. That's been a long time! K picked on Uncle Micah every chance she got and he gave it right back to her. It was fun to watch them interact together. I really miss my brother. It was great to spend time with him and Megan. I sure wish I lived closer to them and not just because of Hannah.

Here are a few more pictures to enjoy

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She's Here!!!

I figured I should get busy and post some pictures of Hannah. She was born Jan 31st at 1:45 ish am. She weighed 6 lbs 10 oz and was 19 1/2 inches. My SIL had a rough time but she hung in there and did an excellent job!! I am currently in KY visiting Hannah (and everyone else too). She is a beautiful baby girl!

I haven't done much, just visit with my brother, sil, Hannah and my mom. I did make it to our favorite eatery, Dairy Hill. It is a hamburger/ice cream stand that has been around since my mom was a little girl. A friend of mine owns it and usually doesn't open until March. I guess he heard I was coming and opened just for me!

Here are a few pictures, enjoy!

(Ok, one, I'll do more later)

Hannah Grace

Here is a new picture of my niece. Look at those cheeks, I think she's storing food!! She should be arriving any day now. I will get to meet her next month. I can't wait!!

Happy Birthday Kaitlin!!

We are working our way backwards a little bit. We haven't had a moment to post about Kaitlin's birthday. A few months ago Rich was in one of his odd moods and decided to tease Kaitlin. He and Kaitlin were the only ones home one evening, he told her we had been tricking her all of these years and she was only 7 not 9. He told her how she was smarter than friends her age so we were able to move her up a few grades in school. Well, the whole family went along with it for a bit and she was really starting to wonder if she would be turning 8 and not 10. We finally called off the joke. She is very excited to be DOUBLE DIGITS!!

Due to her birthday being so soon after the holidays, we are celebrating with a party next month. (She turned 10 a couple of weeks ago).

She is a delightful young girl. She has her daddy's personality and is close to mastering his teasing abilities. She definitely keeps us laughing. She is changing everyday, we can't wait to see what the Lord grows her into.

Happy Birthday sweetie, we love you!