I WILL MISS THIS!

One of the things I do on my job each day is drive the school bus. I drop kids off at three different schools in the mornings and pick up from one school in the afternoon. I really enjoy doing this. At first I was very nervous about being entrusted with the lives of these kids each day on the busy roads. But each time I put the key in the ignition I pray to God to keep us safe. Driving the bus helps to break up my day and gives me a small break from my crazy classroom. I love listening to the children talk. They are all elementary school age and many times the talk is funny and innocent. They talk about American Idol and nose picking. At other times their words seem wise beyond their years. They talk about God and death. I remember one day a little girl was talking to her friend and she said, "You know, if you make fun of someone or talk mean you are also being mean to God because what ever you do to someone you do to God." Two of my afternoon kids play their recorders on the ride. I have heard When the Saints Go Marching In over and over. I will miss all of these times. Here are a few pictures of some of my younger riders. My bus carries 14 kids but I did not have time to get many pictures.
Ok, so I deleted the photos of the kids. I thought it might not be a good idea to post them without the parents permission. However, I will show one because I know her family.

GOODBYE- I WILL NOT MISS THIS

I am in the process of saying goodbye to my job. Today I want to go over what I will NOT miss about my job. First of I want to say to Sharon at http://roseofsharonmay.blogspot.com- I really did not copy your post about your daily commute -I promise. I had already planned on doing this type of post.
Here is a look into the most miserable part of my current job!
5:00 am I wake up.
6:15 I leave out the door. About half way into my commute and you can still see that it is still dark outside.

I hate driving on the interstate. I think the only time I should be driving on it is when I am going on vacation! As I finally reach my exit the first signs of daylight are emerging.
Ok, so it is about a 40 minute drive for me each morning. But the worst is yet to come.
3:05 I am off work and out the door to pick up the kids from school. Austin has been out of school 5 minutes already so I know he is waiting. You can see him down there in the distance waiting on me. It looks like another kid has a late mom too!
3:33 Austin is finally in the car and now we have to head back in the direction that I pretty much have just came from to get Aaron.
4:00 We arrive to get Aaron. He was let out of school at 3:30 so his wait is a 3 minutes less than Austin's. He sits on the steps of a nearby church playing his psp waiting for us.
4:37 We finally arrive home.

This is way to much driving and some days it stresses all of us out. And with gas prices like this-
I will be so happy to give up this daily routine! I cannot wait to hop in my car and be to work in 5 minutes. There are things that I will miss about my job and I will be talking about some of them this week.
Oh and a word for Sharon- It is very dangerous to drive and take pictures!! I nearly ran off the road a few times. I do not know how you do it! LOL! Be careful about shooting and driving- pictures that is!

SATURDAY

We got up this morning and decided to have a yard sale. The boys had so much junk! It did not go as well as usual but they did make about $40.00.We donated the remains to Safe Harbor.This is a small local thrift shop that works with abused women. Wes and Austin got up early to help. Billy and Wes cut the grass. They had to use the push mower because the riding one is having issues. Austin took it upon himself to clear out some weeds and rake some leaves that were interfering with his basketball court.


Austin found these strange berries growing out back. I have never seen these before. Does anyone know what they are?

Later I got a big surprise and my friend Sherry stopped by with this tiny baby for me to hold. She knows how crazy I am about baby girls! The baby weighed 3 lbs at birth and is now a little over 5 lbs. She is 3 months old!That is hard to believe. I just fell to pieces when I got to hold this tiny one. Unfortunately she has been born into a very bad situation and my friend Sherry keeps her most of the time. Sherry has raised this child's brother since birth. He is now 7. The mother is a family member of Sherry's, but she is never around to be part of their lives. It is so sad knowing that this tiny sweet baby will never know the love of a real family.


I hope you all are enjoying your Saturday!

SHOW AND TELL FRIDAY

It is time for show and tell again over at Kelli's place. http://kellishouse.blogspot.com/ Please go by and join in the fun. I know it seems like I show a lot of my kitchen but that just seems to be my favorite place. So here are a few more of my kitchen treasures.
I remember as a little girl my grandmother had a little metal box on her porch and each week the milkman would come by and put her glass bottles of milk inside. So when I came across these old milk lids I did not hesitate to buy them. Just picking one up and holding it brought back so many memories.
I later found this great milk truck sign. Another item I would like to show is my old retro green clock. I found this at a goodwill store and knew it had a perfect home in my retro kitchen. I does work but it gets hung up sometimes when the numbers turn. And lastly I want to show this old car and home coffee pot. It comes in a hard case. Inside is a coffee pot, cups, scoop for sugar and even spoons. It has a car lighter plug so you can use it on a trip. I found this at a yard sale and once again could not say no to it.


Thanks for stopping by and hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

HANGING OUT

So, we are all just hanging out tonight. I am grilling hamburgers and the boys are all playing basketball. Sandy is hanging out enjoying his new ride. We bought him a Dodge Durango. He hates to say goodbye to his old truck, but it is time. He has had it forever and it has been good to him, but he is so excited about his new one! This is way out of normal for me to be up so 'late' (LOL) and cooking. It is 8:30 and I am usually in bed. I think I just feel so much less stressed out with knowing that I am about to start a new job and knowing the boys are safe and sound. :) It was really great how everything came together on the vehicle. My best friends husband had just totaled his truck and he went out looking for another affordable one. I hadn't talked to her in a few days so I called her today to talk about the plans to get the Dodge. She asked if we had sold the truck and I told her no. They came right over and bought it with cash. We were able to use that for the down payment!

HOW MUCH LAUNDRY CAN TWO BOYS HAVE????OR ONE!!!

We got all of Billy and Wesley's things moved back in. There are boxes of stuff all over my house and back yard. And there is LAUNDRY! Just how many clothes do BOYS need? It seems that Billy buys a new outfit each weekend which Wes thinks is just crazy. Wes came home with one basket of clothes. All the rest are Billy's. You have got to be kidding me! Yep-Billy is very concerned about looking good-but come on now! This is just insane! Seems I will be turning my storage room into a closet for Billy. It feels kinda good to have them home. At least I know they are OK and not hungry :) It is also very weird. They have been gone for a year and we had just settled into our routine here without them. They keep reminding me that it is only temporary. Well, we will enjoy it while they are here.

HELLO

Hi all!!! I have been up to SO MUCH here. The past few days have been a whirl wind. I got the phone call from the school and they do want to hire me. YEAH! - but funny thing is the day before that I had another job offer. An office job! We know the couple who owns this company and they are truly wonderful people. I will give more details later but she is offering to let me leave and pick the kids up from school and knows that I will need to leave for drs appts and stuff. Both jobs are an excellent opportunity and I will have to decide this weekend. When God closes one door he opens another- well he opened TWO for me and I am not good with decision making. Also, Billy and Wesley are going to be moving back home for awhile. They are having difficulty paying the bills and need some time to find jobs and save up a little better. This is going to be a big change for all of us and it will be difficult but it is what must be done right now.
So, for fun and enjoyment and to relieve some stress we have been playing tennis. Aaron, Austin and I have been playing with two of my friends that I met at my last job. They are trying to lose weight by eating better and exercising so we all thought tennis would be great. We are not that good and as you can see by some of the pictures we are even playing the ball from the other court! But we have had a blast! So much more has been going on here but I will elaborate later. I will be by to check on you all tomorrow!

MISSING IN ACTION

I will be absent here from blog for a few days. Hope you all are well.

Check Up

I took Aaron and Austin for a check up. They have not been to the doctor in a good while and we were establishing a new family doctor. They were so funny and were asking me a million questions before hand. Do we have to take our clothes off? Aaron kept insisting that noone could make him take his clothes off. He had that right to say no! Ok, boys it is no big deal. Are they going to-you know- make me cough? LOL! They really must watch to much tv! Guys it is no big deal. You need to let the doctor do what ever she needs too. SHE??? OH, my- sigh-. So, Austin was up first. He checked out good. No problems. She measured him and said he was 5'3" 119 lbs. When she stepped out of the room he was mad. He said, "They heighted me at school and I was 5'5". Aaron and I cracked up. They HEIGHTED you? We gave him a hard time all day about his grammer issues. He was really saddened by the 2 inches. OH my. Then Aaron's turn came. He came in at 5'9" and 122 lbs. Again his blood pressure was high. I really thought it was because he needed to lose some pounds but she said no. High blood pressure in children is not because of weight. Many overweight children do not have blood pressure issues. She wanted to draw blood to rule out some things. They stuck him three times and he would not bleed. Ah ha- that is what is wrong with him. That is why he has no heart- no blood to it!! Ok, really they had to freeze his vein with some chemical and then got the blood. We will know more soon. But GOOD news!!! No one had to take their clothes off!!
Can't post pictures. My page here has not had picture, spell check or any of those options in several days. Wonder what is up?

Forgiveness

So, I have been thinking a lot about forgiveness this week. Honestly, I have a real hard time with forgiveness. I don't know why. Mostly it is the 7 times 70 kind. Does this mean if the person does the same thing over and over again and again that you just have to keep forgiving that? I do know that God forgives us over and over for the same mistakes we make time and time again. But me- well that is hard. Last week when my exhusband was released from jail this overwhealming sense of anger poured out of me. This man has made the same mistakes time and time again. He has had the upperhand in my life for over 21 years. As I left home in my car that night I was consumed with anger. I wanted to do whatever possible to get back at him. I drove and I cried. I shouted and screamed. I came home and sat down at the computer. I had so much to say but no words came. Then I remember the story of the Amish people and how forgiveness came so easy to them. How at peace they were. This anger in me does no good. It has eaten at me for many years. It makes me miserable. But I can't let it go. It is too hard. Does forgiving mean forgetting? What good would it do to forgive? Just a few of the many questions that have been on my mind. These videos really do make you think.
This first one has some really powerful words.
Don't forget to pause the music.

Good News

Yesterday when my sweet husband, Sandy got home he had some good news. He got a raise! He usually gets a yearly raise but this year came and went and they had a lot of office management changes so we thought it might not happen. But it did and it was even more than usual. We are both so thankful that he has this good job as jobs are very scarce in our area now. There are so many who are unemployed and can not find anything. I have also decided to stay at the job I am at now for several reasons. I still do not have transportation for the kids after school and I don't want to push Aaron into driving if he is not ready. Also, the company I am at now knows all about my health issues and they understand when I have to go to drs and stuff. The past week my health has been going downhill again, not because I am eating something wrong but as my dr expalined--the fact that I have an auto-immune disorder means that many things can signal my body that something is array and my body attacks its own immune system. I could be a virus, infection, food or any number of things. So, this week my body has been once again in overdrive! But all is good! Don't worry about me!! I will press on! LOL!
Bye!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO AARON

Wow! Aaron is now 16. I can not believe it. Aaron came into this world on April 4th. He was 9lbs 1oz. We laughed about how he looked like he was ready to crawl. I cried when I gave birth to him. He was born 2 years after I had lost my twin girls. I did not want to rush into another pregnancy and try to replace what I had lost, so I waited two years. I knew that this child was going to be special. Aaron learned how to play chess at the age of 3. When he began 4 year old kindergarten he would play chess with his teacher. To this day when I see her out at the store she still talks about that. Aaron has always been in the gifted and talented programs at school and maintains a high GPA. I am so proud of him. Aaron is also a huge sports fan. Since a very young age he could talk teams, stats, history, scores and pretty much anything sports as well as the professionals. I dream of him becoming a doctor. He dreams of become a sports announcer. I will be pruod of him no matter what he does with his life. Here are a few pictures of him.



Aaron goes to his first Buccs game! Doesn't he look smart with those glasses? He doesn't wear them anymore.

Aaron doing what he loves best. Stuffing his face and watching sports. This is at the ESPN zone. He was so excited to go there. There are tv's everywhere-even in each bathroom stall!

Aaron-you don't sit IN the potty! You sit on it!

Sorry Aaron I just had to put that one! Happy Birthday! I love you! And you are a spoiled brat!!!

SHOW AND TELL FRIDAY

Today is show and tell over at Keli's place http://kellishouse.blogspot.com/. Go check it out and join in the fun.
Today I am showing this unusual glass basket. I found this at the Goodwill store for $2.00. It has a handle and some beautiful etching on it. I have no idea what it is for and have not figured out if I should put something inside or just sit it out like it is. Any suggestions?



I would also like to show this darling picture I found of my two oldest boys. They were blowing dandelions in the yard. Billy even has two in his hand. He really wanted to make sure his wish was coming true! I blew it up and framed it and put some inspirational words around. I wanted them to hang it up at their place but they said it would be embarrassing for their friends to see it. Boys! Oh, well I will hang it up here.

Also, I want to say Happy Birthday to Aaron. He is 16 today! I will do a post later for him.

Update on Ex

Just found out this morning that my ex-husband has been released from jail. I am afraid that the sparks will now start to fly. Please keep us in your prayers.

A Few Signs of Spring

A few signs of spring a popping up around my yard.



Last year only one of my black iris' bloomed. Looks like I will have several this year. OH- disregard all those weeds mixed in! I guess I need to get out and take care of those!