Jasmine's Science Poster

The third graders each had to choose an animal to research. Jasmine chose penguins.






Our family likes
penguins : )




There were four different things that had to be included on the poster--a picture, description of habitat, a worksheet to be filled out and the lifecycle.





Jasmine adds stickers to her poster.

Weekend

At a new shopping area.









Checking out the ice cream





Hopscotch in the middle of JC Penneys.


teriyaki beef/chicken








Rummikub--how do you all say this name? We say it room-i-cube.








Tyler was a bit hyper!!!!!









Jasmine empties the trash.





Jessica made chocolate covered pretzels.





Ty and Jasmine read together.




Troubleshooting.

Cleaning. He's not a rummikub player. Shocking.

Boring Week, Kids, Jessica's Dilemma

Even Shy is tired of the constant rain! He's been helping me with a writing project.

It's been a rainy boring week. Tomorrow was suppose to be the first day of soccer but since it's been raining, many of the teams haven't had practices yet. So the start of soccer is delayed a week. Some of the teams are going to go ahead and practice tomorrow.

Now that we are a few weeks into school, I am noticing some deteriorating behavior in the kids. The start of school was exciting enough to get them off to a good start. For one child, it's hard to break behavioral habits that have been going on for a long, long time. And sometimes being a good kid doesn't get you the immediate attention that the shock value of inappropriate behavior gets you. (Yes, we praise his efforts but not overboard) It earns more privileges, which is better, but sometimes they aren't immediate. For another, emotional growth and maturing is bringing out some special needs that we suspected were there but hadn't seen yet. The behaviors are still very managable with rewards and redirection. For the other two, I think it's the stress of keeping up with school, work, and homework.

Jessica ended up dropping band this year (12th). She went into the highschool marching band in 10th part way into the school year without the experience the others had. The Christian school did not have band so she had been just teaching herself at home. Going from that to a well established marching band was hard. She should have been placed in the lower band but wasn't. She didn't have marching experience. Instead of making suggestions or offering help, the band director made her the target. He would make jokes at her expense and this encouraged the band members to do the same. She would come home upset every day. But she really wanted to be in band.

She was going to quit at the end of last year after putting up with almost two school years of it. But then the director retired so she stayed hoping things would improve with a new director. But they didn't. The new director didn't criticize her but neither did he end what was already going on. She'd been the target for so long that the kids were just used to criticizing her and making jokes at her expense. The new direcctor is kind of wimpy and I'm thinking the band will be strong as long as the returning players are there but will probably go down hill after that.

There is one saxophone player named Sydney who is really nasty. His favorite word starts with "f" and he uses it liberally. He would say the most rude things to Jessica every single day. If I weren't such a nice person I would really wish for Sydney to fall flat on his face during the marching band assessment next month. : )

The after school band practices and marching at games were also leaving her little time for her job, homework or anything else so I finally talked her into dropping band. Why continue on with something that makes her so miserable? Yes, she loves the excitement of marching at games etc but it just wasn't worth it.

She wanted to stay in past senior recognition so we could walk out on the field with her. That was the only thing keeping her in band so I told her we'll take her to Chilis for dinner that night!

She is in the church orchestra which at our church is a big deal so she will still be playing saxophone. Practices for the big Christmas concert will be coming up soon.

In the River & Springs

Last Sunday Jessica and I ended up walking from one spring to another (see post), although not on purpose. They aren't actually that far apart if you aren't lost and wandering in the woods.

This week I dropped Jessica, Adam and Jasmine at one set of springs and they floated/paddled to the other. Tyler had to work and Rick is still in a cast.








Starting out.

Partners

At the other end.

Now we want to take the kayaks and do a longer run.

Looking back 4

My favorites from 2008. The pictures from the first half of the year where lost when my computer crashed. I downloaded them from snapfish but they are tiny, not the original size.



Spring break. We picked Jeff up and went to Jacksonville for laser tag and miniature golf and then to Gainesville for the rock wall.




The champions



Jessica
She looks good upside down!




Jeff and Jasmine




Tyler




Tyler in his Explorers outfit at the parade for fallen police officers in Tallahassee.






Jessica flew to IN to spend time with my mom in June. Ty, Jasmine and I drove up a couple of weeks later stopping a lot of fun places on the way. Then girls and I drove back while Ty stayed for a few weeks and flew back.









We went to Birmingham Zoo, Montgomery Zoo and Nashville Zoo during the trip.



















Turkey Run state park.















We stopped to visit Ashley and her family.















Bonneyville Mill near Bristol, IN


















The kids with my mom and sister.













Jessica and I went to Haiti in July for the I 600 signing trip.































We got back from Haiti just in time for the Christian Book Convention. Jasmine is singing to Nicole Mullin who sings "I Know My Redeemer Lives."













Jasmine and Karen.













All of us with Karen except Tyler who was still in IN.













We had the choice of seeing Fireproof with Kirk Cameron or seeing Kung Fu Panda with Po. Guess which we chose?











With Terri Blackstock, Christian suspense author.














Ty turned 18 and we got him a Wii.














Jacksonville Zoo on a visit with Jeff. He was not too thrilled about the birds.












Jasmine and her pumpkin.















Thanksgiving Day. We replaced an outgrown tradition with building gingerbread houses.













Thanksgiving Day.














The kids Christmas picture.















Jasmine's school Christmas pj party.















At Wild Adventures at the end of the year.