Around Our House

Things have bee non stop crazy around here the last few weeks. This is always the case the last few weeks before school gets out. The kids have 7 days left of school and we have even more stuff coming up.

Here's a catch up of the last few weeks.

My Dad and Suzy bought my Mom a beautiful new car.  It's a 2007 Ford Taurus that was driven by a granny who lived up here. David and I went to test drive it and when we liked it, my Dad, Suzy and Mom came up and got her the car.  It has beautiful leather interior, and I'm so happy that my Mom has a nice reliable vehicle. And I'm so thankful to my Dad and Suzy for getting her the car.  Our family is a unique one for sure and I'm thankful that we all love each other and support each other instead of tearing each other down. With ex's it's easy to do the latter, but my family is a great example of how to move on. I'm very proud of that.

Our church ended the year with a Color War for the Jr. High kids.  Emily wasn't sure she wanted to go. I don't think she knew what to expect. But, I encouraged her and she went. And she had a blast. They basically threw powder all over each other.  Needless to say, all of these white shirts went in the garbage.

But, these smiles are worth a few shirts!

Last week, I was sitting at my computer in the morning. The boys were just doing their thing before they get ready for school and I hear Ben flipping in the other room. Anyone that's been here knows that Ben loves to bounce on his ball, but he was trying actual flips. Um, what?  He says he watched a Parkour video and he wants to learn. Um, what? Have you seen Parkour videos?  If not youtube it and you'll understand my hesitation. They basically do flips all over the place and eventually work to jumping buildings.  

BUT...our gymnastics place has a parkour class and I thought that it would be a perfect chance for Ben and Noah to do something fun together.  So, I took them to a class. They learned flips and other tricks. I'm glad they had instruction.  They loved the class!  I even took them to open gym this past weekend.

 

And I signed them up for the class.  So, they went last yesterday for the first time and I was talking to the front desk lady and came in and saw Noah on the top of the rope. I don't know how long all this will last, but if they have fun for the summer, that's fine with me.

Last Friday I was out running a few errands when Dakri calls me to tell me there is a fire by our neighborhood.  She was panicking, which made me panic. So, I came home and the main entrance to our neighborhood was blocked, but I could see all the smoke. The wind was heading north, which is the direction of our house.

I wasn't overly worried yet, but then they evacuated the neighborhood to the west of us, then the neighborhood to the north of us; basically an entire half circle within a mile around us. I decided to get a list ready and pack a few things.  Emily's Porky made it right on the top.

Making an evacuation list is a scary thing that I've never done before. They wouldn't let the school buses in and were dropping them at the district office. So, now I'd have to leave to go get the kids. Problem is once they start mandatory evacuations, they don't let you back to your home. If your pets and photos are in the house, oh well. So, I didn't want to pack up the entire car to get the kids and I didn't want to leave. So, David got the kids an hour early from school and got home.

This was the view of the fire from Dakri's house which is around the corner from us.

They had the fire out in 8 hours, which is nothing short of a miracle for our state. It eventually grew to 5100 acres, but only burned 2 houses, which is also nothing short of a miracle.  It was super close and I hope we don't have to deal with that again forever. They say that a truck dragging a chain probably started it on the highway. 
We had a late Cinco de Mayo party at Dakri's too.  It was fun with good food and great friends. YUM!

So, that's our two week roundup.  More craziness to follow in the next two weeks.