Wednesday, May 28, 2008

It's Official

It was voted upon tonight at the church business meeting to close the PDO. I am saddened, however I also believe that the the program or the church had to change to be a true ministry of the church. I am not saying that it was not a ministry to the families that attended, the children heard of God and Jesus on a daily basis, some whom may never have heard of him otherwise were taught about God. This is the part that is sad to me, however these parents sought out a church for their preschool and their are many others on the same road which also teach the same basic principals. God will provide for those families.
Some teachers were upset, and I can see their point they poured the last 1, 2, 5, 30+ years into the program. They have every right to be upset with the church for not properly supporting the program. I hope that the church sees that preschool and children's ministry is a need, and we can't grow our church without having something for the children.
My opinion, it's a good thing. I told the children's minister after the meeting that my heart is for kids. I want the best for the children. I chose to put my ministry into the PDO this past year. I won't say it was a wrong decision. I don't regret it, other than the time lost with Joy and the issues with Joy's classroom. I am now going to turn my efforts and my focus back into the church and find ways to serve to grow the much needed children's ministry. This is my 3rd summer at this church, and my 2nd one to work at the VBS (the 1st I worked summer school). I mentioned to the children's minister that I have 1,000 ideas running through my head and I hope to start something next year for stay at home mom's. Keep tuned in and we will see where God leads!

Thursday, May 22, 2008

Is Blogging Gossip?

Is a personal blog such as mine gossip? I tell stories from my life as I see them. Completely my point of view my opinion and my understanding of things. Then you read them, you may share with someone else something you read on my blog, it's hearsay and can quickly become gossip. So is it wrong to share personal experiences that involve others? Should a public blog be only personal antidotes that involve no other people?
I try hard not to go into "rant" mode and I try to never post a blog when I am heated up and upset over something. However, it was pointed out to me today that something I said on this blog got back to a person that I had blogged about it (unsure if she has read it or not). Then the statement was made that people made decisions that could poorly effect this person's let's call it a business based on what I had said in this blog. I am sorry for being cryptic, but I am curious what you think, is blogging gossip? Should I return to the original purpose of the blog to just update everyone on Joy (btw she said luv you for the first time today!)? In review of the situation and the blog I posted talking about it I have one statement that I will apologize for, but first I want to know what is your feeling on the blog.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Some Video...

Today at water day I took some video and since Rob is not home to be using his computer I am working on downloading today and well a lot of other videos onto YouTube. So here it is some video from anytime this year!











Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Another Potty Story

After bath as I have said before we allow Joy to walk to her room to get her diaper. I have also been encouraging her to sit on the potty while she doesn't have a diaper (she really wants to run around the house, but we won't let her). Last night she was sitting on the potty for what seemed like an unusual amount of time for her (more than 10 seconds) and then next thing I hear she gets up yelling "Mess, Mess, Mess!" I was at first confused what where is a mess (her definition of mess is spilled liquid). Then I realize the mess is in the potty! She had peed in the potty! I was proud I told her it's good to go pee in the potty and then poured the pee in the toilet, rinsed the potty with some water and poured that in the toilet then we flushed and put the potty back together. I think she understood we were happy for her. Makes me think that this summer might just be potty training summer?

Sleep

When Joy was younger she would sleep anywhere, then again most newborns do. Then somewhere along the way it became sleep in the car seat, crib or playpen. She is slowly getting more selective about where she sleeps. Now I am also more selective about where we are at nap time. I am not a nap nazi as one of my friends calls herself, but I am pretty sure she needs one each day and I do my best to give her that opportunity in an appropriate location. I prefer her naps be in a "bed" either the playpen or crib, but on trips I schedule the trip to have her napping at least part of it in the car. Well anyway my observation is these kids I see out and about sleeping ANYWHERE! Saturday at a restaurant a family of 3 comes in child is 2-3 years old and out like a light! They ordered sat down and were eating with the child sleeping on the bench between them! If Joy was that tired I would head home or wherever I was staying at that time, I would not let her sleep on the seat at a restaurant, if I was hungry and had no food that's what drive thrus are for! Then take her and put her to sleep in her bed.
I have also seen kids in grocery carts between the ages of 2-4 nodding off! I don't understand? Joy doesn't do this, is it because I am trained to take her home at nap time to let her sleep there? Or are these kids just able to sleep anywhere and the parents take advantage of that? Now Joy gets pretty cranky come time to rest. Her toddler side comes out with full force. Do these other kids not have sleepy tells? I can tell when Joy is tired, and I usually do something about it. I either do something to energize her or she goes to bed. It's not that hard to do! Isn't the child's sleep more important than your eating out or grocery shopping? Mine is!

Monday, May 19, 2008

Don't Read the Book

I love it when a book becomes a movie, I am even more excited when the movie matches the book. Before this week I was only throughly disappointed with one of these instances, it was the John Grisham book about the Jury, the book is about a Jury selection for a big tobacco trial, the movie was about a jury selection for a gun trial COMPLETELY DIFFERENT! This was very upsetting as this was my first John Grisham to read and see the movie in the theater.
Where am I going with this you ask? Well Rob and I had the rare opportunity to go see a movie this weekend (thanks Grand Lady). We chose to see Prince Caspian since Rob had gone to see Ironman on Thursday night. Well if you are a reader of the Narnian series then you will be dissapointed with the story line as although they start in the same place and have the same ending as the book, the middle is WAY off! I don't understand why either. I did enjoy the movie, but really wish they had stuck to the real storyline.

Friday, May 16, 2008

Somewhere Over the Rainbow!

Okay, I don't fancy myself a singer of any great magnitude. I do however love to sing (if you have ridden in my car you know this). So last night my friend Jen has a brand new Wii (Happy Mother's Day to her!) and so of course our Thursday night dinner group has to check it out. We played the Wii doing the bowling and the tennis and a fitness test first (don't ask how I did!). Then we broke out the big guns, American Idol. Now as much as I love to sing I hate to watch other people sing, unless it's a live concert, so I am not a fan of the show. Anyway basically what the game is is glorified karaoke. I have been to a karaoke place once and except for my shyness of singing in front of people I enjoyed it (there you go Nikki the truth comes out). Last night I have known these girls well let's just say we don't say how long anymore it's a long time so they already know my singing inability so the shyness thing did not come into play. We played the actual game American Idol and I won! I was having so much fun at this point (and had great confidence) so I kept going trying to "unlock" different things by getting platinum on songs. I sang many songs and unlocked Somewhere Over the Rainbow. At this point I say why not it's 12:00 at night let me see how bad this is going to be. Well it was PERFECT! You heard me right 100% correct (at least by their standards). Because of that I had to sing it again with the judges (I had started playing in a mode without Randy, Paula and Simon). When I did Simon said "I cannot say anything good about that performance (some other fluff) because it was amazing (or some other nice word I forgot since I got home so late)!" Anyway I had to share my accomplishment and new found love for the American Idol game. Karaoke anyone?

Monday, May 12, 2008

Scary!

Oh I almost forgot the cutest thing she did yesterday. After dinner at Cafe Express we walked outside and she was walking away from us when a pigeon flew towards her. She yells scary and turns and runs away while looking back at the other pigeon still there making sure it did not also try and fly towards her. Poor thing, she was definitely shook up by it, but Rob and I were smiling because it was so cute!

Mother's Day The actual event...








Mother's Day turned out nice. The dedication was very nice, the pastor looked up the origin of each baby's name and Joy's is Pure Joy (Katherine means pure). Although the name meaning is not something that helped influence Joy's name it is something that could change our minds. I have always liked the meaning of my 1st name (lady) and so I want my kids to have good meanings too. Anyway his looking up the meaning of her name was special to me. Then he prayed for her with her hand on her back. I was surprised she let him put his hand on her, she isn't one to like people to touch her especially if she doesn't know them. He did say near the end of the prayer she was lifting his hand off her head. 2 other children were also dedicated and it was a nice event. After the service we came back to our house and had lunch. Marty cooked a brisket, which was perfectly done, Frenchy (my uncle) did beans with an ingredient list longer than my arm. I did some pasta salad, and my mom made a lemon cake. It was all pretty good. After lunch everyone visited. Joy was amazingly awake and happy the whole time! Usually I can barely get Sunday lunch in her before she gets ready to crash, but yesterday she was raring to go until around 2:00 when the crowd departed! Unfortunately that did not mean for a longer nap, just a later one!
When she woke up we went to dinner at Cafe Express one of my favorite places to eat, and then back home and I put her to bed for the night.
Presents... From Joy and Rob I got an Apple TV, I love it! I can play our iTunes music on the TV, really anything on itunes is now on the TV! In addition we can watch movie trailers and YouTube. It's great now if I can only learn from Rob the details on which computer and itunes etc. This is also the first step of 2 taken on Saturday to remove cable from our lives! We watch maybe 3 shows on cable, and we can get them either from streaming video off the internet or itunes. So with the apple TV and the antenna we purchased Saturday (stimulating the economy with our check). We are ready to cut the cable. I guess I can go call them now!

Tuesday, May 6, 2008

Mother's Day

The original plan for Mother' s day was to have a relaxing non-exciting day with no commitments and no worries. Well things always change. Our church just got a new pastor after being without since Last February. Since we didn't know the old pastor that well and didn't ask the interim Joy was never dedicated. Not to say we don't want her to grow up in the church or anything like that, just the formal "dedication" never happened. So another couple in our Sunday school mentioned they were dedicating their daughter on Mother's Day, I mentioned we had not dedicated Joy yet and Mother's Day would be nice (the church secretary is also in our class). So next thing I hear is in the announcements they are asking for all children who have not been dedicated to be dedicated on Mother's Day. We are now signed up. So my uneventful Mother's Day has become Joy's baby dedication day AND Mother's Day. The good news is my sister is cooking a brisket, my mother is cooking potatoes and dessert, and that leaves me with house clean up and a salad. I guess I can handle that. Now to figure out a family picture for them to display. I guess I shall raid Rob's computer now. Maybe I will get those bath pictures up too!

Thursday, May 1, 2008

What you really want...

Some at home pics



Some out and About pictures from San Jacinto/Battleship Texas, Moody Aquarium, and the Wild West Something in League City last weekend...