A Full House

Rae Lynn Benedict

2011-05-19T11:19:00.005-04:00

Headed with alarming speed toward adolescence! Rae is finally finishing up her third grade year at Greenville East Intermediate. This has been her first year to have a bad teacher. When I state bad I am implying that she is mean as well as hasn't really taught Rae anything. Everything Rae learned math wise this year is due to Jeremy, myself and Rae just figuring it out herself. She struggles with the concept of math anyhow but having a teacher belittle you and insinuate that you're just pain dumb to the whole class does not inspire learning. The good part is Rae's homeroom teacher is the best. The day she found out she will be getting Ms. Baker again next year was very exciting for her. Her Science and Social Studies teacher is pretty cool too. At the beginning of the school year she had some trouble finding where she fit in with her peers, but all of that issue seems to have cleared up.

Rae's interest include horses, (actually pretty much any kind of animal but especially horses) swimming, reading, movies and hanging out with friends. Her and Shane spend more time watching documentary's than anything else. The biggest argument is whether it will be an animal doc. or a scientific doc.. Shane's interests lie in the cosmos were as Rae's are directed more toward the living things.

When she grows up she wants to be a teacher. She gets her ability to interact well with younger kids from Jeremy. She does great with the little girls, and puts up with a lot from Shane. He seems to be most amused buy pestering and bugging the tar out of her. She does have her limits though. Her latest defense has been to emit very loud obnoxious screeches! I understand the not being able to stand Shane's pestering any longer, but my nerves can't handle being shocked like that either. I came up with a great consequence for Shane when he pesters too much-do all of Rae's chores for a week- one reminder usually does the trick. Now I just have to think of a good one for the screeching.

From a mothers perspective she has been, so far, the easiest child to train and get along with. She generally has a happy outlook on life and truly wants to do right. Most times when she's out of line all I need to do is quietly reminder her to think before she acts or speaks. There is no rebellion in her she just stops and reassesses herself. She confesses and shows signs of a true belief in God the Father and God the Son. Her willingness to redirect her attitude comes from her wanting to please God as well as her parents.

This summer from June-August we have leased a pony named Camy for Rae. This way she will be able to show in 4-H at the Darke County Fair. She's been taking riding lessons for about 4 months now. In March she entered her first horse show and got two ribbons. BIG BIG day for our little Rae.

Shane II

2011-02-24T12:32:00.002-05:00

I forgot to mention in my previous post some very important declarations made by young Mr. Benedict.
Just in case you are reading this and don't have previous knowledge of Jeremy's unwavering devotion to Penn State, I will say it has deep roots. So what I am about to write was a very BIG deal within our household. At the supper table one evening a couple weeks ago I told Shane that if he could get good enough at wrestling and if he continued doing it through high school he could get a scholarship to college. Then Jeremy chimed in with how good PSU's wrestling program is. At this point Shane interrupts to ask just where Penn State is. Well Pennsylvania of course. Shane gave Jeremy a sort of confused look and said " Well I'm not going to Peen State then. I'm going to Ohio State duhh!"
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CHOKE
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SWALLOW
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SPUTTER
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"BUT"
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"BUT!!"
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"WHAAAAAT!!!!!!!"
and the shock set in. Oh where, oh where did he go wrong. Actually These are just Jeremy's reactions. I on the other hand had the best abs work out of the year due to the laughter. Honestly though I never coached Shane on this. Since this momentous event the shock has worn off and reality has started to set in. Jeremy has even conceded that if Shane actually got so good the he was offered a scholarship to OSU that he would put on the scarlet and gray and cheer his loudest at all the meets. Except when Shane would be wrestling the PSU kid then he's just not sure!!

I also wanted to link a few of Shane's wrestling match videos here so...

against Covington

against Bath

round 1 against Aaron Wallers

round 2 against A.W.

and round 3 against A.W.

Shane/Bub

2011-02-10T12:14:00.006-05:00

Shane Markley (my maiden name) Benedict. 8 weeks before Shane was born Jeremy and I came to the conclusion that the name we had picked out for our son, Kane, had to go. We both liked it and felt confident the the stigma behind the name Cain did and would not affect us, but what about the little boy? Would he grow up resenting the fact that we didn't consider his feelings about the matter? Hindsight is 20/20 they say, but I'm still not sure how he would have felt about it. He's sort of like a crusty little crab, hard on the outside but soft on the inside.

Last night when Shane went to put his dirty clothes in the hamper he discovered that he actually had to reach the put his things on the top of the pile/mountain of dirty clothes. He then collapsed in a fit of giggles declaring loudly that "Mom REALLY needs to do the laundry!" The good part about it was he was more than willing to add Jo's dirty clothes to the very tip top when I was getting her pj's on her. He wanted to see just how tall he could make that mountain of laundry that Mom so needed to wash. I'm happy to report that although I probably won't be finishing it today the laundry is sorted and the washer and dryer are humming cozily. I'm so glad for a warm house and modern commodities like washers and dryers on days like today!

This year Shane is in the First grade. His teacher is Ms. Green and she is an excellent teacher. Shane's math skills are amazing, but he is still struggling to understand the concept of reading. He seems to be able to memorize really well and does good with his sight words, but struggles a lot when it comes time to sound words out. My challenge is to get him interested in the books he is trying to read. Since he is a science and biology geek it's not that difficult. He loves all kind of informational books the hard part is fining them with words simple enough for him to read. The funny part is when we get to some scientific word that I don't even know and we both sit there trying to sound it out. I'm still not sure we figured out the true name of that one kind of frog the other day. Oh well it was fun to say it all the different ways it might be and good for him to try.

Shane has two hobbies this year. I had originally told the children they could pick out one each, but both of Shane's hobbies were inexpensive. He joined the Cub Scouts about a year ago and really loves all the outdoorsy stuff. This past November he also signed up for wrestling and he's been doing really well. This coming Sunday is the tournament and then after that we'll go to the Nutter Center for his final meet if he does good enough this Sunday. So far this year he's gotten 6 pins.

Just this past Christmas, when we were in Kansas, Shane spent a day with his Uncle Kent reading water meters. That evening at the supper table he wondered if he was related to Kent. Upon confirming that he was indeed related he replied "Sweet!" Immediately a red flag went up and I had to inquire as to just what those two had been up to that day. Besides Kent trying to teach Shane how to gleek, if you don't know what that means consider yourself lucky, I'm not sure what all they did. Shane did get paid a very large sum of moolah for his wonderful companionship that day though. He is squirreling it away and intends to amass a much bigger stock pile. I'm rather pleased to find out that he has a desire to save his money as in the past he can't wait to spend it.

He may be the only boy in our family (actually can you every really say a man is not a boy any more? which would mean there are actually two boys in our family), but he definitely holds his own in a house full of females. ...Note I'm not commenting on the maturity of the parental female of our household...

Lexi

2011-02-04T13:14:00.007-05:00

"Alexia Thu Thuy Benedict!" Shane uses every one of her four names when he discovers her destroying or just plain wrecking one of his creations, which she just can't resist whether they be masterpieces made of Lego or tinker toys, architectural structures for his train or cars, carving out of wood, or one of his many collections. She now has an accomplice in crime, her side-kick, stinker winker bean, better known as Joey. Upon discovery of her wreckage she has newly elected to attempt to divert all blame to said side-kick by emphatically stating "Jo Jo JO JO JO!!!" It's not working out so well for her seeing as we're on to her little scheme. For example yesterday I discovered Lexi's artwork on our white cupboard. Due to the fact that it was colorfully displayed in purple marker and there was the same shade of purple marker marks on her hands I was pretty confident I had discovered the true culprit. Besides that the scribbling were just too advanced to be the scribblings of a one year old. Actually if it had been Jo I'm pretty sure the purple markings would have been primarily around Jo's mouth as she's more apt to chew on the marker than use it to create artwork.

Now how about a list of some of Lexi's favorite things: school, Daddy, outside, food, massive piles of hoarded toys, and wrestling with the entire family(excluding Mom of course). I just don't find much pleasure in being attacked by four jumping squealing, elbowing, kneeing rowdy kids! Jeremy seems to find it rather amusing though. I do find it amusing as well, but only from the sidelines thank-you very much.

Lexi has been home for two and a half years now. She is in school primarily for speech therapy and the last PT conference I went to the therapist was very encouraged by Lexi's progress. She does seem to have a lot of new words since she started school this past fall, but I have yet to hear her put two together. Her two newest words are "me and mine". Have you ever heard of a child who waited until they were 3 and a half years old to implement these two words into their vocabulary!?

Joey DOB 11-17-09

2011-01-31T23:35:00.008-05:00

This post will be about Jo Lynn, the beloved baby of the family. It's so funny to watch Rae and Shane when they scold or correct her. She is still little enough that her naughtiness and sassiness make us all want to burst out laughing. I've explained to the older kids though that I don't want Jo to get the idea that her naughtiness is an acceptable source for our amusement. So as long as they are scolding her they have to keep a strait face. Once she can't see them they no longer need to be in control and may he-haw to their hearts desire. So this evening was a classic example. Jo got into something she wasn't supposed to have (for the 1,000th time today) and Rae took it away, whereupon Jo began her big bad baby sass. Rae did great she even kept her voice stern, but as she hastily exited through the kitchen I noticed her eyes sparkling, mouth pursed, cheeks puffed and gawffing snickers emitted through her nose/ears??? But seriously this stage doesn't last very long if I remember correctly. Very soon, I expect, no one will be amused by the sass this child already has mastered. Within thirty minutes of being home this evening Jeremy notified me that " that girl is fast!" He was complaining that he barely moved her away from getting into one thing and turned his back for a second and the next thing he heard was the sound of the eggs he had just gathered cracking. Good thing he's fast too and rescued the eggs before she ruined the whole lot of them.

Joey, as Shane nick-named her on her first day home from the hospital, has a lot of character. She loves to imitate the other children and , be one of the big kids, which cracks Rae and Shane up. At least for now. It's the funniest thing to see her climb into the child size recliner and literally lounge when she witnesses them put a movie on and get comfy in their chairs. She growls, lifts her eye brows, tilts her head to the side, shrugs her shoulders until her neck is completely invisible and so many other funny expressions throughout the day. In many ways she reminds me of Rae at her age, vivacious and very social. She is definitely more of a mamma's baby than Rae was though. I have thoroughly enjoyed her thus far and wish it didn't seem like time is racing by so fast. I'm afraid I'm going to wake up tomorrow and she'll be in Kindergarten already.

Hello Again Bloggers!

2011-01-29T16:46:00.007-05:00

I'm not making any promises to myself or readers that this isn't a one time thing for the year, but I've been thinking about resuming my blogging for a while now. It's like having a scrapbook of my own to look back on latter. I like reading my old blogs as much as I like reading everyone else's.

My family has changed so much since the last time I blogged! Major changes include another daughter, Jo Lynn born in November of 2009. and two deaths in my husbands side of the family. Jeremy's dad passed away in May 2009, and our brother-in-law, Russell, passed away in November 2010 leaving an obvious emptiness in our extended family. Three of Russel and Faiths children happen to be our children's best friends. They are like three individual sets of peas in a pod.

In order to encourage myself to continue posting on my blog I'm planning to do individual updates on each family member one at a time.

Pictures from early 2009

2009-08-25T15:00:00.004-04:00

Fishin' in the Stillwater
Lexi's first winter with snow.

Shane's first wrestling season.

Watching Daddy split wood.

Pictures from 2008

2009-08-25T14:52:00.003-04:00

Sharing popcorn out of the big bowl with Poppy. You have to rank pretty high for these kinds of privelages!

Mighty warrior saves beautiful indian (aka asian) princess.

Big brother is always happy to help with thing like opening presents.

Say cheese!

Now everyone wants to help!

Rae puts in time on the new house remodleing.

Lexi finally has the hang of these sippy cup things and they are oh so grand.

Wow they are both smiling and looking at the camera in the same photo!

Isn't Spring Grand!

2009-05-22T12:24:00.002-04:00

So much has changed since I last posted on here! Our family is going to grow in number once again this November, Lord willing. It has been confirmed by the Dr. that it will be growing by only one. :) Although by looking at me one might wonder. The Dr.'s real nice he says that's very normal for the third pregnancy. I know the truth of the whole matter though and it's called weak abdominal muscles. I asked Shane what he thought a good name would be for the baby if it is a boy. He answered very matter-of-factly "Monkey Man". So for now I refer to family member #6 as "Monkey Man". Rae couldn't be more excited. She is ready for it to be November right now! I on the other hand am loving that it's still just May. If only this morning sickness would just go away.

Lexi is growing at a very normal and healthy rate. I had her to the Dr. this morning for her two year well child check. Doc says she looks great! She now weighs a whopping 22# and her height to weight ratio is very good. Her hair is getting long, but sure lacks thickness. She takes after Shane. After several times of having his hair all buzzed off it is beginning to thicken now. I'm not planning on going that rout to thicken my daughters hair though.

Now that we are in the country I have my very own big garden for the first time ever. It's fun to watch the plants popping up, but the idea of harvesting in the middle of summer while several months pregnant doesn't sound so fun.

Rae's dog gave birth to four puppies last Saturday. They sure are cute now and the children are really enjoying them. I just hope we can find homes for all of them. They are half coon hound (the neighbors dog) so I'm not sure it will be all that easy to find homes for them. :)

Jeremy's dad is in the hospital this week. He suffered a minor heart attack two weekends ago and the Dr.'s found that his heart was in very bad condition, but due to his otherwise bad health he was not a candidate for surgery. He had gotten some better and been released from the hospital. We went to visit him, all 5 of us and 4 of Joel's together, on Sunday. He seemed to be doing pretty good considering. This past Tuesday evening though he had another heart attack, and at this point the Dr.'s and nurses are just doing what they can to keep him comfortable until he goes to see Jesus. I asked the children last night just how exciting is this for Grandpa that He actually gets to meet Jesus face to face here real soon?! We are all sad thinking of how much we are going to miss him, but Grandpa is so blessed. He has loved the Lord all his life, so meeting Him will be just indescribable.

The children and I are planning a trip to Kansas this summer. We are all looking forward to it so much. Except Lexi who just doesn't understand. Our plans are to be gone for about two weeks.

We now have chickens, but no coup! I'm just really getting into this whole country thing. Big garden, lots of pets, chickens and I even asked Jeremy to put up a clothes line for me! :0 Hopefully he finishes the chicken coup soon; my chickens are just plain outgrowing their tub in the house!

It's 1:00!! I got to go!

I Should Be Working

2009-02-12T11:14:00.008-05:00

But here I am instead playing on the computer. I finally have some bean bags to sew again and I'm in real need of some extra $. Aren't we all !? We finally signed a contract with a realty company to try and sell our house. We spent the evening Monday packing up the last of the upstairs things, and vacuuming. I still want to take a bucket of soapy water to the bathroom and kitchen floors. As clean as I think my kitchen may be, removing big appliances makes it look like I never clean! If this house would just sell it would relieve a lot of our financial strain, so if you are a reader who prays please pray for us that our house sells quickly!

Jeremy is headed out on a medical mission trip the end of this month. He's really starting to get excited, and I'm starting to really wish I was going with him. He had a meeting Tuesday evening with all of the others who are going also and he learned a good bit of what they will be doing. It's in the Dominican Republic so it will be nice and warm. It sounds like they will be very busy, but they will get some free time in the evenings. Jeremy hopes to spend his free time at the beach.

Shane has two more wrestling meets. One this weekend and the last one next weekend at the Nutter Center. He seems to be getting better every time, but he is definitely one of the smallest (38.5 lbs) kids out there. That is not in his favor at this point.:)

Rae... Rae continues to be a wonderful little helper around the house and she is doing really well in school. She brings home lots of papers with 100% right on them. She is only in first grade, but it still amazes me how quickly they learn. We've just started working on getting Shane ready for Kindergarten. I had planned to work on it all winter and here we are at least half way through and I'm just starting. So far he seems to pick things up quick which is good for my patience. I wouldn't make a very good teacher. I have enough trouble teaching everything else that I'm pretty sure all that book learnin' stuff is better left to the experienced teachers at this point.

I made the children chore charts Monday, so far Rae does really well getting hers done. Monday Shane did really well. Tuesday it took some supervision and yesterday was like pulling teeth!! I really dread making him do them today. If he works steadily at them they would take less than an hour, but they took all of the morning and a better part of the afternoon yesterday. I have a feeling today may take clear up until bedtime. I'm determined to teach them the responsibility of working though, and so far I've really let it slide. So at the age of 7 and 5 I actually think they are doing well....... Rae is doing excellent and Shane is doing nothing more than I expected. He's a lazy couch potato and we're going to change that before he gets to set in his ways.

Lexi is a tiny, little, 20 pound, 20 month old, cuddly, stubborn, smiley, get into everything she's not supposed to have gal. What more can I say. She's a very normal almost two year old.

Jeremy's mother is in the hospital again. She has high blood pressure and as far as I know the doctors haven't figured out whats causing it yet. We took her in Sunday for a really bad headache. They ruled out another stroke, but we still don't know fro sure why she's have this spike of high blood pressure.

And now for the good part

Pictures!

Before and After

Fuzzy Foto but Cute Kids

At the Library Again

2009-02-03T18:39:00.006-05:00

This time I brought my laptop, but forgot to charge it before coming. Therefore I have almost no power left. I'm going to upload some newer photos.

This is what happens when you trust your older brother to help you style your hair!!
Rae's new comfort that Nana made her for Christmas.

Shane's new comfort.

And this is what happens when said older brother goes sleding down the hill that ends in a pile of broken concrete!

New video #1 He Works!

New video # 2 He Get's Beat

New video #3 Siblings

No Internet! and Some Highlights

2009-01-08T12:04:00.003-05:00

Since we moved the first part of September we have been without internet. Actually we had an air card from AT&T for about 6 weeks, but it didn't always work and when it did it was sooOOOoo slow. We also lost our old email address so everything that anyone has sent to that address since September 3 I'll never get.
Today we are spending some extra time at the library so that I can be on the net for a while. Shane is enjoying the children's computers while I hang out at the adult computers. Lexi is on and off my lap and never strays too far. I believe ,by the smell of thing that see just took care of some business. :) There is so much that has happened since we moved, I think it would be easiest to just wright down a few highlights.

* Lexi learned to drink out of a sippy cup. YEA!!
* We finally finished the big room at the back of our house and got the carpet installed. Jeremy got an old wood stove from his brother and it keeps the room very comfortably warm. I have my sewing set up back there the laundry is back there all the kids toys are back there and the computer is back there. (not that we use it that much without internet anyhow) So we have named it the rec room.
* In November we had our firs post placement report done.
* Rae turned 7! She is such a sweet little girl. She of course is human and has her moments, but she has a true love for Jesus and desires to follow him. It makes training her so much easier, because her heart is being led by God. She also lost her fourth tooth the day after Christmas.
* Shane now has his own room and does very well by himself. He is a continual amusement, delight and exasperation to me. He started wrestling in November. He has a long way to go before he's actually good at it, but they say the younger they start the easier it is for them to pick up on it. The training and discipline are good for him too. He's usually wiped out after practice.
* We have adjusted to being a family of five and love it. It was quite an adjustment at first. Mostly for Me and Lexi, but Shane also had some adjusting to do. Lexi is constantly getting into his projects. he enjoys Lego's, tinker toys, coloring and many other thing that include small parts that Lexi is not supposed to have. He ends up playing in his room with the door shut quite a bit. Lexi has gone through a few different stages of bonding, but she seems to be bonding and adjusting in a normal healthy way. One stage she went through she was very clingy and wanted to be held all the time. another stage she would reach for other people to hold her. Sometimes she would even reach for someone else while I was holding her, even strangers. This stage concerned me the most. The most recent stage ( which she is in right now) She prefers me or Jeremy to hold her but will allow a select few others to hold her. She wants to be held when we are in a large crowd or in a new place, but is fine to get down and play on her own when we are at home and there aren't strangers present. In my opinion this is the most healthy stage yet.
* Jeremy installed an insert in the fireplace it keeps the front room warm. We used $500 worth of propane in one month!! So it is a very good thing that we have the fireplace in the front and the wood stove in the back.
* Lexi has just started saying a few things with meaning. She has been babbling for quite a while, but hadn't started "talking" until just here in the past few weeks. She calls me and Jeremy "mom" she says "Uh-Oh!", thank-you "Dae-doo" and peek a boo " baa-boo". She does the motions for peek a boo, waves bye-bye and follows simple commands.

I have a lot of things that need done at home and yet here I am hanging out a the library, but I figured if I didn't start posting again everyone would think I just decide I didn't want to blog any more. Hopefully we are able to figure out some kind of internet solution soon so I can download some pictures.

Three Months!!

2008-09-28T17:33:00.002-04:00

I knew it had been a while since I had posted, but THREE MONTHS!! Since my last post we have moved. I have been really busy fixing this place up and still have a lot to do so I may not post again anytime soon. I also still have apples and pears to can.
The children love being in the country. We got both Rae and Shane their own dogs two days after we moved.
Well my mom and dad just got here so I've got to go!

And Then They Were Five

2008-06-28T09:05:00.003-04:00

We have now been home for one week! We seem to have worked our way into a new schedule and everyone is sleeping through the night. I must say though this is the most scheduled I ever remember being. I decided to go ahead a use a schedule though until Lexi gets adjusted to her new life here. I am not really the type of person who likes so much structure on my time, but for now it is working out beautifully. I'm starting to feel rested!
I have removed the password from our adoption journal now. I feel like since we are now Lexi's legal parents and we are safely back in the US that there is not really a need for the password.
Our days this week have pretty much all gone something like this: wake up around 7-8, Breakfast around 8:30, 2.5-3 hour morning nap starting between 10:30 and 11:00, lunch as soon as Lexi wakes up, play time, afternoon nap starting around 5:00, supper at 7:30, and bedtime is between 9:30 and 10:30. Lexi is a very content and happy baby in the mornings. She crawls around happily entertaining herself and I love it! Afternoons not so much! I have no idea why, but after lunch Lexi is not able to entertain herself. If I sit and hold her or if the children get down on the floor and play with her she's ok, but otherwise she is very fussy in the afternoons. Rae and Shane have so much more to do than just play with baby toys all afternoon. I bought them an 18 inch snap set pool on Tuesday (my first outing with 3 children) and they love it. I can hardly make them come in and entertain Lexi all afternoon and I don't really feel like just sitting all afternoon either. So far we have worked it out where I hold her part of the time, the children play with her part of the time and she crawls around fussing part of the time. Hopefully given time she learns to be as happy in the afternoon as she is in the morning, but that would be perfect and no one is perfect!
Jeremy's parents have a move day set up for the second weekend in July. I'm thinking it will only take us 2-3 weeks to have the old place repainted and re carpeted so that we can move in, so sometime early August we just might actually move into our new place. My plan is to put the girls in one room and Shane in another. That means that my only child who actually knows how to and enjoys sleeping in will get woke up every morning by her baby sister. How unfair! I mean it's summer and she has to go back to school way too soon anyhow! The whole, no more sleeping in again, has me in a tizzy and I want to defend my daughters rights to sleep in too! I may just allow her to sleep with Shane until school starts back up this fall. Or should I say late summer.
Tomorrow we will finally get to go to church again! We only missed three Sundays, but it seems like so much more.
I still haven't touched the pile of mail from while we were gone except to add to it each day! I think between that and the laundry today we may have an extra fussy afternoon here, because I really need to get some things done here and little Missy is just going to have to entertain herself for a little while. Maybe I'll be speedy and get most of it done during her 3 hour morning nap. LOL

Videos

2008-06-13T05:34:00.003-04:00

Tuesday Morning in Hanoi

Tuesday Afternoon in Hanoi

Wednasday in Hanoi

Bath Time Saturday

News!!

2008-05-27T22:08:00.002-04:00

A few weeks ago I posted about "No News". Now I have so much going on I hardly have time to think. We made a trip to Kansas a couple weeks ago. I spent a little over a week there. Shane stayed with me, but Jeremy and Rae came home after just a few days. Jeremy had to get back to work and Rae needed to be back in school. We have very good friends who were willing to help out with Rae in the afternoons and took care of her until Jeremy got off work.

I'm now back in full swing making bean (technically corn) bags for Corn Hole games. It is something I can do here at home so I don't need child care for the children, but I'm still able to bring in a little extra income. Last week about half way through the stack of bags I was sewing up for the week my machine quit working! I ended up having to get my old one out and use it. It works ok, but I'm spoiled. I like all the extra features on my new one and the old one takes me so much longer. The sewing center that works on sewing machines here in Greenville was closed last week. They opened up again today and I took the machine by there. Unfortunately it is not the brand they sell, so they can't order parts for it if something is broken. They are just going to clean and service it. Hopefully that fixes it.

Rae only has 6 more days of Kindergarten left. She is so excited. She wants to stay up late and sleep in every day. She definitely takes after Jeremy and I. I could easily stay up until 1:00 or 2:00 every night. The thing is I want to be able to sleep in until 10:00 the next morning. That doesn't work to well with school. This past fall was a huge adjustment for us. Jeremy is the same way. He likes to stay up late, and if he doesn't need to be up at any particular time the next day can sleep until noon! I usually can't sleep much past 10:30 or 11:00. Shane, poor little bugger , is not like that at all. He is tired by 9:00 and ready to be awake at 8:00 the next morning. He drives the rest of crazy with abundance of morning energy.

Today we finally got the call about our travel to Vietnam to finalize the adoption of our little girl. To read more about that visit our adoption site. You will need a password, so leave a comment with your email address and if/when I find the time I will send it to you.

Life is in full swing and we are loving every minute of it!

I Want My OWN Ice Cream Cone

2008-05-07T17:14:00.007-04:00

I don't like to hold babies. For those of you whose jaws just dropped let me clarify. I don't like to hold other people's babies. This odd quirk goes way back. As a young girl after church on Sunday's when all the other girls my age would make a mad dash for the mothers with babies as soon as church was dismissed I was left wondering what all the excitement was about. Three-fourths of the babies who were snatched out of their mothers arms would start crying. The others were either drooling or smelled like spit-up. And as soon as the baby you were holding started to cry three or four old lady's around you would turn toward you and say "What'd you do? Did you pinch that baby?" Even the first time someone used this little joke on me I didn't find it funny. The day my first daughter was born this changed. I couldn't hold her enough. She was so sweet and soft and she fit in my arms so perfect and naturally. This was a relief for me considering my past experience with babies. I had babysit quit a bit and knew HOW to hold a baby, but still it was my job. I didn't really bond. I bonded instantly with both of my children. And now I'm impatiently waiting to be able to hold my third child, and yes this time I want desperately to hold her.

Now on to the ice cream cone from my title. I've been trying in my mind to find an analogy as to why this odd quirk of mine has gotten so much worse ever since we started our adoption. You would think that longing to fill my arms with my daughter would make me want to hold any baby I could get a hold of, but actually just the opposite has happened. Today after listening to my children argue in the back seat of the van about "Hold my ice cream cone for me while I get situated." it came to me. I have been standing in line waiting on a chocolate ice cream cone for 20 minutes. I can see behind the counter that it has been made, but they are checking over the recipe to make sure no important ingredients have been left out. Meanwhile someone else walks up to the counter and orders a vanilla ice cream cone. Within the very normal amount of time, 2 minutes (aka 9 months), they are handed their beautiful vanilla ice cream cone. I now look back behind the counter again and notice my ice cream cone is starting to melt. I feel desperate to have permission to go get it, but they still need to check just one more thing. At this point while I'm still so focused on my chocolate ice cream cone the lady with the vanilla cone turns to me and asks if I would like to hold her vanilla ice cream cone. Now do you think I really want to hold her vanilla ice cream cone?! I want my OWN chocolate ice cream cone!!

"Pop" Party

2008-05-03T14:28:00.002-04:00

I know I write mostly about my children, but between laundry, cleaning, balancing the check book, cooking and sewing there isn't much entertaining here besides them.

The other day Rae asked me about "pop" party's. I explained that as far as I know there is no such thing as a "pop" party.
Rae- "Well then what do you call the party after someone dies?"
Me- " A funeral."
Rae- "Uh, I know about funerals MOM. What is the party called?"(lots of girl attitude)
Me- "There is no party, just a funeral."
Rae- "Well when someone dies they go to heaven, so why is there no party?"
Me-" umm, I don't know?" I use this answer a lot. No wonder they think they're smarter than me so much of the time.
Later Shane explained why it should be called a "pop" party. Because you die and "POP" you're in heaven. I would be inclined to agree with them if it were not for the fact that those of us left behind are going to miss the person who has "popped", and don't usually feel much like a party. Amazingly at the ages of 6 and 4 they have not yet experienced someone close to them "popping".

According to the dictionary- pop: to go, come, enter, or issue forth suddenly or quickly.

Spring!!

2008-04-18T18:20:00.007-04:00

What a week! We could not have asked for nicer weather. It has been sunny and warm all week long. It's supposed to rain tomorrow, but if everything is going to stay this beautiful green color then we will have to endure a few rainy days. The grass has just turned the most beautiful shade of green in the past couple of weeks. It almost needs mowed.

We have a small fish pond in our backyard that Jeremy dug and lined and stocked himself. It has three or four different kinds of plants and several fish. They pretty much have followed God's command to be fruitful and multiply. We put three ordinary goldfish in there a few years ago, and now they are many. They have gotten quite large for goldfish.

Shane absolutely CANNOT stay away from the pond. It's only around two feet deep so I'm not really worried about him drowning, but the water is disgusting. Especially this time of year. It needs emptied and refilled. Earlier this week the children discovered the frog (he's pretty big!) that lives in our pond. They have tried and tried to catch him to no avail. They are constantly scooping buckets full of water out of the pond and making huge mud lakes to play in. All of this behavior is a big no-no, but Shane just can't stop himself. They also love to throw rocks in, the bigger the rock the bigger the splash. The problem with this is that the pond is lined with a rubber mat that can get holes in it if a large enough rock smashes into it, so after 100 (I really don't think I'm exaggerating here) times of telling the kids to stay away from the pond I finally punished Shane yesterday for once again playing in the water. I know, I know that should have happened after the second time of telling him to stay out of the pond, but as a parent that is my biggest fault. I wait until the 100th time and then, " Aahh! I've told you a hundred times to not do that!!" He's probably going to end up with worms or something from playing in it. This morning guess what I found him doing. You guessed it: playing in the pond. This time though he had found a new way to play in the pond. He got out one of the fishing poles (it even had a hook and weight on it) and was fishing very patiently out of the little decorative fish pond we have in our back yard. As soon as I had composed myself from a fit of laughter I called trough the window to him "Shane, I thought I told you NO PLAYING IN THE POND." He turns around and answers "Well Mom, that was yesterday. Today's a different day"

No News

2008-04-10T15:09:00.002-04:00

I haven't updated this blog for a while. I feel like I need to have something to write about before I start, so I'll write about no news. Our proposed move to the country........No News. Our adoption........No News. Our updated home study........ well, we almost have that done, but not quite. So I guess........No News. More corn bags to sew.............No News.

One smidgen of news. I still haven't filed my taxes!!!!! I'm waiting on one more form from Jeremy's employer. We should be getting it soon. This is probably boring you all even more than it is me. I'm going to go read my book.

Nine Years Ago Today

2008-03-27T12:25:00.004-04:00

I married Jeremy. I grew up in Kansas and lived there until I got married. My first cousin, Ryan, was also born in KS, but had live in Ohio for a couple of years. Then he moved back to Kansas. While he was living in Ohio he became very good friends with Joel (Jeremy’s brother) and because of Joel he also became good friends with Jeremy. When I was 18 (the spring of ’97) Jeremy came to visit Ryan in Kansas. That’s when I first met him. The truth is I was smitten from the first time I met him. We started dating in August of ’97. Long distance relationships are good for getting to know someone. We would spend hours on the phone. And hours on the phone = talking about things that would probably be left unsaid otherwise. He proposed in November of ’98, and we were married in March of ’99.
Marriage is not always a bed of roses, but I am so glad that we choose this path. I love living with my best friend. There is no one on this earth that knows me and understands me the way he does. The person who can make you the most frustrated can also make you the happiest. When I first started this blog Jeremy read my profile. It said that I had been married to the love of my life for almost nine years (now the almost is missing). He chuckled about the term “love of my life” and said that I need to be honest. I asked if he knew of any other loves in my life. No, he didn’t. So, that just leaves Jeremy, “the love of my life”.

Benedict Vacation

2008-03-24T22:45:00.007-04:00

We just got home this evening from a trip to Tennessee. We spent the weekend with Jeremy's family. We rented an eight bedroom cabin in Pigeon Forge. It was a lot of fun, but I didn't have Internet access so I wasn't able to check e-mail. I felt like I was going through withdrawal. I've become far to addicted to e-mail. Hoping to hear that we finally have approval to travel to Vietnam to pick up baby Benedict.

Jeremy has three brothers and one sister. All of them are married with children except for his youngest brother. The cousins had a ball playing together this weekend. They range in age from 16 years to 2 years. with most of them between 4 and 8.

Tori and Rae in their matching outfits

Our family photo (minus one). I wish I knew how to get the date off of Jeremy's face!

The Cutest Piggies

2008-03-20T13:50:00.005-04:00

We got new pictures of our baby girl today. If you want to see more of them you'll have to visit our Adoption site. But for this blog I'm going to post a picture of "The Cutest Piggies"

How to Make a Tar Monster

2008-03-13T18:02:00.004-04:00

My four year old son told me in great detail today how to make a tar monster. The conversation started out on a completely different topic. But for any of you who have ever carried on a conversation with a four year old boy you know it goes something like a dream. You can be in one place one second and the next second you are in a completely different place. It's so hard to keep up sometimes that I end up just nodding and mumbling "um-hum". I have to be a little bit careful though or I end up agreeing to things that are not acceptable.
Like:
Shane- "I'll just finish off this one pound bag of candy."
Me- "Ya"
Shane- "I'm not eating any vegetables ever again."
Me- "Sure"
Shane- "I'm gonna spread a layer of mud all over the porch."
Me- "um-hum" "What?!"
Very dangerous territory. Anyhow I was going to share with you how to make a tar monster. This particular conversation started out with how to play a new game Shane had made up. I unfortunately forget the name of the game, and asking Shane about it would only get me blank stares and a long "whaaat??". Because even though it is in depth at the time it vanishes quickly. For this game he was telling me about we needed dirt, sand, water, and grass. I was paying enough attention this morning to ask, "and then what do you do with the dirt, sand, water and grass?" His response was to start adding items needed in order to play the game. We would also need wood, glass, (not sharp glass. I asked) leaves, glue, rope, play dough, one eye ball. Now he had my attention. "What do you need an eyeball for, it's a game?" His answer "Just one eye ball. Not two" See he doesn't listen to me either. So you mix everything together and put the eyeball on top then pour tar over all of it and that makes a tar monster. And that's it he was done ready to go on with something else. I was left to wonder what other weird things are buzzing through his head everyday. It is starting to make so much sense why we women don't understand men!

I've Been Tagged

2008-03-11T12:32:00.003-04:00

Four things you may not know about me.

A) 4 jobs I have had in my life:
1) nanny
2) house cleaning
3) clerk
4) sewing

B) 4 movies I watch over and over:
1) Tommy Boy
2) Jeremiah Johnson
3) The Lord of the Rings series
4) The Passion of the Christ

C) 4 places I have lived:
1) Lawrence, Kansas
2) Greenville, OH
3) yet to be determined
4) "

D) 4 TV shows I watch:
1) 24
2) CSI
3) Lost
4) Little House on the Prairie

E) 4 places I have been:
1) Washington D.C.
2) Williamsburg, VA
3) Pigeon Forge, TN
4) California

F) 4 people who e-mail me regularly:
1) my mother
2) Amy Sparks
3) my adoption agency
4) Kelly Paulus

G) 4 of my favorite foods:
1) microwave popcorn
2) mint and chip ice cream
3) cookies
4) Bob Evans hotcakes

H) 4 places I'd rather be right now:
1) Vietnam
2) Kansas
3) getting a massage
4) in an airplane on the way to Vietnam

I) 4 friends I think will respond:
1) ?
2) ?
3) ?
4) ?

J) 4 things I'm looking forward to this coming year:
1) a trip to Vietnam
2) a trip or 2 to Kansas
3) Vacation w/ Benedict family in Tennessee
4) Vacation w/ Markley family somewhere

Now I tag Charity, Jodi and Lyndie.

The First Week of March

2008-03-08T14:20:00.020-05:00

On Monday we had 65 degree weather. It was great. The kids played outside for about two hours. Then it started to rain in the afternoon, and they were forced to retreat to the house. It dropped about 20 to 30 degrees by nightfall.

Tuesday it continued to rain. When we get a lot of rain the water eventually starts to leak into our basement. The perimeter drain cannot keep up with the amount of water and the result is a wet floor in our basement. All of the kids toys are in the basement so we really try to keep the flood at bay. We build a dam on the floor around the crack where the water leaks in. And then wring out the towels as they become saturated. The perimeter drain flows into the sump pump pit. On Tuesday I was doing laundry, also in the basement. The washer drains into the sump pump pit also. As I started my second load I noticed soap suds starting to rise out of the pit! But alas the sump pump was not kicking on. And it was pouring rain out side. I checked the breaker. It was not thrown. I went ahead and switched it on and off thinking maybe it would restart it. Didn't work. I got a flash light and made sure that the float wasn't sticking. It wasn't. The sump pump was simply not working. By now the pit was completely full. I called Jeremy at work and he called his cousin Wayne. Wayne is a plumber and agreed to come by and either fix it or replace it for us once he got off work. Jeremy asked if I had checked the breaker, and tried unplugging it and plugging it back in. I told him I hadn't tried unplugging it and plugging it back in, but that I figured flipping the breaker would have the same results. He agreed. After he hung up I decided to try the unplugging and replugging anyhow just so I could say I tried everything before Wayne had to come all the way over and work on the completely water submerged sump pump. I got the stool, set it up, climbed up on it and behold the thing wasn't even plugged in!! I was sweeping cob webs from the rafters and pipes last week and must have bumped it loose without even knowing it. Once it was plugged back in it ran just fine. For about a solid 20 minutes! Then I had to call Jeremy back and explain "Um, it wasn't even plugged in, and it's my fault. " Fun Fun. By then the temperature had dropped to below freezing and there was ice everywhere. Especially on power lines. In an attempt to keep up with the water now coming in the crack in the basement I didn't have supper ready by 7:45 when the power went out. So we ate cold cereal for supper. Jeremy then spent the next couple of hours hauling water (drawn out of the sump pump pit) up the stairs, out the door and to the street. Seven gallons at a time. We have one 5 gallon bucket and one 2 gallon bucket. He did this until the power came back on around 11:00. No toys were drowned on Tuesday in the Benedict basement. I also finished my 500 beanbags in the afternoon.

On Wednesday, due to weather and power outages Rae did not have school. There goes the last day of spring break. Greenville schools are going to be making up snow days for the entire week of spring break.

Thursday I babysat for my cousin Kyrston's children. Rae also had a friend come home from school with her. I didn't get a whole lot done that day. The ice melted out of the trees. It was to fun watch. I sure wouldn't have wanted to walk under any of them though. The ground around every tree was white with chunks of melted ice.

Friday Rae (actually all kindergartners) didn't have school again because the weather forecast was predicting lots of snow. I rolled my eyes at that one, until it started to snow about 9:30 a.m. and hasn't stopped yet. It is now 3:00 on Saturday and we have a lot of snow. Friday the 7th of March there was a bank robbery in the little ole town of Greenville. All the other grades of school were in session when this happened, and the High School went into lock down. I was glad to have Rae home with me at that point!

My Favorite Day of the Week

2008-03-02T19:03:00.002-05:00

Sunday's are my favorite. First I get to sleep in. Second we go to church. Third we get the entire day free of work. And fourth at 8:00 Sunday evening the US Consulate in HCMC begins their work day which means I can start watching my e-mail for an acknowledgement from USCIS.
Fridays used to be my favorite day of the week. Now they mean two days of no possibility of an e-mail from Vietnam.

This past Tuesday Jeremy left for a Paver Convention in Tennessee. He got back home late last night. I didn't used to like it very well when he was gone for several days. Anymore I don't really mind so much. Don't get me wrong, I love my husband. I just enjoy evenings that I don't feel a need to fix a meal. The kids are very lite eaters. In fact Shane can go several meals and only eat 2-4 bites at each meal. They personify the "eating like a bird" phrase. Amazingly though, if I put something like waffles dripping with syrup in front of Shane, he can eat more than me! So while Jeremy was gone we had leftovers one night, yogurt and popcorn another (I only ate the popcorn since I don't like yogurt), and ate Chinese another. No meals fixed! Well, except for breakfast and lunch which I don't really go to a lot of bother for anyhow.
Another thing I like is the fact that the kids don't judge how clean the house is. Jeremy doesn't judge either, but I always feel a responsibility to try and have it picked up a little before he comes home. This of course doesn't happen every night, but I try. This week I was busy with bean bags and didn't clean until Saturday. And guess what, nobody cared!

BTW Jeremy says that as for describing the kids I can declare that they personify "drive dad crazy" too. After five days without their favorite person in the whole wide world (now you know how I rate) they CANNOT stay off of him. Poor Jeremy, so much for the Sunday afternoon nap. I actually almost took the favorite person in the whole wide world title from him this past week. He wasn't here so as runner-up I almost had a chance, and then he shows back up and guess were I am. Slightly above chopped liver again. Shane would not even let me help him with his snap this morning. He actually manually held his pants up the whole time Jeremy was in the shower, because he preferred Jeremy to me for help in the pants-snapping department.

The Aquarium

2008-02-25T17:07:00.010-05:00

We spent Saturday at the Newport Aquarium in Cincinnati. The kids both got in free. It's a good thing, because the price for two adults was expensive enough. We spend about the same on the zoo and there is lots more to see at the zoo. We did get to see a lot of water life that is not common to zoos though. I enjoyed the jelly fish the most. They are really quite amazing creatures. I wonder how they keep from getting their tentacles tangled.

Shane's favorites were the Sharks and the Stingrays. Lucky for him they even had Shark Rays. when he got to pick out a stuffed animal at the gift shop he didn't hesitate. He picked the Shark Ray.

Rae's favorite was that she got to spend the day with Macy. One of her best and dearest friends. Fun days are made even better when you can share them with someone you love.

Thank goodness we are not outnumbered by our children yet. We had quite a time keeping track of both of them. There were a lot of people there so it was easy for them to get away from us while we were looking at the exhibits. It was a good feeling to finally get them strapped into their car seats at the end of the day and know we wouldn't need to chase them down any more tunnels or halls. It was easier when they were in strollers.

The Gap and More

2008-02-21T11:01:00.008-05:00

I had a cup of coffee this morning. I usually only have coffee when I have a lot to do and want to rush around like a squirrel on caffeine for a few hours. I'm not sure the effect actually gets me anywhere. You know "haste makes waste" and that sort of thing.

I quickly took some pictures of Rae's triumphant smile this morning before she left for school. The one picture is kind of scary. Looks like that squirrel on caffeine I mentioned earlier. I explained she need to smile while showing her teeth and the next one turned out better.
Shane missed telling Rae good-by this morning. Which always makes him kinda sad. So he went and curled up in her bed. And whoops! he just fell back asleep. I doubt that was his intention. He probably thought he could put in a little secret thumb-sucking time. He has become very self-conscious of that little habit. We almost never catch him at it anymore.

And Shane in the laundry basket a couple weeks ago. He made himself a cozy little (squirrel like) nest and fell asleep watching a movie in the basement. My! aren't we just the little family of squirrels.

Well I gotta go work off some of this caffeine. 500 little bean bags waiting to be sewn up are calling to me.

First Post

2008-02-20T20:54:00.005-05:00

4 going on 5. We are 4. Jeremy, Michelle, Rae Lynn and Shane. We will be 5. All the aforementioned plus Alexia. I have a blog specifically for adoption news, but I think a blog about every day life looks like fun.

Tonight our 6 year old daughter just lost her first tooth. After the initial shock of seeing BLOOD!!! She decided that the new gap in her mouth is pretty cool. She had bitten down on a stuffed animal (why?? I don't know) and Shane decided to take it from her. The result-her tooth gave way. It was ready to come out anyhow. Shane just helped it along a little.

I have 500 little bean bags to sew up in the next two weeks. That equals $250. Is 500 bags worth $250. Well, with a left over Christmas balance on our credit card I guess it has to be. I have been taking it easy for the past couple of months and enjoying every minute of it. Now it's time to get started on the not so enjoyable things in life. At least I don't despise sewing bean bags. I could be cleaning houses for other people. That is work I would despise.

Jeremy's parents new house is weeks away from being finished. As soon as they move out of the old place I'm going to start fixing it up for us. I'm hoping we can get moved into it before we travel to get Lexi. I want to do a lot of painting, replace some windows, add a shower/tub to the main bathroom and replace all the carpets. The main bathroom has only a stall shower, and the master bath has a stall shower and a jacuzzi tub. I definitely want a regular tub for bathing the children in.

Lexi's paperwork made it all the way back to the International Adoption Department in Vietnam. Now we need for them to approve it all and send it back to her province. Vietnam is getting things done a lot faster than USA. We are still waiting on United States Citizenship and Immigration Services to acknowledge that we sent them a form asking for visa approval. It was sent a month ago. As of today they still have not even started processing our request. Good Grief! I don't even let my junk mail set around that long, let alone the mail that matters!