Boys' Birthday Party

Better late than never, right?

Well, here are some pics from Tiernan and Jaeger's birthday party!  Tiernan turned 8 on Feb 23rd and Jaeger turned 1 Feb 18th.  To keep up with tradition, our family friend Ana was kind enough to make Tiernan's birthday cake!  2 years ago she made a baseball, last year he requested a football and this year he was asking for a soccer ball...until about 2 week before his birthday, then he changed his mind.  He wanted a crocodile cake!  (Prob thanks to all the man vs wild episodes he had been watching).  Ana agreed to take on the challenge of a crocodile cake and it was amazing!  I had no idea how she was going to make it, I thought she might just draw one in frosting on top of a normal cake.  But nope! He got a whole crocodile.

 

Jaeger wasn't as picky and didn't request anything :) So I just said she could make his cake very small and in the shape of the number 1.  It was cute and fit him perfectly. He started poking at it and eventually stuck some in his mouth.  He held his right arm out to the side of his body the whole time which was kind of funny :) And since I wasn't sure what to expect with the crocodile and didn't exactly know how many people yet to expect at the party, I decided to order a 1/2 sheet cake from Sam's club for everyone to eat as well.

 

Guests starting arriving about 10:30.  First it was Ana and her family, who had to leave shortly bc of other plans.  Then gma Barb and gpa Ron, Jonny & Becky & kids, pastor Matthew's wife Susan and 2 boys, and gma & gpa Legatt!  First it was lunch, then cake, then presents.

Tiernan was estatic to get a few cool toys, including legos, but the coolest he thought was the remote control helicopter he got from gpa Ron.  He's been practicing on his and always asking to fly it, and since he was getting pretty good at it, we all thought it was time he got his own.  He loves it!

24 hour date

Because of the easter weekend, Nathan got 3 days off. What better way to kick start the vacation than with a date night! The kids (ALL of the kids...which btw was Jaeger's first time away from mom overnight ever so needless to say this hasn't happened in well over a year, can't even remember the last time actually...) went to gma and gpas house around 1:00 in the afternoon and shortly after, I left to run some errands. Nathan got off work a tad early so he could catch the chiropractor while he was still open and then after that we were free as two love birds! What to do???

Well, we started the night by driving around town trying to figure out where to eat. First place we stopped, Texas roadhouse, was so busy that there were at least 75 people crowded in the front waiting to be seated, nope! So off we went to Boulders. We'd never been there before and ordered a bunch of appetizers to share...buffalo wings, cheese curds, artichoke dip...ya know, low fat stuff like that ;)

Then it was to the mall to wander and do some shopping. Here comes the crazy part...we closed the mall down! I mean, I know its only 9pm when it closes but it might as well been 2am bc if I'm still awake and kickin after 8, its a good night!!

So after we left there, we picked up a couple movies and headed home. And oh the house was so nice and quiet when we arrived. No kids yelling, no teeth to brush, no pjs to put on, no bedtime stories. Now, don't get me wrong, not that that stuff is all bad, but having a one night break from it all is quite the change of pace!

The morning was just as weird. No kids coming into the room at 5:30am saying good morning, no thumping of feet hitting the floor after jumping down from the kitchen counters, just quietness. Ahhh. We got ready and left for morning errands. The mall (again), thrift store, post office, oh...AND....a coffee stop!!!

Now, if you know Nathan, you know he normally wants NOTHING to do w coffee and rolls his eyes whenever the word is mentioned or even when I say coffee smells good. I was even a little reluctant to ask him to swing past the cafe for me to get one quick. But he sure surprised me! He says "well I can come in with you and get something" uhhhh...."yeah u could get a smoothie or something" "no I think ill try coffee" wwwwhhhhaaaatttttt????? Wait, who are you and what did u do with my husband???  So in we went and I ordered him the same thing as me so that way if he didn't like it, I could drink it :) and also bc I know nothing about coffee except what I order so I have no idea what else there is. So 2 16oz vanilla breves it was. Best part was that they we're only 1.13 a piece..gotta love the 360 cafe!  And you know what the result was? "That wasn't that bad" said Nathan. Wow. That's one giant leap for mankind folks!  I wanted to take a pic of him drinking it for proof but he put it in the floor and wouldn't let me. I put mine in front if him hut he pushed it away. Small steps here people, small steps :)

After our errand running, we grabbed lunch quick on the way back and headed to pick up the crazy kids. Gma and gpa had a busy 24 hours and were ready to take a nap by the time we left. We don't do that often but its sure nice and appreciated when we get the chance to. So thanks again mom and dad for willingly watching our crazy herd of kids. But now they might reconsider the couple days they agreed to over Nathan's birthday. Haha :)

Pic of us before we left.
Crazy hot husband driving me on our date
Pic of Nathan pushing away my coffee :)

First week completed!

Well we made it through the first week of school for the boys! And not once was I late dropping them off or picking them up, which I say is a huge accomplishment in and of itself!....esp since I have to leave the house by 7:20am with 5 kids up, dressed and fed. At first I thought that I would roll out of bed, fed the older boys, and throw the other three in the van and feed them when we got home, but I found myself getting up early (totally a God thing bc I would NEVER do that on my own) getting somewhat ready, and having time to feed all the kids! Then last Wednesday, I joined the Y and plan on going after I drop the kids off at school on M, W, F. I made it twice last week so I'm on track! Although, oh my goodness, I have never been so sore in my life!! My legs hurt so bad that I couldn't even stand up straight without the muscles in my inner thighs pulling, lol. Nathan called me a "sissy" so I felt the need to remind him who delivered all 5 of his babies at home with no meds?...oh yeah, right... ;)

So back to the boys...once they got over the "we are going to school AGAIN?" thing, they were fine. Caedmon told me each day he made more friends and even on the 2nd day, I turned to say bye to Caedmon after they hung up their stuff and he was already in the classroom playing with things. Alrighty! Guess he is doing fine! :). Their teacher sent home the first weeks worth of papers and Tiernan had mostly As, a few A+s, and few Bs of some sort and Caedmon had mostly A+s with a few As. I think for the first week they did okay! One day after I picked up the boys, I asked Tiernan how school was, his reply was "It was AWESOME!!" Great! What made it so awesome? "We had 2 recesses AND lunch!" LOL! You are SUCH a boy!! :)

The home had a little different dynamics without the 2 here. I only had 3... 5 yr old, 3 yr old, & 1 yr old, but it is strangely quiet. A nice strangely quiet. I was even able to take a nap one afternoon! At one point I remember that Jaeg was taking a nap and the other 2 decided on their own to play a card game in the living room and I noticed that all was quiet and i could actually hear the soft radio music that was playing, ahhhh so nice :) also, Ariella and Brayan are learning quickly that they need to be nice to each other because otherwise they have to play by themselves, there is no one else to go to.

So the first week was a success and we are all looking forward to the next few months before summer break!

Big Changes

First of all, just wanted to mention that the "exciting thing" that I was talking about in the last post that I couldn't comment on just yet was the fact that we finished our basement!  Woohoo!!  And the reason why I couldn't say anything before was that Nathan had made a small bet with a friend over who was going to finish theirs first so he didn't want him finding out beforehand but now we are pretty sure he knows :)  And Nathan won :)  So anyway, that's super exciting for us because 1) we just doubled our square footage 2) we added 2 bedrooms 3) we added another bathroom 4) we have a cozy movie watching room with another fireplace and 5) we have a huge playroom with lotsa room, a trampoline, etc for the kids to go crazy in!....and not to mention a place where I can demand the kids go now!  While the basement was getting finished, ALL their junk was upstairs gettin' tripped over and ate by Jaeger and shoved in our already too tiny garage, making for a mess EVERYWHERE.  I can't even explain how nice it is for everything to be in it's place once again....ahhhhh. :)  And it only took us 4 weeks.  Everyone we talked to about it (contractors, etc) said at least 6-8 weeks and even our main worker was surprised that we finished that soon. My first contracting job and I finished under time. Nice.

Ok, so onto the other big change!!!....We have decided to put the 2 older boys in school for the remainder of the school year!!!  This has been an ongoing thought for us for a l.o.n.g. time...like years.  But this year we got really serious about it since we are "back" and not on the road.  This decision has been on my mind day and night, everyday, haunting me until we finally made up our minds.  I (we) felt like we couldn't go either way....the thought of sending my kids to school made me sick but the thought of homeschooling them (esp right now) made me just as sick.  I felt trapped, like I was stuck between a rock and a hard place.  I didn't like either choice.  I've always (ok, always as in like once we had kids) thought I was going to be a homeschooling mom, forever and always, no matter what.   Everyone has bad days, I get that, but this was more. 

Tiernan has always been a people person.  LOVES people, loves big groups, loves chaos, loves activity.  We've thought from the beginning if he would end up needing something other than us during his days.  As this year went on, him and I...who happen to have a lot of the same personality...started to butt heads.  He didn't want to learn from me and frankly, I didn't want to teach him.  I wasn't going to fight him everyday to get some school work done, with him in tears and both of us yelling and frustrated just for the sake of "homeschool".  And honestly, I was starting to not like being around my kids because I knew eventually the attitudes about school would start and I knew that something needed to change.

My mom still teaches my kids once a week and for that they will all sit (for the most part) for a good 3 hours and listen to instruction and do whatever my mom has planned for the lessons that week. At church, he (they) goes to sunday school and to a program called RAD every wednesday where they are instructed by a teacher. Not one problem.  He would learn from anyone but me.  Now, that only goes for school-type work.  Instruction on sports, games, legos, etc we have no problem with.  We have fun together in those areas but at some point the kids have to actually sit down and read and write and that's where the problem lies.

It was so hard for us (well, me esp) to make this decision because I had thought that I was a homeschool mom.  I had visions of being the coolest mom, going on all these cool trips, doing all these neat activites and crafts....and then I had kids....and several of them.  And I began to realize that I am not an elementary school teacher.  Some people are blessed with that gift and love for teaching reading, I was not.  And that's okay.

I was told once that there are 2 types of homeschoolers: ones who want to homeschool their kids and ones who think they have to.  After MUCH prayer and processing all of these battles going on in my head, I began to realize that I was homeschooling because I felt like I had to instead of because I have an absolute love for it.  Of course in a perfect world, I would love to be able to have everything organized and have 72 hours in my one day to get everything accomplished and babies who don't need to be fed the same time as the math lesson is going on, etc, but my reality right now isn't that.  And for now, I'm okay with that.  I know that my children can still thrive and learn to love the Lord, even if they aren't under my wing 24/7.  We will not stop parenting just because the kids are in school.

Could it change later? Absolutely! Could we end up homeschooling later? Absolutely!  Could we end up homeschooling some kids while sending others to school? Absolutely!  I think each family needs to evaluate what is best for their child and their situation and go with that.  Not focusing on what others are doing or that each kid has to fit the mold of the other just because we had some silly notion in our heads that we were going to do something.  Do I feel a little anxious about what some of my homeschooling friends will think or say?  Yes.  But I hope they can understand and know we are doing what we feel is best for our family at this time.

And where are they going, you ask?  Well, that was another thing we debated back and forth about and what made this decision so hard (until I actually found the school that they will be attending).  We knew we didn't want to throw them into the big public school who's district we are in because it's huge.  Class sizes are big and I didn't want my kids being lost in the crowds, plus we weren't exactly sold on public schools yet.  But on the other hand, the private schools around our area aren't exactly cheap, esp for the size of family we have.  Once you figure sending 3, 4, 5, kids to one of the major private schools here, yikes, that's big bucks...and for elementary school?...didn't really wanna go there.  So what gives? 

Well, one day I had remembered that I swam with a girl in high school that had gone to this school in her younger years.  I had no idea if it was still open or whatever so I did some searching.  Yep, it was!  I called it up and that same week they were having an open house.  The boys and I went to the open house where they got to spend time in the classroom and immediately it felt like home.  It teaches k-8th grade and it's super small....ONLY 15 students in the WHOLE school!  There are only 2 classrooms, k-3 in one class and 4-8th in the other.  So the teacher kind of acts like a homeschool parent would in the fact that they are teaching mulitple grade levels but the students are all integraded.  I loved it.  The boys will still be in the same classroom and only with about 7 other kids.  The whole school eats lunch together and outside play ends up being like one big family where the older kids always include the younger kids in whatever they are doing (sledding, etc).  Younger siblings are invited on field trips, where the parents drive.  It really does feel like just one little step up from homeschooling and that is what is so nice about it.  It's a private christian school so my kids will still have our faith intertwined in what they are learning, which is important to us, but tuition is much more affordable than other local private schools.

We will be able to test it out for the next 3 months of the school year and then re-evaluate over the summer, but for now we are excited!  And I feel weight lifted because we made a decision.  Life sometimes ends up a little different that we think it's going to go.  But I'm learning to trust God, and I'm okay with that.

January

One single post in January. Ha. Maybe this will mean that I'll actually be able to keep up with transferring my blog to a hard cover book.  I'm still in 2010.  Still can't believe that even with everything going on, I blogged almost every.single.day.  Wowzers!  Makes for awesome memories though.

So how has 2013 been treatin' us so far?  Well...here's some of the recent happenings....

We have something going on real exciting here but Nathan doesn't want me to post for another couple weeks, so you'll hafta wait!

Tiernan lost another tooth...#6....and was super excited to get a lego guy under his pillow instead of money.

Jaeger and Ariella had a little bout with pneumonia last week.  Jaeger was worse. He was within about a half of a day of being hospitalized but thankfully the meds helped and that didn't happen.  Within a couple days of him going in, he was back to his normal happy-crazy self.  Ariella is better too!

Shortly after the new year, our friends' house burned down, almost a total loss.  I've been helping with rides, shopping, a place to hang out, etc.  It was crazy to actually see the place.  Not every day do you go inside a home where everything was black and almost unrecognizable.  Thankfully everyone is okay and they are making decisions about their future.  If anyone wants to help or see what things they could use, I helped make a website for them.  www.theforsmanfamily.weebly.com

Nathan is still working transmission, although we've been enjoying him home alot lately because of the extremely cold and windy weather.  He was home most of all last week and this week so far.  The only bad part about it is that he still has to go in in the morning so it makes for 4 hours of driving per day....good thing we have the civic!

We are still wrestling with what will happen next school year.  We might be taking the plunge and putting the kids in school.  We are finding out that that might be best for them right now but it makes me feel better knowing that we can take it year by year or sooner if change our minds or don't feel like its a right fit after all.  So we'll have to see what unfolds in the next few months.

I'm enjoying a relatively quiet morning this morning.  After RAD at church, I brought the 4 oldest over to my parents for a sleepover.  Since we needed to be at their house by 9am so my mom could teach them (they have school at my parents each thursday), I figured why not bring them the night before and then I could have some quiet time with just Jaeger before I go get them!  It was really nice to just put Jaeg to bed last night and to wake up and just make myself breakfast.  What a change in pace!  And Jaeger even slept thru the night which made Nathan and me sleep like rocks.  It was so nice!

I had my first public speaking experience when I spoke at the MOPS group in Foley.  I was asked in Dec if I would and I agreed.  I spoke on the topic of Home and Time Management.  Even though I feel really inadequate right now about that specific thing, I was able to share my ideas and what has worked for me while raising lots of little ones.  I think it went well and I hope I was able to give a few people some ideas about running their home a little more smoothly!

I've also been busy trying to turn this house into a home with painting walls and putting in shelving, etc.  My dad made an awesome cubby and coat rack in our entry hallway which has been so wonderful and I re-did our bathroom so it wasn't so blah!  I hope to keep painting as the rest of the white walls drive me crazy!


Bath before:                                                                            Bath after:

     Hallway before: (we had already put up shelves)         Hallway after:

 



 I'll try to post more pics soon....I need to get them organized first!

Christmas day

What a great Christmas day!!

We started the morning off with waffles made by Nathan and we had Nathan's brother Neil & family over to eat with us before they went back home.

Then we took some naps and went to ny parents for the rest of the day. Talk about some good food!! We had the traditional fondue with steak and fish (caught by dad in lake of the woods), twice baked potatoes and pina coladas. After clean up, we opened gifts, the highlight of the kids night of course. They were very excited. T got a fishing pole, C got walkie talkies, B got legos, A got princess stuff and J got some pjs and a toy.

We finished the night with snow on the mountain! It's been years and years since any of us had it but it used to be a tradition by my gma back when we were growing up. It's basically a pile of fruit and some cake topped w a bunch of whipped cream. Crazy to think we didn't like it as kids, what's not to like about that?!

We are home now and getting the kids snuggled in bed. We are so thankful for this time together as a family and are in awe of the Lord's goodness!! Merry Christmas!!

Enjoying Daddy's Time Off

The kids and I are thoroughly enjoying having Nathan home for a whole 12 days!! The first day consisted of opening presents with our family and making and decorating cookies. I am trying to get better at enjoying those moments instead of worrying about the mess that's being made, but I will admit that I still need lotsa work!

The kids kept busy the rest of the day putting together their Lego sets they got and Ariella was enjoying her princess dolls! They also enjoyed a game of Hedbanz together, which was hilarious to watch as they didn't really understand the rules but had fun anyway. Jaeger got a bunch of balls at I put in a pack n play but we still aren't convinced yet to keep them as they cause more trouble with the other kids :). Nathan and I purchased a iPad for the family so I am writing my first post on it! I hope it will come in handy with school as well.