Bible school

If you look at this picture I bet you can't guess what's wrong? Well maybe you can. I'll give you 3 guesses. Ok give-up. Well I'll start the story at the beginning. I could only take my kids to an evening bible school b/c of my work schedule so they had to wait until July 13 to go to one. Well it was well worth the wait. Jarrett & Brooke had a blast!!! We went to First United Methodist Church by Walmart in WMonroe. We had visited once before and it was highly embarrassing. (I'll save that story for another day.) One the first day I stayed with Jarrett b/c he had his tramatizing last day at the only daycare he has ever know. He paid attention, learned alot, and really impressed me. Maybe in my mind he still is a baby, but I love seeing him growup infront of my eyes. Well on the final day he had to stand up infront of the church and perform a song with sign language. He was fine until he got up there and I noticed he was crying and a lady came and put him in her lap to comfort him. I took pictures thinking it would be a funny memory to show him how he had stage fright. After the song was over he was still crying so I went to calm him down. I couldn't so I took him out of the church and that is when I noticed that he couldn't open his eyes. Evertime he tried he'd scream and start crying again. I tried to flush his eyes out in the bathroom which was very difficult by myself. Finally after about 20 minutes of him screaming and crying I put him in a chair in the foyer and went in to get Brooke from the church. I had missed her performance, but she understood. When we left he rode with a wet papertowel over his eyes the whole way home and wouldn't stop crying. After we got home I gave him a washcloth and turned on SpongeBob hoping he'd quit crying and try to watch it so I'd see how bad his issue was. He finally stopped crying so I got to check out his eyes. They were swollen and extremely red. I figured he had eaten pizza earlier and had rubbed his eyes with the spices still on his hands and that irritated his eyes. So it wasn't stage fright after all, because the following Sunday he got to perform his song w/ sign language infront of the whole church when we visited there. He did great and he knew all of the movements.

P.S. If anyone needs me this week I am working 12 hours graveyard shifts so it will be really hard to catch me.
Brandi

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Girl Scout Sleepover

The following girl scouts came to the Girl Scout Troop #29 Game Night and Sleepover: Brooke, Abbie, LeAnn, Madelyn, & Sarah. They dined on a candy land cake, hot dogs, chips, sunnyD, popcorn, & candy. No tummy aches though. I was afraid they'd have one eating everything that they did.
After we ate we played the following games: Chutes & Ladders, Peanut Butter & Jelly, Pin the tail on the doggy, Horse-opoly, & we watched the movie College Road Trip.
Abbie

Brooke, Madelyn, & Sarah watching "Monkey Trouble" on the disney channell while they ate cake.

Here we are playing Horse-opoly.

LeAnn
Brooke playing Pin the tail on the doggy. P.S. Ashley was an awesome helper!!!! Thanks Ash!!!!! She'd be a great teacher if she didn't want to be a meterologist.
Sarah
Us all playing games.
Movie Time!!!!

The girl's had a great time. They didn't fight at all which suprised me. They can definitely come stay the night again. They were a joy to have. I'm sorry that Lexi, Kailey, & Castien didn't get to come. We'll have another one soon. I'll plan a campout for October at the girl scout camp. So girl's be prepared for a night hike, smore's made at the campfire, and much more.

Brandi

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Daycare Woes :(

I was going to post pictures today, but I have a sad heart and decided to vent a little. Jarrett's church owned daycare had a large family of the church decide that the daycare is inconveniencing the church so the board voted to shut it down come July 31st. We faound him a new daycare by our house that we really like and we are very happy, butu we will really miss where we are going. They are like a family to us. Jarrett has been going there since he was 2 months old. Alot of the workers are family and the director's daughter used to babysit for us when Ashley wasn't old enough. We love them very much. We thought everything was going ok except us having to leave at the end of this month until my hubby called me yesterday morning and said for me to up our start date at teh new daycare b/c Mrs. Vickie said to find somewhere immediately. That seemed a little odd to me so I asked about it when I picked him up. Mrs. Vickie got a letter from the church board signed by 2 people saying that the daycare bank account had been closed as of July 14th and everything spent past that date she would be held responsible for. She didn't even have enough food for lunch so she went to the grocery store and purchased the food out of her own pcoket. She has 26 kids left and 3 workers. She said it would be best if yesterday would be his last day , but she didn't have the funds to refund us for the 1/2 week of daycare we lost. She cried. I cried. Jarrett hugged us b/c he didn't know what was going on and he it worried him and put him in a fussy mood. He had to hug all of his friends goodbye and the workers left and they were crying. I asked Mrs. Vickie how could "Christian" people do that. She told them that she needed grocery money for the kids and they didn't do it. I know Mrs. Vickie and would 100% vouch that she is an extremely honest person. She said it upset her so bad she'd leave if she could, but she couldn't leave her babies that would suffer in her absence. She thinks she has found a job for herself and her workers maybe. I really hope so. I need prayer right now so I'll quit this feeling of anger and resentment I have towards these board members for disrupting so many wonderful peoples lives in a very rude and inconsiderate way. They should have left it open until the end of the month like they said and this transition could have been easier. I asked Mrs. Vickie why wouldn't she go fight the board for it to remain open. And she said "This is God's house. I will not fight in God's house. Maybe something better will come for everyone." We let Jarrett go to my inlaws house the remainder of this week so we aren't paying double daycare, but he starts next week. Hopefull he will transition quickly and be very happy.

Brandi

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Mother Daughter Campout Pictures.

Brooke & Sarah with their flowers they made.
Mrs. Dana & Ashley concentrating on their flower craft.
Mrs. Denise (my previous co-leader now leader of my old Cadette Troop #141) & her daughter Jennifer.
I had to work again on the weekend of the mother daughter campout so Ashley had to spend the night with Mrs. Kim & Kaitlyn in their cabin. Brooke was very upset that me and her had to leave after the games. This year I went back a different way so I didn't get a unecessary speeding ticket. Last year I didn't realize I was close to Eros until I rounded the curve and say the speed limit sign change to 35mph. I threw on the brakes, but I still got a ticket. I told the officer I was leaving teh girl scout camp and Ashley was asleep beside me to prove it. I told him I was very unfamiliar with the area, but he still gave me a ticket. Shame on him. I had to go pay the mayor my ticket guess where???? At the gas station where he was working. When I asked how much he guessed $120.00. You could tell he was guessing. That will be the last time I go through Eros if I can avoid it.

Next here's a picture of my little sister Lynnsey who is getting married in August.

I'm not sure if I posted a picture of Brooke's straight A trophy. Here it is Mom. For those of you who don't know my parents live in Tenessee and use my blog to see pictures of the kids and their accomplishments. It is alot easier than emailing them.

Brandi

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More Beach pics & Family Game Night.

Ashley & Jarrett watching the fireworks in Destin.

Ashley & Brooke watching the fireworks. This is one of my favorite pictures of the beach. Jarrett is riding on the luggage cart to the car.
On our last night there we got ice cream and walked the beach. This was a first for all of the kids and they enjoyed it once they saw there was nothing to be afraid of. We had to chase Jarrett to get him to the beach b/c he was scared. Brooke was worried about crabs, but luckily we didn't step on any. We had trouble keeping the kids out of the water. It was just tooooo tempting.


Awwwww sweeeettttt. Look at the sisterly love.

I love watching them walk together. It counteracts all of the sibling fights they have in my book. It proves that they do care for one another even if they fight over the seats in the van.
Game Night. Jarrett was soooo excited. I guess Jason told him about it on the way home b/c when he saw me he kept asking to play games. He kept walking around saying "It's game night. It's game night." Jarrett played Tetris & Hungry Hippo. I loved the way he giggled the whole time playing the hippo game. You can also see his tongue sticking out while he concentrates in the 3rd picture.
playing tetris

Last but not least Ashley during our game night. Jason, Ashley, & I played Phase 10, Dominos (double 12's-Mexican train), and Boggle. Needless to say Ashley won every game we played. She is my little gamer. She once chose a binder with games printed out from the internet at a Girl Scout christmas party. Denise who made it was worried that no one would like it. She was super excited when it was the only present taken during our game. You know the game where if someone wants it they can take it or open another present. Ashley still to this day plays with that notebook of games. I think these games have helped her in Math. I realized we should probably start inculding Brooke & Jarrett in our card games to help with their Math. Brooke had to go to her Dad's so she was unable to play games with us, but she'll get to on our girl scout game night this weekend.

Brandi

hiking gear

More Beach photos

Yes Ashley and I did ride the Cyclone you see below. I thought it was just going to be like a big farris wheel without all of the cars. Boy was I wrong. My neck still hurts. When you reach the top it flings you over and you flip over and over. I couldn't even tell if we were upside down on right side up. The one time I tried to open my eyes we were upside down and that threw my stomach for a loop. It was best to keep my eyes shut or I was afraid of getting sick.
Before: Notice the smiles :) :) :)
During. It went so fast Jason had trouble getting pictures. He kept taking pictures of the sky.

Afterwards. Notice no smiles :( :( :( We were fighting our stomachs. It took a while before our equilibrium allowed our stomach to settle. Even Ashley had trouble with this so it's not me getting older like I usually think.

We played Minature Golf. Jarrett hit one hole in one, but the star was Brooke she hit about 4 or 5 hole in ones. She loved this game. The low of the game was when Jarrett accidentally lost his ball in the water. He cried the remainder of the game even though Ashley gave him her golfball.

We went to the Track. It had a minature fair. It had loads for the kids and they had a blast. We will definitely visit one whenever we see one.

Brooke riding the wet bumper boats.

Ashley and Jarrett riding GoKarts. P.S. Ashley got carded trying to drive with Brooke on the 3 story gokart track. The driver must be at least 16 yrs old to have a passenger. Jarrett & Daddy riding.

Jarrett on the swings. He wasn't afraid of anything this year. I can't wait until the fair.
Brooke & Jarrett on the train.

Brooke on the freefall ride. See her doing the rock on thing she does.

Awwwww Aren't they being sweet together.

Jarrett & Brooke riding the airplane. I'm suprised Jarrett did this b/c it went up in the air like it was flying. He was all grins and giggles. It was so cute. All in all it was a great trip. The kids had a blast. We aimed for it to be a kid trip and we were successful. They want to do it again next summer. I have no complaints.

P.S. Girl Scouts Juniors or older we are planning a Savannah Georgia Trip to the birthplace of Girl Scouts. It is a girl scout town. We will be going Nov 20-24, 2009. Deposits will be due real soon. The tentative price will be $450 per person, but we will have several fund raisers. I will post the tentative itinerary later. Ashley and I will be going. We can't wait it looks like it is going to be a blast!!!!!

Brandi

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