MY GRAMMA AGGIE

This lovely lady is my Gramma Aggie. We went to see her in June, in St. Petersburg, Florida. 

She is 87 and so amazing. Although she is blind with macular degeneration, she still plays Bridge 3x/week and can beat anyone in ANY game of cards, any game, any time. However, she can only play if she is sitting with people who love her!   It goes something like this:  "Hey Vickie, what did he just throw down?"   Me: "Queen of hearts, Gramma"    Her: "Oh okay, hmmph." and then she throws her card down.

Gramma and Dave swim at their retirement community pool twice a day.  Actually she TAUGHT Dave (her 5th hubby) how to swim before they got married a few years ago. He is 7 years younger than her.  We really love Dave, he is such a sweetie pie. 

My Gramma has a heart of gold, a bright contagious smile, and an inexhaustible repertoire of witty jokes for anyone who will listen. I am so proud of her. Thank you Lord for my Gramma Aggie!!

LAST DAY OF SCHOOL PARTY!

Running on fumes by the end of the school year, but God gave me the strength to organize ONE LAST EVENT for the kids.  Since this is our last year at Lakewood, I invited Hayden's and Matthew's friends to attend a "Last Day of School, and Say Goodbye Party" at the Jupiter Lanes bowling alley.  It was fun but bittersweet.  We will really miss these kids.

 

 

Matthew and his sweet friends!

Matthew enjoyed helping Spencer's little sister set up the bowling "guide" -- very cool device-- helps her get it straight down the lane!

Me and my girls! Shawna and Angelia.

  

It was a fun party.  We are very SAD to be leaving LPS, but also looking forward to our new schools which are much closer to our house!!  Hayden will be going to Sachse High School, and Matthew will go to FCA, the little private school that our church operates. 

SUMMER IS HERE AT LAST!!!!!

TEACHER FIESTA LUNCHEON 2009

This is an event I started last year, to honor our awesome teachers at Lakewood.  Last year was a Luau themed lunch, but this year it was a Fiesta!  All the great moms of Lakewood brought cool salads, hot dishes, and lovely desserts for the teachers, then we treated them to a wonderful luncheon right after school.

The teachers really enjoy just relaxing and visiting with one another.
 

LOVE NOTES! 

At the end of the luncheon this year, we gave each teacher a Box of  "Love Notes!"   I encouraged all students to write thank-you notes and love notes to each of their teachers, coaches, principal etc., then I collected them after school for about a week before the teacher luncheon.  I bought 20 little boxes from Container store, then punched a slot in the top of each one so the students could drop their notes (and money) inside.  It was a great outpouring of love, and the teachers were so touched to know they are LOVED by the kids and parents of our school! 

My girls.

I really love these ladies -- Jenn, Marilu and Marti.  Jenn was an amazing help to me for this event, she jumped right in and helped organize all the food-- she is a Caterer so she knew just what to do!!   Marti was a great help too, she has a servant's heart and stayed until the very last dish was washed. 

But I couldn't have done ANY of these Helping Hands events this year without my dear friend Marilu Dillahunty, the darling lady on the right.  She is an awesome friend and we work so well together.  We had a busy and fun year doing various LPS events.  Together we ran the "Lakewood Bistro" snack bar at the basketball games, organized the Sports Banquet, and poured lots of prayer into many parts of Lakewood.  Also we made food every Thursday (and sometimes Friday!) for the kids at our "Sack Lunch" table after school --- this was how we raised funds for the Teacher Luncheon event, and really ALL of our other Helping Hands events.  The Sack Lunches put some money into our petty cash box and became our very lean operating budget.  Marilu was right there at my side through each and every event this year.  I love her and treasure her friendship so much --- I am going to miss her like crazy when we leave this school.

SPEEDY RETURNS!

This is our vagabond turtle, Speedy!  He lives under our house.  He has lived there for about 5 years, and only comes out to see us when the weather is nice ... like in the Spring and the Fall.

Speedy usually doesn't hang out for more than a day....  he leaves as quickly as he comes!! But we are always delighted to see him!!  We gave him a quick shower and a few pieces of cut-up green apple.

Matthew is like Dr. Doolittle, all animals love him!

KITE DAY!

As the leader of the new "Helping Hands" group at Lakewood this year, I had the privilege of organizing some fun events and fundraisers for our school.  This was one of them, "Kite Day" which we did at a local Dallas park.  It was a blustery day in April..... just perfect for flying a kite!

Here is our kite!!  We had it up in the air for a very long time, it was soooo fun!!

Matthew's friend Bob had a verrry cool kite!!

Jackson and Robbie just came to play and have fun with their sisters!

It was a very fun day, and all day long I had the song in my head from Mary Poppins .... "Let's go fly a kite.... up to the highest heights ...."

MATTY PLAYS THE CUPPIANO

This was Matthew's talent act, at our school's Talent Show Fundraiser. We knew there would be several kids playing the piano in the talent show, so he wanted to do something special and out-of-the ordinary! He came up with the idea of playing cups (which we named the "cup piano" or cuppiano) after being inspired by a youtube video of someone playing a short song of jingle bells.

He auditioned by playing Jingle Bellswith 5 tall drinking-glasses, with 5 different levels of water, which he had tuned to the real piano until he got the "levels" right. He used two plastic cooking spoons to hit the notes. The talent show crew loved it, and put him in the show, but they asked him to play two songs instead of one. UH-OH!!! We needed a lot more cups!!! We dug out every wine glass we had, plus purchased a box of big water goblets from walmart, and ended up with a very nice lineup of 12 wine glasses with different levels of water.

Once we had more notes, Matthew decided to cut out the original jingle bells song ... and instead worked out the notes to play the very sweet tunes of Amazing Grace, and Carol of the Bells. It was a very cool Talent Show!!

PAINTBALL TRIP!

Hayden got a new Paintball Gun for Christmas -- a Tippmann 98 Custom, I think? (I can't remember the exact name of it, although I can certainly remember the price tag)

He arranged a Paintball Trip for his family and friends, on the Saturday after New Years Day. They went to OfficialPaintball park in Forney, Tx. We had a few guys from our basketball team, including our awesome Coach Matt and his trusty sidekick(brother), the assistant coach Troy, both seen at left, along with Michael-- Troy's son.

Stephen and Matthew went too of course, and they also took Matthew's little friend Hunter from down the street. Matthew is still feeling his battle-wounds several days later, it was his first time to go paintballin'.

I love this picture on the right, it looks like Matthew is wondering how this LITTLE ball can make such a BIG impact!

They all had a great time and will definitely be doing this again soon. It's a wonderful male-bonding excursion, with no girls allowed!!! (Not that I would want to go anyway -- spend the day getting shot at? hello?) I went shopping instead, and was happy that night to be able to get the paint out of all their clothes.

All in all, it was a great PAINFUL, PAINT-FUL day to remember!!

GREEN EGGS & HAM!

My sweet friend Marilu gave us some of her free-range eggs for a Christmas gift. She has a big family and they started raising chickens last year. They have several kinds of chickens, and one of them produces GREEN EGGS!

We had a good laugh about this -- and a very good breakfast! -- on New Year's Morning. Thanks Marilu!!