Oops it's March already! Where did all that time go?

We have seen Jasmin home to Germany, it was a tearful parting. We have learned to Skype! We had a wonderful Christmas with Mom, Pat, Patty and Tyler. We celebrated the New Year by drinking Welch's Sparkling Grape Juice! The girls have grown and boy has Kole grown!
We celebrated 6 years having Kole in our family! We have had tears, laughter, more tears and even more laughter. The kids are doing fantastic at school and I earned a promotion at work!

Here is how things size up at our home.

Kole just finished up a season on two basketball teams. His competitive team finished 2nd place at one tournament and 3rd at two others.

Kali has finished Swim Team and is now playing soccer for her first time ever!Yes, I am now a soccer mom. She loves it! So she has three seasons to play counting this one. Kali is also on the Scholastic Bowl team at school, the Biology club, and treasurer of the sophmore class. She has been driving with her permit for several months and it is getting closer to driver's license time. Kali continues with band playing the clarinet, tenor sax and alto sax that Kaci gave up.

Kaci finished up with school volleyball team and has started Club Volleyball. She is also running in track this year. Her favorite event is the Hurdles. She had a good Basketball season too! Kaci also participates in Art Club. She has given up on band. Kaci also finds time to hang out with her friends.

Kole also turned 10 years old this year! For his birthday we got him a cellphone. It is inexpensive and gets the job done. There goes my cellphone bill. LOL We are now maxed out with 5 lines.

Boyd is still working at the airport and I am still with State Police.

Our house always looks lived in. We are down to 4 dogs (Reiko, Doodlebug, Tasha and Mia) and 1 cat. Daisy Doo went to a new home in Southern IL. Mojo went to a new home about an hour away from here. Both are doing so much better in their new homes. Smokey a new cat we had acquired disappeared about two months ago. We only had him for about 2 months.
My weightloss aspirations come and go. Sometimes I am gung ho into it and other times, I just throw caution to the wind!
Pictures:  Kaci's Volleyball team; Kole in his basketball uniform; Kole with his first Mohawk; Jasmin;
Kali, Jasmin, and Kali wearing Lincoln hats; at the airport for Jasmin's farewell, Me!  Hope you enjoy!

Almost Christmas!

Since the last posting we had three Christmas programs to attend.
Boyd sprained his ankle, and I slipped a disk in my back. And, Mojo was hit by a car... There are my three so the bad luck can just stop now.

Boyd's ankle has healed and I was healing during the past week. Almost back to normal today. Mojo has his stitches out from the plate they surgically used to fix his broken leg and on his way to recovery.

The kids are out of school for Christams break and I took time off for the first time ever before and after Christmas. I am so glad I did.

Finally got my Christmas letters printed and today, although late, I will be getting my Christmas cards ready to go out.

Kali IS GOING TO CHINA!!!! She is so excited. And even better news is that her friend Meg is going too! A trip of a lifetime for her. Then maybe in teh future she can go and help at orphanages on mission trips. This trip is a little more expensive then some. I'm ok with that because, she will finally get to see all the things that she missed when our flights were messed up years ago when we went to get Kaci. And she will be able to experience so much more! We have enough or close to enough for our next payment towards the trip. Now to start in again on the fund raising. If you would like to help Kali in her fund raising for this trip, send me a comment with your email and I can let you know how to get in contact. Some things she is doing is a Pampered Chef online party, just order on line and she gets the profits. Also a Scentsy online sale where she gets 20% of the profits!
Here are the webpages:

Scentsy: www.brianlewis.scentsy.us look for the ongoing parties and select Kali's fundraiser. ORders are shipped directly to you!
Pampered Chef: http://www.pamperedchef.biz/tracystewart?page=host-search-results&showId=3448794

This will take you directly to Kali's party. Or just go to tracystewart and type in Kali's name in the search to take you there.

Another option is save your aluminum cans and if you live close we can pick them up and cash them in ourselves. If you don't cash them in, send me a comment with your email and I will not publish the comment, but instead email you with our address where you can send your donation. Or if you just want to donate you can do that too! Either through the chipin that is on this blog or comment with your eamil address, I will email you our address and delete the comment instead of publishing it. And not to worry, we are paying at least half of the trip or more out of our own pockets. IT would be easier if Mojo's surgery had not cost us $1300. yikes! But he is worth it.

Anyway, enjoy some pictures that we did take:

I hope you enjoyed the pictures! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

72 hours ...

We will know for sure that Kali will be going to China in June 2012 in just 72 hours. She attended a group interview with 11 other delegate candidates today and got along well with all of them! She has grown up so much! So here we go! We have started fundraising as if she was selected. Any amount we make that is above and beyond the amount Kali needs for this trip will be donated to our local food bank and to Love Without Boundries.

There are a couple things we are working on besides the Chipin account.
One is a Scentsy Fundraiser. You can go to this website (www.brianlewis.scentsy.us) scroll open parties and select Kalis Fundraiser. Order online and the order will be shipped to your home address or the address you designate.

If you are local or within an easy drive we are also collecting aluminum cans to turn in.

Any assistance will be helpful and we thank you from the bottom of our hearts for helping meet this goal of returning to China!

Leave a comment if you have cans to be picked up or better yet, if you are far away turn them in for cash and then just send Kali a check. You can private message me on facebook or at my email address s.bringolf@att.net

Thank you!!!!

Chipin To help Kali go to China in June 2012!

Thanksgiving and a lot more!

This year we went to my brother Pat's house for Thanksgiving.  We had a lot of fun and loved getting caught up.  Too bad we could only stay a few hours.  Then Friday following Thanksgiving, we had a big meal at home.  We are still recovering from the carbohydrate overload of the past 3 days.

The kids are healthy, the animals are all doing well with the exception of Mia.  Her leg is messed up and she will need to see the vet.  If it isn't one of the kids, it is one of the dogs or cats needing medical attention.

Earlier this month I took Kali to an orientation for People to People Ambassadors.  She has applied and interviews next week to go to China!!!!!   She is so excited!  I am excited for her!  We are in the process of funds raising and saving to hopefully have enough money come June 2012 for her to go. 

Right before her 16th birthday she will be returning the the country of her birth as a Student Ambassador for the US.    We are saving aluminum cans and cashing those in.  She is also working on coming up with other fundraising ideas.  Two friends have offered to have Scentsy parties and giving her a percentage.  Her interview is a week from today.  I don't seem to think there will be any reason why she shouldn't do wonderful at the interview. 

If you would like to help in anyway, have a fundraiser, make a donation, save your cans and donate what you earn from them...  let us know by email for commenting on this blog.  This is a chance of a lifetime for Kali.

I am going to try to get a Chipin working to put on this blog.  Just need to figure it out.

Thank you in advance for any assistance anyone would like to give.  

November is here already!

Time is flying by!  Kaci turned twelve!  Kali is driving!  Kole is playing on a competitive basketball league!  November is the month when we sent our paperwork in for each kid years apart!  Thanksgiving is on the horizon with Christmas right on it's shirt tails.

Parent teacher conferences are done.  The kids are amazing!  Academically I will never have to worry.  They try their best and do well.  They are all honor roll kids. 

Kali has been struggling to get straight A's this year, but she also has a very challenging  course load.  Biology II (junior class), Chemistry (Junior Class), Geometry, World History, English, Band, Spanish II.  I am sure there is one more in there. She is also involved in Swim Team, Leadership, and she is the Class treasurer.  She is a sophmore.

Kaci continues getting wonderful grades.  She also participates in Band and Basketball.  Basketball is winding down, then on to volleyball.  She is trying out sports this year and will decide her favorite over the summer. 

Kole is reading at a 4th grade level as a 3rd grader.  He is being moved to a more challenging reading curriculum at school a couple days a week to challenge him.  He finished up football on a good note and then moved on to basketball.  This was his first year on Honor Roll.

We also acquired a new cat.  Smokey (I was going to name him Maurice, but no one liked that name).

The dogs are doing well and love Smokey.  Tink is starting to accept him in the house.

Picutres:  Bonfire, Kaci's basketball team, JAsmin's cross country team, Reiko and Smokey,
KAli, Ally and Kole at bonfire, Kaci after the cake fight, last two are Kole at football.

I should be ashamed...

Making you wait for updates on this blog! LOL

Well, it has been a crazy since my last post.  Jasmin has joined our family and started school.  She is participating in Cross Country.  Kali is on swim team, Leadership committee, and who knows what else.
Kaci is participating in basketball this year.  Kole is finishing up football and starts basketball this week. 

Homecoming has come and gone.  Everyday is a busy day here.  We went camping as a family for the first time.  Thank goodness we had Jasmin with us!   She knows how to do stuff in the camper that we were renting.  Below are a bunch of photos from when school started on.

I hope all the pictures make up for the lack of content!