Busy weekend already

Last night Kali had another football game to go to for Marching Band and then this morning she had to be at the school for the annual Athens Heritage Days parade. Kole had to be at the school too for the Cub Scouts walking in the parade. The morning was great for a parade and the sun even came out! On our way home I noticed some ominous black rain clouds. As soon as we were in the door, the bottom opened up and it rained like crazy! The kids introduced QiJia to the wonders of playing in the rain! He wasn't to happy at first, but then he was o.k. with it.

Below are some pics in the reverse order of how they happened! LOL I still haven't figured out how to put the first last etc... Enjoy

Homecoming 2009

Today I took all four kids with me to go shopping for QiJia for his homecoming clothes. I think he looked rather sharp.

Here are some pre Homecoming dinner/dance pics

Updates

Isn't that a boring title? Anyway, Since I was on last, Boyd had a birthday and the kids have been busy with school. I have been busy with work and helping kids with school work. Guiding them through their maze of homework and activities. O.k. if I wasn't busy I wouldn't be happy. I think Sunday will be a day for me. Last weekend one kid had two sleepovers, and one and a sleepover. This week is Homecoming week at the high school. They have had a different theme each day and tomorrow night is the homecoming football game. We go every year! I think tonight is a bonfire.. I will have to check to be certain. Saturday is the big homecoming dance. Qijia has been invited with a group to go to dinner at Rachel's house and one of the moms is taking them to the dance. Katy is taking Qijia shopping for a suit. ha ha He will have to wear it at the wedding in November too!



Boyd has kept busy with little maintenance things around the house and helping his brother with a roof job. We found out yesterday that our niece was in a car accident and was T-boned. Thank goodness she had not picked up the twins yet.... Apparently she will be fine. Boyd is going to stop in and see her and give her our best while he is there today.


Kali has been busy with Wednesday night church activities with her friends and sleepovers. Along with her regular homework, speech team, and band activities. Kaci is busy with school and dance. Kole is getting busier with Cub Scouts and is bringing home reading homework. You can tell he does not have any excitement for it. But he is doing well. I think I will try to challenge him more here at home with reading. He rushes and doesn't want to sound out words, but make up ones he likes better... lol Kali and Kaci did that too!


Next weekend is the big Wedding party cookout and getting Kole measured for a tux. haha
I will have the groom and daddy take him. I need to get Kali fitted for her dress too.


I should shop for a dress or pants suit for me to wear to the wedding too. It is coming up fast now!


Below are pictures of the birthday cake that Kaci baked, Kole and QiJia with their new haircuts and Boyd on his B-day playing with the bb gun he bought himself.

September is here

Wow it has been a while since I updated...

School is in session for all the kids... We are keeping busy trying to keep up with all the school work, school requests, and just keeping the house from falling down around us. LOL

As you have probably read, we have a student from China staying with us this school year. He is a very nice boy. We have had some language barriers, but we are working on them.

The kids are all doing very well in school so far and the new rules this year have been working great. No video games or computer games during the week. Getting to bed by 8:30 pm and a few others and they are doing great!

Kali has joined speech team again this year and will be doing storytelling, duet improv and a group script. We are so proud of her for doing this.

Kole is enjoying his cub scouts that meets once or twice a month.

Kaci is loving her hip hop dance class.

Now to see if we can get QiJia involved in something with the school, a club or volunteer group or something like that. He is usually on his computer as you can see from the pics below.

Our furry kids are doing well also. Mia has finally lost weight and looks like a doberman instead of a rottweiler with a dobie head. lol Tasha's fur is growing back and she doesn't look as shaved as she did.

Last weekend was very busy. Qijia went on a trip to St Louis with Wells Ling, a good friend of the family. He really enjoyed himself and we are so thankful to Wells for showing QiJia St. Louis... While QiJia was in St. Louis below is what we were up to here.

On Friday night I took the kids to the first home football game including our friends' exchange student from Brazil, Thais. She had a great time with her friends and it was nice to see a football game again.

On Saturday, Boyd took Kole to a Cub Scout event and I took the girls with me to an FCC picnic. They took care of several of the younger kids by taking them to the park to play and bringing them back safe and sound. They made a new friend, Sarabelle. She is 11.

I enjoyed hanging out with the other parents and catching up.

On Sunday we went to a birthday party for the husband of my wonderful friend and sister of the heart. As you can see, busy busy...

This weekend is a bit more laid back..

Here are some pics from last weekend and this weekend

Happy 90th Birthday to Grandma!!!

Today my grandma turns 90. Wow! We went to the nursing home on Saturday for an Open House Party for her. A lot of family and her friends were there. She whispered to me that her boyfriend was there, but his wife took him away.. ROTFL!!!

She lit up like a candle seeing all the family and friends. My uncle's friend Ben showed up and made her day... He was like another son to her.

She noticed QiJia and wanted to know "Who is this young man?"

I told her it was QiJIa and he was staying with us for a school year. She just smiled so big!

The party wore her out after about an hour and a half, so she called it quits and headed back to room as we headed back home.

Grandma and longtime friend Mrs.Pearcy

Mom and Judy

Brandi, Pat and Rob

Tyler, QiJia, Kaci, Kole and Phil

Cookout!

Yesterday we had a cookout and invited some friends over.. We had a great time!
Susan and Curt brought there son Ethan (from guatemala) and their exchange student Thais from Brazil. Lisa and Mike came and broght Billy and Sierra. And Kole's Big Sib, Wells from the U of I came. It was a small but fun crowd!

It was so much fun, I didn't even take any pictures! shame on me!

The kids played in the pool and Wells, kept surprising them from outside the pool, it was hilarious! After they were out the water continued with the hose and glasses of water being flung at each other.

We had quite the menu: Hamburgers, brats, ribs, salad, pasta salad, fresh veggie tray with dip, chips, watermelon, cantaloupe, chocolate brownies and gooey butter cake.

We did not even need dinner last night. ha ha

We talked and kidded around and just really enjoyed ourselves... we really need to do this more often!

Reiko and Sweetpea did relatively well, once the initial excitment was over, then after a couple hours it was more stimulation than they could handle... Time to really work on the training again. Poor Ethan was so close to the ground that Reiko thought he was his own personal lollypop. Billy being tall, Reiko thought it would be fun to jump as high as he could to get him to come down to his level so he could play with him....
Sweetpea on the other hand, did really well.

I think the kids would really like to do this again. Maybe not this year, but who knows...

Big news of the week

After careful pondering and an o.k. from the rest of the family to try this one more time...
We will be hosting a boy from China. He is 16 and from the Jiangsu Province. This is the province just to the east of the Province Anhui, where Kali was born. He is very tall 5' 9". For us that is tall since none of us are over 5'6". ha ha

We are just waiting for final agency approval. We should be getting that today and they are going to get him here as quickly as possible to get registered for school.

More later as we find out!