First Birthday Party

Well, Abi got invited to her first birthday party. The little girl was one we met from MOPS and her name is Kara. She turned 3 years old. She had a Dora the Explorer Party and Tracy (Kara's mom) did a great job!

They tried to do duck-duck-goose but the kids were just not into it. Tracy made these really cure back packs out of foam sheets and had goodies inside of them. One of the goodies was a piece of chalk that they kids got to use to color flowers on the fence. They even had a map and a hunt for the birthday cake. J (Kara's father) was swiper and it was lots of fun!

I felt a little bad because Abigail and Nathan don't watch Dora so they were not very aware of what was going on, but they played nicely. Kara has a younger sister who is Nathan's age so we took Nathan too. All went well until Nathan got frosting on his hand and he couldn't get it off so he had a bit of a melt down but once his hand was cleaned off, he was fine!

Now I just have to figure out what to do because Abigail has started saying she gets a party when she turns three! I guess we'll have to discuss that one with daddy!

Jury Duty Scam - Melanie Verified it - Really!

Hi Everyone, I just got this e-mail from a friend and since I was just called to jury duty this month I figured I’d ready it…well then I decided maybe I should verify if it was accurate and I found a warning on the FBI website just like they said…here is the link… http://www.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel05/092805.htm 

This has been verified by the FBI according to the sender.
>
>
>It is spreading fast so be prepared should you get this call.  Most of
>us take those summons for jury duty seriously, but enough people skip
>out on their civic duty, that a new and ominous kind of scam has
>surfaced.  The caller claims to be a jury coordinator. If you protest
>that you never received a summons for jury duty, the scammer asks you
>for your Social Security number and date of birth so he or she can
>verify the information and cancel the arrest warrant.  Give out any of
>this information and bingo, your identity just got stolen.  The scam has
>been reported so far in 11 states, including Oklahoma, Illinois and
>Colorado.  This (scam) is particularly insidious because they use
>intimidation over the phone to try to bully people into giving
>information by pretending they're with the court system.

>The FBI and the federal court system have issued nationwide alerts on
>their web sites, warning consumers about the fraud.

                

 

UPDATED>>>

Well, I finally got a chance to sit down and update the blog a bit more. You'll have to look around because I know I updated some enteries going back in March...

Here are just two more pics for you to enjoy...(hahaha) you don't get many of me...be this was one of those times that I got in the picture...Abi was helping me wash the dishes...she is getting to be more and more a helper...and the last one is just goofy of the kids playing in the clean clothes basket!

Story Hour...Lebanon Fire Truck Tour

For the last Story Hour of the season, the Lebanon Librarian (Esther) arranged for us to have a tour at the fire station in Lebanon...the kids got to hear these neat little hats and they got to turn the water hose on and shoot water in the street, and then we all went for a ride on the fire truck.




Here is Abi taking her turn at the water hose. When she got home she got our garden hose sprayer and wanted to water the garden. It was pretty cute as she pretended to be a fireman and water...Daddy said she even turned off the hydrant when she was done!
This is Ben...Abigail and Nathan's cousin...he was down visiting Grandma and Grandpa Schlatter and so he came to see the firetruck as well. He was a little timid with the whole event but I think he really enjoyed himself in the end.

These two boys are my friend Lori's two kids. Cauy (the little one in the gray and yellow) is very outgoing and pretty much fears nothing...he just turned two...he will end up being a year ahead of Nathan in school because of the cut off dates but Colton, who is the older one in the blue should be in Abi's grade...we think!

Nathan's Ear Update

Well, we are home and all is well (now). Below are a couple of pictures I got of Nathan in his hospital gown and playing cars with the nurse. He was not at all interested in the ladies taking his vitals and gave as much guff as he could. They never did get a waking blood pressure. But once they were all done messing with him, he settled in and played nicely!




















Afterward however, was a different game altogether. He did not like the feeling of that anesthesia at all and he kicked and screamed and thrashed around. Finally, they said we just had to let him go so they walked us out and I buckled him into the car seat. That seemed to calm him down until I got in the car. Then he screamed and screamed. So I got out to go around to where he was to calm him down and when I got out, he calmed down again. I soon figured out that when he saw me he screamed but if he couldn't see me, he would settle down and try to sleep.

The procedure took about 25 minutes for both ears (compared to 15 for the one last time) but we didn't leave Hastings until around 9:30 because he was so upset. But after sleeping for awhile, he was doing much better and is even smiling and playing so what normally. He seems a little off kilter which could be from the anesthsia and the release of the pressure in his ears. I was told it could take but to 48 hours for him to feel normal pressure in his ears.

So, that was our experience. Daddy and Abigail seemed to have a much more normal time as Abi got to play at Grandma's and be her big helper. We sure appreciate having family around!

I still need to get the other pictures posted, but I am really tired as I had to get up at 4:30 this morning in order to get Nate to Hastings in time so I'm going to go take a nap!

Nathan's Ear

I guess I haven’t updated this thing since Easter.  We went into the ENT (Ear Nose and Throat Doctor) on the 5^th and Nathan has to have tubes put in both ears.  The date for this is this Thursday the 19^th….I don’t have a time yet or anything but we will have to go to Hastings for this.  I’ll let you all know how it goes.  The doctor said that he was going to put a t-tube in which is a little more permanent in that it will have to be removed an can’t be pushed out like the last one.  There is a slightly higher risk of him ending up with a permanent hole if they let it go too long but that is slight.  Anyway, just thought I’d update you all on that.

 

Sunday Marion took the family on a little tour of the area.  I’ll try to write more about that another time and maybe even add some photos.  We have had lots going on here and this week is actually pretty busy for me so I’ll have to see how much I can get done.

Merry Go Round (In Progress)

For those that haven't heard yet, we are in the process of restoring an old merry-go-round! Marion's uncle, Ernie, found an old delapidated merry go round in his iron pile and asked if we want to try to fix it up...so we are trying!

I wish I would have gotten some pictures of what it looked like when Marion brought the thing home, but I didn't get around to it and Marion ended up taking it apart before I got the camera out there. So...this is sort of half way through the process...

Anyway, we had to straighten all the pieces, Marion had to weld a few of them, and then we got new bolts and tried to put it all back together again! Here are the pictures after we got it all back together and planted in the ground.

The kids just couldn't wait to ride their new merry-go-round!
We don't have the seats on yet so they just crawled into the handles!




They really had a great time as Daddy pushed them around and around and around!






We still have to paint the bars, cut and paint the boards for the seats, and then do any final adjusting! It appears the seats will need to be leveled...we can't quite figure out why they are tilted so much and what we need to do to fix that, but it works and the kids are already having a great time with it!

Garden of Eden

How many people can say they visited the Garden of Eden? Well, we now can! Actually it is a National Historcial Site, why I don't know...but it is. It is in a little town south of us and Marion decided we needed a mini vacation to get away and be a family and so we headed south!

First we went to Hays where we visited the Old Fort Hays site...that was actually a great place to start because the kids could roam around and get worn out! HA!

Anyway, I don't have any pictures, because I forgot to take the camera out of the van before we went on the tour...oh well...I guess we'll just have to hold those memories in our minds...the kids had a great time playing and wondering around and crashed hard once we got to the van.

After that, we headed east to Victoria where they have the Cathedral of the Plains. We thought we'd be able to go inside and look around because Marion had checked mass times and they weren't supposed to being having mass in the evening...but when we walked in...there was mass! The interesting thing was that the priest was reading the same scripture our pastor had read for the morning service! Here is a picture or two of the cathedral and a link for more if you want them:

http://www.kansastravel.org/cathedralofheplains.htm

After the cathedral we went to Wilson where we saw an old restored hotel that was pretty cool...Marion went in to look around and I stayed with the kids...I was a bit nervous at just gawking...but when Marion came back he said I should go take a peek...so I did and the clerk took me on a personal tour where I got to look at the three room suite Jacuzzi Room and several of their other rooms too. It was pretty awesome and Marion was jealous afterward that he didn't get to do all that!

And finally on our way home we stopped off at Lucas where we saw the Garden of Eden:
This guy who lived in the 30's made all these statues out of cement and lines his property with them. We didn't get all the symbolism and all that and the house was closed by the time we got there. Some have said it is neat if you can see the symbolism along with the statues but personally...I just thought they were weird!

All along this one side he had done statues of things like: a bird trying to get a worm, a cat trying to get the bird, a dog trying to ge the cat, an indian trying to get the dog, a soldier trying to get the indian and a woman trying to get the soldier! It was just bizzar to me!

This was another one of those strange ones...there is a man named "Labor" crucified with his accusers all around him and they are "Layer", "Banker", "Doctor" and I don't remember the fourth one...See what I mean?
Okay...then we get to the REALLY strange part...this man loved what he did so much that he left specific instructions to be mummified and buried in his back yard...Note that it has his name but only refers to his wife as WIFE...apparently she is buried there too!

Overall it was a good day and we did have alot of fun...even with all the bizaar statues!

Easter at our house!

Well, we had 20 for Easter dinner at our house this year! It was a blast...11 adults and 9 kids! I think this was the first holiday we have had at our house since Thanksgiving of 2003! I should have gotten pictures of how we set up the seating but I didn't think about that...we borrowed a table from the church and we went diagnal in the dinning room. And we had our first kids table! Kimberly, Aaron, Tyler and Piper got to sit in the kitchen at the kids table!

After dinner the guys went out to hid the eggs for an egg hunt while the women cleaned up the table. We were very glad that the snow had mostly all melted off so we could do this and it even warmed up for us so it wasn't fridged out! After the egg hunt, my sister had brought an egg pinata for the kids to break...that was fun too!

And then to finish it all off, all the kids got to go over the Sharlyn's to see the eggs that were about to hatch...none of them had hatched yet but you could hear them pecking at the shells...and then on Monday two of the eggs did hatch! What a great Easter all around! Here are the pictures for you:

I had alot of fun making these bags for all the kids with their names on them.





We let the little kids go first and then we let the older ones come out and find the rest.


Here is Abigail and Ben looking for eggs with Mark and Marion looking on...

Here is Kimberly going over the cellar "mountain" (as Abigail calls it).


I didn't get pictures of everyone for two reasons...one is that my camera died on me and before I got more batteries it was over.

And second, Aaron had an encounter with one of our bushes and that stopped me from getting pictures for a while. I think I am only missing Piper and Aaron though.

This is Tyler looking in the flowers.

Easter Pinata

Okay, I don't know if that is really how you spell Pinata but I bet you get the point ...it was a round paper thing that the kids hit around and broke open to get candy... Okay, so anyway, it worked out perfectly because each kid that wanted to got to try to hit it twice and on the last try Kimberly broke it open...Enjoy!
Teacher Roxanne explaining what to do...
We made the older kids wear a "blind fold" (or more like a stocking cap) over their eyes the first time and then the second time they could just hit it.
Here is Piper giving it her best try.
Look at Tyler go.

Easter Pinata II

Willow just wasn't so sure about this event...I don't think she ever wanted to try it, though we teased that maybe Marvin could have busted it open!

Ben on the other hand was VERY into it...that was the funnest part I think for him!

Watch out here comes Abi...

Even Nathan got in on the fun.

Sunrise Service

Yes, we really did it, we went to the Sunrise Service! ALL TEN OF US!!!

I know some of you probably think we are insane but it was a good service and I am glad I did not miss it. Nathan ended up back in the van with Marion, mostly just because he was fussing because he wanted Mommy and Abigail wanted Mommy and Mommy only has so much lap! When we got them back to the church and unlayered them, they were actually HOT! We REALLY dressed them warm...Nathan had three layers PLUS a snow suit!