Well, it's been almost a week since I posted last.  It's not because of a lack of completely outrageous, funny things to talk about though.  It's mostly because I lack the time to post about them - and then I forget about them.  So I'm going to quickly post a couple of funny things before I forget about them too.

Yesterday Jon was doing homework at the table in my bedroom.  I went in to use the bathroom and he was singing the 12 Days of Christmas song. 

"Five     Hundred     Dollars!  Four hundred dollars, three hundred dollars, two hundred dollars . . ."

And you can guess the rest. 

I also noticed that he put 1000$ on his birthday list (just like that). 

It doesn't hurt to ask I guess.

Also last night I burnt dinner - a little bit.  I was making some gravy to go over turkey and rice.

Brian thought it smelled like Chinese food but it was really burnt gravy. 

Anyway, Jon and Andrew had about five servings.  Andrew heard it was burnt gravy and said

"Burnt gravy?  Yuck!  But it's pretty good."

He also asked if we could have it for breakfast.

And I'll leave you with a picture of Peter that pretty much sums up the week.

Recital

Last night our family went to the annual Homeschool Recital at church.  There are several homeschooling families that get together twice a month through the school year for playing and visiting.  The kids love going and it's a great way for them to spend time with their friends.  It also gives us moms a chance to get out of the house which is pretty cool too!

This recital gives the homeschooled kids a chance to perform for eachother and the families.  The kids get access to the instruments in the bible college chapel - and some kids bring their own guitars etc.  It's usually a pretty good time.

So, the kids have been practicing for awhile now on their songs.  Unfortunately Faith had a fever all day yesterday so she decided not to sing. 

I thought I might end up staying home but at the last minute we decided to go together.  I'm glad I got to see the kids sing and their friends as well.

I snapped a couple of pictures in the driveway before we left. 

The Smith Boys - a new local band.

With Alyssa as well.  We had to wait for her to finish curling her hair so she missed out on being in the first picture.

Brian ran the video camera while wrestling with Matthew.  I was blissfully unaware of this as I was sitting off to the right and in front of him.  Ooops! 

One of the moms recorded the recital from a better vantage point so we are getting a copy of that video as well. 

But, for now, here is some of the video for you to see.

While watching the video from the recital we came across a funny video of Peter.  I had turned the display of the video camera around so he was looking at himself.  Enjoy . . .

Neverending Uno

Last Saturday night Brian took Peter shopping with him.  Peter is old enough now to go out with Daddy and spend some quality time hanging out and getting some shopping done. 

The rest of the kids and I decided to play an innocent game of Uno. 

Little did we know what we were getting into. 

 There were the usual teases and jabs -

movie quotes and singing. 

Lots of laughs. 

And funny faces. 

I could not believe how this game dragged on. 

We had lots of trouble even remembering whose turn it was. 

Matthew was just a spectator.

James skipped me repeatedly.

We all lost a little patience.

Some of us got bored.

Jon had several cards in his hand and kept turning around to look behind him.  I found out that he was keeping his 'overflow' cards on the bench because they were too much for his hands. 

I asked Jon how many cards he had sitting on the bench. 

He said, "One, two, three . . . I counted seven."

We were still going.  It had to have been close to an hour by now.  I had reshuffled the deck about three times and I was pretty sure we'd still be playing next Thursday when I heard that wonderful word - "Uno!"

It came from Andrew.

I looked at him slyly and said, "Whatja got over there, Andrew?" 

He didn't want to show me.  The whole time he'd been careless about keeping his cards secret and now he won't show me his last one. 

I said, "It's okay, you can show me.  I'm going to help you win."

His face lit up and he whipped his card around to show a green reverse. 

James was next and then Andrew.  James placed a wild card and said "Blue." 

I grabbed him by the arm and said, "Say GREEN and it will all be over!  Say GREEN!"

So he changed it to green and Andrew put down his last card! 

We were all so excited that we threw Uno cards into the air and all over the table and floor. 

Whew! 

Full disclosure:  We weren't playing with a standard Uno deck.  We have parts of several decks all put together. This contributed to the longevity of the game because of the abundance of "draw 2" cards etc.  Next time we will try to remember to remove some of these cards.  Brian usually does this but he was out shopping with Peter and I forgot :) 

Saturday Stuff

Yesterday I took the girls (and Matthew) shopping.  We were looking for a couple of new dresses for them to wear to the homeschool recital that is coming up this Tuesday. 

We struck out terribly. 

We spent about three hours going to about EIGHT different places and had absolutely no luck whatsoever. 

I did, however, have sore feet when we got home.

At least Matthew got a nap in.

Being 11 and 9, they are kind of in between.  We had no trouble finding dresses for little girls.  Cute summer ones and fancy ones.  Tons of them.  We also found a lot of dresses for older girls but they were too big.  If there were things in their size they were always too short or cut way to low.  Seriously. 

In summary, it's nearly impossible to find classic proper clothes for girls.  People always say how easy it is to shop for girls - but I disagree.  There will ALWAYS be classic boy's clothes available.  Pants and dress shirts/ties are not hard to find for boys.  Girls, on the other hand, are harder to shop for if you're looking for quality, modest, classic clothes. 

In the end they are going to wear something that they already had.  I was just hoping to get them something new.  It wasn't meant to be.

*end of the public service announcement*

After we returned home, we were getting ready to have lunch and Brian found this on the patio. 

Three pictures for triple ewwww!  It's hard to tell, but this bug was huge.  I would guess 3-4 inches.  *shudder*

After that we had an awesome bbq lunch of burgers and cheeseballs with watermelon as dessert.  I meant to take pictures but didn't. 

Then the girls banded together and made a snack for everyone.  It was a recipe out of Faith's new magazine.

Caramel apple cookie pizza. 

It was good! 

Stay tuned for what happened Saturday night - you won't want to miss it!