Where Dreams come True

After a long sabbatical, it's good to be back online and back home. As you can see we've had a summer vacation, and I might add, it was magnificent. We wound our way through the south, stopping at one of the nicest beaches I've ever been too (Destin, Fl), on our way to none other than the very place where "Dreams come true"...DISNEY WORLD. The destination of all summer vacation destinations.

I was surprised at how easy the drive went, compared to road trips with my family when I was a kid. Back in the olden days we didn't have CD players, Nintendo DS, and cell phones to keep us entertained and connected with our friends while we were away. My daughter was content in the backseat snuggled up with her pillow and cell phone, happily texting away with her friends about nothing in particular. The boys entertained themselves with movies and games and hubs and I spent our time going back and forth over which road to take...darn GPS things...it created more controversy than an old fashioned map, but that's another story. What short cut to take and where the best restaurant was located all faded away, once we reached the Magic Kingdom.

Disney World

Testing 123

Hello Bloggy Friends.

I am sorry to say I am still having technical difficulties. I hope to be back online soon.

Until then please talk amongst yourselves.

More Exciting than Cake?

What could be more exciting that chocolate birthday cake? Getting reconnected! I've been without an Internet connection since the big storm. Maybe it was a coincidence, but my Internet connection has not worked since that night. Thanks to hard work from Hubs, I'm back on line. Hurray. Many exciting events have occurred since I last blogged. I've been to swim meets, birthday parties, Volleyball victories and witnessed tween age mini dramas play out right before my eyes. It's good to be back.

The Beverly Hillbillies

Much to the delight of the community, our little town is sitting upon a 20 year reserve of natural gas. It has never been drilled before, because the price of natural gas has not been high enough to warrant getting to this reserve. This reserve has been hard to get to because of the shale that has to be cracked to get down to the gas, plus they have to do horizontal drilling which is a fairly new/costly technology.

Every weekend I see gas folks walking the neighborhood, trying to get people to lease their mineral rights and give them access to the gas under their property. At the same time homeowner associations are banding together to try to negotiate better lease agreements between neighborhoods and the big gas companies that have come to town to court homeowners. There is strength in numbers. The media has begun to talk about these activities, and one comment this morning was"our part of the country will not see a recession because the gas reserve is our own little stimulus package".

The people who own the land where a drill site is located and people with large pieces of property, will fair pretty well. I just don't know how much income this will actually generate for a homeowner. Nevertheless, if it were a little warmer, I'd invite the neighbors over to have a BBQ to celebrate our good fortune and we'd all take a dip in the cement pond.

"Jumping Up and Down Screaming" Wonderful

I don't know about you, but I can fill up an SD card with pictures in no time at all. Digital photos are better than sliced bread in my opinion. The reason I think it's so great is because I admire the technology and ingenuity behind uploading pictures and hurling them across time and space in the blink of an eye, to grandparents and friends near and far. The ease and speed with which that is done is very appealing. As I transferred my pictures from my camera to the computer today, I marveled at the speed with which all of our family activities were cataloged and preserved for who knows how long (hopefully longer that the time we own this computer, thankful for backups). I did pause to reflect on the nagging feeling that time was passing quickly. No other time do I feel that reminder, that time marches by, more strongly than when I look at pictures. If I took all of my digital pictures and scrolled through them from front to back, I could probably view all of them in an hour or two, and in that hour, I could watch the kids grow up before my eyes. A scary thought, but it only reminds me to make the most out of the day that God has given me.

This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. Psalm 118:24

On that note, I would like to share with you the gladness we have enjoyed this past week...

My daughters joy of a personal best in the 200 IM at the swim meet, and my son's joy that the swim meet was over.

The joy of being silly at school in a lip sync contest.

The joy of a family wedding...

and realizing that you won't die if you have to dress up in a suit and tie.

The joy of knowing that chocolate cake awaits you, and that there will be plenty of leftovers, because what you see here is only the grooms cake!

The joy of getting "hard to get" tickets to the most exciting concert of your life and getting "jumping up and down screaming" crazy with your cousin (thank goodness for earplugs).

May God bless you and your family with a "jumping up and down screaming" wonderful week like he has given us.

I Said It's Too Dangerous

What is it about kids, when you tell them something is dangerous, it makes them want to do it that much more? Our trampoline is in disrepair. The safety net that enclosed the trampoline got torn in several places (because our wild kids and their friends would throw themselves at the safety net and bounce off again), so we took it off. The bumper pads that cover the springs, have come to pieces in spots and it needs to be replaced. I mentioned this to my husband, the fact that we needed to get a new safety net and bumper pads, because the kids hadn't jumped on the trampoline in months. Well wouldn't you know, they all heard me complain about how dangerous it was to have this thing on the hard concrete in our back yard, so they just had to all pile on it, husband included.

One of their favorite trampoline games is "crack the egg", and the 2nd favorite one is "flip the bacon". I won't tell you the rules, but you can imagine how safe those games are in this trampoline. When the yard apes finish off this trampoline, I guess we'll get another one. Until then, I'll just keep the video camera close by and maybe you'll see us on " America's Funniest Home Video's".

Whose Race Is This Anyway

The Pinewood Derby is an annual event that kicks up a lot of excitement in our Cub Scout community. This year was my son's third year to race and he captured 3rd place in his age level. I thought his car was great and he had fun building it. He was not entirely happy with his placement, you might notice the attitude in the post race picture and the crossed arms as he's receiving his award. Last year he got 1st place in his age group and was on top of the world, but that's how it is when your the car to beat! Competition gets more intense every year.

This year we had his den over to our house to cut out and sand the body of thier pinewood derby cars. One of my son's friends (actually his mother) made a point to get my husband to cut out a car identical to my son's winning car from last year. That car captured first place in the race, and my son noticed. He was a good sport about it, but he learned not to share his racing secrets with anyone (yes, there are racing secrets and it's very confidential I might add!) The Cub Scouts have to check in their cars the day before the race. At check in everyone has the opportunity to get a look at the competition, and I have learned enough about pinewood derbys that I can spot the potential winning cars. I can spot the winning families by how much graphite they have under their fingernails (including me, my husband, and my son in that order I might add, and that leads me to make the statement "Whose Race is this?"). The top cars are usually within a few tenths of a second difference in times, so you can imagine how competetive it can become.

The races are run very well with a computer software measuring the finishes. It's quite a thrill to see the times flashed up on the video screen that's set up for the fans. Racing music plays in the background while parents and kids all fill up on pizza and coke. Oh, the thrill of victory.