Chloe, lately, has been asking a lot for us to play "ding dong" with her! As usual with Chloe we have to do some investigation to figure out what she is actually meaning. Getting no where in verbal communication finally we asked her to go get "ding dong" and we will play it. *lol* Come to find out Chloe loves Barnyard Bingo aka 'ding dong' in Chloe language. It does have a ding dong like sound I suppose when the little handle goes up and down for the chips to fall out. So, between the sound the game makes and the word bingo she got ding dong.

You talkin' 'bout me?!

I'm a darling and know it!

Today Eric went to a used furniture store in hopes of finding us a cheap yet somewhat nice china hutch to keep my Mom's Friendly Village china that she passed down to me. Unfortunately, he had no luck in that aspect. We don't want to spend a lot of money on one right now. Especially with the need to do some winter clothes shopping for the kids and Christmas around the corner. However, Eric did come home with TWO very nice used, matching, oak bookcases for us that match with the rest of our oak decor! I am soooo very excited as we were running out of space for our books. We have replaced our hand me down bookcase beside the fireplace that the last owner of the home left here with one of the oak ones. The other one we put in our dining area next to the right of the back door to our yard. They both look great and I actually have space for future books! The old hand me down bookcase is going to go upstairs in the hallway because we will still need more book space for the kids. I plan on putting their Sonlight curriculum cores on the two older department store quality bookcases upstairs. I don't want to pack away each core as they finish them because they still enjoy the books and the girls will be starting with the first core we bought in the Fall for pre-k.

Eric also found us an oak framed mirror for $28 to go over our fireplace! I was so excited as we have been wanting a mirror for over the fireplace for a long time. It's a little bit smaller than we wanted but I am hoping to find something to go on each side of it to compliment it. I'll have to show a pic later and get some advice from all the home decorating divas out there. Eric definitely found some treasures that have been on our wish list and will be much loved without spending a fortune on new furniture. Tonight, the kids were so cute as they prayed that Papa would be able to find Mama a china hutch someday that we could afford.

Jared is home and the procedure went really well!  Jared was such a trooper. Mama even got a compliment on how brave she was to WATCH! When it comes down to it how can you help but not see what they are doing to your kid?!  OK, I admit I was just a tiny bit curious. *lol* Not to mention I knew Jared would ask me a hundred questions when it was all done.

When it was over Jared got to put on the doctor's special glasses that have the magnifiers sticking straight out. Then he asked the doctor to show him every single instrument he used to take his "bump" off. Afterwards, he went into another room where the nurse was going to show him what his face looks like. The nurse kept telling him to "hop up on the chair" so that he could see in the mirror that was on the wall. Well, Jared politely sat down on the chair. The problem... the mirror was WAAAAY up high on the wall for adults. So again the nurse said, "Jared you can hop up on the chair." So Jared gets off and sits down again.  Then the nurse giggles and says, " Jared is so polite that, of course, he knows he is not supposed to stand on furniture!" I then had to tell him that he could stand on the chair to look into the mirror. Ya, after telling this same kid 100 times not to stand on the furniture at home he looks at me like I have four heads or something. *lol* OK, so he finally sees himself in the mirror and approves of the docs handy work.

Then get this... bless his little heart! Jared gets to pick out treats and immediately sees this magic erase board and asks if he can bring it home to his brother Caleb who loves art! You know the boards that you draw on with a plastic pencil and then lift up the top sheet to erase it? Then he goes on to pick out two ballerina doll figurines and bracelets for each of his sisters. Then he only pics ONE thing for himself which was a police car/truck. The nurse practically had to beg him to take more for HIMSELF!

Jared gets in the van to go home and enthusiastically says, "That was the nicest nurse!!!" I so wish she could have heard him as it would have melted her heart. It certainly melted mine...

OK, one more story that is funny after the fact.... Earlier when I took him in and he had to see the nurse since the surgeon was still in surgery he saw this huge medical equipment on the shelf with a saw. His eyes just about jump out of his head as he asked the nurse, "Is that one of the tools the doctor is going to use to take my bump off?!" Poor kid! I thought he was going to have a heart attack. The nurse then explains that the tool was for taking casts off. Jared then tells her, "OH! Uncle Duncan told me all about those last night on the phone!"

So it's over and yup, Mini was right... all in all it was an honor to be there for Jared as his Mama. I was honored to see my son be so brave, respectful and so incredibly generous on top of the fact that he so desired me to be there above anyone else. I am so proud of him!!! Can you tell?!

Jared's appointment was at 1:45pm however, we have been bumped up until 4:30pm because the surgeon is still in the operating room with another patient. So, we are comfy at home right now while Jared has a numbing cream on his face to help with the needle prick for the REAL numbing stuff  He's nervous and waiting it out doesn't help! Although, we are both glad to be waiting in the comfort of home.

I do have a funny to share... I picked out a chapter book I thought Jared would love for me to read while we were waiting and possibly during the procedure. For curious minds it's The FireHouse Mystery in The Boxcar Children series. Anyway, I was reading out loud as quietly as possible to Jared in the waiting room when all of a sudden this elderly man shouts, "Can you read that louder?" When I looked up he continued, "We all want to hear it too!" ROFL!!! Another man pulls a newspaper away from his face and says, "Yeah, I'm not really reading anyway. I'm just looking at the pictures in the paper."  Jared and I both got a good chuckle out of that experience!

Will update as soon as we arrive back home from his procedure.

I was going to say Pray for ME but then thought that was a little heartless considering the situation. I'll explain the me part in a second. First, Jared has this growth that grew from his face being pierced by something. The docs are speculating from the duck itch we got this summer since it was on his face. I agree as I had it as well and whatever burrows into your skin is nasty and really uncomfortable! Anyway, in one spot Jared's did not heal properly. The growth has blood vessels running through it so it has to be removed by a surgeon. BLECH!!

The frustrating part is that the growth decided it couldn't wait until Jared's appointment at the children's hospital. Nope, instead it decided to not only quadruple in size but, also get a little pin hole in it yesterday sending blood gushing every where like a sprinkler system coming off his cheek. Yeah, you think it's gross?! At least you weren't the one having to shut off the sprinkler! EW!!!! Fortunately, (or would that be unfortunately?!) I have had lots of bloody experiences with my impulsive, energetic son and was able to be as calm as a summer breeze crossing the lake. Ha! Ha! No seriously we did fine. Jared was a little nervous because his mind immediately went to when he has cut his head open and thought we were heading to the ER. As soon as I realized his nervous twitches I asked him to share with me what he was thinking and then we were able to both get to where we were hammin' it up and laughing pretty good. Guess Mama is good for something eh?

Actually, in this case, Mama has proven herself to be TOO GOOD!  Jared has strongly requested from the beginning of his diagnosis that *I* be the one to go with him when he has it removed. His words to be exact, "I don't want to hurt Papa's feelings but I really would like Mama to go with me this time." In surprise I questioned for more clarification as he has always been a Papa's boy from day one! "Well, there are just some things that you want certain people to be with you and other things you want other people to be with you." Great, so I am the one he wants when the surgical knives come flying out and the cauterizing tools start buzzing. Mini (Grandmother) says this is supposed to be an honor! OKAAAAY, sure.

So, yeah, pray for Jared and ME tomorrow at 1:45pm. He will be seeing Mama's local surgeon who took her gallbladder out. Jared says he wants to ask him lots of questions about what my gallbladder looked like and whether he reached his hands in or not to get it out. Crazy kid!! Gotta love having boys  If I make it through this without hyperventilating or losing my stomach it will be a miracle! On second thought.... Jared and I do make a good comical team in times like this so maybe we will be perfect together!

Actually Jared is going to love it once the procedure is over because Dr. Bentwood is our neighbor. I can imagine with my little passionate emergency services boy how excited he is going to be to finally know the DOCTOR who lives near us! I can already picture him puffing up his little chest and giving that confident wave of his while yelling out, "Hi, Dr. Bentwood" as he passes by him someday on the local side walks. I am confident Jared will win the heart of Dr. Bentwood rather quickly. Me, I would rather it to be that I never see him again! *lol* With all due respect of course!

Anyway, tomorrow we will BOTH have to in Dr. Bentwood's words, "Buck up!"

The saying really is true when you have twins! I had to walk out of the room to do something with the boys. I knew the girls were safe and having fun playing with their toys so thought everything was just dandy. I return to the living room to find this...

And then this...

Should have known better to have left the futon down! No wait...should have known better than to leave my twins alone for any length of time!!! *lol*  I have no idea WHY they thought this was fun. Especially since they had to put it all back! Silly girls!!

As you can see our sofa and love seat are gone. Eric sold them in a yard sale because they were ripping right down the middle seams. Since I spend most of my day downstairs in this area I decided to put the kids' toys under the picture window (where I could supervise them!) and our futon, for now, where the large sofa used to be. I'm now looking online for a nice futon cover and pillows to make it look more living room-ish until we can do something else in the future. It actually works out well as it gives more floor space to play and the kids love curling up all together on the futon bed for movies or story time.

Today we went to visit my Mom. Memere to my kiddos She has moved back into our old home but it is now newly renovated and looks great! The kids had fun playing with Memere and all her trinkets and treasures she bought them. Jared especially loved cuddling and rocking with Memere while Caleb convinced Memere to watch Animal Planet with him. Phoebe and Chloe just wanted to wear Memere's jewelry and play with her bears. All the kids enjoyed pizza from Pizza Hut for dinner!

The kids all climbed up into Memere's lap.

Jared having a little fun with Memere and a pillow.

Mom gave me one of the most special materialistic gifts I could have received from her. She dug out of storage The Friendly Village china that I grew up with using for the holidays and allowed me to take it home for my kids to now 'grow up' with it. It was a blast to open all of the boxes and see all the pieces Mom had! Another amazing aspect of this collection is that it was all collected from my Grandparents' hardware store. Some of the pieces Mom didn't use much when I was little still had price tags from the store on them with my Grandparents' writing! I'm thinking it is Grammie's handwriting. So, the china reminds me of my Mom, my Dad and my Grandparents. To say the least it will be a wonderful honor to use it this year for the holidays with my children.

Here it is all on my dining table! Now I have to get to washing it all. Time to save up for a china hutch in order to display it!

Look what else we found while digging through treasures! This was MY Memere and Grandpa on their wedding day. Have no idea why Grandpa isn't Pepere? I actually have Memere's wedding dress and let me tell you she was tiny. I couldn't fit in it when I only weighed 90lbs!! I'm glad to finally have a picture of her in the dress. My Memere was beautiful!

I was tagged by sidzwife to do this fun activity. Eric's meeting to be held at the house ended up getting canceled tonight last minute. Regardless, as the norm for the last two weeks he is working late into the evening on paperwork and his presentations so good timing for me to have some mindless fun.

10 years ago:
1) I was 23.
2) moved back from MO to my home state in a HUGE Nor'easter with about 15 house plants that I didn't want to leave behind.
3) Began as a full time Missionary w/Eric living only on $400 a month  
4) I traveled and shared my testimony in 100 churches in our district
5) still couldn't get pregnant after two years of trying to conceive

5 years ago:
1) was still healing from my hysterectomy
2) still overcoming complications of withdrawals from all the morphine I was on when I had endometriosis
3) was enjoying raising my two little miracle boys adopted from Ukraine
4) successfully ministering on campus with Eric and raising up another campus missionary
5) bought a full size trailer camper and continued traveling all over with our kiddos to raise our missionary budget (the vehicle we had to pull the trailer spontaneously burnt up one night when Eric took the boys to McDonalds. Praise God everyone is still here to tell about it!)

1 year ago:
1) Had no one in diapers! (Hey, I'm proud of this fact after potty training twins and living in the bathroom for a couple of weeks straight!)
2) planning and preparing for The World Missions Summit (NO REGRETS!! AWESOME TRIP!!!)
3) began seeing a naturpathic doc and eating better (my um, weight can prove that one!)
4) painted the entire exterior of our house
5) sponsored Dr. Kindell to come on Campus in which we had a LOT of controversy

Yesterday:
1) helped save a chipmunk from the death grip of my cat
2) started this, never finished and now have to remember two days ago?!
3) Talked to both Mom and Mini on the phone
4) Made a great roasted, garlic, thyme chicken for dinner
5) It was Grandpa's (FIL) B-day so the kids called him and found out he went duck hunting near the property where we camp on the lake and got two ducks.

5 Snacks I like:
1) home made popcorn
2) blue corn chips & salsa
3) cucumbers and vinegar
4) Granny Smith Apples
5) Tomatoes (although they don't like me any more)

5 Songs I know all the words to:
1) The Hymn book
2) Thomas the Tank Engine Theme Song (heard just one too many times!)
3) Anything CeCe Winans
4) Anything Stephen Curtis Chapman (I know pathetic but it goes back to dh's and my dating days.)
5) Probably over 100 Worship Choruses

If I had a million dollars:
1) give tithe to my church
2) pay off my house
3) adopt more children
4) give more to missions
5) help anyone in my family who had a financial need!

Things I would never wear:
1) bikini
2) a watch
3) dangly earings (four children = ouch!)
4) Skirts/dresses cut above the knee (I hate skirts anyways Much more of Jeans and t-shirt girl!)
5) birkenstocks

Favorite tv shows: (Right Now.)
1) Everybody Loves Raymond
2) Yes, Dear.
3) Rachael Ray (although she makes me waaaay too hungry and I feel the pounds adding to my hips just watching!)
4) Dancing with the Stars
5) Amazing Race

5 Bad habits:
1) staying up too late
2) leaving too many glasses of water hanging around the house
3) worrying
4) negative thinking
5) cracking my knuckles both in my hands and feet (thanks to ballet!)

5 biggest joys:
1) Having a personal relationship with Jesus
2) My husband who provides stability, unconditional love and makes things happen!
3) My four beautiful children
4) My family
5) Eric's Family (which also is my family)

(I took out the five fictional people I would date because I'm happily married and too literal to pretend)

People I tag to do this:
1) likejelly
2) Agape
3) contuese
4) maguire5fl
5) xapaula

Chloe has been so anxious to play piano like her big brothers so I suggested to Eric to let her try it out. I think we have another musician on our hands!  She asks everyday now for her "piano time" for school. The best thing... Papa has had enough music in his childhood that he easily picks it back up at Jared's lessons and teaches the other kids. That saves us $80 a month PER kid!!! Ya, piano lessons in a University town are not cheap. Anyway, doesn't she just look darling with her serious look at the piano?!

The harvest moon gave a great night for our all time favorite family fun night, Hide & Seek in the dark!! We shut off all the lights, after taking a few peeks of the beautiful moon, and played in the moonlight beaming through our windows. The main reason I am telling you about this is because it needs to be written down in history that on Oct. 5, 2006 Jared and Mama BOTH STUMPED Papa at hide & seek!! The master of all hide and seek games actually began to get concerned as we were found to be NO where for a VERY long time! *lol* To say the least, Jared and I will live this one up forever and WON'T let Papa forget about it!!!  Jared was the last to be found and has earned the title of being the master of hide & seek in the dark. (Should I add that it was Mama, after Papa found me, who found Jared and NOT Papa?) Oh ya! We are having fun with this one!

I do have to share something really sweet...literally. I found a great hiding place in the kitchen amongst paper grocery bags that had yet to be put away. Remember we are playing in the complete dark so everything just looks like a shadow. Jared just kept walking past me over and over until finally at one time he reached his arm out and touched my back as I was hunched over. I tried to be perfectly still hoping he would just move on thinking I was a duffle bag or something. We have plenty of those still lying around yet to be put away too. Anyway, he finally found me and later I asked how he knew it was me and he said, " I could tell by your smell."  My reaction, "MY SMEEELL?!" Caleb then pipes up with a response, "Ya Mama. You always smell sooo sweet."