Happy Thanksgiving!

The last two days have been nice and festive. The kids at their school yesterday had a pilgrims picnic where we brought lunch and all the different grades performed something. It was really nice to see what they have been up to. They are really enjoying their school and learning a lot. By the way, Kylee did not have a picture in here because the 6th grade is so large they split it into two classes (9 kids each) and decided to take a few kids from each class to represent the 6th grade. She was happy to get out of it. She is not thrilled about being on stage.

Kindergarten
(Victoria is in the middle and Anni on the far right)

4th Grade
Genet had some serious hair going on that day.
It was cute though I have to say. :)

5th Grade
Million is in the back in a striped shirt

8th grade
Galen is on the far right

Today for Thanksgiving we had a mixture of friends and family. A total of 19 people. Although I totally spaced on taking pictures. I guess that means I was just having too much fun to remember.
Happy Thanksgiving to all our friends and family. We are Thankful for every one and everything in our lives. God Bless!

Scott turns 44!!

Today Scott turned 44. He doesn't like it when I say he is almost really considered "middle age". I always say it in a respectful way. :)
We really celebrated last night because we went with Million to Seattle all day today. We had a special dinner for him last night with lasagna, homemade bread and homemade chocolate cake. It was yummy!! We only put 8 candles on his cake for forty four, I was afraid I might start a fire if I put them all on. It was a fun night.
Today he took the day off to take Million to the doctor with me and we had a special lunch of Ethiopian.

Nerd Galen

Last night Galen got to go to nerd bowling put on by one of the youth groups in town that our kids attend. It was a great turnout and the kids really did a great job of dressing up. This is what my boy looked like as a nerd. I thought he did pretty good.

Victoria's baptism!!

Today we celebrated Victoria's baptism. It was a beautiful ceremony at church. Everything seemed just right. The weather was beautiful, the lady who visits our church just once in a while to sing in the choir with an incredible voice was there today, our friends were there, and Victoria looked like a little angel. It really couldn't have been any better.

Victoria's godparents are good friends of ours and have become very close to our children especially to Victoria. They really have a special bond, so they were the perfect choice for her. They moved here last year and are originally from Cameroon, Africa. They are incredible people and we have been truly blessed to have them in our lives.

After the ceremony at church we came back here to have a celebration. We were joined by the Dondji's (Victoria's godparents), my mom, the Fordan's (Million and Genet's godparents), our godson (unfortunately his parents couldn't come because of an illness in the family) and our priest. It was a fun day. Victoria's godmother even made her plantain which she just loves. It is a special food she used to have in Ghana.

A very blessed day indeed!!

Victoria thought this was really funny. She had the sweetest smile on her face.

I call this the "Lion King thing" when Fr. Tomas lifts the child up like this. I couldn't believe he did it today though since he is going in for back surgery tomorrow.

Victoria with her cake.

Victoria with the Dondji's, her wonderful godparents.

The "littles" move to a new school

We made kind of a big decision in the last few days and acted upon it yesterday.

Our district had major budget cuts this year. One way they decided to save money was to cut full-day kindergarten. But, instead of just going back to half day kindergarten like they used to do, they decided to try to please everyone. So, they decided to offer half-day AND every other full day. The full-day option sounded good in the fact that I wouldn't be driving in so much since the four other kids went to our local private school and don't have busing. The girls would go Wednesday, Friday and every other Monday. Basically going two days one week and three the next. This sounded all fine and dandy, but it was a little fishy when they didn't even give us a calendar of the days they would be going till the beginning of school. Well, when you add in holidays and half day in service days, they were going to acually be in school 78 total days, when full time students go 180 days. So, they wouldn't even be doing HALF the amount of days. We finally came to a realization last week how little school they were really going to get. I had called their teacher (who is also a friend of mine) to ask about getting speech for Victoria. We started looking on the calendar for the month of November and realized that they would be going to school three days this week, one day next week, one day the following week, and HALF a day the following week! Unexceptable!!

Scott and I started talking about our options. We decided that we had two options. Either I got on the ball and home-schooled them with the public school supplementing them on the days they actually went to school or sent them to go to school where the rest of the kids go. Well, thank goodness for multiple child discounts and that after three, the rest are free except for fees. We decided to say good-bye to our much loved Lincoln Elementary and hello to all six kids going to Ellensburg Christian.

The little girls started today and LOVE IT!! They asked when they went to bed if they got to go to school again soon. I got to actually tell them that they got to go again tomorrow!!

ECS is an awesome school and has great opportunities. They get all the things the regular school has and more. They also all are learning violin and learning both Latin (younger kids) and Spanish (6th and up). Galen actually gets the opportunity to travel with his class and another school to Washington D.C. for two weeks this summer.

It was a hard decision, but one that we definitely feel really good about.

Trick or Treat!

Anni-Princess Belle, Victoria-witch, Kylee-baby, Genet-baby and Million was their "Big Mama"

I love Halloween! I don't read a lot of things into it. I just think it is a fun time for the kids to dress up and join in community fun. We live in a pretty small town and so we know a lot of people when we go out. It is just a lot of fun.
Galen had to miss out this year. But, that was ok with him. He is on a retreat with one of our local churches. I am sure he is having an absolute blast!
Happy Halloween everyone!!

Carving pumpkins

My kids love carving pumpkins! I still haven't taken a picture of all the pumpkins done yet. Maybe tomorrow. On the night that we carved them, the big kids had to run out to youth group and I didn't want to take a picture without them. Unfortunately, since then not everyone has been home at the same time. :( Maybe I just need to take a picture of the pumpkins and not worry about their makers. :)