Houston Chronicle - Belief

It's hard to do, but I found a decent article in today's Belief section of the Houston Chronicle. You can check it out here.

We are not homeschoolers. Fortunately, we are blessed to be able to send our children to the public school in our area and still have our personal values and beliefs reinforced (rather than attacked) at school. However, Larry and I have discussed the possibility of opting to homeschool if there was ever an issue where we would have to be concerned regarding what the boys are being taught. So, this article caught my eye today.

I have to say, it was a pleasant surprise to read an article in this particular section of the paper and not mutter to myself in disgust the entire time!

C-O-N-G-R-A-T-U-L-A-T-I-O-N-S

This morning, Joseph participated in the elementary school's spelling bee!

Out of each participating grade (3-5), the top spellers were selected to compete. There were a total of 15 spellers in the bee.

Joseph got 4th place! He was the last 3rd grader eliminated! 3rd and 1st places went to 5th graders and 2nd place was won by a student from the 4th grade.

M-O-M
I-S
P-R-O-U-D !!!

Scout's Christmas Lament

Sweet Scout (our 3 year old weimaraner) has been severely traumatized this week. We have boxes of Christmas decorations everywhere and I think that she's afraid that we are moving. Tuesday was particularly hard on her. She has become obsessively protective and has resorted to collecting all of the Christmas plush toys that make sound and begging to take them outside.

There is a particular toy that makes her nutty. It's a dog, wearing a Santa hat, which sings 'Deck the Halls', then howls and sings 'Santa Claus is Coming to Town'.

Last night, in an effort to make her stop whining, Larry allowed her to take the dreaded Santa-Hat-Wearing-Dog outside. She pranced out the door, to a far corner of the yard, where she placed the toy, before turning around and scratching some grass up over it.

She came in and went straight to sleep. Larry went back out and brushed the toy off. It's now on a shelf where no little boys can set it off!

I thought that it would be the end of it. However, she has now shifted her suspicious behavior to ZhuZhu pets. Evidently, she feels the need to protect us from those intimidating creatures as well!

November in Quick Review!

I took an extended blog break during the 2nd half of November and feel compelled to sum it up in the most efficient manner possible...Bullet Points!

• Turkey Trot - The annual race at the boys' elementary school. Both of our guys did great in their grade level races!
• Grandparents' Day - Another annual event at the elementary school. Grandfather was missed greatly on this day. Joseph still treasures the picture that Grandfather had on his refrigerator from our first Elementary school Grandparents' Day!
• Potty Training - This is going extraordinarily well for Caleb and much earlier than I ever tried with the other three guys. He just desperately wants to be like his big brothers.
• Thanksgiving - We typically spend Thanksgiving with my mother-in-law and Larry's step-father. However, they had big party plans with some friends, so we thought that we would squeeze ourselves back into my parents' plans. However, they didn't really have any. So, I volunteered to have it at my house. WHAT WAS I THINKING?! It was my first ever Thanksgiving meal to prepare. I must confess that I relied heavily upon my DVR'ed episode of Throwdown with Bobby Flay featuring Ree Drummond, The Pioneer Woman. It went beautifully and we had lots of fun. I kicked everyone out early (at 8:30pm) because of...
• 2 ER trips in one week (of Thanksgiving) - This was due to some switches in my medication causing some critical functions to rebel. At the moment, everything is working fine and we are tweaking meds and seeking further answers. I believe that this will all end soon. 
• ***GREATEST BULLET OF ALL*** Jeremiah accepted Christ! - We were driving home from the library and he asked, "Mommy, do you know the ABCs?" I found this to be an odd question, since we have been going through the aBeka K4 curriculum this year, but answered, "Yes, Baby." He continued, "Not the normal ABCs, the 'A - Admit to God you are a sinner' one?". To this, I quickly answered with a 'yes' and did a non-chalant u-turn to head back to the church for a conversation with Daddy. We made our way into the old chapel and ended an incredibly sweet and amazingly profound conversation with Jeremiah praying to receive Christ, while kneeling at the front row of the chapel. Precious...the top of my Thanksgiving list, for sure!

How was your November? I can't wait to see what December holds in store!