Park Ranger WolfMan

WolfMan, you are absolutely amazing to me ... As a child, I couldn't keep my hands off of God's animals ... you really are even more Dr. Doolittle-ish than I was. If you find a hurt animal, you take it to safety ... like you did for "Lucy" the Scissortail Flycatcher today.

You gently checked her wings ...

and then, you

let her quickly know that you were going to take good care of her.

I love you so much, your gently ways with the animals ... you love for all God's creatures ... even that mean old rattler that you tried to gently shoo away,

that you ended up killing because it just wouldn't leave you and your brother alone ... and that is what makes you my official park ranger ... I know now why you weren't upset when you lost your BB Gun ... you take no joy in sport shooting.

Mother's Day 2009

Three years ago, I took this picture of my little lovey's for Mother's Day.

It is hard to believe how much they have grown.

I'm a sick, sick woman ... I think I actually miss changing diapers ... SIGH!

Park Post ... Part Zwie

Once we finished up at UTPB Stonehenge, we moved over to the duck pond area ...

The UTPB Ground Crew does a great job of keeping this lush green park area just gorgeous!

So, while the little girls went to check out the wall paper in the bathroom ... the boys found a tree to climb. And they loved it of course ... they love to get in the tree. And can't wait for Mr. Rooster to build their treehouse. (More later on that project!) And while they were up that tree, they found all kinds of flora and fauna to check out from their perch in this massive Oak tree.

Park Day ... Part Eins

While Mr. Rooster was in Evanston Wy- Oh My Goodness IT IS GORGEOUS -ming, I took the Wild Bunch-Zoo Crew on the requisite trip to park for pictures and for fun. I mean gee this trip that Mr. Rooster took was so hard on the kidlets that Savannah literally made herself sick.

So here they are ... The morning of April 22nd ... all smiling and having fun at the UTPB Stonehenge replica. We love to take photos out there ... it is really just uber cool to have a bit of British history, replicated here in Texas, especially here in town.

My girls are so darn cute in pigtails!

LOL, See how sweet they all look here .... look at the first pose though ...

Sarah ... don't choke Jon~~~

Tune in tomorrow at the same bat place, at the same bat time ...

for the further park adventures of the Zoo Crew - Wild Bunch ...

I'm BAD ..

Last week was ... well, YUCK ... nothing went right ... blogging was a go, no go situation ... LOL, can you tell I have been doing a K.T. Analysis ... well, probably not, but hey ya' learned something new today. Roo does K.T. Analysis at work and for his master's program. I do K.T. Analysis while consulting and while trying to maintain a normal level of life around this crazy house.

So, let's see ... to tantilize my edge of the seat readers, I have PICTURES of the zoo crew. AND, soon I will have an AWESOME giftie picture to share with you that Roo let me buy for myself. I was reading another homeschool mom's blog. She lost one of her precious little boys this last year, and her simply awesome siblings bought a locket for her birthday with his picture in it. So, I went on a major internet surfing expedition to find said locket where I could show Rooster. Hehehe ... the man so has my heart ... he loved it as much as I did and told me to order me one!

Hmmm ... well, let's see what can I plop in here to make ya' happy ...

Oh, I know ... how about some smiling faces ....

Here are my Easter Sunday smilling faces ... the Wild Bunch went out and chased down the Easter bunny, beat him up, and forced him to hand over his eggs.

Bible Bowl-ing

At first I thought this was some weird church sport. Okay, I'll admit, I didn't have a CLUE!!!! I'll be the first to admit it ... I'm not ashamed. Not at all ... well, of not knowing. But I am ashamed of me because ... I'm NOT smarter than a Bible Bowler ... MAN, these kids are awesome!!!



Do you know ... what book the Ethiopian was reading when Philip caught up to him? Or how about ... who spoke after Paul and Barnabas at the Jerusalem Conference? Or maybe ... before dawn, on the 14th day of the storm, what did Paul encourage everyone to do?




If those aren't enough ... I have more ... I have FIVE HUNDRED TWENTY-SIX more facts that these AWESOME kids learned.

Our church, Sherwood, sponsors our 4th, 5th, and 6th grade children. These kiddoes study for about four months in preparation for this one day awesome event. We traveled to San Angelo this weekend, and met other children from not only another local church, but also kids from around West Texas such as Bronte, Robert Lee, San Angelo, etc. I think all total there were 8 different churches participating with about twenty six - three or four "bowler" teams. Then, these kiddoes were divided up between experienced (the ones that had been there at least one time) and inexperienced (obviously the ones that had not ever been before).

Enter Smiley

and Ranger ...

Well, my little darlin's were on the inexperienced teams ... the Ranger and Miss Smiley had not had the opportunity at our last church to participate. The church didn't do Bible Bowl ... wow ...what a missed opportunity!!! I know every church can't afford this, but WOW ... what a ministry for the "FUTURE" of the church!!! These guys were well, can I just say "AWESOME" one more time ... and I'm not braggin' about my kids ... I'm talking all of these kids were just well ... OUTSTANDING. Everyone of our kids missed less than 20% of the questions.

Okay, okay ... on with the 'splainin' Lucy ...

Six rounds of thirty questions each ... One Hundred Eighty Multiple-Choice Questions!

With all the kids missing less than 20% of the questions that means they got at least 144 right ... well, our lowest score out of our 18 children was 159!! That's right ... the most missed was 21 questions ... and that means that child only missed 11%. And to add to that outstanding accomplishment ... our kids had at the top end of the spectrum a 179/180, a 178/180, a 176/180 (the Ranger), and a 172/180 (Smiley) ... now isn't that just incredible!!!

One book of the Bible ... Acts!

Each kiddie has their own cubbie with "A,B,C" flip cards. They must listen to each question being read nice and slowly by a very well eunuciated voice, with their three choices, THEN they can flip their card. And I'm not talking about three choices that you or I could go oh yeah that was this one ... we are talking about three choices with just MINUTE differences in the answers.

Anyway ... we went ... we saw ... and we had a BLAST. And we've got the t-shirts to prove it!

Let's see ... you say you want pictures of this fun time ... well let's see ... let's start with my guy ... hehehe ... he took a day of vacation to get us (our family, not the church) ready. But hmmm, guess he will be taking a day of vacation next year since he committed to helping with Bible Bowl next year as in he wants to be a team leader. He is such a good earthly Father ... a whole lot too hard on himself, but such a good example for his children. Okay, now I'm gonna get all weepy if I don't move on ... but hey it is POWERFUL when you see God move! We just have seven more years of Bible Bowl ... maybe in seven years I'll be smarter than a Bible Bowler ... hehehehe!

Also, in this picture you can see my grinning Wolfman, and the back of the Georgia Peach Princess' head ... she had a one-sided-over-the-head-catch-all-the-bangs-you-can-braided-do that day. Sir Hiss-a-Lot was also running around there ... he just moves too fast for the camera. These three guys were just AWESOME too ... they stayed out of the way, out of trouble, and were EXTREMELY supportive of their older brother and sister, and their teammates, too.

You will also notice lots and lots and lots of uhm, yellow in these shots ... man, I'm telling you if I never see yellow again it will be TOO SOON!!! YELLOW - ouch - my eyeballs hurt from all the yellow ... And it wasn't a bad yellow ... it was a rather mellow-yellow ... it was just well ... I really don't like yellow! Hahahahahahaaaaaa !!!! But the design on those yellow shirts was rather awesome ... their theme was "where the Kingdom began" .... and boy howdy ... what a Kingdom it shall be with these awesome kiddoes there!!! Every "kingdom" should be so lucky to have subjects such as these learning it's history.

Enough for this morning ... I gotta catch my breath, beat the washer into submission, coax the drier, and get my little dwelling back to "un-packed" status!

Birthday Wishes ...

Today ... is the 12th year that we have been blessed with ...

The Big Bubba ... he is the one that started our story ... and he is usually the one that instigates moments like these .... where all of my children are strangling a poor komodo dragon statue in the Fort Worth Zoo ...

or ....

all of my children perched on the ledge in the water park ribbiting like frogs ... because well they were near the water ...

Then, there are the moments when God's tiniest and very beautiful creatures catch his attention, and just don't let go. He was simply entranced by these beautiful little birds in the zoo. They bought little sticks with bird seed stuck to them to feed to the birds. He ended up with birds all over him ... trying to not only eat the food he had for them, but also nibble at his ears. Funny how their touch never concerned him in the least bit.

Of course of late, you will find him pestering his father with relentless questions about how this works, why this is the way it is, or what does this do, where is this or that, when does this occur, and on and on and on the questions roll ... And his questions are never annoying, they are thoughtful and though provoking. Of course those questions that come at 11:00 at night when we are trying to fall asleep are a bit frustrating. And no matter how many times we show him how to Google an answer to his more technical questions, he still comes to both Rooster and I first. Don't get me wrong, I love it! I love the fact that he thinks we are a fount of knowledge~~~

These boys have seen their share of rattlers since we live in the country, but alas they never seem to tire of any display of one especially one that is this long!!

Happiest of birthday wishes to my dear Big Bubba ... you are my tenderheart ... and I love you tenderly with all my Momma heart!

Edit ... sorry ... I have referred to the above mentioned child in this post as Big Bubba, and have been informed that he prefers the online moniker of Ranger ... ah, I love my children soooo much!