I knew it

I knew I wouldn't do too good with this blogging thing. I thought I was going to set aside the time each week to do it, but until I get a real schedule made (which I've been working on for about 5 years) I probably won't write once a week. I'm online wasting time today because enough of my friends bugged me enough so that I finally joined facebook. Because myspace, asunet, alasualum, and every other site i've joined out of peer pressure wasn't enough!! lol no worries. i did find some old friends from Ohio i hadn't found for awhile. but it's still just one more thing for me to put on my to do list.

What's going on here? Dell is out of town for 2 weeks which means we get to eat more pizza!! he finally admitted that he doesn't like it as much as i do! i found out a friend and her husband are from NY and they are perfecting a homemade pizza recipe for REAL NY style pizza. they're going to invite us over when they get it all right. They like pizza so much that the husband wants to put in a brick oven! I can't wait for my invite.

Gabi is on meds for her second double ear infection. Her and josh have had colds for about 2 weeks and my sinuses have been driving me nuts. I finished crocheting my friends baby blanket. It turned out really nice and the lessons I learned from it won't be noticeable to anyone else! I look forward to finding the pattern I'm going to do for the next blanket....and who i'm going to make it for. Perhaps I should finish Joshua's baby blanket--that turned into Gabi's blanket--that is still undone in a bag! It's plain though and I'm not motivated to work on it.

The girls got their report cards and Miracle got straight A's again. And this quarter we did not check any of her homework, so these grades are all her own. We wanted her to understand the importance of checking her work before turning it in. Brianna doesn't get letter grades yet in first grade, but she had a lot more G's and at our conference, her teacher said there has been a lot of improvement, both in her work and her behavior/attitude. So we were very happy about that and praised her a lot for that report.....hoping maybe we could get some improvement here at home.

I think that's all the updates for us for now. love you all!

Here he is

Many of you have asked "Where's Wendell?" LOL Here he is....

This picture is no surprise to any of you that know him well! This is after our Thanksgiving meal.


Like father, like son.....I had to go WAY back to find this one. Yes, we take pictures of him, but I don't think he'd like them. This was taken at Miracle's dance recital back in June.

Miracle's 8th Birthday

Today was Miracle's birthday. I can't believe it's been eight years already. My baby is growing up. While I understand that she doesn't care for having a December birthday, I think back to our first Christmas we had with her. I remember sitting on our couch, listening to soft Christmas music, and just holding her in the living room lit only by the lights of the Christmas tree. It was so beautiful. (Both her and the Christmas tree!) One of Wendell's talents is that he has a wonderful eye for decorating a tree (Thanks Dip!). I grew up with a tree filled with the ornaments that were made yearly in school by my siblings and me. (Do you guys remember the gold dog ornament Cynthia made!?!? I always liked that one.)

I got sidetracked (surprise). So today Miracle chose to go to Bandana's BBQ Restaurant. They serve plain meat and then you have about 5-6 different BBQ sauces on the table to choose from.

One person at school actually remembered that today was her birthday and got her this stuffed animal. She named it Cupcake because that's what the bear is holding and she has ALL of her stuffed animals named. She's also excited about turning eight because she's now the same age as as the other kids--at least until they turn 9! (For those who don't know, Miracle skipped first grade after homeschooling for a year, so this is her second year with the older kids.)

Me and the munchkins waiting on the food.

After dinner we went surprised Miracle by taking her to Club Libby Lu. She wanted to go there last year for her birthday party, but we did something else instead. The girls got to make their own lip gloss, shampoo, and hair gel and got this cool bag for their hair styling products. So of course, Miracle has already asked if she can wash her hair with her new stuff.....ugh.....

Look closely....we got Gabi's ears pierced at Libby Lu's too! We got the little pink earrings. The hardest part was getting the dots lined up in the middle of her lobes! She got them pierced one at a time and was fine once she got her two fingers in her mouth!!!

Well that does it for me tonight. It's late and tomorrow morning we have an Angel breakfast to go to at a local church. Maybe I'll have some cute Christmas pics to share from that.

First things first --- Updated Pics

I'll start with the girls' school pictures. These were taken back in September.




Miracle is almost 8 and in the 3rd grade this year. She has a really cool male teacher who is in a Christian band and because her class asks a lot of questions, he is able to share his beliefs. She got straight A's on her first report card and we are really excited since this is her first year of letter grades.








Brianna is 6 1/2 and in 1st grade. We like her teacher as well and we are all working together to help Brianna do the best that she can and get the most out of this year. Her teacher says that she reads on a 3rd grade level....now we just have to get her to ENJOY reading!!!







I really do take a lot of pictures of Josh, but didn't realize that I don't catch a lot of him giving a real smile, by himself, while standing perfectly still so that it's not blurry!!

Josh is 2 1/2 now and he asks almost every day if he can go to school or ride the bus. And when he prays, it's always about the girls on the bus! Even though we sent the girls to school at 2, we decided to keep him home another year because he knew what they'd be teaching this year anyway....plus he has 2 teachers and 2 teachers' aides at home!!


Here's me and Gabi. I did finally get her pictures taken (at 6 months) but I haven't scanned them yet. That will be my goal for the next update!

And yes, I'm going to find a picture of Dell to put in here too!







I can't resist. Our main photographer, Brianna, caught this and I just think it's funny!

This is for you!

I'm going to jump on the bandwagon and start a blog. Mainly so that I can keep family and friends more in touch with the kids as they grow. I realize that some of you haven't seen Gabi since the day after she was born! So my plan is to schedule these updates and hopefully sit down once a week to keep you informed of whats going on in the Mayes house!