Last Post From Home?

Are you tired of this title yet? I'm still writing from home because we need to bring our modem back to the company to disconnect our internet, and Matt is going to do that tomorrow.

I found out Friday afternoon that the kids don't have school on Monday...Inservice Day. I shouldn't be surprised. It is rare for them to go a full week of school. Zoe is so excited that there is no school tomorrow, then it is St. Patrick's Day, and then it is her birthday. A fun week indeed!

We went over to my parents' house Friday evening to watch Glenn Beck's special "We Surround Them" with my mom. I thought the show would be more of an overview of the 9 principles and 12 values...

The Nine Principles

1. America is good.
2. I believe in God and He is the Center of my Life.
3. I must always try to be a more honest person than I was yesterday.
4. The family is sacred. My spouse and I are the ultimate authority, not the government.
5. If you break the law you pay the penalty. Justice is blind and no one is above it.
6. I have a right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, but there is no guarantee of equal results.
7. I work hard for what I have and I will share it with who I want to. Government cannot force me to be charitable.
8. It is not un-American for me to disagree with authority or to share my personal opinion.
9. The government works for me. I do not answer to them, they answer to me.

12 Values

* Honesty
* Reverence
* Hope
* Thrift
* Humility
* Charity
* Sincerity
* Moderation
* Hard Work
* Courage
* Personal Responsibility
* Gratitude

, but I enjoyed the show anyway. The kids watched a movie upstairs. We ate dinner and then we came home.

Saturday morning, after waking up and discovering very little milk in the fridge, I took a quick trip to the grocery store for milk and chicken casserole ingredients. After breakfast, Emily, Eleanor, Noah, and I headed to the gym for basketball practices. We were there from 9:00-12:30. I am so glad next Saturday is the last of the basketball practices! My dad stopped by the gym to watch Eleanor. Matt was at home taking down the bunk beds. They were falling apart and we needed to take them down before they fell down. The kids love their "new" bedroom without the beds. It is much bigger and it is like a playroom now. We brought home 3 body pillows from my parents' house this afternoon for the kids to sleep on and we also have a few mats. They love "camping out" in the living room, so now they get to "camp out" in their bedroom all of the time now.

At 12:30, Emily went home with her friend, Megan for Megan's birthday party. Megan invited Zoe at the last minute, so I went home to pick up Zoe and bring her to Megan's. They had fun painting birdhouses and animal ceramics. They ate pizza, played, and Megan's mom painted their fingernails. The party was non-stop fun! They didn't get home until 7:30pm.

Matt took Zoe, Emily, Eleanor, and Zach to church in Machias today. Mom and Dad picked the rest of us up to go to church in Ellsworth. Matt had more kids with him, but he had the reverent children. Noah slept through most of Sacrament meeting, but Kate was her busy, 2 year old self. We stayed in the chapel through the entire meeting, but it got quite challenging toward the end of the meeting. Kate was getting louder and more playful as the meeting went on. My lesson went really well today. I was complimented by Sister Conary, who is a retired teacher, that my lesson was really good and when I replied that I have a great class who participate a lot, she said that that is because I am a great teacher. That made my day. :-) My mom was asked to do the Nursery today, so I went in to help her during the 3rd hour. There were only 4 kids in there, but they are between 18 months and 2 1/2 years old, so they are a busy bunch with short attention spans. I appreciate their teacher, Martha, more now after that hour!

Our family was reunited at my parents' house this afternoon. We ate dinner and relaxed/played for a few hours. I snapped some pictures of the kids in their sweaters from Aimee. Aimee had requested a picture of them in their sweaters when she gave the sweaters to them at Christmastime, and I finally granted her wish today.





FINALLY!


Noah likes to wander down the hall now and play in the bedroom. We heard him crying, so Matt went to investigate.

Noah had climbed into this drawer full of Dora toys and couldn't get back out. Silly boy!