Storms and Blessings: The Week in Review

What do you mean, it's been three weeks since I last blogged!?!?! My laptop  is still down and with the mad scramble to finish K12 online school with the girls, there just hasn't been much time to squeeze in computer time.

Let's see...here's what has kept me busy this week:

Sunday, May 22: I was glad to discover that no one had been raptured.

Tuesday, May 24: Devastating tornadoes tore through the OKC metro area.  It was the most intense weather Matt & I have ever experienced! It's the first time I've been close enough to a twister to actually photograph it. Sadly, several lives were lost. Heartbreaking news that a family lost their two little boys (the same ages as Luke and Nathan) as well as their home and all tangible reminders of their sweet children.   Their 5 year-old daughter remains in critical condition at this writing. Please keep the Hamil family in your prayers. 

Thursday, May 26: Zac and Seth's last day of school! I am now the mother of two high schoolers: Zac will be a junior and Seth will be a freshman in the fall.

Friday, May 27: I asked the Lord to give me the opportunity to bless Abby with something to show my thanks and gratitude for all her help with the younger kids.  She does Katie and Luke's schooling with them and babysits when I grocery shop. She is such a wonderful helper and I haven't had a way to reward her for all of her hard work.
Friday evening, May 27: I received an email informing me that I won a contest I'd entered for a new iPod Shuffle. The Lord honored my request and now Abby has the iPod she has wanted! God is so gracious and loving and I know I won because He wanted to bless her, too!

Double Digits

Ally turned 10 on Mother's Day. I took her and Madalyn out for a little girl time on Saturday evening.  We shopped for nail polish at CVS, picked up ingredients for her birthday meal (chicken tacos) at the grocery store and got mocha Java Chillers from Sonic. Afterward she, her sisters and Luke camped out in the living room for the night.
Sunday the birthday girl had her wish fulfilled for Matt's awesome blueberry pancakes with, as per her request, fresh strawberry sauce. I baked her a German chocolate cake with coconut-pecan frosting and as a little surprise, I baked a chocolate chip cookie the same size as the cake, frosted the cookie with chocolate icing,  and put it between the two layers of cake.  It was rich and chocolatey and absolutely yummy!
Ally loved her gifts: a fashion stylist game for her DS, a cd, tee-shirt, and especially the heart and butterfly necklace that Matt picked out for her.
For the first time, half of our kids are in double digits! Where has the time gone?!?!

The beautiful birthday girl!

See the chocolate chip cookie baked in there? You can never have too much chocolate! (Well, ok...yes you can.)

I Guess that's Why They Call It the Blues ♫ ♫

I know, I know...I've been neglecting this blog.  It's not been intentional, but rather due to a few factors beyond my control: 1.) My hp Pavilion laptop is currently dead.  The thing is only 2-1/2 years old and I've had to replace the hard drive twice. Last week the hard drive died once again, but since it's no longer under warranty I replaced it myself.  A friend researched and found a good one for me to purchase and when it arrived I put the little sucker in all by myself.  I did it correctly, but unfortunately there is now a glitch with the boot disk.  So -- for those of you not technologically hip, I'm sorry.  So many words for one little explanation. That said, it boils down to me sharing the family computer with 8 other people.
Second reason: life is boring.  Wait...did this mother of eight just say "life is boring"? Yep.  Because it is. Day in, day out, it's the same thing with a different dinner menu.  The older boys have 14 school days left.  14 days of me getting up at 5:30 a.m. to have some peaceful time before waking them up for school; 14 more days of hurrying them to the bus stop, hoping they make it on time; 14 more days of happily hearing about their day when they arrive home in the afternoon. The girls have about one month left in their school year. However, even with summer break to look forward to, it doesn't change the fact that each day is just like the day before and the day after.
Matt uses the car 6 days a week for work.  On the seventh day (Sunday) I might be lucky enough to get a trip to the grocery store. That's it.  That's my outing for the week.  High gas prices and a lack of funds prevent us from doing anything more than what is absolutely necessary. I'm turning into Rapunzel because I can't even make a hair appointment.
When I sleep at night, I have dreams that consist of boring household things like  realizing that we've run out of paper towels, or discovering that someone left the hose running all night, and I've even been known to dream that I went to 7-11 and they were out of Big Gulp cups.  Not very exciting stuff...not even the weird inconsistencies that usually come with nighttime dreams.
S...please forgive me for not blogging more often. When there is actually something worth blogging about, you bet I will!