the chickens are gone. all of them. something pulled up the fence and took them all. had to be something fairly small, like a small dog or fox or raccoon or something. every last one of them though! no bodies, no blood, just gone.

sucks.

i guess i'll have to have the kids clean out the coop. maybe i'll get some more in the spring.

sucks though.

parenting a high schooler is sooooo much tougher. this past week we have had to have several different discussions about things like fighting being wrong (in most but not all situations), typed words do not convey sarcasm, lying to your parents to try to keep out of trouble will only land you in more trouble, and finally defriending your dad will not keep him from finding out the bad things.
little things i found out.
if you put things like "i want to kick your a$$" on facebook to someone and you go to a new jersey school, you are automatically suspended the first time and expelled the second.
depending on your school district policy, the same can happen in missouri.

well, my oldest is 15 now. has been for a almost 2 weeks. he had his first football game. he played both offensive line and defensive line. he didn't start the game, but he played part of the 2nd quarter and then the rest of the game. they won 43 to 8. pretty fantastic first game! we saw hubby's aunt and cousin at the game. the cousin's stepson played for the other team. he was an awesome player, but he didn't have support from the others on his team. i haven't been to a football game in about 15 years. i think i went to one after alex was born. i used to love going to the games...freshman year especially. there have been a few changes since then. cheerleaders uniforms are different, and there are more of them. pommers are now dancers and there are fewer of them. (only 7 out there) but i LOVED it. the day was beautiful and my kid was on the field.

i've been reading a lot lately. i've started reading a new author, Barbara Delinsky. her books are fantastic. very real life. i haven't read one yet that i've had to force myself to finish. they are pretty hard to put down. ones i've read~ together alone, woman betrayed, fingerprints, within reach, family tree, more than friends, suddenly, the woman next door, and while my sister sleeps. i don't think i could pick just one favorite...they were all pretty great in their own ways.

i've been thinking about my life more and more lately. with all of my kids at school, i should get a real job right? or go to school? i mean i still watch kids and all. hubby and i had a decent conversation about it last night. he had thought working at a daycare would be good for me. no. no thanks. is there anything wrong with daycare? probably not. but the reason i like what i do now is it's flexible, and these kids are mine when they are here. not mine for a year. mine until they stop coming. my sis-in-law works at a daycare and really likes it. she has the kids in her room until they turn 3. then they move on. i couldn't imagine giving up these guys before i have to. i like seeing the way they develop their own personalities and quirks. i like being a part of that. especially since my own are older now and i won't be having any more. anyway, back to the job/school issue. i figure i have some time to you know, ponder, what it is i should do. hubby was really great about it. not that i expected anything different. i know he only wants me to be happy with what i do. i just wish i knew what that was.
when i was a kid, i wanted to go to college and get a degree, go to law school and be a lawyer and then a judge. why? my mom pushed for me to do it. why? well for her it was because she missed out on it because she was pregnant with me. would she have gone to college if i hadn't been on the way? maybe, but more for the parties than the education. i'm not trying to be mean or rude, that's just how she was/is. i want my kids to go to college. why? because they will get to see more, and do more and that will help them to figure out what they want to do. won't it? i mean if they know what they enjoy doing or learning about won't that help them? it's a little late for me. my life is set in a path that family is the most important thing. hubby and kids are my main focus. i don't want to change that. but i would like my kids to maybe figure out what they want before they start a family. it just seems like it would make their lives easier. maybe not. i don't know.
parenting is so much harder now. when they were babies we were their main teachers. now, they have teachers and friends and coaches and i worry so much some times. alex is going to a school with 300+ kids in his grade. he didn't have 300 kids in his entire school before this. i don't know these kids. i don't know their parents. i think back on some of the stuff i did, and the kids and their parents and it scares the heck out of me. i hope he does better than i did. i definitely want us to do better than my parents did.

where did the time go?

well, you know it's been a while when you can't even remember your own web address. sad i know. unfortunately, my life has really not been too terribly exciting. hubby has changed jobs a few times. he is now back to selling fords in the same place. he was managing a tire/garage location, but we never saw him. he was putting in 65 to 70 hours a week (sometimes even more) and not taking a day off. if he would have been getting overtime i might have told him to suck it up, but just making a salary and working himself to an early grave? no thanks. the kids need a dad and i need my hubby. so selling cars works out so much better.

alex starts high school this fall. i'm not sure if i am excited about this or depressed. his is going to the same school i graduated from...while 6 months pregnant with him. there are only a couple of teachers still there from when i was there. he started football. and surprisingly he LOVES it. i say surprisingly because he is pretty lazy, and they work his tail off! he will be taking 3 different advanced/honors classes. honors geometry, biology, and honors history. he's really smart, but i hope he's not overdoing it for his first year. it's a pretty big change. he's going from a class of 19 to a class of 200+.

haley will be in 7th. she's taller than me (has been for about a year now) and looks more like 18 than her actual age of 12. not cool. not cool at all. this i a big year for her. at least a big fundraising year for her. this is the year they raise money for their 8th grade year. there are 2 big trips in 8th grade. one is a team building trip the beginning of the school year, and the other is the pro life trip to D.C. plus the gift to the school, the teacher/staff and other assorted odds and ends. she decided to play volleyball again this year. she skipped last year because she didn't want to play for the coach. but she's not coaching anymore so haley decided to give it another shot. so we are looking forward to soccer and volleyball for her in a couple of months.

grace will be in 4th grade this year. big change there is we are losing the nun who had been teaching this grade for quite a while. there is a new teacher we have yet to meet. she gets to start volleyball this year...well instructional at least. unfortunately, the coach haley didn't like will be grace's coach. thank goodness she has a son so she's only going to coach this one year. i'm pretty sure grace needs glasses. we were discussing the books she reads, and why she likes them...and her reasoning was she could see the words easier and they didn't give her a headache when she tried to read them. great! so i need to get her in to see what she needs and if she should or could do contacts. contacts seem like a lot of work, but if she's like haley, and her prescription changes as much as hers did, contacts may be better. we will see.

josh is going into 2nd grade. first communion year. first confession year. big big year! i can't wait to see how he's going to do this year in school. he's really smart and this teacher is great at challenging the kids. his class is pretty small (i think there are 16 kids) and it makes it easier to focus on the individual needs of each kid. josh is getting so big now. and sweet! he is my most helpful kid. he should be doing instructional basketball this year. boy is he going to be good! he's bigger than most kids his age...not just taller but he's like a brick wall. it's going to be interesting watching him. he's really gotten into Lego's this year. like getting the kits and making whatever. he has several star wars things and i think quite a few halo things too.

zack is going into 1st grade this fall. last year was tough for me. trying to keep up with what he was doing in his class and all the things going on with alex in his class was more difficult than i thought it would be. i appreciate that they were trying to get the kids excited about doing projects and such, but really? a different project a month. he did his own stuff...not like quite a few other kids in his class. but seriously, most of it was stupid. one month was a leprechaun trap. stuff like that. i know, i know. it sounds cute and all, but really? just teach the kid to read and add. but no, he didn't learn much with that. we are still working on that. i'm worried about this coming school year. this teacher is really nice and all, but not the best. i'm hoping i can get him where he needs to be before school starts so he won't get left behind. i think he just has to get interested in what he's learning. i've been taking them to get books from the library and he's been really enjoying that.

i'm still watching kids...yeah for me. most of the kids are great, but there's a couple that are a little tougher. i'm not sure if it's their personalities or the fact that i have them for 12 FREAKIN' HOURS A DAY!!! that's a lot. sorry, i'm complaining and i shouldn't. they are for the most part a nice family. young, but nice. the kids i watch during the school year (3 of them) will be 3 years old this year. the girls are potty trained, but the boy, um, not so much.

we still have chickens. we even hatched some out this year. it was pretty cool. we have casey the dog, and the cat. no name for the cat. it just is. actually i'm pretty sure it's a girl...it has a pretty big umbilical hernia. i wasn't sure it was going to survive when the kids found it last year. it was maybe 4 weeks old and haley found it under the neighbor's truck. the cat and casey have a very loving relationship. casey treats the cat like her play toy/baby. and the cat takes it. in fact when the game is over (swinging the cat by the scruff of the neck) the cat i usually the one to come back for more lovin'.

well, i think that's it for me!

first day of school

ok, i'm excited about it being the first day of school. 4 out of 5 of my kids started today, and zack starts pre-k tomorrow. 3 hours 2 days a week. i think we are both pretty excited about it.

since summer is officially over, i figured i'd hit the "high" points from the last few weeks since my last post.

the fair happened the last week of july. starting that tuesday. haley was supposed to have her pig up there by 5pm. guess what happened...well, the stupid things escaped during the major downpour we had. and they stayed gone until the next morning. yeah, she was pretty upset. we were all pretty upset. in fact, i think between jeff and i, we could have just shot the damn things and been done with them both at that point.
especially when they disappeared the next day too. we finally got them secured in the pen, set up a time for them to go the the butcher, and we went on vacation for the weekend.


we had a great time at tablerock. even after the morning call of "hey one of the pigs died". that call came on sunday...they were going to the butcher on tuesday. not happy, not at all. so when we got home on monday we had a pig to bury, and that was a nasty smelly mess. ok, no more about that.

tuesday we took the remaining pig to the butcher. it only took an hour to get it in the trailer. that was with 4 of us pushing and pulling and well, whatever it took to drag it up in the trailer. we have decided that at this time, there will be no more pigs at our house. we are done. unless josh or zack use there powers of persuasion on their dad and talk him into it. i am done.

that leads us to last weekend. friday night i played bunco with a bunch of friends and got home at around 2ish. had way to much fun! hubby's work picnic was sunday. he took the girls to the baseball game first. they had a great time and aunt barb spoiled them rotten. at the picnic they had a raffle for all kinds of prizes. we got tickets for every family member there. alex was fishing with my mom so we got 6 tickets. 4 out of the 6 won. besides the 3 different gift cards we also won a 40 inch flat screen t.v. that's right everyone. a huge t.v. that is now in my bedroom. why? well, hubby was having a hard time seeing the t.v. before...but not anymore.

the kids had a great time at school today. even though (or maybe because) they got out at 11am. that's right all.

i'll try to update more often, but no promises!