November anniversary

We celebrated our ninth wedding annivesary on November 25 in South Dakota. Darren surprised me with these wonderful flowers and then took me out for supper. It was so wonderful to be with him without any little helpers. The meal was quiet and peaceful for a change.

A couple of weeks beforehand I had taken my wedding dress out thinking my sister Mauri wanted to try it on for a possible wedding dress for herself. (She ended up buying a LOVELY dress online.) I had to try my dress on and see if it fit...and it did. Here is a terrible picture of it.

And here I am with my 5 boys - to prove that I could fit into it after 9 years and 5 boys.

I am so lucky

Last night on the way out the door to violin lessons I mentioned to Darren I was hungry for pasta, chicken and wine. When I came home there was a delicious Italian worthy pasta and chicken dinner complete with Italian wine Darren had bought on his last trip there. IT WAS YUMMY! Darren had already fed the boys, so it was just him and I eating. The boys roamed around the table until they quickly vacated after a sip of wine. I heard quite a bit of gagging and there were a few cups of water consumed after that. :-) Nice to know none of the boys are fond of wine quite yet.

After supper Darren served some cookies from Italy with an Italian dessert wine, Limoncello. The cookies were AWESOME, but the wine was better by itself instead of dipping the cookies in it like you are suppose to. Then to wrap up the night, Darren bought out yet another bottle. We then had a half glass of Passito (another wine).

It was heaven! I have to admit I'm not much of a wine fan and I can't say I loved the wine, but it was good. I felt wonderful afterwards...so calm and relaxed. And NO I was not drunk (at least not too bad).

Slowin' down after vacation

I know I have posted about gearing up for vacations in the past. Right now we are winding down, coming off the high of our last vacation. We had a great time in South Dakota (honestly, do we ever go anywhere else??) yet again.

The boys played at the Mark Park a couple days when the weather was nice. My family has added new things to the park, so it was like we were seeing it for the first time again. Its truly amazing. Today would have been Mark's 18th birthday, so the boys and I will put $18 in the Mark Park fund in memory of his birthday. Its hard to imagine he would have been 18 - a man who could go to war for us, buy tobacco and other "firsts". I know he is looking down at the park and sending his love to us for remembering him. Some days...well, some days it still doesn't seem like he is gone. I find myself expecting to see him back home. I guess that is one of the bad things about living so far from home. I haven't really gotten used to him not being there yet. I am sorry to say I didn't even make it to visit his grave this trip. Maybe that is a good thing because I just let life happen for a change and didn't try to center it on Mark being gone. Oh well...I've shed my two tears for the day and now can move on. Please remember Mark in your prayers.

Back to vacation...Darren had a birthday - he is 34 now. We had an anniversary - 9 years and counting. Darren took me out for supper and up to Deadwood for some gambling. I won on the penny machine and 2 cent machine. After subtracting our loses and the original money we put in...I still came home with a nice amount. I would have come out further ahead, but Darren wasn't winning when I was. That's the way it goes I suppose.

Our Thanksgiving was quiet. We spent it with my parents. The next day our family had a photo shoot at the house so we cleaned and cleaned and cleaned the main living area. Mom was interviewed by a magazine about feeding our large family. So they sent a photographer in to do pictures for the article. It was fun and frustrating at the same time. There were...ummm 25 of us?? Not even sure, I'd have to count...terrible isn't it?? Anyway, getting that many of us to smile or even look at the camera was a major deal. As soon as I download pictures off the camera I will post a few on here.

We had the Gebes family Thanksgiving on the Saturday after. It was a quick stay as we were on the road by 3 that afternoon, heading home. We were even in time to stop off at Cabela's. Darren drove until 2 AM when we stopped at a hotel room. It was a LONG day!!

We are now home, the house is back in order, clothes put away and most everything unpacked. School has had a slow start, but we will get there. I must admit I enjoyed the South Dakota 60 degree days verses our 30 degree days here.

Be careful what you wish for

I was just commenting to Darren about the fact that him and I had not had a true date, by ourselves, in over a year. That's a long time. With five boys that are far too full of energy, its hard to find a babysitter. I have to admit we really haven't tried to find one, so we have no one to blame but ourselves.

Back to the "be careful what you wish for"....

Sunday morning, during church, I started experiencing horrible pains in my belly. I thought it was gas. Darren rushed me to the ER because I couldn't walk or move without crying. I made mention to Darren that we were having a "date" of sorts and all we needed was some food and a drink. We had planned to go out for a quick drive-thru supper after the ER visit.....BUT...after a couple hours in the ER we were informed I was pregnant. Yippee right??!! Well...it didn't go so well.

The PA who was my dr. had my blood checked, all looked good so he was going to send me home. By this point the pain had lessen dramatically, so he had "forgotten" about it. It was then decided I should have a quick ultrasound to make sure it was all ok. That quick one didn't find anything, so they had a longer one done by an ultrasound tech.. After 5 hours in the ER, we were told I had a tubal pregnancy. It was a shock to say the least. I was immediately prepped for surgery and by 8 PM I was under.

The surgery went great and recovery was ok too. I don't remember any of it. Ha ha, those are some good drugs!! I was informed by my dr. that the tube had already ruptured before surgery and it had ruptured into my stomach. He also said it hadn't ruptured that day, but awhile ago. I didn't even know it was physically possible to have that happen and not have pain or die from internal bleeding. They did take out my left tube and all seems ok. I do have to have my blood tested until the pregnancy hormone level reaches 0. He does not know if they were able to retrieve all of the placenta since it had ruptured into my stomach. There are rare cases where it will attach itself to something else (stomach, intestines) and start to grow. Having my blood tested is the only way we will determine if all is well. I am still able to have more children according to the dr. and he sees no reason why it wouldn't happen sooner than later. I am happy to hear that.

I am sore from surgery, but as well as can be expected. I feel great emotionally and physically. God is good and my faith in Him has not faltered. I knew I would be ok and I know my baby is in a great place right now. I have considered naming the baby. I have had a miscarriage in the past, but never named that baby. I thought it would be fitting to name the first baby Patience and this one Faith. I remember feeling like I would love to get pregnant sooner than later after the miscarriage, but patience was a good thing too. This time my faith has been stronger than ever. Both names will be a great reminder to me in future pregnancies...I need patience and faith!

I must say...between H1N1 and this...I'm ready for a healthy, quiet rest of 2009.

All Souls Day

Please remember the soul of my brother, Mark Bestgen, in your prayers today. This is his second All Souls Day apart from us. I think I miss him more than ever lately. I could use his example of kindness and generosity right now, not to mention his smile full of love and life.

Also remember the souls of our departed friends and family. I will in turn remember those souls who are in your thoughts and prayers today.

Eternal rest grant them O Lord and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace. Amen!

Saints among us

Can you guess who they are???
Blase picked St. Andrew.

Stephen picked St. George.

Cormac decided to be St. Patrick.

back view

And Rex is St. Nicholas.

His backside view.

It was fun to make the costumes and see the excitement on the boys' faces. We had a small party with another family from church. It was a fun time for all of us.

Where oh where went October?

I haven't been on here much - as you could tell if you checked. I would like to say that October went by too fast for me to post, but quite the opposite happened. It was a l-o-n-g d-r-a-w-n o-u-t month.

First off I had mastitis - which is not fun, especially when you are still nursing.

Then two weeks later - we ALL got the H1N1 flu. I had it the worse and took the longest to recover. It was miserable to say the least.

I have managed to keep somewhat of a school schedule going. I did take off one week for the H1N1 recovery attempt. The boys are doing good in school and we seem to have a routine worked out.

Darren is bow hunting. He hasn't seen any "big bucks" in person, but there are a few on the trail cam. There is one spike buck that literally follows him around. He says he can't even scare him away. It must be some good bait corn Darren's been putting out.

I have been busy working on things for church. I made some chapel veils and typed up the words to some hymns for singing. I am glad to help out, but its been interesting finding the time when we are sick.

I am hoping November is a bit kinder to us and I will have the energy to even care about posting.

Flicker

We were treated to the song of a Northern Flicker this morning. He was very close to our back door and VERY loud. Blase insisted I take a picture, but I wish I had my video camera out and quiet children. My camera doesn't take very good pictures at a distance, so this is the best I could do. We have seen them eating in the yard quite a bit lately. I actually got fairly close to one a couple weeks ago. Today is the first time we remember hearing one of them "sing" to us. It is a beautiful song.

Gnomes

Our Gnomes the little boys use for school. I have caught the boys making up conversations between the different gnomes. I love the baskets! So far they have enjoyed our Gnomes and Gnumbers adventures. I wish there were more stories on the website, but what is there is great.

Planets

We are studying astronomy this year in school. This is the first time I am using the Apologia's program (Exploring Creation with Astronomy) by Jeannie Fulbright. I am IN LOVE with this book so far. Its simple, informative and most of all appealing to the boys. We are also doing some of the accompanying notebook and a lapbook I bought from Knowledge Box. The boys are putting both the notebooking pages and the lapbook activities into a 3 ring binder.

Here is the balloon planets we did yesterday. The boys can name all the planets in order faster than I can write them down. They were pretty proud of themselves. The big green balloon is Jupiter is not big enough, but we did the best we could. All the little ones are the sizes they are suppose to be. Do you like our rings around Saturn?? Can you name all the planets? We came up with our own version of a mnemonic sentence.

My Very Early Morning Just Seems Unusually Nice and Peaceful

Letter A Week

Last week was Letter A Week. Here is a few pictures from Cormac and Rex's school work from last week. We had a great time and so far the boys are begging to do school. I am using a lot of ideas from the Serendipity website ( http://ebeth.typepad.com/serendipity/ ). I am finding their ideas both easy and refreshing for all of us.

Rex's Letter A color page. He likes to use every color he can.
Cormac's Saints who start with A. You can't see it, but he did write his own letter A at the top and did a great job. He decided that St. Aloysius is his favorite Letter A saint.

This is Cormac's review page of 1-5. He colored the gemstones himself. We are using some ideas from the Gnomes and Gnumbers posts on the Serendipity website. I like their idea of teaching the Roman numerals at the same time as the regular numbers. One of these days I will have to post pictures of our gnomes.

This is Cormac's sponge apples he painted. I did help him paint his name, but other than that he did it by himself. I had trays of painted mixed and the boys would decide what color their apples would be. Cormac painted his own stems on the apples.

This Rex's drawing of Paul Cezanne's Apples. He did this 100% by himself. Not bad for a 3 year old. I am impressed with his love for drawing and color. I cannot wait to see him advance as he develops more hand and eye coordination. I might even learn a thing or two from him.

We are using the fairies ABC ideas from the Seredipity website as the main schooling for Cormac and Rex. Stephen does sit in on some of the sessions as well. I am enjoying all the ideas they have suggested and we attempt at least one idea from every subject.

This is Rex's coloring page of the Apple Blossom Fairy.

We ended the week with a Letter A Teatime. It was a great time for all of us. Blase and Stephen helped make the food and everyone helped eat!

The boys sitting at the table. Notice the tea cups, THANK YOU Mrs. Fameree! The boys were actually very excited about using real tea cups. We had apple pie and apple juice.

We read some of these books and look through the others. We used the apple pie recipe in the back of How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World. The crust tasted very good.

Here is the apple pie. Blase cut out a bunch of letter A's that we used to form the top crust. Stephen cut out 5 airplane shapes and said they were army airplanes (one for each boy).

We made this felt "Wee Saint" of St. Anne. She made a wonderful addition to our table.

NEXT TIME....Letter B, bananas, birds and St. Bernadette

Distractions

The boys and I say morning prayers everyday (except Saturday if Darren lets me sleep in). It is the same every morning and I normally do not let anything distract us from our prayers........unless one of these comes into the yard.

It isn't everyday you see a spike buck in your yard. He walked around like he owned the place. He had two beautiful does with him as well. The boys were super excited and I had to take a picture, so prayers were put on hold while we admired God's creatures.

Here is a doe with "Spike". They are eating acorns. Darren talks about sitting on the roof during bow season as the deer enjoy coming close to the house to eat the acorns.

Blase's First Holy Communion

Receiving Our Lord for the first time.
Darren and Blase receiving Brown Scapulars.

Blase with Fr. Litzner

The whole family after Mass.

Blase with his cake...it was YUMMY!

First Day of School

August 31st was our first day of school. We usually start in July, but I am slow this year. So far things seem to be going good. The boys need a bit of encouragement to stay focused and I need an extra couple of hours a day. I hope to post a couple pictures a week of what we are working on. Oh wait - there's where the couple of extra hours a day comes into play.

More fun on Aug 12

After we visited Mount Rushmore we drove through the Black Hills, Custer State Park and onto visit the Mammoth Site in Hot Springs. Here those pictures...

the beautiful Black Hills
Pigtail Bridges (yes I took it while I was driving)

more trees

One of the tunnels we drove through. There is one tunnel that frames Mt. Rushmore just perfect, but we were going the opposite way to take a picture of it.

Blase and Stephen in the Black Hills

buffalo in Custer State Park

This one was close enough to spit on. It just stood there and didn't move.

Some of the Mammoth Site bones

more bones

listening to our tour guide

in the museum part of the tour

Mt. Rushmore Aug. 12

While we were in South Dakota in August we visited Mt. Rushmore. Here are some pictures...

The whole gang of us that went. L to R Brech, me, Juliana (green shirt), Stephen, Christina (black shirt), Kaylene, Mauri, Rebecca, Blase and Andrew (red shirt). the boys and I

Kaylene, Blase and Stephen by the teepee.

They walked down and around the park a bit.

Stephen and Blase with Washington and Lincoln.

A well deserved rest in the shade!!