FedEx Baby

From the FedEx tracking site.

Dec 31, 2009 9:47 AMOn FedEx vehicle for deliveryPENDLETON, OR
Dec 31, 2009 9:33 AMAt local FedEx facilityPENDLETON, OR
Dec 31, 2009 6:02 AMAt dest sort facilitySPOKANE, WA
Dec 31, 2009 4:06 AMDeparted FedEx locationMEMPHIS, TN
Dec 31, 2009 1:12 AMArrived at FedEx locationMEMPHIS, TN
Dec 30, 2009 10:38 PMLeft FedEx origin facilityFORT WAYNE, IN
Dec 30, 2009 7:36 PMPicked upFORT WAYNE, IN
Dec 30, 2009 5:10 PMShipment information sent to FedEx

It will be in my hot little hands today by 4:30pm

Update

Because I know you are sitting at the edge of your seat....

I reordered my book from Walmart yesterday. It was shipped FEDEX today. I should have it tomorrow or Monday at the latest. Yeahhhhhh!!!!!

A Christmas Fantasy Destroyed

Ok, that might be a little over dramatic.

Let me start from the beginning. I have been following The Pioneer Woman's blog for the last couple of years. She posts stories about her life as a cattle ranchers wife, homeschooling her children, photography and cooking. This past year she has written and published a cookbook. Like the rest of her fans I have been waiting for this cookbook to be finished. Many of the recipes she post's on her blog have become some of our family favorites.


So back to my Christmas fantasy..... I ordered (as a gift from my family) her new cookbook. I did this on the 16th of December and had it shipped 2-3 days. Paid extra for that. I was going to open that book last on Christmas morning. While the family was playing their new video games I would sit in my rocking chair, feet in my new fluffy slippers (thanks kids, I love them) in front of the fire and read cover to cover my new cookbook.

I think you know how this story is going to play out. I didn't get my cookbook. You know what else, I still don't have it. It is in some post office warehouse in Kentucky. I want to be clear about this, I am in no way slamming our local post office. I have no issues with them. My gripe is with either Walmart how didn't ship 2-3 days and shipped "when hell freezes over" instead. Or the post office who is using my beloved book as a door stop.

Walmart required that I wait until today for them to either reship or get a credit. Now I have to decide what to do. Either way I will get my hands on that cookbook. The joys of living in a small town, they don't have this book anywhere.

I will keep you posted.

Another Christmas has past

This Christmas was a little weird. It just never really felt like Christmas. If you look around my house, you can see the evidence that it was here. Either that or a tornado came through. However, Jason does live here and we do consider him to be a human tornado.

We started Christmas week with a trip to Hood River. We booked a trip on the Polar Express to the North Pole and back. It was a lot of fun and they do a really cute job of acting out the Polar Express book. If you have not seen the movie, you really should.

We have tried to get tickets for the last couple of years, but they always sell out in October. I am just not thinking about Christmas in October. Steve deserves full credit for this one. He booked the trip the first week of October. He also booked it in the observation car, which was really cool. We didn't have to fight for seats.

We where on the top, but it really didn't matter. We went at night and there wasn't a lot to see. To be like the book, they encourage the passengers to wear their PJ's. Jason was the only one in our family who would wear his PJ's. We all agreed, we would wear ours next year.

A couple of pictures from inside the train.


I didn't do any editing of these pictures, so you will have to just ignore the red eye.
They came around and served hot chocolate. I was disappointed that they didn't sing and dance like in the movie. That would have been cool.

They conductor came and took our tickets. He punched them out, just like in the movie.


Here is Jason enjoying his hot chocolate.

The train journed to the North Pole where we picked up Santa and his helpers. While we waited for Santa to visit our section of the train we sang Christmas carols. The kids really got into it when we sang 12 Days Of Christmas. They divided our car in to two halfs and which ever side sang the loudest, won. Our side of course won. A couple of parents (Steve) got really into it and couldn't talk very well after.
Here is Santa.

He sat and visited with each of the kids on the train and left them with a bell. You need to read the book or see the movie.


When it came to Anthony's turn, Santa sat in his lap and told him what he wanted for Christmas. Did you know that Santa wants a trip to Hawaii?

It was really worth the money and we had a blast. The Hood River train does a bunch of different trips. The next one we are going to try is the Great Train Robbery. It's a longer train ride and you stop half way and have a BBQ.

Megan and Jason where also in the Christmas play at our church.



Megan played the mother of Mary. Our parish priest wrote the play and I think it is one of the better shows we have done.
Here are the 3 Wise Men getting ready to go on stage.


Believe it or not, I didn't take many pictures Christmas day. It was a great day and the kids are as spoiled as ever. I ordered a cookbook that I have been wanting for some time. This was a gift from my husband. I planned on opening it and then sitting and reading it all Christmas day. Did I mention I ordered this thing 3 weeks before Christmas and paid extra to get it here on time. It is still not here. According to the post office web site, it is still sitting in Kentucky. I have to wait until tomorrow before Walmart will do anything about it. I won't get started on why Steve and I tend to ship UPS or FEDX. I also won't get started on government run post office, Amtrak and Healthcare.

Anyway, I hope everyone has a wonderful New Year.

Wrestling

Wrestling is in full swing. This is our 5th tournament 2 weeks. The weekend tournaments take two days so I was glad this one is close enough to home so we didn't have to spend the night. Anthony did really good tonight, he won all 3 of his matches. So he will start at the top of his bracket tomorrow.



I took this video of his last match.


Short post for now, because I am off and running today. Play practice at the church with Megan and Jason. Then off to hopefully watch Anthony wrestle then back because because Megan is serving at mass tonight

Have a good Saturday.

Thanksgiving Pictures, just a little bit on the late side

I know it has taken me a while to post some pictures from Thanksgiving. Here they are.

We made the trip back to Sacramento to spend Thanksgiving with Steves family. We did get a chance to stop in and spend the day with my family too.

Here we are having dinner at my parents. It is always fun watching Andrew's reaction to Anthony getting taller and taller. Mom and Dad made us one of our favorite dinner's. Fish....yummm, it's one of the things I miss about living in California.

It took about 10 times to get a decent picture. Check out Megan in this one.

She is such a joy sometimes.
We spent most of the week at Steves parents house. I worked on fixing their computer and Steve, Kelli, Anthony, Jessica helped clean out the garage so Doreen could get the car back in. I would post a picture of that but I think I might get into trouble.

We tested out the new bbq, and cooked some prime rib. It was wonderful.

We had so much food.
Getting ready for some black Friday shopping. Kelli ended up running back to Dixon to get all the different newspapers she wanted. We each had our own copies to go by. Jessica went with Dave and they started at midnight. Steve, Anthony and I left at 3:30am and Kelli left about 6:00am. We brought some great stuff (most of it was for us and not Christmas) and I am still amazed that Steve got it all packed in the car.

Joseph wasn't around to much because he was sick. Poor kid, next time we are in town we will get to see more of him.
Jessica taking pictures of my kids. Gotta love the 2 camera bit.

And no trip can be complete without a lot of chocolate.

This is Jason's fudge fountain. It makes me sick just looking at it.

Fall Ball

Here is a picture of Anthony tonight getting ready for Fall Ball.

Here are the flowers. He picked them out himself and he was never so stressed out about making a decision.

Happy Birthday Jessica

Hard to believe that you are already 18.
Have a great birthday and we will see you soon.

The Holiday Season

I have officially skipped Thanksgiving and moved on to Christmas. I have some Christmas decorations up, Christmas letter is done and presents for out of town relatives completed. I think some of it has to do with our early snow fall this year. Something about the snow just feels like Christmas. In fact, we are supposed to get a couple of inches tonight.

Steve went back to work full time today. It is an adjustment for both him and us. We have gotten used to having him around. Here is a picture from the fund raiser that Steve took part in at our church. It was a murder mystery dinner, where we the guest had to solve the crime. It was a huge success and sold out. Steve played the part of Cole Conway, big time bookie. Here is some of the cast below.


A quick homeschooling update: Jason has doubled his reading level in just 2 months. This news came today from the teacher who is working with him an hour a day. She has a new program that really drills home the sight words and I have been working on the phonics part of it. In a few weeks we will both be working on phonics. She and I have been working very close together to see if we can figure out what is going on. I am so excited for him that things seem to be working.

Veterans Day Parade:
It was so cold that day. We hung out in front of a car dealer to watch the parade go by. Anthony is checking out the new trucks and dreaming a little bit.




Here comes the parade.

Jason and the cub scouts are first.

Next the Girlscouts


And for my all time favorite entry in the parade:

Halloween and other stuff

Happy Veterans Day. I want to thank those solders who fight for our freedom. Today as we head off to the annual Veterans Day parade that our little town has I will do as Megan suggested. We will personally thank the veterans that we see there today.

Since I have mentioned the parade, it is cold and looks like it's going to snow. The perfect day for a parade. Both Jason, with Cub Scouts and Megan with Girl Scouts will be in it. So that leaves Anthony and I to cheer from the sides and take pictures, of course.

It has been crazy here with so much going on that I have not posted any Halloween pictures. So here they are.

First off, the Pumpkin patch.

Megan trying to pick the perfect pumpkin.

Here it is


Jason and his. Can you believe he won't stop and smile for the camera.
He is actually yelling to Anthony, "HELP!!"

Anthony and his pumpkin, of course he never needs any help.

Well, except when he is carrying candy around fellow football/wrestlers.

To be fair, the kid who took him down has 50lbs on Anthony. The other kid standing is stealing Anthonys candy. The kid in the blue hat is on Anthonys baseball team. Because I am me and the kid taking Anthonys candy runs the high school tv system. This picture will be making it to Tiger TV. Poor Anthony.

Halloween night.
It started with trick or treating downtown. The downtown area shuts down and hands out candy to the kids. Then Megan headed off with her friends and Anthony spent the evening with his girl friend and family. Steve and Jason decided to trick or treat till they dropped. First off to the college dorms, then the high school for the carnival and finally around town for the old fashion knocking on doors. I think the kid came home with 40lbs of candy.

Jason was a vampire and Megan the grim reaper. You can't see it in the picture but under her mask the eyes light up red. Very creepy.


I have lots going on in the next week. We just finalized plans to spend Thanksgiving with our families this year. We are very excited. Of course there will be lots of pictures to share.

Home School Update

Yesterday, for a science project Jason took mine and his finger prints. To see how each finger print is different he used a magnifying glass. He studied the differences then set the paper on fire. On purpose, of course.

All in the name of Science.

Homecoming Week

It is Homecoming week here. For those of you who do not live in a small town let me set the stage for you. First we have the parade. Nothing fancy, just the football players and other fall sports teams walking down our main street. In the football players case, they will load the back of trucks up as full as possible and drive. I am amazed each year that someone doesn't get seriously hurt. The band will be there, cheerleaders and other clubs from the high school. Followed by the big bon fire in the parking lot of the school and then of course the game on Friday night.

Our high school has a dance right after the game but it's not the traditional Homecoming dance that most schools have. They have a big formal dance in November instead. So tonight we will bundle up as warm as possible and go cheer for the high school. Keeping our fingers crossed that we will have a win on Friday night.

Here are some pictures from last nights game. They lost but it was a great game. Typical fall weather for Eastern Oregon. Snowing and very very cold.

Rocket Launch

Jason got to launch rockets with his cub scout pack today. So very cool.

Here they are getting the rocket ready. The pack has spent the last couple of meetings building a painting their rockets.




The first launch


Getting it ready for the next launch

Jason was able to launch 4 times. Here he is getting ready for the last launch.

This is the last time we saw this rocket.

edited to add: the rocket was found about half a mile away.