Blog Neglect: Guilty

Here' s bullet list of some of what has been happening in our world this month as my defense:

*coldest days in recorded history

*rolling power outages

*sever water restrictions implemented for a few days

*record highs for the month two weeks later

*a psycho ex-landlady tried to evict us even though she no longer owns the house

*a psycho ex-landlady got our electricity turned off, remedied 2 hours later

*a psycho ex-landlady got our gas turned off, remedied 2 DAYS later

*a police report is filed against psycho ex-landlady

*niece hospitalized for over two weeks and counting

*nephew comes to visit

*brand new homeschooling co-op started and met at St. Mark's

*Brishen started confirmation classes at church

*Melani completes 10 hours of adoption education, Jon is catching up with 6 so far

*baby niece diagnosed with Addison's disease, relief at answers, sadness that answers weren't better

*we took a "Sabbath Week,"  meaning a week without school

*spring weather makes it hard to get Basia inside

*many hours were spent in basketball gyms, cheering on the homeschool team during the final tournament

*our Tae Kwon Do school sent their black belts to the US Open in Austin, and we cheered from afar by watching online

*Melani's doctor calls to confirm low iron levels and schedules appointment for treatment (Melani worries that treatment will include things like giving up chocolate, soda, dairy, and boot camp; she will be glad to have the appointment so she can stop worrying about those sorts of horrors; she will eat lots of chocolate for the next three days just in case.)

*we went to our first UTEP Minors game and had to cheer for the NMSU foe, sad but fun

*we became even a little more Texan with Texas license plates on our van, sheesh

*I cannot even tell you all that has been going on in Jon's world, but I assure you his job is interesting these days.

Here are a few pictoral highlights: 

Camden fell asleep like this!

 Strict Aunt Melani let the kids watch too much TV.  We tried to wean Camden off his love of Horseland and move him toward a love of Dora.

 We have played TONS of basketball since the weather turned so nice.

 We put together picture albums to send to two children we sponsor in Congo.  It was hard to show them our family life, knowing they may never have that.  It was also hard because we know the lady delivering the photo books will also deliver photo books to kids who are about to be adopted, and I so wish every single child's photo album could be from a future family and not just a sponsor.

 This is a horrible picture, I realize.  I just want to show you the size difference between Brishen (a very tall kid and the tallest on his team, by far) and the tall guy from another team.  Do you see the kid in white?  He is a future Shaq, for sure!

I got ambitious on Sunday and made laundry detergent (and a mess--above), bread (and a mess--below), meatballs, muffins, cookies, waffles and lots more messes.  It was nice to get things made ahead for the week and is something I hope to do often on Sundays (minus the messes).

 The beautiful weather led me to get back to my regularly scheduled hanging of laundry outside.  My drier will get a lot less use in the months to come.

Basia saved and saved and then got a money gift from Grandma that let her realize her dream of owning a foam crossbow.  Her first comment?  "I will not let Robin Hood down!"