My heart is sad - again.

**WARNING - THIS IS A HEAVY POST.

Yesterday, a little girl in our school came home to find both of her parent's dead. Self-inflicted. A first-grader. She walks out and finds a neighbor and tells him that her parents have been shot. The neighbor calls the police who show up and in turn call our school principal, the little girls' teacher and our school counselor who show up immediately to take care of the little girl and take her to her nearby grandmother. In the past 5 weeks, 7 cases of domestic abuse such as this have happened in the Portland area. What is our world coming to? It makes me so sad that some people find this to be the only answer. And now, what about the little girl. What happens to her, and how will it affect her?

Derrick and I have had a rough year this year. Not with us, we are totally good, but our circumstances in general. Derrick was involved in a company lay-off last year, about this same time, and it took about 8 1/2 months for him to find another full-time job. We are still trying to play catch up, and probably will for quite a while... but this is never the option.

Then, this morning, I email an old friend to wish him a happy birthday (yesterday), and he informs me that he spent the day in the ICU with his dad. His dad had fallen down the stairs on Tuesday night, stayed there unconscious all night until the housekeeper found him the next morning. He is now in a coma and had to have his brain drilled to relieve some of the swelling. This is a great man. A giant of a man, who is now laying in a coma.

I am just sad today, and wanted to share some of it. Sorry... but sometimes the sad has to go with the good. But truly, it makes our problems seem not that bad. Yes, they are ruling my life right now, and control my almost every waking moment, but I am thankful for all that I do have. For the family who loves and supports me no matter what; for all my many friends who always take care of me; for our faith and knowing of our Heavenly Father who loves us and protects us the best he can; for our health; for our home, for our school, where a principal and teachers will drop everything to take care of a lost little girl; for our freedom... there's just so much to be thankful for, and every so often, I need to be reminded of it.

Please keep this lost little girl and my friend's dad in your prayers. They can both greatly use them right now.

We are Tigers, Mighty, Mighty Tigers!

... everywhere we go people want to know who we are, so we tell them! We are Tigers, Mighty, Mighty Tigers!!! Macy and the other Tigers finished up their season last Saturday with a big win over the Chiefs, 8-5. Great job girls on another great season. Good luck next year!!!

2009 Tigers

Ooh, What’s That Smell?

I’m sure many of you know that Shannon has started selling Scentsy products. What’s Scentsy? Instead of having open flame candles to give your home a nice aroma, you can use warmers that use a 25 watt bulb to melt scented wax. So you get all the benefits of wonderfully smelling home without the danger of setting your house on fire. With a house full of 5 kids, 2 cats and a dog this makes me sleep much better at night. You can even leave it on while you’re away. Shannon’s doing really well at it and just found out she was the highest selling person in her network last month. She’s done a bunch of parties and even did a local craft show last weekend. So here’s the plug, if you want any, contact Shannon. Here’s her website: https://shuckvale.scentsy.us/Home. Your house will never smell better... our's currently smells like caramel apple cider, it makes me want to eat the walls!

Time Machine

Welcome to the time machine. I’m sure any followers of this blog (all three of you out there) have realized that the updates here have been few and far between. It’s not intentional I assure you, it’s been on the “to do list”, but what can I say, we’ve been busy. So since I’ve got a couple of minutes to spare, I’m going to go back in time a little bit and try to catch up what’s been going on since Chad went to Scout camp in August and then bridge the gap to making pineapple upside down cupcakes. After I get through all that then I’ll catch up to the present. Anyone confused? Me too, but just keep reading and ignore the man behind the curtain.

Halloweenies

Halloween this year was as crazy as usual. First, we had the annual Trunk R’ Treat and Chili cook-off at church. I made my extra special seafood chili… yummy! After the food all the kids walk around to the trunks (oh, that’s where it gets the name) and trick ‘r treat. It’s a good way for kids to collect a lot of candy in a short amount of time… and of course mom's and dad’s get to share in the spoils too.

Grandma also came to town for David’s Eagle Scout Court of Honor and she stayed with us for a couple of days. While she was here grandma went a little crazy. First, she got a haunted house gingerbread house and built that with the kids 'till like midnight. Then she prepared a Halloween Feast which included Cheese Fingers (cheese sticks made to look like fingers with red pepper finger nails), Ghost shaped homemade tortilla chips, Mummy Dogs (hot dogs wrapped in crescent roll dough with mustard eyes), pumpkin shaped mac and cheese, salad with scabs (dried cranberries) and Carrot Fingers in guacamole (carrot sticks with almond finger nails in guacamole dip). It was as good as it sounds. Thanks Grandma Huck!

Then on Halloween night, all the kids got dressed up: Chad was Napoleon Dynamite (not much of a stretch there), Luke was the Big Bad Wolf disguised as Grandma, Macy was Madonna (!?), Haley was a cow girl and Reed was a puppy. I took Luke, Haley and Reed trick r’ treating around the neighborhood and Macy went with some of her friends. We have been really fortunate living up in the Northwest that we have not had a Halloween with rain... yet. Let’s keep our fingers crossed!

Chad decided that he wanted to have a Halloween Party this year so he invited a few friends over (including girls…!) and they had pumpkin shaped pizza, fresh popped popcorn and watched The Sixth Sense... one of my fave's but I don't know if it's for the attention span of 13-year-olds. Also, one of their friends broke his ankle and couldn’t come to the party so they all trick r’ treated over to his house and visited him.

I also have to mention that it's Cooper's birthday too. If you know Cooper, it'd all make sense to you. Don't you like his costume? Those are his angry eyes.

But all in all it was another great Halloween, we hope you all had a good one too!

Julia, Alina, Sierra and Macy

Josh and Luke... what a big nose you have...

Chad Dynamite

our trunk of treats

Luke, Haley, Reed and Macy

The spoils!

Grandma's house under construction

The Halloween Feast

Cooper looking sinister

Chad's Partaaayy!

It’s Over Already?

It seems like just yesterday that I was writing about soccer starting, and now it’s over. Haley’s team had their last game and they had a big celebration where they got a cake and each got a trophy. Great job Haley and The Pixie Chicks!

Haley and the trophy

The Pixie Chicks

Schedule for the day...

• Make pineapple upside-down cupcakes for Trunk-or-Treat (check)


• Take shower (check)


• Macy soccer game


• Haley soccer game


• Meet Susie to help set-up for Robby & Carter's reception


• Go to bank


• Clean house


• Get costumes for all the kids (yeah, we're a little behind on this one)


• Pumpkin Patch with Haley's Girl Scout troop at 2:00


• Set-up for reception


• Make chili for Trunk-or-Treat (D's doing this one)


• Robby & Carter's reception - 5-8pm


• Church Trunk-or-Treat - 6-8pm


• Trying not to kill anyone or ourselves - PRICELESS!

And that's only today. Tomorrow... Church Primary Program, Pick-up Grandma at airport, David's Eagle Scout Court of Honor - not too bad! And, fortunately, the sickness seems to be clearing. Luke is finally "awake", moving around and not running a fever... however, he now seems to have spots all over his tummy that remind me of chicken pox. Not sure where that came from... don't think it's one of the symptoms, but who knows???? D, Macy and Haley are all coughing and have sore throats... but hopefully, that's the extent of it. Now... on to our day! Have a great one and wish me luck!!!

The swines are invading!

I won't say we have "that" flu... but there is definitely some sick in our house! Luke has been home the past two days, nauseous, with a fever, coughing, body aches, and just yuck... and now Haley is coughing and home... and I think four of the five children all took medicine before they went to bed last night.

Really not good timing - but is it ever???? We have two soccer games tomorrow, our nephew's wedding reception tomorrow night, our Primary Program on Sunday morning, and our other nephew's Eagle Scout Court of Honor on Sunday night, as well as Grandma Helen coming to visit. Oh well... what can you do?

Scouters

Chad and Luke are both advancing in Scouts. Chad just received his Star rank and Luke got his Second Class. They are both doing awesome… great job guys and keep up the good work!

Luke... the happy

Chad... the goof