I heard the bells on Christmas day

Ok so there is something that not too many people know about me, sometimes I hear a song and it just touches me to the inner core and then I spend days (weeks sometimes) just listening to that song over and over, searching for history on the song and trying to find a youtube video that fits what I see about the song in my mind. This week I found one of those songs, Casting Crowns has done their rendition of I heard the bells on Christmas day. Wow talk about a song that was written in just an amazing time period in our wonderful nation. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote this song on Christmas day during the civil war, his oldest son away, fighting to defend what he believed to be right. This story and even the line "Peace on Earth" is often at least in my opinion constrewed for people to make it mean what they want it to mean. Often people say that Christians shouldn't believe in war, that was the way my great grandparents were raised. My family because of religious beliefs did not "have to fight" in the war (ok my history teaching husband would be mortified that I don't have any clue what war was going on in the 1930s or 1940s ) however beyond what popular belief was in our hometown about how while other people went off to war to get killed my family stayed at home they all did their part, I'm proud to say two of my great uncles were doctors that took care of injured soldiers, my grandfather was in the navy and my other grandfather working in a plant to help with war efforts. My throat always gets thick when I see someone in a uniform and tears well in my eyes because that person has given a sacrifice for me and everyone else in this country to have the freedom to do what we want and say what we please. So while this phrase "peace on earth" would be awesome if you are a Christian we are to realize that until Christ returns there will not be peace on this earth. Longfellow wrote this song and there are several verses that dealt with the civil war, not the words that we are used to, but I do believe the peace that Longfellow was looking for this Christmas was within his own heart. See the year before his lovly wife and mother of his five children was just doing what a normal momma does, journaling the growth and progress of her children and she had cut a lock from their seven year old child and was going to place it in an envelop she used wax to seal it, however a spark fell onto her dress unknown to anyone and then a wind came, through the window and her whole skirt went up into flames. She ran away from her children into the other room where she and her husband despertaly tried in vain to stop the flames. She died the next morning.

why do I ramble) or as Kjell calls this my rantings! Well when I went to youtube to find a video the only thing I really found was people showing wars and soldiers and that we need that kind of peace, yeah it would be awesome and I'm not blind to the fact that their are children in those countries seeing things that no child should have to see, but I think there is a lot of "peace" we can spread in our own country, in our own neighborhoods even. I wanted a video that would show things that all of us walk past every day. Kids who this Christmas season won't recieve one present, who know what it's like to be hungry, the woman who gets beat up but is still "loved" Ask yourself do you know someone who is saying "there is no peace on earth, for hate is strong and marks the song" because even if we are too busy getting ready for our own happy holiday season everyone of us has to know someone who will not have peace in their hearts this Christmas. What are we going to do for those people? What is our God given resonsibilty to help those who do need to feel peace in their hearts? Maybe it's a mother taking care of children while her husband is serving our country, maybe it's the widow lady across the street (Lila ??? ) the child who we really don't want our kid hanging out with because we know "what kind of family they come from" What are we going to do to spread peace this season.

It's true until Christ comes again their will never be the peace that we all wish and long for, but we can do our best to help those around us, one person at a time.

My new year's resolution

Ok last night Kiah comes in our room at 4 30 announcing she has to go to the bathroom. I couldn't fall back asleep and just kept thinking of all the STUFF I have in my house. We just got back from Topeka and I made a Target and Aldi stop that where "so desperatly needed" only to come home and try to lodge items into any open crevice in the pantry. Yeah it's full to overflowing. I bought four packages of diapers and came home to 3 other packs there, I bought some laundry stuff only to see probably close to a years supply of things. Why do I do this, you may ask? I thought Kjell and Laressa never spent money she is secretly hoarding stuff and pretending they don't have money???? No we don't have money, and we don't spend a lot on many things, my pit fall..... good grocery deals. Who can turn down the frozen bag of corn that with the sale and the coupon I can get for 20 cents? Or the laundry detergent I paid less than a dollar for.... It's HARD to save money. lol when there are so many things I can get so cheaply.

But this holiday I say this as holiday not Christmas because it started before Thanksgiving in case anyone thought I was trying to be politicaly correct I'm not. I was trying to figure out gifts for people for Christmas. Two years ago I made everyone those fleece cut blankets everyone it was like 30 blankets. Everyone loved them I still get raves so trying to find something that tops that and completly failing has made me thing why do we get people this "stuff" that many of them probably throw away. Take Kjell's uncles for instance. They always give us a fairly expensive gift. They are wealthy an attorney and a pysch. ? not sure which one so I'll leave it at that. So when my budget is under ten for a grown single man....... let's just say I'm sure their gifts get thrown away pretty quickly. Last year I did get them like a little old spice like five thingy kit.. but I can't use toiletries as a copout every year. So I was frustrated. Ask yourself what did you recieve for Christmas last year and you probably don't remember much. So what is the point? How can I make my gifts have a point? I just got an idea I may just get these bacholor's some of my homemade cookies.... yup but then I've covered the baked goods for next year what do I do then?? I did manage to find some people what I concider a gift that keeps on giving, magazine subscriptions. I got about six people those, for five bucks a piece and they will get it all year! Not shabby. Ok back to my point. I have too much junk/stuff in my house.

I came upon a magazine article a couple weeks ago that just about made me livid. It was a couple women talking about this "new idea" of not spending more money then they make... REALLY wow what a concept! But one family decided to take this further they decided to try not to buy anything (I'm not sure of all the rules) for a whole year. Now this is a wealthy family not trying to make it on a teacher's salary they used their "savings" on like a month long cruise when they were done. So they odviously have money. So here goes, here is what I am doing. I am no longer going to buy anything after the turn of the year. Yes I will pay my bills but I have at least enough food to make it three months. (I'm not joking) Now you are probably wondering what about milk, fruits, veggies? Well let me put your mind at ease. We ARE POOR we get help from the state well the kids do they qualify for WIC so we get about 6 gallons of milk a month and 12 dollars in fruits and veggies. Plus I have about 20 bags of frozen veggies in the freezer and 20 cans of fruit in the pantry. Now I have one caviot, I am supposed to be doing a "once a month cooking" thing with two other ladies, we are supposed to be doing it Dec 12th but I'm trying to change it to after Christmas but I will be able to buy food for that. Other than that I'm going to see what happens. We will see how long the TP and stuff like that lasts but as far as buying it before I really have to.... see though there's the problem if I only buy things when I really need it I never get it on sale so we will see maybe when we are down to two rolls I start shopping the sales!.

I have so much shampoo/condition packs from free samples I could for sure make it a year. and the everyone else in the family has a bunch too. Lotion? I could start a store with all I have, so I think we will be ok. I'm pretty excited about this. How much money do I think I will save? 50 bucks a month... you must be thinking but Laressa that's hardly anything . Well duh I told you Kjell and I are very good at not spending EVER beyond our means. I just think we need to do it for reasons other than saving money, just to realize we don't have to have so much STUFF we are a nation build on "in STUFF we trust" I know that Kjell and I will miss our fast food spluges. I guess I'll now know what to ask people for when they say what do you want for Christmas/birthday. Gift cards. some people think so unpersonal but for me not wanting to spend money, that will be the only way to do anything "fun" money wise. No I don't think I'm going to sit at home and cry about what I don't have it's not like I'm getting rid of electricity, water, sat, phone, cell, or internet. I mean these are life's neccesities, (there is irony in my voice but we are moving in baby steps) I just want to be able to have more and live with less. I went through the kids' toys about a month ago they were always all over the house so I finally just put half of them in a box downstairs to rotate them out.. I'm thinking why do we even need that box? Who have I become am I truly unamerican now. Oh well we will see how this goes. I will be truthful as to what Kjell and I spend (oh yeah and i haven't ran this little idea past Kjell yet :) so we will see how that goes. We each get 25 dollars a month for spending money so if he wants to spend it he can. I know there will be times we have to spend money I see two trips to colorado in our next year at least and there will be other trips but I'm just going to be more conscience about what I spend and hold myself accountable for all purchases.

Oh yeah and remember when I started P90X and I said I'd love to be as spiritually fit as I was getting with that in 90 days my sis in law and brother are starting to read through the Bible in 90 days starting tomorrow I'm doing it with them I am so super excited, we may live four hours from them but they will be able to hold me accountable too.

Weekend with the Nordgrens

Well I did not fall off the P90X workout bandwagon. I made it through week one and didn't miss any days. We will see how it goes this upcoming weekend when I will have family in town. After the first week I can say this about the program. HATED the first day, LOVED the second day although it was extremly hard and I had to pause it a couple extra times to catch my breath. Liked the third day. Hated the first 45 minutes of yoga, the second 45 was fine, day five was fine, day six was fun and day 7 was easy (it's a rest or a stretch video I decided to do the stretching so I wouldn't (cross my fingers) be as sore this week?? So anyways not looking forward to tomorrow's workout at all but know I will get through it... and not die then at 4:30 in the after noon I get a massage so that will make everything better!

Well this weekend we stayed in Atwood and missed Jordan's play because the town always does huge festivities on Halloween, (this year it was to be Friday night) well we got like six to 10 inches of snow (it depends on how much the wind was blowing and where) so school got cancelled on Friday it was a really weird snow because by Friday night almost all of the snow was gone because it got that warm. Anyways we went out for Dollar tacos at Park Hill with some friends of ours and then were going to hit the businesses for their specials. (the egg hunt, yes an halloween egg hunt don't ask why I don't know) and costume judging were cancelled but we had been told that the businesses would be open. Wellllll they weren't. Only one was. Where we paid our bill and he had a "no tax day" that's his special so it saved us..... 9 dollars. Then we went around and realized none of the other shops had stayed open. So we summed up our weekend in Atwood instead of in Wichita with my family watching Jordan's play... as we stayed for dollar tacos and nine bucks. We were bummed. But then I realized it was the free movie for kids night at the movie theater and I figured maybe one of us should take Kiah. Kjell said if he went home he's just put Justus in prison (his walker because he can't get into as much when he's in there) and play his computer game. So I got to take Kiah to see Aliens in the Attic. Not quite the cutesy little kid movie I would have liked her to see, I didn't even have time to check out the good the bad and the ugly on movie reviews like I always do.... but it was ok. I was really worried she might get scared but she didn't she sat on my lap for most of it so we got some good cuddling time in too!

Saturday we took the kids out trick or treating. Kiah was a lady bug and Justus was super man in a costume that was too small because I bought it on clearance last year and didn't think he would be so big! They had fun. It was a perfect night for it too. The weather was fabulous and we had just had a snow storm, crazy. No coats for anyone. Then we went home we had a couple. Oh yeah I didn't buy candy this year..... Horrible I know I had planned on making cookies, but never got to it. So we found some Hannah Montana unopened candy braclets and gave those out first. Then we ..... used a bit of Justus's candy... for two people then we went and got the Mcdonalds coupons out of the car and used those! lol..... Kjell said talk about frugal... it wasn't on purpose... We had about six jr high girls... the ones Kjell teaches and I coached. It was funny two of the girls just burst into the house. We heard the doorknob first and then in pops two girls.... lol only jr high kids!

Sunday we went to Colby for half price candy.... well Kjell went for candy I just don't feel too good stuffing my face with candy and then working out kind of feels like an oxymoron... but I bought cookies... yummy yummy 180 calories per cookies cookies. I actually had the will power to break one in half eat it as an afternoon snack and then finish it after supper. And it was fine that way.... wow I'm learning!

Well this week will be crazy. Kjell's parents and two brothers are coming next weekend. We are putting in our new bathtub(FINALLY!) and a new porch on the front of the house. So excited to finally get rid of a bathtub that was so gross when we moved in we thought we'd never use it. So Kjell has been busy doing the demo work on the front concret porch to get it out of the way. It's taken him a long time but he keeps at it.. I've taken a few swings with the sledge hammer.... but not enough to do much damage!

Well that's long enough.. got to get to bed

Psalms 100:3

Know that the LORD is God. It is He who made us, and we are His; we are His people, the sheep of His pasture.

Today I am a bit frustrated. Ya see I started my workout and I have so many people who are just helping me along the way, giving me support, talking me through things that are hard, offering advice, remember their times going through the same things and that is great. But lets say I started talking about how I was going to do an hour of time each day with God on facebook. Would I get the encouragement, would I get the support, would I get the "I've been there too before trying to spend time with God and it's hard to give up time." No not all of my facebook friends are Christians so I would except weird faces when they say I would like to try to spend one hour with God each day, but it's the Christians who don't say anything, and don't think I'm pointing fingers because I know sometimes I've been the worst offender of not commenting on "Christian things" when did it become more important for EVERYONE in the world to take more care of their physical body than their mental and in my case my spiritual body? Wow I guess after these 90 days of P90X and trying to spend more time with God I hope to look different on the outside and the inside.

The verse at the top is my memory verse for today. See the Awana program now has books that the leaders can go through and I thought I needed to add that to my collection because I memorized so many verses as a kid and now I can't hardly remember any of them so I'm back and I'm going to start doing that. My other job for today is to start a prayer journal for the kids I'm leading at AWANA another good thing because we have kids at an age where they are still told what to do if they have to come to AWANA they come but these next eight years after jr high are when kids really start to become their own person. I know it's when I did the most growing, stumbling and searching in my life. So now I'll get off the computer and do that. I know I'm ok, but I know I can do better.

So much for this blog being about the kids! Oh well their time will come I'm sure. Oh here's a good conversation Kiah and I had last night Kiah: mommy why did Jesus have to die on the cross? Me: because of sin, we are all bad people and someone had to pay for what we did wrong. Kiah: so he left God in heaven? Me: yup Kiah: then God didn't have any friends. Me: well He could still see Jesus and all the people on the earth so I think He was ok. WOW she never ceases to amaze me!

89 more days

Well today was day one and it was HARD. I just felt like I was incapable of doing it. Not everything, no I enjoyed about 15 of the 58 minute workout. Haha. I know I'm just being hard on myself. I can't do a pushup to save my life and that was half of this workout. The other half was pull ups and I don't have a pull up bar or the bands they were talking about. Sometimes it stinks living so close from a big store where I could go buy either one of those things. Guess I'll wait until Thanksgiving but by then I'll be four weeks in. Oh well. I really do wish I had a partner to do it with me. I don't know when my mom was here and we did it together I would not want to quit. Weird because I know she wasn't watching me, but I didn't want to quit on her either. Tomorrow should hopefully be better maybe... doing plyometrics, I haven't done that since highschool/college. Tony the guy on the video says just keep pressing play. and that is what I plan to do.

Kjell has begun the demolition of our front porch. He actually started this weekend. Kjell's parents are coming out in two weekend and going to help us build a nice wood porch and putting in our new bathtub. Over thanksgiving we are going to buy the vanity for our "master" bathroom and maybe put the lights I bought for the main bathroom in the other bathroom since we haven't had time to change the wiring yet to get it in the main bath. We have new neighbors behind us. They are a couple we went to a Bible study with and they are kind of doing what we are doing they bought it and are doing one major project. Redoing the whole kitchen so they are living in the basement right now until the kitchen is done. They are lucky they have a finished basement. Maybe that will be where we go with next year's tax return. Who knows. Oh the good thing about demo on the porch. Kjell is using the old cement for our driveway. It gets pretty bad when it snows and we looked into paving it.... and that is a project a couple years down. I think he may be able to put the broken up cement in the whole driveway... meaning we can pull up the carpet under the carport. yes we have carpet in our carport actually in random places it's nailed down outside. Well going back to watch the eagles slaughter the redskins. Feel sorry for the skin's coach

P day

So tomorrow is P-Day the day to end all days the day to begin all days. It's the day to start P90X and I don't know but for some reason that has made me stuff my cheeks like a hampster for the last week. Kjell did all the measuring of body parts today- all I can say is it's game time. I had to take a before picture and since I was wearing less than I would wear to the pool I think I'll keep that picture forever just for myself. Since I've ordered P90X I've seen it advertised everywhere. It's actually made me angry, why? because I hate doing what everyone else is doing DRIVES ME NUTS. I like to do something different not "normal" so I guess now I'm just joining the crowd. My goal is to lose 16.5 pounds from what I weighed tonight. My summer goal was not quite reached but I had gotten close enough to know that my goal weight needed to go about ten pounds more than where it was. For some reason after having kids the weight that looked ok before no longer looks ok!

Today we got family pictures taken first time ever. We also had Justus's pictures taken he was a grouch! did not want to sit he didn't want to stand during his indoor shots but he had fun once he discovered the leaves outside so I'm excited to see the new pictures.

I got our "Free full sized homopathic kids meds" I am not sure yet if I believe they work. Since Kiah was nice enough to get a head cold we've been able to try one of them. It's these tiny pellets that she had to take five every 20 minutes for an hour then every two hours after and it was supposed to stop the symptoms. Well we did the first hour and the first of the two hour ones and then stopped I didn't notice any changes. They also sent cough syrup that tastes just like honey I've heard that honey does some amazing things for colds and things. The other one is called oacillococcinum and it's supposed to offset flu symptoms before they start. This is a little tube you pour a powder on your tongue. Well not sure if those two work yet but you gotta give them points for crazy ideas of how to adminster their products.

Well finishing up watching football I've already clinched a victory over Kjell in fantasy, wasn't even pretty I had a 40 point lead with three guys left and he didn't have anyone left. The other league was a bit closer playing Jordan if Brandon Jacobs gets another touchdown I lose.

I still haven't figured out the way I'm going to take the blog. I named it for Kjell and I both but so far he hasn't gotten too interested. In fact the other day he asked who I was writting and I said I was writting on my blog. He's like you have a blog and said no we have a blog. I guess it really will end up being something that is probably just a place for me to get my thoughts and ideas out since I only have three followers! (I thank you three)

There's just so much on my mind right now I don't even know where to start. I guess with the fact that I should never watch the news before I go to bed. We used to but now we spend time online during that time. But we happend to catch and clip about this couple in the UK who had a bed and breakfast and are have now lost 80% of their buisness, and are facing a closing of their business and up to 8000 bucks in fees. Why? Because they had a muslim woman stay at their B&B and somehow the topic of religion came up. Well this couple was a Christian couple, who happend to disagree with the woman. Who then turned and sued them. Really, I know this is the UK but I thought the freedom of our thoughts and feelings were supposed to be protected. And to add to this, what would happen if the story was reversed. Can I as a Christian who is SICK of hollywood, MSNBC, CNN, ABC, that lady with short hair who HATES Christians can I go and sue them for millions. Well of course not, why because Christians are supposed to sit down and shut up while we just allow others to take over and treat us with the upmost disrespect and distain.

I attended a parenting class last night with Kjell, their books have a HUGE problem with spanking. I do believe that you have to be careful with how you use spanking, and after thinking about this for several weeks Kjell and I realized that Kiah maybe gets one or two spankings a week. We do try to use other methods first and NEVER spank her when we are angry. Well this book tried to tell us that the Bible has been interpruted wrong for two thousand years. That whole verse about spare the rod spoil the child. well the book said that rod actually refers to a shepard's staff, and it doesn't mean we are supposed to spank our children rather guide and direct them like a shepard. WELL first off DUH we are supposed to guide and direct our children but NO it doesn't mean shepards staff. if it did then why does it say in Psalms thy rod and thy staff they comfort me..... why would they use the same word. It says if we use the "violence of spanking in our house it will pour out into our streets." so watch out Atwood looks like my three year old is about to come by for a drive by. Do these people really even have children? I worked in an urban area for two years, where I doubt many of the kids were ever spanked. beaten some yes but for the most part, forgotten, ignored looked at as being more of a problem than being part of the solution. Vilence pouring out into the streets... YUP. My idea is maybe the more the child is ignored the more of an issue with lashing out.

Then there's the whole issue with cookie monster now telling children they shouldn't eat cookies. REALLY??? The cookie monster is telling us not to eat cookies, that's almost like the President of the USA not not standing up for the USA....... oh...... My guess is what parents need to do in this situation is get their kids off the couch watching seseme street all day and hang out with them. Kiah is lucky to get 30 minutes of tv a day (more on the weekend since mommy and daddy like to watch football but it's family time as well) What else does Kiah get EVERY DAY that's right *gasp!!!!* a cookie, yes folks I feed my daughter one cookie basically everyday. She's skinny as can be, healthy and happy. Yeah we eat things in moderation it's not ten cookies a day it's one cookie, but really when the cookie monster turns on everything he stands for I don't know what could get worse.

Ok one more rant. I am on the no call list so Mobile Alabama blind people please don't call me and hang up again. During nap time waking up both kids. I really hate it when people do that. I didn't answer my phone fast enough or something (one and a half rings) so now they will call everyday at nap time until I'm actually the "lucky" one who gets to talk to a real person. Fabuloso!

On a brighter note Justus got his first hair cut yesterday, he looks so grown up, and also I think I may now have him be a vampire for halloween. He had no top teeth but his canines are coming in! LOL so he would do great and with all the Twilight hype and yes mommy read all four books and can't wait for the movie to come out.. it might just work!

I have to bring snacks to Kiah's preschool tomorrow and what did I make sugar cookies so take that cookie monster. I do think I will try to post my P90X progress on here as well. I was looking through the stuff today and think just even writting on here about it if no on reads it, i will feel more accountable. 90 days is a long time to devote an hour to a workout. Hummm just thinking wouldn't it be awesome if I did that with God too. Get spiritually and physically fit at the same time. Maybe I'll go back through some of my old Bible study books from Spring Hill till we get something set up here. Did some really good ones then.

This has been a great week for my online survey rewards. I got two checks in the mail this week for a total of 65 dollars. And today I realized Kjell had enough points to cash out for a 25 dollars home depot gift card. Not bad for only working when I have time. Tonight I have to go to our church to help with smorgasborg I had to make a potato recipie so I made one for our family at the same time so that we could eat on ours for about 2 meals. Now I'm going to relax until I have to go to church. I got Kiah's room clean today. Not sure why I bother five minutes with her and Justus in there and it's not in good shape anymore! Enjoying the Oklahoma Texas game. As odd as it is I kinda like both teams. I used to be an OU fan but I really hate them always playing their school song. And Kjell and I saw Texas last year and enjoyed that (haha they killed Kansas and it was freezing!)

well I am starting to get all sorts of offers to try products for free if I will blog about them. I wonder if they check my blog to see if I have any posts. or followers for that matter. Will I become one of those who starts talking about all the money I save (like getting three cards today from shutterfly for .99 and they all have wonderful pics of my family on them) or all the other great awesome free stuff I've gotten lately... I don't know this was supposed to be a family blog but I can tell you that hiptosave.blogspot.com is where I get a lot of my good stuff. To think all this free stuff started out as a walmart thing with me and my mom and now has progressed into so much more. getting free stuff almost every day in my mailbox is fun. I am still doing all the online survays too and have managed to bring in 65 dollars this week and am hoping my check for 50 will come as well. It does take some time but I do get to stay home with my family and I only work when I want to. hopefully I'll get to try these two new products they are talking about one is a temple thermomiter thing. I would love to try this because I have yet to find one that is accurate for my family. I end up taking one of the kids' temps and then taking mine to see if their's is high. So I think something that would be easy and fast would be great. I would love it to get it soon since I'm bound to have H1N1 hit my household in the near future.

So I haven't posted a blog in a long time. So much has been going on lately I don't really even have time to do anything special. I guess I got out of the mood for writting when I wrote a whole bunch during the BAK but couldn't put them on here without the internet so I saved them to a word document but who knew you can't copy and past those things in. Oh well hopefully I'll get better at writting again it may take a couple of weeks since I have two more weeks of volleyball. My baby boy turned ONE yesterday he had a pretty good day. He fell off the bed right when he got up in the morning wasn't I a great mom! At his party he ate his whole entire little cake. I will try to get some pictures up here shortly

My blog has two followers. I guess if life was a popularity contest I would lose. It wouldn't be the first time I was never really popular when I was growing up. It changed a bit in college since I was a tennis player. We weren't really individuals we were just the "tennis girls" Ok so that wasn't even what I was going to talk about.

Last night Kjell met his dad around Clay Center and Baloit and then was his SAG the rest of the way back. Which meant a night at home with two kids by myself. I read an article a couple weeks back about a single mother who wrote a letter to married gals complaining about the things their husbands don't do right or don't do at all and how she was like she'd like to have any of them around to do "all the things wrong" at least she would be getting help. So that article was on my mind when a moth flew into the bathroom and Kjell wasn't there to kill it for me. It's amazing some of the things that he does around here that I just take for granted! So the moth lived to see another day in our house as I ran from the room so he wouldn't follow me to the bathroom.

I couldn't sleep last night and fell asleep shortly after two. I didn't realize that it had been a very long time since I had slept in our bed without Kjell there. In fact in our new bed I think it was the first night ever. Today was crazy I had a lunchen at 12:30 then Kiah and I got our hair cuts at 3:30. My wonderful little girl sat so still while she got her hair cut. I thought it would cut out all of her really blonde hair because it is coming in a bit darker but there is still about two inches of it left and it appears the sun is bleaching it out a bit. I thought it would be nice to have them for the BAK.

Tonight was my last night of Bible school. I'm sad to be done. I really had fun and I really do miss being out of my house and interacting with children. But I wouldn't change staying at home for anything in the world. It's just I LOVE being around children, however if and when I do go back to school, it's going to be to work with older kids. 1st and 2nd graders really are a lot of fun. I really do believe they act a lot like jr high kids though, only jr high kids have a bit more reasoning skills so to me it's easier to get through to them.

Tomorrow the adventure begins. I got Kiah all packed but since we aren't leaving until 4 she is the only one packed. Kjell's mom got her a cute shirt to wear it says "my grandpa rocks" perfect for what he has to do to get her across the state. The first few days are going to be really HOT. Pray that we can find some shade! We will see when I get to write again some schools give us their internet password and some do not.

New found respect

Well I have a new found respect for first and second grade teachers. Tonight was day two of Bible School. We had thirteen today, one more than yesterday. But today seemed a bit harder even though we had more helpers. It's a hard line to toe when you have kids that a super active and don't listen and you know they want your attention so they act out, and knowing how to handle so they don't disrupt others, but also so you don't give them too much attention and they see that it is working. AAHHH! It was fun and the kids are really enjoying the songs and everything else and hopefully learning more about God ( I know with the meals sometimes Bible school can just be a place parents send their kids so they don't have to feed them)

Tent night went good...for Justus. I really hate sleeping in a tent and the floor was hard so it was just hard but he only woke up at 4:30 and then again at 7:30. So we are hoping the BAK works out. It was cold and rainy so the first time in a long time that we didn't go for walk. The last day of my gym membership was today so I utilized that and went and walked on the treadmill.

Got the jars done for our fundraiser so tomorrow I will be taking them to 11 businesses. I hope it goes well we will leave the jars there for about two weeks. Pam had some LIVESTRONG bracelets in kids' sizes so they fit on the lids of the small mouthed jars, so I thought they looked pretty cool. Tomorrow Kjell leaves at 4PM to find his dad, where he may be on his bike!

So today was and IS still interesting. Kjell's dad is doing a fundraiser for a woman in Atwood who has cancer so my job was to call around to area businesses and ask if we could but jars there so that people could put money in them. Everyone was super nice and everyone said yes except for Duckwalls they aren't allowed to have cans. It's so neat to see small towns get behind people, the cable company was like oh I love Debbie can I put an ad on the TV for you (on the local station) was like YEAH YOU CAN. Well I was super excited about that so I called my Atwood partner who is helping me make the jars and she works at the school and she sounded bad so I asked her what was wrong and she said something really bad has happend that is school related I'll call you back in a couple minutes you and Kjell both need to be on the phone. Ok so the next ten minutes were the longest minutes in a long time. We were wondering two things Kjell lost his job (which really shouldn't have crossed our minds since he's already been handed a contract for next year) or someone died. Well someone died. She was a para in two of Kjell's classroom and basically the only person (besides himself) that Kjell really wanted to teach for him (she would take over the class sometimes on track days when he was gone) She also was the manager of the pool, she was 45. She just didn't wake up this morning. I've always had a really hard time with death. I know that God has a plan for our lives and if we have accepted Christ into our hearts this world really is nothing we should long for or long for others to have. But I MISS people, I have a tender heart when it comes to life. I still miss my great grandma imensly and still get teary just thinking about how much I miss her. She's been gone for over two years now. So that was the sad part of the day.

Today I walked forty five minutes (as I'm writting this I'm thinking why did I lable this Kjell and Laressa's blog when I have a feeling I'll be the only one to ever write!+) I've been walking a certain number of minutes each day for the past month. It's supposed to be three months to losing the babyweight. I haven't seen any proof of that yet but I feel more toned.

Tonight Kiah and I went to Bible school. I am in charge of the 1st and 2nd graders I don't have to teach I just take the kids to different areas and maintain peace. We had 12 kids today. It's interesting because they are doing the Bible school with several other churches, four different demonations all of which Kjell and I don't fully agree with, but we feel Bible School is ok. Wow do we miss our church in Spring Hill.

Right now I am sittng in a tent in our basement. We are practicing for the BAK. It took Justus awhile to fall asleep but he wasn't fussing just talking, and trying to crawl. YES trying to crawl where in the world did this come from? He hasn't even been interested in anything and now he's just going to try to hop right into crawling. Kiah hasn't fallen asleep yet, outside there is a storm coming so I'm glad we opted for the basement.

Well I told Kjell we needed to start a blog, his response.... "why?" hummm. The main reason I wanted to start one was because we are about to embark on our second annual BAK. (Bike Across Kansas) and I have been keeping journals for both kids and figured I needed a way to only have to "write" once when it came to this trip because if it's anything like last year we will be doing a lot. Then I can just print it off and tuck it in the pages of their journals that I plan on giving them when they are 16. We will see if I keep up on this and if I can sway Kjell to participate, I mean he was able to get hooked to farm town why not blogging :) I'll have to figure out if I am smart enough to post a picture on here. The kids are growing TOO fast. Oh yeah I may not be doing the entire BAK because Justus hates not sleeping in his bed. We were going to try tenting tonight in the backyard but it is supposed to rain so we will hopefully try it tomorrow night.