Saturday, September 20, 2008

September is crazier than Christmas and other thoughts....

I've discovered something about myself. I love being busy, having lots to do and tons of people to see BUT there's a fine line. When I cross this unseen line I move into the land where I can barely cope. Out come the "crazy eyes" and out goes any peace in my mind. I loose sight of the big picture and just go into "one foot in front of the other" mode. It's not pretty.

The goal this year is to figure out how to get all the kids to their events and to homeschool without entering "crazy-eye" land. Oh and I'm back, in case you're wondering. Hubby took me on a 5 day trip (no kids) to San Fransisco.

It was the perfect cure for what ailed me. Now I'm back all rested and refreshed and ready to run the roads again.

...some new and exciting changes have been happening at the Speilman house. Well they're new and exciting to us anyway. Son number one went to school for the first time. Is he five you ask? Nope. Thirteen. He and his cousins biked off to their first day

and so far.... he's loving it! I think what he likes most is the independence. I've suddenly had to allow him to take on a lot more responsibility. He has to get himself to school and home and get himself organized for school and sport without me around. He's rising to the challenge quite nicely and I'm more than pleasantly surprised!

The girls are back at dance and Isaac (son #2) has joined them. He went to the year end show last year and thought he might like to try a class. We let him attend his cousin's classes for the first week, just to try it out. She's doing 2 ballet, 1 technique and one jazz out AND he LOVES it! It's crazy and kind of wonderful. It took my hubby a minute(okay a few weeks actually but who's counting) to get his head around the fact that his little boy was going to take ballet but I think it's all good now. The main thing is...he LOVES it! And he's quite good.

And of course there's soccer for both boys and the homeschooling.
I'm going to write another post about the homeschooling so stay tuned! I've been praying for passion, for inspiration, for some love of teaching/learning to come back. AND God answered. I'm pretty excited about this year.
God is so good! I have so much to be thankful for.

Saturday, September 6, 2008

Seven is a perfect number....

My third born child, the one that brought some pink and frilly into our lego filled lives, my first daughter, turned seven on the 4th. Seven! WOW!

She has brought us so much joy! She's friendly, outgoing, fun, intense and loving. It's wonderful to watch her grow and change over the years. She definitely is her own girl!

Here we are welcoming her into our lives...(yup I know, I look pretty horrendous but hey...I just had an 8lb 4oz baby)


Here she is at almost one....


Almost two....



Third birthday....



Four and a half....

Fifth birthday.....



Sixth birthday...
..

And here she is now, celebrating being seven!



We Love you very much Madeline Elizabeth. You bring much joy to us all!

Monday, September 1, 2008

new gadget that I love...

Hubs came home the other day with an anniversary prezzie for me.

Let me just take this opportunity to say just how much I love presents! Really I do! It's crazy. Awhile ago Kev and I read this Book "The Five Love Languages"
So it really is official. The number two for me was, yup gifts! And Kev? Not gifts at all. There has been some learning curve to this marriage thing:)

See how I get off track?!

This nifty new gadget keeps track of the distance and time I run and allows me to upload it all to the computer and track my runs. So cool!

Here's a pic of my fav new toy: Nike+ Sportband


I LOVE it!! We found out the distance we thought was 10K was actually 8...opps! So now we're running 10. It's helping me so much with my motivation and training for the half marathon in October. I really love that it allows me to track and look at all my runs with distances and pace.

Can you tell I love this thing?! AND my hubby thought of it all on his own. He loves gadgets and I love gifts - perfect! AND this is one I can actually use!