Ever heard of the Melting Pot????  I've always wanted to go there ever since I we moved to Florida which is where I first ever heard of one. Its a fondue restuarant!

We took our friends Jim and Shannan with us. Its been a while since either of us couples have had a nite out without our children, and a long time since we've been able to just catch up with each other! I can't even tell you how good it felt to Laugh!!! We had such a fun time!

Our Husbands enjoyed making us laugh, they just had to stop for donuts for thier sat morn breakfasts!

A good time was had by all, and hey did you notice I got my hair highlighted??? That was my B-day gift to myself LOL!!!!     ~Jill~

Happy January everyone!!! I hope you are having a good one without too much sickness!  i can't believe that Tuesday of next week we will be half way thru! I really don't mind January like I used to when I lived in the North! Although it has been too unseasonably warm here for my taste, the sunshine does make one feel better.

I am hoping to do more blogging this year, I really enjoy it, but I just got incredibly busy over last year! (can't imagine why....only 5 girls we are raising, with one of them being 19 months old! )  AND if it weren't for them and all the living I do, I wouldn't have anything to blog about, would I?!!

Since it's been so long since I've blogged, I'll start back up here with Christmas.....

We spent Christmas here at home, then a few days after, headed up to Indiana to visit Family. We surprized them! Yep, My mom-in-law didn't as much get to run the sweeper over her perfectly clean house before we got there! LOL  We stayed thru New Years Day with a big dinner at my Sis-in-Laws new residence.

While we were there we decided to rent a Uhaul to bring some furniture home that we had stored there. It was our full bedroom suite that we started out with when we got married! It's antique that Dave's Dad and Mom had given us. We decided we would downsize from our king bed that we couldn't hardly get around in the bedroom. SCARY!!!!

So since we've been back, we have taken down Christmas decor, moved in the bedroom furniture, moved out the king size mattress, cleaned out drawers and closet, tried to find my decor I had before Christmas, and moved in the tredmill that was a gift from my mom-in-law! The tredmill is not together yet! Oh yeah I forgot, we got a bigger TV and moved out the old one, and moved the TV cabinet to the dinning room to store other stuff. We've tried to do school this week despite fighting sickness  So you can guess I am very tired and glad that tomorrow is Saturday!!! 

I'm just very happy that I finially set myself down again long enough to re-start my Blog!!!  Hopefully the next one will be better, and I will let you know how the tredmill is working out!

I tried to put on a few pics but it wouldn't let me, maybe next time.    Have a great weekend!     ~Jill~

My heart swelled and wanted to melt at the same time!  Yesterday we had our homecoming service at church, and while Hannah Grace's little friend was up singing a special with her parents, Hannah stood up (no one else was standing) and raised her little hand (not so little anymore)!!!!!! Then others started standing and worshiping all over the church. I know proud is not the right word but I am so happy, so pleased, to see these fruits come from my children, so BLESSED is the word! 

We also had the youth to lead the worship service, and there again was my two teenagers leading out in worship!  Thank YOU Lord!!!!

Hope you have a wonderful Monday full of Worship!

These were our table centerpieces

our welcome table

our sound girl

this was my gift to my secret sister, there's a small package under the candy that has a bracelet in it!

this is her! I really enjoyed being her secret sister! She's such a sweet gal!

This is the younger set of secret sisters, they had thier own draw this time! Such fun! They are just little women in training!

And this was who was "my" S.S. !!!! She got me the nicest sweetest gifts, alot of books, and I know she prayed for me this past year!

Another table pic with little Hope in the background.

This was DD Leah's secret sister! They had each other's name! How neat!

Unfortunately Rach's   S.Sister must have quit coming, but hopefully that won't happen this time. She entered the young girls draw this time.

Last but not Least! This was our special speaker!!!! You can just guess what the message was on, I think something about us women wearing masks....

Hope you enjoyed the party!   ~Jill~

I'm dreaming of a White Christmas, nope, a quiet day in my house to clean and declutter!!!!   You know you can't shovel snow off the walk completely while its still snowing right? Well you can't "clean" when there are many in the house!!!  Most stores and businesses do their cleaning after hours when there's no customers right? I just LONG to go thru my house and put things where they belong, catch up on hot spots and laundry all the while planning in my mind new things I want to do! So any Ideas on where or what the whole family could do about once a month for me to have that kind of day??? We live away from family, so visiting is out of the question.

As for today and the last few... Mother Nature has not been kind to me lately, My hormones must be so out of whack, I fought with DH this Sat and last, this Sat being the worst, lasting into Sunday with the result of everyone going to Sunday morning church but me . Mind you, I have a yeast infection, I'm getting ready to start the monthly (Thanks EVE!!!) it just has felt like I cannot get caught up on rest. I have things I want to do, but can't get to them, so then that frustrates me, and if I do get a minute, then I want to sleep! Enough of that I'm going to make  myself cry if I don't stop, but I would appriciate your prayers! Hopefully theres some of you who may know what I'm going thru!

We are feeling what Fall is to us here in North Florida! Its cooling down a bit with nice cool mornings and evenings, cotton fields are beautiful and boiled peanuts are all the rage right now! Today inspite of everything that ails me, It is absolutely a georgoes day outside! I'm inside with the screen store letting in the sounds of birds chirping and dogs barking, my children playing, and a nice breeze! Even the air is starting to smell different! 

Our day got re-directed since I didn't feel well, we haven't begin our classes today, only baking alphabet cookies, playing webkinz, and painting the acorns I had them collect outside is what has been going on.  i just didn't have the heart to make them not enjoy the pretty day for a while. We fully intend on doing our school work here in a bit!

Now for a few new things.... DH painted DD Rach's room this weekend, its a very pretty blue! She's been waiting for months! There was some kind of cardboard like covering over the old tongue n grove boards that he had to rip off the walls and the ceiling! It was no easy job, it stirred up a lot of dust and dirt, and she had to sleep on the couch for a long time till he got it all cleared out.

For the little girls room, they were needing a mattress, a good one, and I just happened to find one on a local flea market site on facebook. It is one of those soft side water beds with the tubes inside the mattress. We had one we bought when we first got married but eventually got rid of. Our girls always wanted one.

And...I got my kitchen Island that our friend from church made, delivered this weekend!

It was really nice for the girls making cookies today, because I have very little counter space!

SCHOOL is going fine, it is still taking some time to work the bugs out of this new to us school on DvD from Abeka. The girls are learning so much, but so far it is still taking alot of my attention for both of them especially kindergarten. Kindergarten doesn't last long but 4th grade does! That has been an adjustment for us! Also 4th grade Math, we found ourselves not ready for, so we've had to stop, get out the flash-cards to practice, and now we are on a different day with Math than the rest of it. Spelling too has been harder, we are a few days behind on it too.  I do love the program though, it gives me confidence they are learning so much. The teachers are GREAT!  The kindergarten teacher Mrs. Bere reminds me of @Bethelou!  Hope says some of the funniest things during school time, like the other day she said "MOM, do those kids really not know their letters?" I said "some kindergartners "don't" know their letters yet" Hope says" This is "learning" school, I want to know STUFF"! Like it was just too babyish for her and she needed to know so much more! LOL!

I will close for now, please keep us in your prayers, we are just going thru alot of STUFF right now. Also I forgot to mention, I got  news yesterday that my Dad had another one of his memory loss spells , accompanied with high blood pressure. The dr's don't have any explanation for what 's going on.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                 ~Jill~