Moving

Be back soon!

Honor Court

M has moved up from Cub Scout to Boy Scout. He is growing so fast. It seems like yesterday he was crawling through the kitchen and using the dishwasher door to pull himself up to stand. 

Over

Travel hockey is officially over for this Season. The team had their party to celebrate the end of the season. One of the moms gave me a disc full of pictures (she has one of those big powerful cameras, I have a phone with a camera) her pictures come out so much better than mine. In fact, mine were so bad, I just stopped even trying to take a picture.

Here are a few from the past season:

Matthew is a Character

Last year, Matthew was selected to be photographed for a children's book. The book has been published. Here is a link that shows the making of the book. 

http://video214.com/play/UGCI0NwLpj0KtVsLIO1VeA/s/dark

Now. I need to go order a copy of the book!!!

Hans and Frans

Have I mentioned my penchant for naming inanimate objects? My car is Miss Daisy, the RAV4 is John Harvard, the new refrigerator is Luca...meet Hans and Franz.

  Big. Bulky. Gray. 

Hans and Franz

Did I Forget?

Ouch

I think I forgot to mention my joy in life had a mishap at School last week. I was on my way out the door to Bible Study when I took a quick look at my phone. I had missed a call...from the School...from the Assistant Principal. The voice mail went something like this "Hello, this is the School's Assistant Principal. Would you please call me as soon as possible? Matthew had an accident during PE. He is okay...but he needs to see a doctor." Yep, I didn't make it to Bible Study that day. I made a little detour by the ER instead.

I love this Little Guy but this is trip number 3 to the ER for stitches or staples. I think we can stop now.

Closer and Closer

Closer and closer...we are creeping along to almost being finished with the house and moving in may finally happen...it is all very surreal to me. I can't quite wrap my mind around actually moving in and making the house our home. M is all ready to start packing his room...I am not ready to live among the boxes yet...and I think all the delays has made me a bit like Pavlov's dog.but instead of salivating, my mind doesn't accept we are really going to move in and live there...with a kitchen that has appliances that work correctly and no mold around the windows, not worrying about the kids disturbing the neighbors, or listening to the constant slamming of doors (life in the apartment).

Passing Inspection

HOME

Almost Home

The CrAzY WeaTHeR has pushed the house completion date back another week. There are about 3 days of work on the outside of the house to be done before it can be inspected. The Builder said the Inspectors always find something that needs to be done and then it will have to he inspected...again. Here is where we are so far on the house.

Note the "Hainting" on the porches. Hainting started in the Carolinas to prevent haunting. They discovered the light blue paint discouraged insects and some birds from nesting and making webs. They think the blue is the sky. I just think it's pretty

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Honor Choir and Leftover Winter Program Videos

These videos are leftover from Matthew's State Honor Choir last October. The files were too big to load from my phone to the blog...so now that Vimeo is working, I'm getting them off my phone onto here and freeing up some space on my phone.

IMG 0894[2] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 0897[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 0901[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 0915[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

These videos are from the kids' Christmas Program:

IMG 1226[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.



IMG 1237[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 1250[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 1279[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 1286[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 1560[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

Ohhh Vimeo

When I started my blog, it was a little testy and would refuse to upload my videos (from my camera). I decided to outsmart the blog and use Vimeo to post them. Last year, Vimeo and I got into a little squabble when I paid for my service and it wouldn't let me use the service I paid for. Many unsuccessful emals later (I really hate how you can't talk to a person any longer...and if you can, they have such a heavy accent, nothing is accomplished. Anyway, I asked them to cancel and refund my money. Never happened. Imagine my surprise when Vimeo charged my credit card for a new subscription. Yesterday, a flurry of emails ensued...my technology limited brain short circuited and I had to hand the communication with Vimeo over to the husband. He prevailed and discovered after many emails that when you subscribe to Vimeo Plus, they create a completely separate account and this is why it wouldn't let me use my account as "Pro."

Technology and I do not play well together. I often find myself frustrated to the verge of tears when I attempt to do more than check email, upload and download pictures. I'm a bit like a toddler who knows what they want and cannot verbalize it. Extremely frustrated and something just might get kicked. This is the price I pay for not staying in the work force. When I worked, I kicked the computers butt...now it is like I am trying to learn an entirely new language...like Chinese...on the bright side, I wouldn't trade being home with my kids for the world and I feel very very blessed.

I have a lot of videos taking up room on my account so I am about to spam my blog with videos.

These three are from Roo when she was the Awesome daughter/big sister last Saturday.

IMG 2092[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 2047[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 2059[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

I am not sure which competion these are from...Maybe last Fall in Birmingham???

IMG 0580[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 0554[2] from
Susan Bice on Vimeo.

IMG 0362[1] from Susan Bice on Vimeo.

Ouch

Today was like every other Wednesday, get the kids off to school, come home get ready for Bible Study, make a cup of tea to drink while driving to Bible Study...went to grab my stuff and head out the door and discovered a missed call...from Matthew's School...from the Assistant Principal...Matthew had an accident at PE, he was with the nurse, he'll be fine, but ummm, he needs to see a doctor. Wednesday took a detour from the usual Wednesdays...

I collected Matthew from the Nurse, headed to the ER since our Family Practice doesn't handle staples. (I called the doctor on my way to collect the patient. Am I one cool collected mom or what? Yeah, that's just cuz I hadn't seen any blood...yet.)

Fortunately, there wasn't a soul in the Waiting Area so we were in and out in a few hours. It would have been less but the NP put a gel to numb Matthew's injury for 30 minutes before she stapled the wound.

This is M's third time at the ER for a head wound...I told him he is averaging 3 1/2 years between head wounds, it's okay to make this the last trip for stitches/staples.

School Snowman Contest

Matthew's Elementary School held a Snowman Contest when School was canceled (my children are duds and did not participate) but it's a cute little slideshow: http://flipagram.com/f/RfwqDKt2Vc

And here are a few more pictures that G took of the kids on their Snow Day.

H gets M with a Snow Ball...His face is priceless...although it does look like he has his hands in his pants..

 This kid LOVES to Shovel

Busy Busy Busy

CrAzY weekend. Last week's crazy weather brought one CraZy weekend for this family (and other families, I'm sure). Our marriage conference that was supposed to take place on the 20th and 21st was moved to this weekend but the kids had BIG activities going on. H had a competition in Birmingham (enter Big Sister to the Rescue riding her little Honda Civic) and M had his playoff weekend to wind up the Travel Hockey Season (enter Matthew's good friend's Mom to the rescue riding her husband's snazzy Jeep). 

I'm so proud of Roo, she served at our marriage conference on Friday night until 11:30 and had Hannah out our front door by 6:30 the following morning. She sent me videos to show me H skating and brought me home a lovely tea towel set from Williams and Sonoma. (see photo) I do believe our house will have a bunny theme running through it. Greg calls the pictures of my great great grandparents "the Rabbits" since they had 9 kids. I have the most adorable set of tea towels now...and there is this bunny door knocker at Anthropologie I have my eye on...if the kids ever stop growing...H needed a new coat (found one on sale) and new shoes (found her Uggs on sale at Dillards) and new underwear...M informed this morning he needs new tennis shoes...and I know he is going to need some Summer clothes...and H needs some dresses (I saw cute ones at Target) yeah, the bunny door knocker is probably going to have to wait awhile...Back to Roo, so the Best Big Sister in the World took H shopping for the undergarments and fed her lunch at Flip Burger and then stuck around for M's evening hockey game even though she had school work to complete. Sunday, Lauren served at Church and went in to work to set up for Orientation today. So proud...

Hannah's Competition went well, I have no idea how she placed because there was drama with the scoring that I won't go into but let's just suffice it to say this, I was not happy to read on FB about the scoring change and not receive a call from the Coach in charge that day. H is just a happy skater and loves to compete and doesn't take it serious but when I am paying someone to Coach her, I expect to be communicated with...end of rant. 

Matthew's team has been playing up meaning his 9-10 year old team (Squirts) has been playing 11-12 year olds (Pee Wees) and his team placed second in the league. I am not sure the improvement in their play was due to a change in Coach, Chris Luongo played NHL And coached at UAH. Or, if the boys finally connected all the dots due to growing up...or a combination of both. But, they were awesome! I do know I have to develop a thicker skin to be a successful hockey mom. Hockey Parents can be awful and I found myself screaming at the other team's goalie when he used his goalie stick to whack one of our players across his back as he skated by...and of course, the official didn't see it. Roo told me to leave the Trash Talk to her since it just isn't my style. Deal. 

So here are some pictures, I couldn't upload the videos of H since the files were to big...I'll have to see if the Computer genius can get the videos off my phone and onto a DVD.