A New Year

Each Fall at the start of a new school year, it seems like New Year's to me! Each child is starting a new grade and new books. We buy new supplies like pencils, notebooks, crayons, markers, and anything else they might need.

I was hoping to start school today, but that is not going to happen. We have been a bit busy and I do not have everything ready. Hopefully I can get things ready today and we can start tomorrow. The children are definitely ready! All of the school systems in our area have already started . The kids have run out of things to do, and I believe getting back to a more structured day will be welcome.

Matthew 11, Samuel 9, Anna 7, and Luke 5 participated in "Moses, The Musical" at our church this past weekend. They had presentations on Saturday and Sunday night. They are a bit worn out to say the least. The week before they had practice every evening. Then there were dress rehearsals Friday night and Saturday morning. They have worked so hard and did a wonderful job!

This is the third year in a row that our Children's Department at our Church has done a musical. Last year it was on Esther, and the year before it was on David. Our Children's Pastor is Young, Energetic and FULL of energy! These musicals are done with a bit of humor added to them. Our Children's Pastor writes these musicals along with a team of people, most of whom are his relatives. They are quite a talented group of people!

My five year old son, Luke, was a little shy participating. Once they started practicing in the auditorium, it was a bit difficult to get him to participate. We even resorted to bribing him, which didn't work very well. We did learn if we dropped him off and left him he ended up participating better. The first night of the presentation he ran right in and got his costume on and went right at it. The second night didn't go so well at first. There were numerous people who were trying to encourage him, but he wasn't having any of it. Time was running out and he was not budging.

All of the younger children were plagues. Luke was supposed to be a gnat. He really wanted to be a frog. So the first night he was a gnat and did a great job! Here he is as a gnat.

Luke is on the far right

So the second night when he wouldn't participate and everyone was trying to encourage him , I was talking to the lady in charge of costumes about how he wanted to be a frog. She said well, we have an extra frog costume so he could be one! She told the Children's Pastor and he told Luke he could be a frog. Well, that changed his mind really fast! Here is Luke as a frog.

I bet you didn't know that plagues could be so cute!

Matthew as Buffalo Bill posing with his little brother Micah

My beautiful daughter as a mean guard. This is the part she wanted!

Unfortunately I do not have a picture of Samuel. My pictures that I took during the play didn't turn out. After the play, he changed out of his costume before I could get his picture and he refused to put it back on. At least I do have him on video.


It was a lot of fun and we really enjoyed it, but is also nice for it to be over. We have to drive 45 minutes to get to church, so we have been racking up the mileage recently. Dinner time has been chaotic and most nights we had to eat sandwiches or something easy. I look forward to a more normal schedule this week!

Well, I better be off to work on getting things ready for school to begin! I have a lot to do, and I need to get the children to help get the house picked up and in some form of order! Sounds like a fun day planned, doesn't it?

Blessings,