Saturday, September 17, 2005








Habitat House

Today, Matt and went to work with others from our church and two other churches here in Tyler to begin building a Habitat house. What an experience! The new homeowner is a young, single mom with an 8 year old daughter. Matt, nor I, did too much hard labor, but it was definitely a long, hot day. Since this is the 5th Habitat house these three churches have worked on, they really knew what they were doing and had so much done before we broke for lunch at 11:30. Someone had set up a huge pit and had grilled hot dogs and hamburgers and served us lunch complete with chips and cookies. They had enough food for 100 people and we had about 50 (maybe more?) of our volunteers, plus we fed the Habitat homeowners who were also working. It was such an amazing thing to participate in. I got to visit a lot with the homeowner and enjoyed getting to know her. She has to work 350 hours on other homes as part of the ownership deal...then, she'll get to pay for the house with an interest-free loan. Pretty sweet. Habitat here in Smith County uses land that is donated and the street we built on had several houses built already. When we left tonight the house was done all the way to the roof decking. They will come this week to roof it and sheetrock it and we have another 1/2 work day next Saturday. I have a few pics I'll show, if I can remember how I did it before. :-) After a shower and some rest, I'm ready to call it a night and go to bed. U.S. Marshalls is playing on TV....maybe, I'll sit here until I doze off. Joanna's team did win their match yesterday....they are 3 and 1 in District play. She had a good game. OK....goodnight.

Monday, September 12, 2005

Grilled Cheese & Grape Koolaid!

Talk about memory lane....that's where I went tonight with my supper. Yum. Yum.

After picking up Joanna from practice, we drove to Tyler to check on the cost of a letter jacket. Expensive.....and they don't even sew the patches on!

Then we made a trip to Hobby Lobby to pick up some stuff to make a Homecoming mini-mum. Wish I coulda just filled my cart with all the neat looking decor....there's lots of fall stuff...plus, they already have Christmas decorations on display.

Now, we're back home and satisfied with the buttery, cheesy taste of a grilled cheese sandwich and the cool, grapey swallow of koolaid. :-) It's softly raining outside and it's not too hot. A nice evening.

I'm also watching Wife Swap....that's a completely strange show. Kinda fascinating, though, to watch how families who are polar opposites live together for 2 weeks. Talk about family dynamics.....it's almost explosive.

Well, the show is about over.....guess I'll get to the work I brought from school now.

Here's hoping you have a grape koolaid, grilled cheese sandwich kinda day! :-)

Saturday, September 10, 2005

A phone conversation with my college freshman!

Mom (cheerily): "Hi, what'cha doing?"
Daughter (groggily): "Nuthin"
Mom: "I was just calling to find out how you were...what's going on...."
Daughter: "Not much."
long silence on the phone
Mom: "Are you sleeping?
Daughter: "No"
Mom: "OK"
more silence
Mom: "Well, I was just calling to say hello and I love you. Goodbye."
Daughter: "Bye"

Just thought I'd share a wonderful mother/daughter moment. Ha!

She did send me an email saying she didn't like to talk on the phone....maybe that'll change one day. Hope so. I can't wait for her to be a mom one day, too. Did I ever act like that? Guess all these moments are supposed to help me understand my mother better, too. And appreciate!


My wonderful family! Posted by Picasa

But, really who cares? Ha! I love the internet and email and have been reading blogs written by several others....I so enjoy reading and have a great appreciation for the variety of writing styles!

My good friend let me know about this website and I thought I'd give it a try. Thanks, Kris.

We've had a busy week with 2 volleyball games (Tuesday night and Friday), church on Wednesday, now I can't remember what happened on Thursday?? I've been nursing a cold all week and have been doing an halfway job in the energy department. My poor students haven't had the most effective teacher all week. Ugh! I'm hoping to get restored this weekend and re-energized for the upcoming week.

I did have an interesting night. I went to bed last night without putting Jack & Hannah (my Welsh Corgis) in their room....so at 3:30 they starting barking and barking....I got up to let them outside and came to couch to wait for them to come back....I ended up falling asleep and finally at 5:30 they were knocking on door to be let back in. I guess they had quite an adventure in the middle of the night! I won't forget to put them in their room next time. :-)

Well, this is enough for now. I have dishes to clean, laundry to wash and I bet I can find a book to read. Guess which one will be first on my priority list? :-)

Joanna is working on her room and hopes to go with friend to make "fan t-shirts" for the next week's football game. Matt wants to go to local Antique Tractor show here in Whitehouse. Guess I need to get moving. Have a wonderful day and feel free to add your comments.