Johnsons' Journey

My friend, Jana’s daughter is doing a Flat Stanley project in her 3rd grade class at school. They are learning about the states and their capitals, and Jana asked her friends if they would “sponser” Stanley. I thought it would be a fun homeschool project for the kids, so I told her that we would do it.

We got a blank Stanley in the mail a couple weeks ago, and we got to “dress” him up. Naturally, our Stanley is into bowling, so he had to dress in his bowling shirt. *lol*

The kids are having fun with it… We still need to get a few more pictures of Stanley around the town, and then we’ll send him back to Pittsburg.

Before I go, I just wanted to give a quick shout out for jumbo envelopes… By the time we are done with Stanley, he’ll probably have to be shipped in a jumbo envelope! *lol*

I can’t believe I haven’t posted on here since Monday… Shame on me! I am getting to be a lazy blogger… Which is something I don’t want to happen! *sigh* … Must get better… I must!

My main problem is that Blurb book I am making, from old blog posts. I would really like to get it done by the end of the month, so that I can buy it with tax returns. Yesterday I got up to page 240, and am up to mid May 1999 … It was then that I noticed a problem…

You see, I started the book a few months ago and got up to page 107, and then stopped working on it until a couple 2-3 weeks ago. Well… I accidently changed the font size, and didn’t notice until last night. *sigh* … I am using Tahoma, and I was using size 10 for the journaling, with size 12 for the titles. I am now making the titles size 10 and making the journaling a size 9… Gah! … I am SO MAD at myself!… I am OCD enough that the change in font size would drive me batty… But do you know how much work it would be to change all the font sizes, and have to reline up pictures to match the journaling. *sigh* … Not to mention that on this old laptop, the Blurb program takes up too much memory and is really sluggish.

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While our personal “birthday season” is winding down, it’s winding down with a vengence! There have been so many birthdays in the last few days! The 29th was my sisters and my friend, Talitha’s birthday. The 30th was Joe’s cousin’s son, Josh’s birthday. The 31st was Joe’s Uncle Larry’s birthday. Yesterday was Joe’s mom, Elvina’s birthday. And today is my Mom, Scott, Joe’s cousin, Carol and Joe’s Grandma Johnson’s birthday (and Jared’s is coming on the 10th). Sooo….

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

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We have some really nice neighbors… And they are going to keep me extra busy baking over the next few days! *lol* … Here are a couple things we received on Friday:

Remember the girls’ friend, Darian? She lives in a house that is behind ours… Anyway, Darian and her mom stopped by on Friday and gave us this little gift of homemade jellies… Plum jam and grape jelly. Alicia claimed the candycane, and I hung the little star ornament on the little tree in the classroom.

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Joe and I went to Walmart yesterday, to do the grocery thing. We left the kids at home because we wanted to get the last two stocking stuffers we need for the boys… While we were there, we bought a pointsettia for our neighbor, Thelma… She’s the one who’s always sending over goodies for the kids… Anyway, when we got home we let the kids each pick out a Christmas card from a box set we bought, and then Joe and the kids went to take it to Thelma (while I put all the groceries away).

They didn’t come back empty handed.

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Our neighbor just keeps giving the kids treats. *lol* … It’s a good thing Joe has a major sweet tooth, because the kids certainly don’t need all the candy she sends over!

Man, yesterday was a looooooong day!

The kids and I were up, showered & dressed, the house picked up, and ready to go when Joe got home from work at 9:45-ish. As soon as Joe got home, we all hopped into the Durango and headed back into town to the bowling alley. We wanted to try their breakfast there… Every week we see parents of the bowlers with these yummy looking breakfasts, and we were wanting to try it… It was yummy too! *lol*

The girls and their new friends

The boys can practice (for their league) from 10 am until 11 am for free, and the league bowling starts at 11, so we always end up being at the bowling alley for around 2.5 – 3 hours. The boys love it, and we bring things (like coloring books) for the girls to do, so they won’t get bored… Yesterday a couple little girls who do the bumper bowling on the league came over to the girls, pulled some chairs up to the table, and invited themselves to some coloring. *lol* Alicia and Amanda were thrilled, and they all looked so cute, sitting around the table coloring.

Josh seemed to be having a bad day, as far as his bowling went, but he was improving by the time the day was done… Jared did well though, and I think he even improved his average a little… Jared is really getting good… Josh has problems, because of his strength issues… His pediatrician says that Josh has some kind of muscle disease, which is what caused delays with his gross motor skills as a baby (he didn’t walk well until he was 18 months old). Dr. Gyerko said that Josh would never do really well in sports and things, because of his lower muscle tone… Josh doesn’t let it get him down though. He’s just out there to have fun… I am proud of him for not getting discouraged… Not that he bowls badly… He would just knock down more pins if he could just throw the ball a bit harder.

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Happy birthday to my brother, Rudy, and to our nephew, Shandon! I wish you both lots of love and well wishes for a great birthday and year!

We had a decent sort of weekend…

The Cougars; Josh, Marshall, and Jared

On Saturday the boys had their junior bowling league at Molalla Bowl… They bowled well, though Joe and I didn’t get to see much of their last game. Joe’s sister, DeeDee, and her husband, Bob, came to watch. They talked to us for the entire 3rd game, so we could watch the game. I had to keep tabs toward the end though, since I was the one writing the scores down at the end of each game.

I almost missed the scores for the 2nd game though, since I was a bit distracted… On the lane next to the one the boys were bowling on, was a group of older boys… They are 14+ and BIG. Well, this kid Dakota (who has been in the news recently), had a mishap… When he bowls he swings his arm back so high, that he almost hits the signs and screens above his head, from behind. It’s crazy!… Anyway, when he swung his arm back, his bowling ball went flying out behind him, and almost hit one of his team-mates. The kid that almost got hit is the kind of kid who has his iPod attached to his ears All. The. Time…. Anyway, he just sat there stunned and kept yelling, “DUDE! …  DUDE! … DUDE!” … Like I said, distracting!

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Whew! It’s SO NICE to be back online, and with my computer! I was lost without it! *lol*

Joe took it to work with him early Saturday morning (before I woke up), and I was figuring that Thomas would work on it on Saturday evening, and I would get it back on Sunday, when Joe came home from work.

You should have seen me pouting when Joe came home empty handed. (And I even looked worse on Monday evening. *lol*)

I guess it takes two hours alone, just to take the laptop apart, to be able to get to the fan… So on Sunday evening he took it apart, and saw that the fan was really dirty. He figured that was the reason it was making the noise, so he cleaned it off and put the computer back together (which took another 2 hours)… Then he turned the computer on, and it was still making the noise… When Joe called him yesterday, Thomas told Joe that he hadn’t had a chance to take it apart again, and he wouldn’t be able to until this weekend… Joe knew I would never last that long. so he told him that he would just come pick it up. *lol*

I will be getting a new desktop computer in February (with tax returns), so Joe just wants to wait until then and have Thomas look at it after that… Then we’ll be giving it to Alicia.

I’d already decided that I would never buy enough laptop (and Joe agrees), but Thomas did tell Joe that laptops aren’t meant to be used as much as I use mine. *lol* … So a desktop it is for me!

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We have this neighbor, who lives kiddy-corner across the street. She’s probably in her 80s (at least). Her name is Thelma, and while I’ve never actually talked to her personally, she seems to be a very nice lady… Joe and the kids have talked to her, but to be honest, I don’t leave the house that often. *lol*

Anyway, Thelma has really taken a liking to the kids. Whenever she sees Joe, she goes on and on about how wonderful they are. *proud* … She is always buying them treats too, for every holiday… Valentine’s Day, Easter, Halloween, Christmas, you name it, she sends over candy.

Well, today she sent over another bag of treats… And there is no holiday in sight! In it was a thank you card, with “To an amazing family” written on the outside. In the bag were 4 bags of candy (like mini Milky Ways, Hershies miniatures, etc), 2 big packages of markers for the boys, a stationary/pen set for Amanda, a diary/pen set for Alicia, two 24 packs of pencils, and even some cat toys for Cuddles and Buddy. (She remembered the cats last time too. *lol*)

Isn’t she the sweetest?

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