2009 was sublime

..ok it was the first word i thought of that rhymed with nine! Well, looking back, i blogged twice as much as the year before! ha, ha, what was sublime though was finding out about having a girl-josh is working extra hard these days. we traded in the explorer for a sienna, yep, that's right a van family...so much for the 'soccer mom' stigma.

josh's business is going well, still growing, what a blessing during these times. i'm still teaching a bio lab for home schoolers, i love it. thinking this could be a fun outlet for me in the future (Lord willing).

boys are going to a great charter school in Orcutt-they absolutely thrive in it. jacob in first grade and nathan in preschool.

feeling very pregnant these days, craving lots of chocolate! hopefully this will subside (the cravings)! little girl E is wiggling away, very active especially around 3am!

had a great reflective christmas in shaver lake giving all thanks to our Lord for His blessings, provisions, and sacrifice.

welp,
happy new year!

it's a...

girl! the boys are gonna have a sister! josh get's his girl. we picked out a name a long time ago...poly ester erdman. drop me a comment and let me know what ya think! we are all doing well.

what starts with a pea and ends with a nut?

If you haven't yet heard, we are PregnanT. So here's the answers to all those general questions. Due April 20th, we will find out if it's a boy or a girl. I am extra tired 24/7, nausea, headaches, insomnia, comes and goes but overall very healthy. Pregnancy looks healthy, peanut looks healthy.
Lord willing this will be our LAST pregnancy, we still want to adopt someday.
And yes it was a suprise...well, it wasn't a suprise to the Lord. When i told Josh, he was so amused that he laughed his head off for about 5 minutes.

Oh, my sister-in-law is due April 24th with her first.

Here's the pics: the nursed descibes the baby as a 'gummy bear' if you imagine that, you can sort of see a tiny little body.

on back legs poking up

babys front, on side

babys back, on side

hurry up and wait...

On the train to San Diego
alarm went off at 5:30am, too early especially since jacob crawled into bed with us. sometime in the middle of the night. get dressed, make coffee, feed dog, feed birds, make coffee, wake boys up @ 6, get them dressed, get coffee (don't forget to take a drink), make pb & j sandwiches, pack food, load car, leave house by 6:15
and i thought i was supposed to be the helpmate! hubby you are awesome!
drive to grover, go to MD's drive through, eat egg mc muffin en route to train station, arrive on schedule(amazing), unload car, boys, & luggage, excitement is high....the train broke down.
disappointment, boys r bummed, take amtrak bus to LA?-NO WAY! cancel tickets, drive to SLO, go to station, get new tickets, free upgrade to business class-yeah-now leaving at 10:35, bus to Santa Barbara, pass our house on bus(11:45, good thing the alarm went off at 5:30, lol), oh the bus stopped 2 minutes away from our house, who woulda thunk?
get to santa barbara, 20 minutes early, train shows up on time, board on business class, 4 extra inches each seat, complementary drink, wine you say! better not, free snacks, whoo-hoow, i could get used to this!
5:30 (12 hours later) still enroute to San Diego, dinner, puzzles, parenting...
8:00 yippee we finally made it! Picked up by Uncle Wendell, he made dinner and brought it with him, had dinner on the water front, right next to the Star of India immigrant ship, used the bathroom on a steamboat, made friends with kids from New York, fed ants sunflower seeds, drive to my friend Carrie's house in Poway, boys crash in car, arrive at 10:00, put them to bed, visit for about 45 min, shower, jammies, bed, 11:45pm, nite-nite.

another day, another bird!

o.k. so i'm walking out of the church gym when i hear, "there's a bird at your feet", sure enough there flutters a sparrow, a fledgling. amidst a sea of feet. the little guy was terrified, but we managed to catch him. i offered him some drops of water and he accepted. this little guy left his nest a bit too early-so i put him in a coffee cup with a napkin and drove home.

he has a nice cage in my secret garden which is frequented by many resident birds. i'm hoping he will be ale to go out on his own in a few days.

another avian adventure

my neighbor sally and Jr, a little boy from the appartments behind our house, came over to ask if we could help them catch his escaped parrot 'paco'. hmmm, this sounds familiar...

the boys and i grabbed a couple bird nets and a stick.
we headed to sally's house to see where paco landed, yep, way up there in a tree. another boy offered to scale the tree which was quite a sight since the trunk was straight up for about 12 feet. He was able to scare paco out of that tree, but he flew a few houses down to a much lower tree. the boys stayed in the alley, nets in hand, while i went into the back yard where paco was. i shook the branches a few times causing paco to lose his grip and get him lower in the tree. a few shakes and he was on the lawn, with my net over him.

we headed back to the house to clip paco's wings so he hopefully doesn't escape again, and Em worked with hand taming him. Jr. hung out and worked with paco as well as he was pumped full of advise from both me and Em about birds.

paco turned out to be an orange fronted conure, a really sweet bird and Jr. is a really sweet kid. i look forward to seeing him more.

five point seven seconds

our fourth of july celebration began with a patriotic rodeo parade in downtown Collbran, the boys and i leaped out of the truck just in time to catch the the opening ride. Collbran, a quaint small one sheriff town; as a boy Josh recalls this parade as being the best ever and after the first 30 seconds the boys unanimously agreed as candy rained down all over the place. by the time it was over i think they had 5 pounds of candy between them both!
we stayed back after the parade to do some of the carnival activities-one of which was meeting Justin Clark-a bone-a-fide bull rider/fighter, yep, that wasn't a typo, it's fighter. the layman term for this is rodeo clown. but after seeing the bulls at the rodeo there really is no 'clownin' around' in the arena. These bulls are two thousand pounds plus and really miffed. he told us that the junior rodeo was still open for mutton bustin' sign ups, so Josh dashed around making all the necessary arrangements and before i knew it, Jacob was signed up to mutton bust-in 30 minutes!



josh and john escorted Jacob to the shoots while we went to the stands to wait for his ride. Nathan made lots of friends at the bottom of the stands, there little cow folk were running around everywhere. it was absolutely adorable, a real down home 4th of july with kids dashing to 'n fro, streaks of red, white and blue painting the canvas of the rodeo. patriotism united the hearts of all the spectators and riders. it was great to participate in some of the roots of our heritage and enjoy the anticipation of the opening of the shoot. jacob was suited up, and climbing down into the shoot, josh was at the top of the shoot while uncle john was helping jacob cowboy up on the mutton. the shoot opens and the mutton burst out making as sharp left sprinting across the arena. jacob clung to the mutton with all his might for 50 yards, 5.7 seconds. the crowd was hoopin' and holllerin'. He took second place and got a check for $55.20! (we're considering joining the circuit!) unfortunately my video skills do not coincide with watching the ride: