Macy's Grad Party!

 We had a wonderful celebration for Macy's high school graduation last night!

She worked so hard and is happy to be moving on to the next exciting season in her life!

 Forever and ever sisters!

Macy and her daddy.  (They're so cute, aren't they?)

Cousin Brennan and Isaiah in his sweater-vest-"tank top".  

 My mom and me!  

(Funny story.  I baked her some bread to take home with her, in exchange for her

picking me up some false eye lashes.  

What can I say...I'm in a baking-fashion-experimentation stage of life.)

(I think that a video of me putting on my new falsies would be fun!)

Macy and my mom.  DARLING GIRLS!

My Mom-in-law and Macy.  DARLING GIRLS!

Macy and me.  DARLING GIRLS!

(Our t-shirts are from Connie...go to her blog to get yours!!)

(Sorry to everyone else I didn't photograph!)

Congratulations to Macy-girl and her huge accomplishment!   

Macy's High Achievement!

It's nearly impossible to believe, but Macy is almost finished with high school!

And today she got a letter for academics.

She's so super smart!

We are super proud of her hard work!

And because Lucy couldn't stand not to have her picture taken also:

What good girls they are!

Macy's Birthday

Yesterday was Macy's 18th birthday!

WOW, I can't even believe that she has already reached this big milestone!

We had a lovely little celebration!

first days of school....

I should have posted this last week!

But here I am, way late, as usual.

Macy and Eli's first day of school, last Friday.

Yes, Eli is WAY tall and Macy is WAY short!

So it goes, here on the ranch.

And here are Lucy and Isaiah on their first day of homeschool enrichment classes!

(A couple weeks ago.)

(Isaiah is severely addicted to his cowboy boots, even on hot days....with shorts on.)

Oh, these kids!!!

summer break!

School's out, school's out!!

Yesterday was Macy and Eli's LAST day of school for 2013.

Hooray for them!!!

Eli is now an official 8th grader!

Macy is now an official SENIOR in high school.

Wow!

(Nick's last day was last week...he is now free from all pesky high school classes...forever!)

(More on him later.)

So now the wild summer vacation begins.

I am eager to see how long it takes before I lose my mind.

But I'll try to hold off as long as I can.

It is my deepest desire to take loads of pictures and enjoy every moment.

Yes, that's it!

So, we'll start with Mr. Isaiah Jack-Jack.

The little man is nothing without his cowboy boots.

Even though I'm pretty sure they're way too small for him now.

But he doesn't care about such petty things!

And Eli loves his cowboy boots, too.

These two boys have really embraced life in America quite well, I must say.

They've been with us for TWO years now!

My goodness, hard to believe.

Lucy, the matriarch of the Chinese clan.

These two, I tell ya.

Many hoops will be shot in this driveway this summer!

Much loving will be given to this dog, Zeke.

Ohhhhh, how he loves rolling around in the fabulous grassssss.

It's the best EVERrrrrr.

The entire Chinese clan.

Really, they're super cute.

So that's that.

Let the summer craziness officially begin!

fun-filled weekend

My goodness, what a weekend!

Here's a partial pictorial:

Blackberry cobbler.

Isaiah going outside to play...with his mask...because his face was cold.

Brenden came home!

And here he is brushing his teeth in my KITCHEN because all the bathrooms were full.

#lifeinabigfamily

Here I am at the laundry mat.

Because my washing machine died. (More on that later.)

I have a new fondness for this way of doing laundry.

Knocked out four loads in nothing flat.

Note to self: save up for four washing machines.

All my kids, and two girlfriends, invaded my kitchen and took over completely.

Brotherly love.

Motherly love.

And now he's heading back to school.

Wahhhh.

*********

OH, and I have a funny Macy story.

She got a job at a little Chinese restaurant near our house.

She worked her first shift last night...

And when K-Man picked her up, she told him she was making $2.50 an hour.

He was quite alarmed by that and asked her exactly what they said...

and she said, "they said they are paying me $10.  

I worked four hours...so, that's $2.50 an hour....is that too much?"

Oh my WORD.

So, I marched in there this afternoon for her second shift,

introduced myself (with a Mama Bear attitude), and asked them HOW MUCH exactly

they were paying her.

(We seriously thought they were taking advantage of her!)

Very sweetly the gal said,

"$10 an hour."

Hahahahaha.

Gotta love the many things lost in translation.

*********

And that's about it, folks.

I hope your weekend was great, too!

what a day!

Yesterday was one crazy day.

Along with my bee fiasco, here's what else happened:

It was Brenden's final day of his fall break, 

so he helped me home school the little children.

Take a look.

My math-major college son,

helping my rascally kindergartener with...math.

And the look in B's face genuinely speaks volumes.

And then he helped Lucy with a word problem.

It left both of us dumbfounded.

We never did figure it out.

Darn that 2nd grade math!

And then later,

Brenden headed back to school.

Lucy has a hard time with that.

And so do I.

But THEN!

We celebrated Macy's 17th birthday!!!

Wow, what a day!

pitiful things

I'm happy to report that

Macy has made a great recovery

from her wisdom teeth removal.

It's been one week and she's almost back

to her old self,

short of still taking it easy on food choices.

Here she is

rolling her own oats for oatmeal.

She's so thrilled that I took a photo!

And in other news:

Here is kitty cat looking so pitiful through

my kitchen window.

And here are two pitiful grown men

who just couldn't take the longing looks anymore.

They opened the windows and let them in.

You have no idea the pitiful things I deal with

around here.

Send help immediately.