A Family for Ellie-Kate: July 2013

Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Chelsea Meagan's 19th birthday-- part one

July 17, 2013: Ellie-Kate's last t-ball game and "Bark in the Park" at the Copperhead game

Thursday, July 18, 2013

July 16, 2013: Ellie-Kate's Next to last t-ball game

Congrats to Emmy!! July 16, 2013

After staying up until about 1:45 a.m. with final preparations and studying, Emmy did great at the Athens County Food and Nutrition Judging on Monday, July 16, 2013! She won first place in her Party Planner project.

We know that we're a bit spoiled in terms of success when Emmy was actually a bit bummed after the competition... Why? Well, for the first time in three years, Emmy missed one question and did not earn a perfect score. As I assured her, she still did wonderful, and, well, one missed question in three years of competition is a pretty amazing track record! Congrats, Emmy!

July 14, 2013

After one of most poorly attended 4-H meetings on record, we had VBS rehearsal at the church. I'm going to be playing "Thelma Lou" in a series of skits set in an amusement park-- think Scooby Doo meets Andy Griffith in terms of mystery and characters. It's going to be very funny and, hopefully, reinforce the Bible messages throughout the week.

Crooksville-Roseville Pottery Festival-- July 13, 2013

Hi everyone--

Wow... as I'm going through this summer, I keep thinking about last summer. For example, as we were driving up to the Crooksville-Roseville Pottery Festival, my thoughts drifted back to this journey with Chelsea last year. In 2012, we drove up for the luncheon and then left to head over to the Franklin County Fair, one of our many "double-header" days.

In 2013, Chelsea was at King's Island with friends, celebrating Elena's 19th birthday. Ellie-Kate skipped the luncheon, and Britti, Ellie-Kate, and I drove up for the parade. The trip took us a bit longer than usual, but we still arrived in plenty of time for the float. In fact, the kids were more than a little bored as they awaited the beginning of the parade.

After the parade, Ellie-Kate did such an awesome job of smiling for photos and announcing herself on stage! Although it's not her favorite thing, she has been such a trooper during all of the royalty activities. I am just in awe of how mature and generous and incredible that she has been!!

When we got home, Ellie-Kate quickly changed and darted for the yard to play ball. Yes, she's a ball player at heart, but it's so cool to see her "girlie" side as well during her involvement with the festival circuit.

More soon--

Christie

Thursday, July 11, 2013

All caught up... at least for now :)

Hi everyone--

I'm very excited to be caught up on the blog again... at least for this moment... We definitely have not had a dull moment this summer, between 4-H and sports and teaching/taking online classes and caring for all of our critters!

This week has been the usual week before 4-H judging time of frenzy and last minute prep. Emmy has been working on her food project (judged on Monday of next week) before turning her attention to her still projects (a self-determined video endeavor that features her friend in a music video, her dog care project, and her pet pal project) that will be judged on Tuesday of next week. When she hasn't been working on 4-H projects or taking care of animals, she's also been going to a basketball camp here in Athens all week, and it's been very valuable.

Chelsea Meagan is working at Arby's, but she hasn't had to work much this week. Let's just say that she's been sleeping a lot and working on the online econ class that she's taking through OU... and caring for those ducks!

Britti is in full swing as the 4-H extension agent, answering questions and making sure that she has all of HER ducks in a row, so to speak, for judging week. When she's not doing 4-H stuff, she's taking pictures of her "baby," Buddy-- her cat!

Ellie-Kate has been enjoying her new reading passion-- the Junie B. Jones books. She LOVES those guys!!! Emmy used to love them too so we have the whole set, and I think that Ellie-Kate has make it all of the way through the ones in which Junie B. is a kindergartener. Ellie-Kate is also enjoying playing UNO, practicing her basketball, and playing t-ball. One of her games got cancelled for this week, due to the rain, but she had a good time on Monday night when she did play. She has another festival this week-end-- the Crooksville-Roseville Pottery Festival-- so that should be fun :)

Roger is just starting his online class, and I finished my two last week. Thus, this week has been spent on driving kids to activities and doing our best to keep animals alive.

We hope that you're having a great summer! Thanks for caring about our family!

Christie

Ellie-Kate's t-ball game-- July 8, 2013

Coach Joel, Michael, Emerson, Cameron, Ally, Carter, Emma, Coach Roger

Griffin, Shane, Corey, Eden, Ellie-Kate, Jessie Rae, and Jack

Ellie-Kate hit this one all of the way to the outfield!

Homerun!!

Playing first base-- again!

Our barn is FULL!!

We picked up Emmy's market rabbits on Sunday, July 7, and they were so cute! Meanwhile, Britti and Chelsea arrived back home safely from Orlando so our "barn" was truly full-- two older girls (tired from their trip), two younger girls (a bit envious about said trip), a dog, a cat, three ducks, and now 10 rabbits!

Sadly, one of these little guys passed away on Monday. The stress of the transition was just too much for his/her tiny system. Fortunately, I was able to get a replacement rabbit (plus a spare) from the breeder, even though that acquisition required me to invest another afternoon of travel to and from Lucasville. Now, we have 11 total rabbits in our house... Yup, never a dull moment...