Say What?

It had been a running family joke that Nick was going to talk his way into the marching band as soon as possible. Whenever we saw a sixth grader manage to worm a spot on the stands, or a seventh grader marching on the field, we knew that Nick would follow in their footsteps. Kai did one show in sixth grade herself, and everyone knows you can get into the band earlier if you have an older sibling.

But I must say, we didn't actually think he'd get a spot with the band in FIFTH grade.



Granted, it's just a spot on the honor guard for now. He'll be carrying the band banner, or maybe the American flag. But he gets the uniform. He gets to travel with the band everywhere they go. He gets to go to the games, the competitions, and the parades. And as he says, he can tell the Penn State Blue Band when he applies for college that he's been in the high school marching band for eight years. (He predicts they will say, and I quote: "What the? Who the? How the?"

But what was really funny was what happened when he got his whole uniform on and stood out on the lawn. Scott has had people glance at photos of Kai in band uniform and say "Is that your son?" But when we saw Nick in his uniform, our first thought was, "Whoa. He looks like Kai."

What do you think?

I'm Bored

Okay. So everyone always says "Where do you find the time, Jenn?" and "Did you actually vacation at all, Jenn?" and other assorted things when I talk about my summer.

But VBS is done. Our trip is over. Band camp doesn't start until next week. And this week, all I have to do is nothing.

That was fun, for a day. Then I finished scrapping every picture I have developed, caught up on the blog, wrote several trip report updates, cleaned the house, did laundry - basically gave myself to-do lists to keep busy. Napped. A lot.

Now I've been doing "nothing" for four days. I'm SOOOO over that.

So today I tried to make up my own cupcake recipe, using bits of this and that. An apple filling recipe from one site. My spice cake recipe I've used since I was a kid. A brown sugar icing recipe (cooked icing, no less) from another site.

The end result was these Apple Spice cupcakes. This was a first attempt - later I hollowed out more of the cupcake with a spoon handle so I could stuff in more apples.





They are good, but I have to say - we had this leftover apple filling. And leftover icing. So we stuck the apples between two tortillas and put them in the quesadilla maker. Then we dipped them in the leftover icing. That was REALLY good.

Good thing I was on a cooking streak and skipped breakfast. Otherwise, I'd feel really guilty about the half cupcake and 1/6 applepiedilla I had. (I'm STILL trying to lose enough weight to not be considered overweight by the old height and weight charts. *sigh*)

Can Hannah Sleep Over? Puleeze?

What was I supposed to say? We only get Hannah 7 weeks out of the year. And Kai and Nick had been gone for almost 4 of them. Sure, it was the night after a long week of VBS. But what's a little more mayhem among friends? Three more kids, make your own sundaes, movies - why not?

Besides, it's not like she takes up much room.

Let's Go!

Wow! What a week. We had 56 kids at VBS, our highest number ever. I had to keep running to Hackman's for more t-shirts and crafts, and every night, new faces appeared at the registration table. It was wonderful and chaotic, blessed and a little bit crazy. But every kid went away knowing that God's Word is true, comforting, surprising, and life changing. And most importantly, God's Word is for everyone! I wish I had better pictures, but I was so busy I handed the camera off to Scott and forgot to tell him to put the flash back on, so everything's a bit blurry. It was still nice of him to try to get me pictures. If you want to see some more of the week, you can check out the slideshows Ed created on Calvary Baptist's Facebook.

We couldn't have done it without our great volunteers and supportive church family. Now it's time to start saving cardboard rolls - next year, our theme is Panda Mania. We're going to need a LOT of bamboo!

Cyndy's Wedding Dress

I can't show you the pictures of Cyndy's dress, of course. What if Ben finds this site? But Hannah, Kairi, and I went to help Cyndy pick out a dress for her Christmas wedding. She found the perfect dress, and at a great discount. She'll be a beautiful bride! And Hannah will be a lovely maid of honor.