Heard at My House

 Tucker: (Watching Brenna eat) Wow! My little brother Apollo isn't really a garbage disposal kind of kid. (Obviously Brenna is.)

Morgan: (showing a friend Owen's Beads of Courage) My little brother has had so much done to him. He has seizures and had lots of ambulances. He's had a hole in his tummy to feed him. He's had a lot and this necklace PROVES it!

Mommy: Morgan, don't pick on your brother. He's not feeling good and he's running a fever.

Owen: Yeah Morgan, be nice to me. I am running a seizure!

Tabernacles!

 Several years ago the kids and I studied the Feast of Tabernacles AKA Sukkot in our homeschool. We intended to continue our studies through an entire year of Biblical feasts, but that never actually happened (although I do remember doing something for Passover).

 For our study of Tabernacles, I decided to let the kids turn the living room into a giant Tabernacle. Every year since that first one( I can't remember how long ago, but at least 6 years), we have built forts in the living room or the kids bedrooms. I let the kids eat and do their schoolwork in the "booths".

 I admit that this year I only let them keep the forts up for about 3 days, not the Biblical 7. That was all I could handle! We also are obviously not too concerned with accuracy.

  It's just turned in to a fun part of our homeschool. It's nice to shake things up a bit and if they are learning something as well, all the better.

Want to Know What I Found Under my Countertop?

No, It's not play dough. It's GUM. Yes, I could have lived my life quite happily never knowing about it. No, gum is not allowed in the house. Unfortunately, I now have children old enough to buy their own gum( and old enough to get themselves to the store to get it). You might think that children old enough to get themselves to the store and buy their own gum with their own money would be old enough to NOT put their chewed up gum under the counter. I did, but obviously we are all wrong.

 In the older kids defense, I do know that a smaller person stole some gum from one of the bigger kids. I'm quite sure she didn't steal this much gum in this many colors though!

Door Troubles!

Owen: "You beat the level!!"

 Duncan had a friend over this week. He and his friend decided that they didn't want to play with Owen. Or maybe they were playing a combination of chase and hide and seek. Anyway, they ran into the boys room and slammed the door behind them.

 Only they slammed it so hard that they broke the hinges and got stuck in the room! This isn't the first time this has happened, but it was the worst( the door was in really bad shape when we moved in too).

 Connor had to go outside and enter the room through the window ( he wouldn't let me take pictures) to open the door from the inside. Connor then spent the next several hours fixing the door.

The door is supposed to open inwards, not outwards!

 Our new house rule is NO slamming doors! Wait, that was our OLD house rule too!

Flight- Young Eagles Program

Cessna Cardinal

 Connor and Cameron have been working on the Flight merit badge for Boy Scouts. Last weekend their troop partnered with the Young Eagles group and they got to go up in actual planes.

 Connor and Cameron rode in one of the bigger of the three planes, so Cameron rode in the back and didn't actually get to pilot. Connor got to pilot the plane during most of their 20+ minutes in the air.

Ercoupe

  There were a few time slots left open, so the Scout troop opened them up to siblings between the ages of 8 and 18 (Young Eagle requirements), we quickly e-mailed back and managed to snag one of the spots for Duncan.

 Duncan chose to ride in the little plane, not realizing that since he was the only "passenger" he would get to fly the whole time they were in the air. He got to take off too! Thankfully, he didn't get to land the plane.The plane he rode in was designed to be the safest fixed wing plane ever made. It's completely roll over proof.

 I think this has bumped river rafting out of the way for the favorite scout event of the year award.

 After the flight the boys received a code to sign up for Young Eagles membership. This gives them access to all sorts of information and videos about flight and being a pilot. They will also be notified about other events in our area. The boys came right home and signed up. Connor already has developed a plan to get his pilots license! Duncan was thrilled that he was able to fly a plane before he was old enough to drive a car. Devon was a little upset that she was too busy decorating a cake to participate, I think more air time will definitely be in our future.

Hobbit Cake

 I promised to do a whole post of Devon's Hobbit Hole cake, so here it is. I had planned today's post to be about Devon's first day of school EVER, but the teachers decided to strike instead.
 It took Devon about 6 hours to decorate this cake. It then took about an hour for it be completely demolished at the party.

Sleepover

 With Enoch in the hospital, we have been hosting some of his siblings. Avi stayed over Saturday night. I sent the little girls to bed just after 8:00, sent them beck to bed a few more times before 9:00, and then went in a few more times to remind them to be quiet. When Devon went to bed just before midnight (she was up late finishing the Hobbit cake), this was what she found. So, of course, we had to take pictures!

 Don't they look sweet? Sunday night we had Avi again along with Kalina and Hezekiah, then Monday night we ended up with Jubilee and Tucker along with the three others. If Enoch doesn't make it home soon, I might run out of room! Just kidding, the kids are thrilled to have friends over!

Lord of the Rings/ Hobbit Party!

Sorry, I didn't get any "before" pictures of the food table.

 Yesterday we went to a Lord of the Rings/Hobbit party! Devon and Tilly have spent weeks getting ready for this event.  I spent the last week sewing every spare second to get costumes finished.


 We had hobbits!

Owen as Frodo (borrowing Merri's vest)

This little hobbit was afraid of the troll

The only hobbit with authentic hobbit hair!

 We had elves!

Then there were an assortment of singleton costumes.

Dwarf

Ring Wraith

Troll

I thought this was a Golem costume, but I guess he was a troll too!

warrior

 We had a lot of food that I didn't get good pictures of including One Ring Doughnuts, Smegal's Fish, Hobbit Bread, and Zambian Fry Bread (made by Judah) which was really good even if it was a little off topic. We also had games although several of those got rained out.

 Devon made the Hobbit Hole cake (and looked away while it was being cut). I'll do a post soon with more pictures of the cake as I think it deserves a post of it's own.

 Unfortunately, one thing we didn't have was Enoch as he was taken to the Emergency room this weekend with a ruptured appendix. I'm sure prayers for a quick recovery would be greatly appreciated!

 As usual, I didn't get nearly as many pictures as I would have liked. We managed to keep Owen from eating anything other than his own food (by watching him like a hawk), but we still had a seizure last night after he fell asleep. We had to give him his rescue med after 4 minutes and it took another 4 minutes for the seizure to stop. I'm calling the neurologist to talk about possibly checking his medication levels sooner than the November visit as he hasn't been sleeping well and I think that is the biggest factor with the seizures. We've been told several times that his medication SHOULD make him sleepy, not wired. We've always noticed the opposite whenever we've increased meds though and I'm thinking the keto diet might be changing how he metabolizes his other drugs. We haven't made new changes to the diet, so I'm not sure what else could be contributing to them unless the diet just isn't going to work for us.

 Yesterday was also my stepdaughter Cassi's birthday, although we didn't get to see her as flying to Kentucky isn't really feasible right now. I didn't get a post up yesterday, so I'll just say "Happy Birthday Cassi!", today instead.

 Interestingly enough the last two times we had to give Owen his rescue meds were also sibling birthdays, Duncan's in May and Cameron's in July. I'm not sure exactly why Owen always seems to have seizures on Birthdays and holidays.