Shae's Favorite Meal

Shae absolutely loves chicken enchiladas! On her last day at school (their real last week has been in the Virgin Islands, graduation is June 1st!)) Shae and Maeghan planned a potluck lunch for the senior class.

Which meant that I had to make the enchiladas, bake them and deliver them hot at lunchtime.

That also meant I had a chance to visit with some of my favorite kids...

I gave the girls their senior trip gifts while I was there. Monogrammed beach towels, a blow up floaty and personalized stationary. I think I am developing a "monogram addiction" but aren't they so cute?

The weary travellers will be home late- late tomorrow night and I cannot wait to see all the pictures!! I just put some clean, ironed, fresh sheets on my girl's bed along with her little welcome home gift. Wonder how I will survive with her so far away next year.

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Senior Year Flies By!

I can't believe Shae's senior year of high school is officially over!

The "Spring Banquet" (even though it is not a banquet...people who went to christian schools totally get this!) was the last event for the school year.

It was a chance to get dressed up and have fun with friends!

And take lots of pictures!

Here are some of the seniors. They are on their way to the Virgin Islands for their senior trip through Joshua Expeditions (a christian organization, they have a missions element during their week too!)! They will arrive tonight after a 4 hour bus ride to San Fransisco, a 5 hour flight to Miami and a 2 1/2 hour flight to St. Thomas. Phew! I know they will be exhausted. But... Something tells me they won't care!

Please keep them in your prayers for safety, fun and above all, good testimonies! They travel back next Saturday and then they have Graduation to look forward to on Tuesday, June 1st!

Superior Anna

A few weeks ago Anna came home and announced that she had been chosen to represent her class in the annual Speech Meet. I will admit, I wasn't super excited...I had been down that road before when Shae was in elementary school and I remember helping her learn the looooooong poem she said!

It's funny how you sort of "relax" with each child after the first one. Anna's category was "Bible Prose." She learned the story of Moses. Every.single.word. all by herself! She would occasionally recite it to us while we cleaned up after dinner, but the girl did it on her own!

Our school was the host school, so it was a minimum day. I brought lunch for Shae and Anna, so we had a picnic and practiced a few times before the students from all the other schools arrived just to calm the nerves a bit.

Papa and Grandma came out to support Anna!

We weren't allowed to take pictures in the room but Anna did a wonderful job! She had such expression and poise. The girl right before Anna drew a blank, and sat back down crying...so I we were very nervous about how that would affect Anna.

When it came time to hand out the awards the nerves set in again! Redding Christian students were called to the stage! There were 4 levels; participant, good, excellent and superior.

I watched Anna as they began calling the kids up...there were many "superiors" in a row and she had a smile on her face, hopeful that she would fall into that category. Then there was an "excellent" called...Uh Oh. The smile on Anna's face began to fade! A couple of "good"s were called up...double Uh Oh!! Hope returned when there was a "superior" again! Phew!

What a relief when the words, "Anna Luff.... SUPERIOR" were said!!

We were so proud of her! I am sure it is hard to live up to a big sister who was naturally good at everything, but I have a feeling there will be a lot more awards in this "little sister's" future!

Anna, we are so proud of you and we think you are VERY SUPERIOR!

Great Job on that very long recitation, I don't think I could have done it!

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Sunny Saturday

I seriously hope that Anna will take care of me when I am old! I walked outside to see this scene today:

Anna had Lindsay all set up with an umbrella, books, drinks, sunglasses and 2 FANS blowing on her!

What a Life!

Driving on Field Trips...

Every year, Redding Christian takes the whole high school to Marine World in Vallejo (between Sacramento and San Francisco). Parents are the drivers. My friend Stacy and I have driven each year that Maeghan and Shae have gone. Two years ago we dropped our kids off at the gate and took off to shop, have lunch and see a movie.

LAST YEAR we had to STAY IN THE PARK FOR 10 HOURS!!

Here are the fun girls I had the pleasure of spending 3 hours (each way) with. It was a fun, giggling, singing filled trip!! I got the low-down on who likes who and all that important stuff!

It was so funny this year because usually we don't hear from the girls all day (unless we are there to hold their stuff while they were on a ride) they love staying there from opening until closing. THIS YEAR Maeghan and Shae BOTH called us around noon and were "over" Marine World!

Guess they had their fill of all the rides, and Mr. Diehl (and his roll of quarters) squirting them with the quarter operated squirt gun!

This year Stacy and I kidnapped our friend, Carmen Diehl (she ditched her husband and his quarters in the park!) to go shopping! We had the most wonderful time together!

Carmen, Stacy and I are identical in the way we shop! We hit all the most important and FUN stores: Coach Outlet(where Carmen got the most precious purse!), HomeGoods, Marshalls, TJ Maxx, Ross...

It was so nice to just take our time because we had 10 hours to waste! We found some great stuff and still had room for the kids to ride home with us (after putting most of it in Carmen's awesome storage area of her van..Stacy and I have NO ROOM in our Expeditions for bags!!)

Then....then.....we went to *IKEA*!! We spent 3 hours in there and I spent a total of only $4.95!

What a fun store to just wander around in with good friends!

Shae and Maeghan called several times wishing we were close enough to come pick them up to shop too, but we were too far away. Carmen has twin boys who are seniors too, and one of her boys called to see if we would make a McDonald's run for them!!! Obviously they all think we have NOTHING important to do but we had some serious shopping going on!

Last year everyone in my car was asleep in about 10 minutes on the way home so I was delighted to have more singing on the way home! They all did eventually fall asleep about an hour away from home but Shae would occasionally wake up and ask me if I was okay. :)

I can't believe another year is ending and I have a child who will be OUT of high school! Oh well, in 3 years I am sure I will be on the road to Marine World again with a carload of Anna's friends!

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There are so many things to think about and even more to PRAY about when you have a child about to graduate high school and go away to college. How thankful I am for the many Bible verses that bring comfort as I prepare to send my first born into the world.

"He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty."

Ps. 91:1

Jog-A-Thon and Purple Furniture

Every other year Redding Christian has a jog-a-thon fundraiser. It is always a huge success and the kids love it! This is the first year that the Elementary through High School has been on one campus (thanks to our wonderful new facilities!!) so it was also the first year that "the big kids" ran. The Junior High and High School could choose between running a 5 or 10K while the younger kids ran around the track.

Here are some of the seniors ready to go!

It was SO COLD and windy the whole time. I was freezing as I stood on the side counting laps for Anna's class! Here is Shae with Maeghan "I signed you up for the 10K, Shae" Hutchins.

Yep...10K...that is 6.2 miles!

The seniors got a good start and took pictures after each "K".

When I looked at the pictures I said to Shae, "were YOU TAKING the pictures?" She said, Uh, NO...I WAS RUNNING!"

What a cute idea to take a picture in the dugout...but I still wondered where Shae was?!

Here are the 5th graders from Mrs. Jarrett's class.

Anna ran 19 laps...4 1/2 miles! I was shocked every time she passed by us! So many kids just walked so I figured she would mostly walk but she RAN most of the way, finishing with the 5th most laps in her class!

When Anna and I were heading home I noticed that Shae's friends were in her truck (well, her Papa's truck she has borrowed for weeks...) asking ME where she was! I had no idea. They were headed to lunch and waited for 30 minutes or so before leaving her a note that they were at Round Table. Shae called to ask me to meet her with some money for lunch and said that the very ones who signed her up for the 10k had quit after 5k and she and her friend, Rachel had finished the 10K!!! She had no idea that they quit! Hahahaha!

So she ran 6.2 miles and ate a guilt-free pizza lunch!

Later that afternoon Anna had her last softball game. It was the championship game! They ended up losing by 2 runs, but, think how tired all those girls must have been after the jog-a-thon!

~Purple Furniture~

Shae left early this morning to do her community service, so she noticed that our neighbors were having a garage sale. She told me to check out the purple furniture.

Lindsay, Anna and I walked over to look at it..I wanted the cute bench for Shae's room. I am going to paint it black and recover the seat, load it with pillows and put it against the wall!

Scott was less than thrilled, to say the least...but The WHOLE set, including the bench, a chair, the dressing table and a headboard with foot board was a mere $40. How could I NOT get it??

I can keep what I want and sell the rest on Craig's List! Lindsay and Anna have been fighting all day over the purple dressing table though!

{he said "these kind of deals never work out for us..we'll see!}

I wish I had taken a picture of Scott's face while he carried it across the street. Priceless.

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