We Survived Summer Break

Summer break is officially over.  We have had 2 birthday's grew a garden, got rid of some kittens, and so far have survived the summer monsoons.  Maddi turned 5 years old on May 31st and got exactly what she wanted for her birthday, a bike!  Her very own bike!  No more hand me downs with broken pedals, half a seat and flat tires!  Our garden took off like crazy!  It produced countless baby watermelons, and cucumbers, a couple of cantelopes, 8 ears of corn, a full size watermelon and 2 baby tomatoes.  The monsoon season came in with a bang and at first it really helped that garden.  I think eventually we had so much rain that it killed the garden.  That, the 115 degree days we have been having lately and our grden friend, the green horned tomato worm.  The cucumbers and corn turned bad before we even were able to pick them.  Kenni was so excite about the garden that he is already planning a winter garden.  That is one thing about AZ that I love, you can have a garden in the winter!  Laura turned 11 years old on August 2nd.  11 years old!  I still just can't believe it!  She wanted a password journal and bunk beds for her birthday.  She got the password journal but the bunk beds were a far stretch!  Her password journal has a voice activated password.  Kenni being the great brother he is, already mimicked her voice and is able to open her journal!  As hard as it was, we finally were able to find home for 2 of our 3 rescue kittens.  A friend of mine took one and a friend of James took the other so we are still able to see them and see how they are doing.  The kids started school on the 8th.  So now all 4 of our children are officially in school.  Kenni really likes his teacher.  He said he hasn't made too many friends yet but his "girlfriend" is in his class so he was totally excited about that!  He said there is a mean girl in his class.  Maddi has already said that she is going to have a serious talk with this girl then she is going to smack her in the face!  James says he doesn't like school but he really does.  Kenni's teacher's daughter is in James class and she is new to the school.  Kenni's teacher was telling me how glad she was that James was her friend.  When I asked him about it he told me he just lets her follow him around to be nice!  Laura really likes her teacher this year.  She is bummed that her best friend isn't in her class but they still have lunch together   Maddi isn't phased a bit by being in school all day.  Her first day she didn't stop talking at all about it until she fell asleep that night.  She has two teachers, once for normal kindergarten and the other for her extended day program.  Her morning teacher is a girl and Maddi said she is super nice and pretty and that is where she does all her learning.  Her afternoon teacher is a boy.  She said they just have fun and play duck duck goose.  She also told me that on the first day of school she sang the song "call me maybe" in front of the whole class!  

May 2012

Summer has officially arrived!  It's been almost 110 degrees, the wind is blowing and dust is flying and school is out.  We've been pretty busy here.  The kittens are no longer contained in a box and they are into everything.  Kenni was in the school play call Finding Home.  He was one of the leading roles.  The story was about Chester Piggie the 3rd (Kenni) was lost and couldn't find his story.  He did an AWESOME job and I am so proud of him for getting in front of everyone to perform.  I have somehow landed myself a full time job.  I am now a secretary at the kids' school.  With Maddi starting Kindergarten next year it will be the perfect place to be.  The downfall is I have to work full time all through the summer.  Thankfully we have our wonderful lifesaver cousins who are going to be watching the kiddo's for us.  James Sr. had the first out of a series of 3 cortisone shots for his 3 herniated disks he has.  Hopefully he will get some relief from the pain he has been in for the last 3 months.  He saved his snazzy hairnet he had to wear and the kids love to wear it.  The boys have started a garden in our backyard and we are really hoping it will take off.  We've tried to have a garden many times without success so hopefully since the boys planted this one it will be plentiful.  

Ozbirn Family Update.....

Well we've been a bit busy around here the last couple of months.  Over Spring Break Grandad and Mary Lew came out for a visit.  Since I was no longer working we convinced Grandma Jackson to come out with them a stay for a while.  Grandad and Mary Lew took the kids to do all kinds of things while they were here but since we didn't have a a car to transport all of us Grandma and I stayed home.  Just a few days after Grandma got here she got really sick with bronchitis and almost landed herself in the hospital.  We worked very hard and keeping her on time taking her medicine and breathing treatments and we avoided a hospital stay.

The easter bunny was nice to the kids this year and brought them lots of candy and even some legos.  He had to hide the baskets in the garage because our cats like to eat the plastic grass!  

Grandma turned 78 while she was here.  we were very happy to be able to spend her birthday with her since we haven't been able to do so since we've lived in AZ.  Laura made Grandma a cake and a special birthday place mat.  We made her a special meatloaf dinner and got her some jammies and comfy socks.  

At the end of April the kids had a festival at school called the Spring Spectacular.  If the school raised enough money then the vice principal had to kiss a pig.  Her and my boys are always teasing each other because she is a Packers fan and the boys are Vikings fans.  She hates the Vikings so she told the boys she would wear Kenni's Viking hat while she kissed the pig.  While we were there the boys climbed a rock wall, they held a baby pig, played on the various bounce houses and played various games.  There was a water slide bouncy house and since it was 105 degrees outside that is where Laura pretty much stayed put with her friends.    

Last week James brought us home 3 little prizes from work.  There were 3 little abandoned kittens stuck in a truck.  Their eyes weren't even open and it was 105 degrees outside so he brought them home.  Since then we have been bottle feeding them and taking care of them.  

Grandma left left last Thursday and is now home safely far away from the sweltering heat of AZ.  We miss her a great deal.  Especially Maddi.  Grandma spoiled her rotten with candy, cream drops and going out to breakfast.  Grandma watched the kids a few times while James and I went to run errands and they said Grandma was the best babysitter ever!  She let them eat all kids of candy and cookies and let them do whatever they wanted!