Thursday, January 24, 2008

Life at the ranch

Two weekends ago Levi and I did a little craft project. A guy I work with came up with this, and it's brilliant! It's Reverse Tie Dye. You start with a dark colored cotton t-shirt. (Wally World, 2/$5) Tie them up with lots of rubber bands, and throw them into bleach water. No messy dyes, no stained hands, no colors that bleed when you wash them. Just magical shirts and lots of fun. I used about 1/3 bleach and 2/3 water, soaked them for 3-5 minutes, then rinsed the heck out of them with clean water. Then I removed the rubber bands and threw them into the wash.

This one was a navy blue shirt to begin with.

And this one was a dark green before the treatment. Levi thinks they are ultra-cool and I got a sparkling clean sink and fresh smelling disposal to boot. Thanks Robert!!
Levi has a wicked imagination. Here he is being a cow. He is moo-ing. (Didn't have the heart to tell him the difference between a bull and a cow...)
Operation Kiddie Korral was in full swing last weekend. With the warm weather around the corner it was time to make a safe play area for the kiddos. That's Levi behind the fence helping his Dad. My next project is to coat the fence with a thick layer of white enamel to look good and prevent splinters.




Just when I think I am about to strangle her, she does something incredible and I am filled with pride. Last night was sophmore academic night at the high school. It was all about planning for college, preparing for the entrance exams, taking the right classes, etc. There are 8 required classes, in addition to the math/english etc, each child needs to graduate. Katie is on her last one. Unlike the rest of her friends, who took all the fun classes last year and this year, she took all the required ones and is now planning on taking advanced placement courses and earning college credits in the next 2 years. She has signed up for the honors plan, where you take extra credit classes and can graduate with commendations. She has even been nominated by her english teacher to take AP english and comp next year, which is a senior level course. There were lots of parents there, but not very many kids. Katie wanted to go, I didn't have to drag her along. She listened and absorbed all the info and we discussed her options on the way home. Then I called the cellular company and ordered her replacement phone ($50 since we have insurance) and it will be here tomorrow. She is really a great kid. How did that happen?






5 comments:

Pattie M said...

What a great idea for the shirts. I'm going to do that next time my step kids are here!! Thanks for sharing that.
Levi cracks me up!!

Lucinda Naia said...

Did you watch the Dateline video on Sunday? I didn't see it so I was watching online tonight. There was a shot at the very beginning of the show of some children who were playing in their hogar. I truly thought it might be PBJ. Since I read your blog and some other blogs regularly, I may have been mistaken. I just wanted to ask if you might have seen it. Here's the link:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/22721799#22769314

If that doesn't work, it's the one titled Jan 21 - To catch a baby broker. Ann Currie speaks at the beginning. I haven't even watched the rest of the video because I was so struck by the fact that I recognized the child.

I've seen on other message boards that they took footage at several different hogars. There isn't any insinuation that there are problems with the adoptions of the children who are on camera.

My apologies to you if I'm wrong and it's not PBJ. I just thought I'd share with you in case it was & you weren't aware of the video.

Wendy said...

Lucinda,

We were interviewed for the story on several occasions. Our first agency was shown briefly as they were being arraigned in court. The baby you saw wasn't PBJ, but they did film at Ahren's orphanage. He wasn't there that day since he is still with his original foster family. I thought it was a great show that unveiled some of the problems the new laws are designed to correct. It's about time their system got cleaned up and the baby brokers run out of town!!!

Wendy

Ellie said...

Love the Shirts...

Little Man ... COW??? Momma... You need to tell him!

And, what do you mean how did Katie turn out such a wonderful kid>???? WELL YOU ARE HER MOTHER AREN'T YOU!

Daughter Like Mother!

HUGS

Esther said...

Got a great chuckle out of the cow picure. Or is it a bull?