what's happening..... now!

I finished my first quarter of school. By the grace of God, I finished with a 4.0 gpa. I received an e-mail stating that I made the President's list at the school. That gave me the thought that "Yes, I can do this". I am doing this!!

My girls also got their report cards the same day, and WOW was I impressed with them! The girls are working so hard to make good grades. Don't get me wrong, they still hate doing homework, and they still have the occasional day that they come home with a note from the teacher about not paying attention but all in all they are dong well. I was worried this year, but slowly they are making it work.

My son is writing his name very well now. They make all of the students sign-in in the mornings and that is helping him out a lot. I was worried about that at the beginning of the year when the teacher told me that "They" don't allow the teachers to work on writing skills in depth in pre-K anymore. It blew my mind when she said that. I am glad that she is taking the initiative to do it anyway. He has also been reciting numbers and letters out of books or off of the t.v. lately. I was floored when he read me a toll free number from a commercial the other day. I teared up. My baby is getting so big!

My husband's hand is getting better as well. Praise God that we love each other and acknowledge that neither one of us are perfect and that we will always have our differences of opinions. We talk through them though, and that makes me happy. He is still on the part time schedule at work and that is making our budget get ever tighter as the weeks tick by. We have exhausted all of our "reserve" money that I kept from out tax return to pay the bills. I have been trying to cut back as much as possible to help ease the budget crunch. I am hoping that it will only be another week or so before they go back to the full time schedule again. Summer is coming on fast, so that helps.

The kids start spring break this Friday and won't have to go back to school until April 12th. I however start spring quarter on Monday, so they will be spending the night with my in-laws on Sunday night (Easter) and I will get them back at some point during the week. I am so blessed by my in-laws!! Hannah's birthday is coming up fast, on the 9th. She turns 8 this year. Man, time flies when you have kids, doesn't it!! I want to plan on doing something special for her. I guess it will all depend on money at that point. She loves to cook, so maybe I will let her help me cook that night. (can you say win-win?)

I have made a self-commitment to not be on the computer once my husband gets home at night. I want to try to be able to have some more time with him, especially once the kids go to bed. We don't really get allot of time to talk about his day or my day and even what's happening in the kids' lives at that point. There seems to never be enough time in the day to fit it all in. So, this is my way of trying to help the situation.

I have also decided to restart my Dave Ramsey financial book. I would love to be able to do the Financial webinar program that he has, but it costs about $100 to do it, and there isn't money in the budget for that. A friend of mine on Facebook said that he held a yard sale for him and his wife to do it, sounds like a good idea to me. There is plenty of stuff that we need to get rid of around here anyway. I told my husband at the beginning of the year that THIS would be our year, and so far we have wasted 3 months of it. We really need to get it together and do things right, especially with our money.

I am so proud of my girls for singing at church this week. Well, Lilly did great in practice (singing and smiling) but then when it came time to sing in front of a whole church, she had a melt down and just stood at the alter with her fists on her chin. Oh well, Hannah sang (like a deer in the headlights). They did great though. I am also proud to say that our little small church's children have planted a (5 raised beds) vegetable garden. They plan on building a veggie stand for the kids to be able to sell their goods at harvest time, or give away the food to the needy families in our area. Our church also helps support a food bank, so some of the veggies may find their way there too. It warms my heart that all of the kids are so into getting this project done. They have all been so excited about it. My kids want to walk over there every afternoon to check on the plants.

I also want to say Thank You for reading my blog. I may only have 4 followers, but it amazes me that 4 people want to read about this weird, wife, mommy, student, wanna be farmer redneck with issues. I would love to hear if any of you have done the Dave Ramsey way of finances. I have heard great things about it, but didn't know if any of you had experience with it.

Bless y'all,
Jamie