Five Things Friday

5. We have a crazy weekend ahead: family night, birthday party, house cleaning, helping sister and J move, graduation, graduation party, church, discipleship class, dinner with our youth.

4. Working out has become something I really look forward to. Thanks Steph for making it fun! Even though she had me running suicides... yes, you heard me right.

3. D has been working on our summer calendar and I can't believe how quickly our summer has been filled with family and youth events!

2. I am teaching our kindergarten VBS class this year. The theme is Sonquest Rainforest which conveniently coincides with the decor of my classroom. So decorating for VBS should be easy and inexpensive!

1. I found the most comfortable flip flops in Florida! They are North Face Women's Base Camp Wedge. Technically Julie found them, but if I could wear them with every outfit I would. Now Stacy and Clinton wouldn't agree, but you will definitely see me in them.... a lot.

holy cow

In less than 1 month (it was a month from yesterday) my baby sister is getting married!!! I can't believe it's almost here. Neither can she. She is beyond giddy with excitement! Yay sister and Jer Bear!

Florida pictures... thanks to Jules

As soon as we got there, Lily sat down and covered herself with sand. The sand she loved. The ocean was a different story.



No we didn't dig this hole, but we're going to look cute sitting in it anyways.



Hat. Check. Swimsuit. Check. Toy. Check. Fat rolls that my aunt candy loves. Check.



No Candace.... I do it myself.

My favorite Mags...eyes closed and all.

In about 4 seconds Lily realizes she does not like that water.

The dolphin retrieving the fish from the sea lion's mouth.

Pure sweetness.

We have the best grammy and papa.

Too bad Jules didn't take this a few seconds later when they actually surfaced.

Me and the cutenesses.

Yep, they're keepers.

Try it Tuesday... is a must!

Thanks to the grizzly girls who gave these to my man in a golf tournament.... I have discovered a new delicious drink. I guess I should be thanking Arnold Palmer because this fantastic drink is Arnold Palmer's half sweet tea/half lemonade concoction made by Arizona. It can be bought in cans so it's quite refreshing to grab one and drink by the pool.

This fantastic drink is not only refreshing, but only contains a mere 50 calories per serving. I assure you it's worth trying. Let me know what you think!

I'm back

Well... after waking up at 3:45a.m. to catch a 6:00a.m. flight...which was delayed... I am finally home. Well, I was finally home...rather at work by 9:45a.m. Thanks to Jesus and Starbucks I'm making it pretty well considering how long I have been awake.

I love vacations, but its good to be back. My kids greeted me with sweet hugs and I missed you's. Yea... I really did miss them.

The beach was wonderful, the weather was perfect, and the people weren't so bad either. In fact, my favorite part of the trip was not the dolphin cruise or soaking up rays on the beach, but rather sitting on the airplane when my niece Maggie leaned over and wrapped her sweet arms around mine and said, "Candace, I love you." Yep, that pretty much made my trip.

glorious

After a crazy last few weeks of youth events, wedding showers, luncheons, rehearsal, wedding day craziness, youth led Sunday, and our big K4 program at school, I am happy to announce that I am sitting in Florida looking at the beautiful emerald coast.

The weather is perfect.... warm with a slight breeze. We flew out yesterday morning and by lunch we were sitting in our swimsuits on the patio of the Hilton restaurant eating lunch.... overlooking the ocean. Jealous? Yea, I thought I'd rub it in.

What I get to look at.....

View from our hotel looking out towards the ocean.

It's okay.... you can hate me.

Trueassic Park

Today was our K4 program. This is our big hooray that we practice for months for. This year's theme was Trueassic Park. Basically all the songs are about how God created everything from the dinosaurs to birds. Thankfully Mrs. Holland's church had done this program for VBS a couple of years ago so we had the music, back drop, and lots of great ideas.

When we began practicing the songs in January, we were shocked at how quickly our kids learned them. The songs are so fun. As the weeks neared, we realized there was definitely some tweaking that needed to be done. We still had wigglers, those who were too cool to sing, those who would rather talk to their friends, twirl in a circle, play with their hair, etc. You can imagine how frustrating this got with 30 kids on stage, 3 teachers, and days until the actual performance.

Thankfully, we have all done a Spring program before so we knew what to expect and we knew that the kids always do a little better when their parents are watching. Today was no exception. They got on that stage and from the minute the music started...they were pros. I couldn't be more proud of them... jelly beans, skittles, and bribing them with a popsicle party doesn't hurt either.

award

Thank you Jennie so much for the award. I am honored to receive it.

The rules for accepting the sunshine award:
1. put the logo in my post and within my blog
2. pass the award to a fellow blogger
3. link the nominee within this post
4. let the nominee know they have received this award by leaving a comment on their blog
5. share the love and link to the person who gave you the award

Check out one of my favorite blogs below as I spread the "sunshine."

Anna at Life Eccentric

I gave this award to Anna because her blog ...when she updates...always makes me laugh. I love her wit and sarcasm. I love Anna because she is so much like 2 of my favorite people...sister and jules. Their (anna, kacie, julie) black and white personalities are a good contrast to my (too much) sugary sweetness. If only I could be as blunt as I'd like and able to say the thing that needs to be said in the moment....so thanks Anna for your honesty, sarcasm, and bluntness...the world wouldn't be the same without it.

Ten Things Thursday

10. This has been a whirlwind of a week. So much so that I've had to cancel some workouts to fit everything in. I will gladly admit...I've missed it.

9. I got my nails done yesterday for r and b's wedding. I went with french both on the toes and nails. One little girl at recess looked at my toes and said, "It looks like you have icing on your toes."

8. The little girl then proceeds to pretend she's dipping her fingers in my "icing" and eating it. Where do they come up with this stuff?

7. Also, during this same time another little girl comes over to see the commotion and steps on my toes...slightly chipping the white "icing" on my big toe. What is a teacher to do? Oh yes, thank you white out.

6. I found the cutest shoes for kacie and b's wedding. Kacie wants us to wear black, peep toe pumps and because B said just said wear black shoes I thought.... this is a great excuse to buy some really cute ones!


5. This is the 2nd week in a row that I'm missing the boo's basketball game. Yea, "boo" just doesn't come out naturally and he hates it so we'll nix it.

4. Though I've missed his games there have been good reasons. Last week Kacie had a shower and then tonight is B's lingerie shower. Julie, myself, her sister, and another friend are throwing it. We are so excited. We have some fun things planned! Don't worry... nothing raunchy, inappropriate, or classless will be taking place. It blows my mind how retarded some people are with these things.

3. This weather makes me so happy.

2. I love driving with the windows down and the radio up.

1. I'm so excited to be apart of R and B's wedding festivities... lingerie shower tonight, bridesmaid's luncheon tomorrow, rehearsal and then rehearsal dinner, make-up and hair appointments.... lots of craziness, but lots of fun!

oh sweet zoo

Yesterday was our field trip to the zoo. It was the most beautiful day for a field trip outside. The kids were sun screened up and ready for their zoo adventure... or maybe it was the bus ride... either way they could not contain their excitement.

Let me first tell you that I love field trips! I would do one once a month if I could...maybe even weekly if my kids wouldn't go crazy. I love doing things out of the ordinary.

This was our third field trip of the year. In the fall, we went to Tom's Farm where we picked pumpkins, went on a hayride, played on their playground, swung from a rope swing... we had ball. Then this February, we went to the Children's Museum which allowed our kids to freely explore which they loved. And of course yesterday we visited the zoo.

You have to expect with 4 and 5 year olds that there is going to be some drama, potty breaks, runny noses, and of course melt downs. Yesterday was no exception.

Like I explained yesterday, Mrs. Parham and I were childless so we walked around with Mrs. Holland and Z. Z is a character. We love him so much and will greatly miss him next year. He speaks his own Z language which we are all proficient in now. He keeps us laughing. So it was 3 teachers and Z. People must have thought "that child must be crazy if he needs 3 adults with him." I assure you he's quite good....most of the time.

We let him lead us around as our tour guide...with his map, hat, and all. Thankfully we were able to spot most of our kids throughout the day so we were able to take pictures, give hugs, and even watch the sea lion show with them.


One thing you should know about our tour guide, Z, is that a schedule is huge for him. He knows that after lunch it's nap time. Keep that in mind....

He was ready to eat lunch at 10:45 so we found the gorgeous picnic area by Teton Trek. After lunch, we made our way to the elephants. We realized we needed something cold to keep us cool. Z ended up with an ice cream cone bigger than him.

It mights as well have been this big!

As we watched the sad, dry, wrinkly elephants we noticed Z's ice cream quickly melting....then leaning... knowing that if the ice cream fell on the ground he'd be done for because remember he has eaten lunch and he is ready for nap time....so I took my hand and squished the ice cream down so it was almost flat. This worked well... for awhile.... then the flattened ice cream began melting even more so I decided to take part of the ice cream off. We then realized that the cone was broken so taking the ice cream off made the remaining ice cream fall to the ground.


You can pretty much guess what happened then... first sniffles and a pout then when we wouldn't buy him a popsicle the mouth flew open and the head went back. Then we walked past the merry-go-round... yep, you guessed it. He wanted to ride it and we didn't have time so our remaining 15 minutes consisted of us dragging our very tired Z through the monkey area.

This is not Z but basically sums it up.

Once we finally met the rest of our group at the front fountain, I realized the kids leaning over in it elbow deep were in fact most of mine. (At least they weren't stealing the money this year!) Although, this time the game of choice was to take the pennies out and see who could throw them the furthest. I'm sorry to the nice people who were hit by the many pennies that didn't make it into the fountain.... I assure you this game ended quickly. I promise my kids aren't as crazy as they seem.

So........

Dear Zoo,

Thank you for providing a fun day out for my kids. It was a break that we all needed. And penny fountain, thank you for tempting my kids with your refreshing goodness. Most came back to school lightly soaked because of you.

Sincerely,
A thankful K4 Teacher

busy week

So much is going on in our crazy Jerkins' life that I don't even know where to begin....

D-Now was this weekend and we had a blast. We were disappointed with how many students had signed up this time. We took a nice size group last year, but not this year. D and I loved D-Now growing up. So we didn't understand the lack of participants. This was just a bad weekend... there were weddings, ballgames, proms... needless to say it wasn't the turnout that many had hoped for. In fact, because of the lower numbers the conference will be moved back to February starting next year... moving off the lame excuses now....

Even though we had a smaller group we had such a great time. D and I agreed it may be the best thing we have done with our kids. We didn't do anything special... just stayed in homes, went to the conference, ate some Stevie B's...


which is blog worthy in itself, lazer tag, go carts, a late night starbucks run.... and whats funny is God had something big planned regardless of our size. In fact, I know that's what made this weekend so special. We were able to really hang out with these kids and get to know them instead of being spread apart by numbers. The highlight of our weekend was that one of our guys... the popular, jokester realized his need for a Savior. So at midnight Saturday night D was able to lead him to the Lord.


After hearing about this, I just had to laugh at my stupid self for wishing that more kids had signed up. It's not about numbers. It's about each of them realizing their need for a Savior and I truly believe the lower numbers aided in this happening.


So D-Now was Friday night-Sunday morning. Now most adults in their right minds would go home and take a long, glorious Sunday afternoon nap. Unfortunately, that didn't happen for me. Kacie had a shower Sunday afternoon and as the matron of honor...well more importantly the one and only sister...there was no way I was missing it...sleep deprived or not.

The shower was fabulous. Lots of good food, fellowship, and tooooooons of great gifts. They walked away with some great stuff!

So finally, Sunday night rolls around and I am in bed at 9:30....except I can not go to sleep because of the rumbling I'm feeling from the walls of my room. What was it you might ask? Thunder? Oh no, just D playing Call of Duty downstairs with the surround sound... for those normal folks who aren't in the gaming loop... Call of Duty is an xbox 360 game that D has that is a shooting, killing, etc. game... so I'm laying there in my cozy bed hearing gun fire and feeling the walls rumbling. After 20 minutes of trying to drown it out I called him...yes on the phone because I was too lazy to get up.... and he so kindly turned it down. Once I finally fell asleep, I don't think I moved until my alarm went off.

So after exercising yesterday afternoon, then playing soccer last night, and recovering from D-Now... you can say I'm a little exhausted. On top of that Rob and B are getting married Saturday! So we have her lingerie shower Thursday, bridesmaid luncheon Friday, rehearsal dinner Friday night, hair/make-up appointments Saturday morning/mid-day, pictures at 3:00, wedding at 6:30.... and sometime before all of this I have to pick up my dress from the alterations lady and get my nails done... I guess I'll be resting next week... on the beach.

Kacie's 1st Shower

Last night was Kacie's first shower. It was thrown by Bellevue's recreation ministry ladies. It was one of the sweetest showers I have ever been to. Judy Shows gave such a challenging devotion about being a servant first to the Lord, your husband, and then to everyone else. How drastically different would our lives be if we all took on the attitude of a servant...putting everyone else's needs above our own? Forgetting selfish ambitions and taking on the attitude of Christ, would not only revive marriages, but it would eventually change the world. Here are a few pictures from the shower.

Can you tell she was excited?

I, for some reason, look angry but I assure you I'm not. And Kacie is in total amazement of the glorious bottle of Febreeze room spray.

The bride and the moms.





The sweet hostesses and the bride.




And now for your viewing pleasure...here are a couple of pictures from the DCKJ photo shoot on Easter.

We missed our calling in modeling... don't ya think?

Ten Things Thursday

10. We had such a great Easter. We celebrated with both families and ate an embarrassing amount of food.

9. My bridesmaid dress for Rob and B’s wedding was miraculously transformed into something that’s wearable… next weekend. I can’t believe it.

8. I’m going to my sister’s first shower tonight!

7. Sister is getting married in 50 days… she was quick to remind me.

6. I am hooked to Dancing with the Stars. The only other season I have watched was the one with Shawn Johnson and I loved it. Well… this year… my fondness has grown. I’m glad Buzz finally got voted off. Poor guy made me sad every time I watched. In fact, I had to fast forward through the whole thing because I felt so bad for him. I love the pussy cat doll, the Olympic skater, and Erin Andrews. Poor Kate Gosselin. There are just no words.

5. I have found one of the best articles of clothing. Message me on facebook and I’ll send you the link. You will not be disappointed… especially when you can find them for $3.99 on sale!!!!!!!!

4. I can’t believe its April. School is almost over. Not that I’m complaining… I just think it’s crazy that I’m once again fixing to have to say good-bye to another group of students… an excellent group at that!

3. With school coming to a close, that means we look ahead to the summer…. Kacie’s wedding, the beach, the lake, laying out by the pool, sleeping late… yes, I definitely picked the right career.

2. D has started this “stupid human tricks” game that we play every Wednesday night. I have to admit it has been one of the funniest things I have ever seen. He has a specific game planned out and students have to come up and participate… although the games make the students do crazy…. “stupid human trick”…. things. It’s hilarious. For example, placing an oreo on your forehead and using only your facial muscles, you must get the oreo into your mouth. The first person to do so wins. Gotta love youth ministry!

1. I’m going to the beach in 13 days…hallelujah.

Wordy Wednesday

I explained a while ago how we were going through a one year bible with our youth. Not only is it a challenge to them, but to me as well. One thing that I love so much about this bible is the translation. It's an NLT. (new living translation) This just means that it's easier to read. There are no thees or thous. Just the word simply put. For example, the Lord's prayer:

King James Version

Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.


New Living Translation

Father, may your name be honored. May your Kingdom come soon. May your will be done here on earth, just as it is in heaven. Give us our food for today, and forgive us our sins, just as we have forgiven those who have sinned against us. And don't let us yield to temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.


I know there are many arguments over different translations. Many can even change the scripture meaning for the sake of making it easier to read. (The was well researched by the dear hubs.) This one however has been right on. It's easy to read and makes things easier to understand. It's great for teenagers and adults.

Enough about translations.... sheesh...I'm turning into my D. Anyway..........

I read over this verse today and it basically jumped off the page and slapped me in the face.

"A fool is quick- tempered, but a wise person stays calm when insulted." Proverbs 12:16

I don't know about you, but I don't take insults well. Not that I'm insulted a ton....but I took this as when I'm talked about behind my back or bad mouthed...whatever......Now I think I'm a pretty easy going person... however insult me, my man, my family, my friends.... whatever is dear to me and you could call me "quick-tempered." I may not spat words out immediately or punch someone in the head or kick someone in the nuts... yes, I went there.... but I will fume, complain, gripe until I feel better. Poor D.

Basically this verse says, I am a fool. So all you fools at there with me let's stop being foolish... and stay calm. Like that's going to be easy! We're not alone in this battle. I refuse to allow the enemy to have victory in this area. So I challenge you along with myself to:

"Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you."

Eph. 4:26-24, 31-32

"But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth."

Col. 3:8

"Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear,slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God."

James 1:19-20


So.... quit being a fool!

back to the real world

Well, it's clear to me that when the time comes for me to quit working... I will probably become a terrible blogger. Right now I know at nap time I have plenty of time to sit down and blog... after I finish all of my important teacher duties of course... but this past week while I was on spring break, blogging was simply an after thought. Between this....

laying out

... no sadly not at the beach. Just in my wonderful beach chair on my back porch.

And this...

reading my beloved Karen Kingsbury... most of the time while laying out.

Or this...

shopping.....

Or this....

Well... I only had 1 massage, but it was well worth mentioning!

Needless to say, I'm back to the real world today. Though I loved my time off, I'm glad to be back in the swing of things. I need routine. So I apologize in the future for not blogging because of my lack of routine. Saturdays and Sundays are a great example of my blogging... majority of the time I don't blog on Saturdays or Sundays because our daily activities vary from week to week... it's too crazy.

So for my faithful followers, I am sorry that I did not do a better job of giving you a daily dose of ...whatever it is I blog about.... Thanks for loving me anyway!

Favorite Things Friday

-warm weather
-playing ball
-OPI's My Chihuahua bites
-working out... can you believe I'm saying this?!
-laying out
-mexican food
-new shoes
-pedicures
-time with my nieces
-oreos and milk
-time with my boo.... aka D's new nickname that he hates!
-dangly earrings
-sunshine
-flipflops
-vacations
-flowers
-porch swings
-a good book
-laughing with the sister
-bubble baths
-clean sheets
-wallflowers