Fun with Friends

Part of Josh's birthday got extended to this past weekend. We were able to get the Hurricane's tickets again for $10 each and $1 hot dogs. I told him that he could have 3 friends go to the hockey game with him, so he chose Brandon, Gabriel and Travis. I'm glad the hot dogs were $1 each as those boys can really down the hot dogs:) I know I can be cheap, but at least cheap is fun:)

Happy Birthday, Joshua

My Joshua turns 11 today. Hard to believe that he is that old. Time sure does fly. He'll be a teenager before I know it. I remember wanting to be a mom so badly. We tried and tried and there were so many tears shed. I remember asking God why teenage girls could jump in the backseat one time and get pregnant, and yet there were two loving people who could not get pregnant. God answered my prayers. I took pregnancy tests so many times. I remember waking up early to take this test. It was positive. I knew I must have messed it up because I turned the test upside down, so the results were not right. We didn't have a Walmart here back then, so I remember waking Jack up around 7:15 and telling him I was headed to Food Lion for something I needed. I'm sure he was dazed as he didn't even ask me what I needed. I ran up there, came home and took the test again and it was positive!! The pregnancy was a pretty easy with just a few cravings. The last month the doctor moved me from full time to part time work. A week or so after that, I got moved to "bed rest" only because I was swelling so bad. Joshua was due on the 25th of January. Of course, he didn't come on his due date. I remember it was Sunday and I didn't feel too well. We stayed home from church and took it easy. Later that evening, I started feeling pain, but the pain didn't come too often. I did call the doctor, but she told me to wait until the pains got closer together. I sat up and watched the entire super bowl with Jack (he was hoping I would make it till the end:)). I couldn't even tell you who was playing, but he could. I remember that it was getting late and then the first ever survivor came on. We stayed up and started that. The pains were getting closer, but nothing really bad. The doctor called us to check on me and told me to come on in. When I got to the hospital, my contractions were not registering on the monitor so she told me I would probably have to come home. They decided to check me and I was 4 cm so she told me I could stay. We took a walk around the hospital and when I cam back the pain was so intense. I couldn't bear it. I had to have my epidural. Finally at 5:50 am, Joshua Caleb McLean was born. Joshua you have been nothing but a joy to us and we love you so much!! Happy Birthday!

Kids

Since I've shown pictures of Jack and me and pictures of the family, it's time to show pictures of the three kids. I think they all turned out great! These were just a few of the many shots she got. Sure love my kids!

Cute

This hardly ever happens, but when the football game is only 3-3 at the half (Alabama vs. LSU) Joshua falls asleep out of boredom!!

History Project

I'm going to jump around a little bit. I have a couple of more pictures to show of the funeral, but I didn't want all the other stuff to get old. Friday Joshua had his first project of the year. They have been studying features such as seas, volcanoes, valleys, craters, etc. They had to make their own country and come up with a theme and a name for their country. They also had to have at least 10 of the 13 geo terms/features on their board. Joshua of course wanted to do a sports theme, so we made it "Collegiate Country". We had Michigan Mountain Range, Clemson Crater, Virginia Valley, Virginia Tech Volcano, Rutgers River, LSU Lake, Iowa Isthmus, Maryland Mountain, Duke Desert, Illinois Island and Stanford Sea. I think it all came together nicely and I am so pleased with it. Hopefully he will get a good grade off of it.

Future Runner

Last Sunday after church Jack and Josh ran in a race. Jack runs in a couple of long races during the year, but this was Josh's first run, and it was a mile. I think he ran it in just a little over 8 minutes. He did a good job. I sure wish I could run a mile.....or just run a little:)

Final Stop

Our final stop on our field trip was the capital bldg. This was fun too, although my favorite by far was going to the governor's mansion.

Stop 2 on our field trip

So stop 2 was the legislative bldg. This was good, but I would have liked to have seen the Senate side as well.

Field Trip

Yesterday I went with Joshua and his class on a field trip. Other than his field trip last year, this has definitely been one of the best trips I have been on. Since the kids have a big NC history project due at the end of next month, we went downtown to get pictures and info for their notebooks. Our first stop was the governors mansion. I really enjoyed this. It was a smaller version of when we went to the White House last year. We had to get security clearance, although we never had to show our ID's. After the governor's mansion we went to the legislative building. We sat outside and ate our lunch....and it was a beautiful day......and then headed over to the capital building for a tour of that. I'll post pictures of the legislative and capital in the next few days. I'll just concentrate on the governor's mansion for today.

My boy hits the double digits.....

Joshua turned 10 today. I can't believe I have a child that has hit the double digits!! We had a surprise party for him tonight. Jack took the boys to the NHL fan fair and then came home a little while. That gave Jenna and I time to run to get the cake and all the other things and clean house. Jack took garbage and then to Walmart and when Josh came home, there were several people waiting for him. The look on his face was priceless. He was totally surprised!! We told him that the neighbor needed to use our driveway, so when he walked in and saw everyone, he just stood there like a deer in the head light!! We invited some adults and kids that have been an influence on his life over the last 10 years. I think he had more fun playing football with all the boys more than anything. Happy 10th Birthday, Joshua,.....we love you!!! (pictures to come later)

Mom and Josh time

Friday morning Joshua and I got up early and drove to Charlotte. Part of his Christmas present was tickets to see Clemson play (his favorite team) in the Meinke Car Care Bowl. I don't know exactly how I got nominated to go, but it seems that both Jack and Joshua really wanted me to go. I have never been to a college game before and it really was a lot of fun. I was glad I was able to go and spend time with Josh.