Busy, Busy...

Hi everyone!

I know it's been a little while since I have posted anything, but honestly things have been so crazy around here lately!

Terry has been in Indianapolis for 2 out of the last 3 weeks for classes on his Accident Reconstruction stuff. I have been trying to get things ready for the town-wide garage sale that is happening this Saturday (May 16).

There are 15 school days left and I have been trying to be ever so patient with the whole waking up super early thing... I am just not a morning person even though I am in bed no later than 10 pm. But that doesn't mean I fall asleep by then.. the older I get, the more insomnia I have!

I promise that I will write with more updates... I just gotta get this garage sale out of the way. There's barely enough room for my truck to fit in the garage!

Here is a picture of Kaitlynn and my Dad before she went up for her Spelling Bee competition. She won the 5th grade spelling bee at her school and went to the Porter County Spelling Bee competition. She did really well and we are so proud of her! WAY TO GO KAITLYNN!!!!

Before I sign off for the night, please say a prayer for our friends Madison, Lana and thier family. Madison just had the same surgery yesterday that Sarah had for Arnold Chiari Malformation. Madison is just the sweetest angel and her Momma is just as sweet as they come too! God allowed us to cross paths and we are so grateful for that. So please say a prayer for her... I know Lana said that Madison was having a rough day today!

Goodnight Everyone!

Love,

Becky

To Madison and Lana,

I am praying for you!

Call me when you get the time!

Love and Hugs to you both!!!

Sarah Update

Today was a follow-up eye appointment for Sarah. Doctors at Riley Children's Hospital in Indianapolis said that her eye has reached a plateau with patching meaning that it's not doing anything for her anymore. With that said, we could move forth with her eye surgery. The surgery will NOT correct her vision, but will help with the muscle issue with her eye. I HATE that she has to go through another surgery, but she is prepared. And as I said in a previous post... there's a silver lining to every cloud, sometimes you just have to look a little harder to find it. We do not have a date for surgery yet, but we know that it will be during the week of June 15th. Although we always worry, this is behind us:

And even after the news she got today... this is her outlook!

We can't tell you how much our children have taught us about life, and most importantly... Faith in God. We know that everything will be okay!

Bye Bye Spike

Today Fur Angels Animal Sanctuary came and picked up Spike. For those of you who don't remember, you can see my previous post about Spike here. He was not safe with our 3 dogs in the house. I received an email from the lady who takes in the birds. Here is what she said:


"I have a person who contacted me that resently lost a 19 year old Cockatiel & this might be a match for them. They are semi-retired & they sent me some real sweet photos of their previous bird. They are not in a rush, they want the right bird, & asked me to watch for them & observe & interact with the bird & let them know if I thought it was a match for them. I think Spike is a very handsome bird, he is a pied Cockatiel from what I can tell from the photo."


So, we know we did well in sending him to the sanctuary. Hopefully, he will be the right pet for the couple who emailed about wanting another cockatiel. So, farewell lil' Spike!

Lucky

It was so warm here on Friday. Kaitlynn and Sarah were in school and Terry wanted to get the grass mowed. Faith and I sat out on our back deck and enjoyed the day... then Faithie decided to help daddy mow: As you can see from the "close up" view, Faith loved being on the tractor, but she wasn't so keen on the noise. About 20 seconds after I snapped this picture, she was off the tractor and back on the deck with me.
After Kaitlynn and Sarah got home from school, they ran in the house to drop off their bookbags and were immediately out the door to play. Sarah brought home a Silver Maple tree from school. The tree was given to her for Earth Day. So we let her decide where she wanted to plant the tree. She decided to plant it near where we buried our beloved pet, Trooper. A little bit of background here, every time a family member has passed away, we have planted a tree in our yard in remembrance of them. We have a Herbert, Okie, Lucy, Cary, Larry, Joe, George, Hazel and now a Trooper tree. She wanted to name the tree Trooper after of course, our dog. After she and her daddy dug the hole, she told Terry that she needed to water her tree so it wouldn't die. Here is our sweet baby girl watering her "Trooper" tree:

Sarah and her daddy. So sweet this picture is. I love how he loves our kids. That's something you'll hear me say over and over again throughout the posts of this blog.

Now, here we go with the "Lucky" part of my post. Sarah was outside playing with her sisters and came running in the door hollering, "Mom, look what I found!" Lo and behold, she found this:

A 4 leaf clover! How lucky! Here is a better picture of it for those of you who can't see so well because of *ahem* old age. Ah! Come on, you know who you are! =)

With all the commotion going on outside, Kiara just had to get a peek! She watches over the girls. This time, she was watching over them from our 2nd story window!Here is our eldest child. She is part monkey:And lil' Faith just loves to ham it up for the camera.
The girls and I played some catch and then they decided to tackle each other. I swear sometimes you'd think they were boys. Don't believe me? Have a look for yourself! My Mom has always said, spank them 3 times a day, whether they need it or not:Nah, really I was going to help them up! HAHA They are good kids. =) Anyway, as this beautiful day drew to a close, Faith was toast. Needless to say, she slept very good from all the fresh air! Which is what I need to be doing right now, so goodnight everyone! ★☾★

Visiting The Cemetery

Wednesday was a bit of a sad day for me. I picked up my Grandpa and we went to the cemetery where my Grandma, Uncle Joe, Uncle Cary and my cousins baby, Jacob are buried. I hadn't been to the cemetery since November when Uncle Cary died, and before that I hadn't been since my Uncle Joe died... do you see a pattern here? Anyway, my grandpa wanted me to go with him so that I could see the footmarker.

It was beautiful. My Grandpa wanted it to have two hearts with "Together Forever" engraved in the banner. You can see it below, although I am not sure that you can make out what it says.
Faith was so funny. She kept saying, "Grandpa is sooo cute!" She just loves him to pieces and he loves her too! My Grandpa also had my Uncle Joe's bird. A Cockatiel named Spike. Well, my Grandpa is having a hard time taking care of Spike, so Terry and I brought him home until we can find him another permanent home. Here is a picture of Spike:
Here is what our dogs think about Spike:We are not really "bird people" we tend to stick more to dogs. And having a bird in our house for any great length of time is not very smart. Hopefully, I can find him a "forever home." And SOON!!! I sure hope Spike doesn't learn how to open the door of his cage. If he does, he will become a snack for Shyanne and Kiara.

Happy Easter

We hope that you are all having a wonderful Easter holiday with your family and friends! We had a wonderful day... Terry's mom came down to be with us yesterday morning and spent the night last night to celebrate Easter with us today. It was a very nice visit... and she did most of the cooking, so that was a bonus! As I sit here typing this, I feel bloated from all of the turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, green beans, and bread that I ate. Dinner was delicious, but I am now ready to go lay on the couch and veg out in a comatose state until it's time for bed tonight. We hid 91 Easter eggs for the kids to find this morning... it was quite fun for them... and us! We managed to find all of them except one rogue egg that magically disappeared. Terry had great pleasure in hiding the eggs waaaay up high where our kids couldn't possibly reach them, but they had a blast! We also scattered them around the yard so that Faith would have an easier time. Here are the pictures of them on their Easter egg hunt:

Our poor little Sarah has a sore throat, so she wasn't feeling too great while searching for eggs, but she found quite a few! She also found the egg that had money in it!

Kaitlynn was being such a great big sister. She gave Faith a lot of her eggs.
Here is Faith showing me a dandelion that she found in the yard. It's her favorite color... YELLOW!!!

"Here grandma, this is for you!"

Here we are, still looking for that last Easter egg.

And here is Terry, my mother-in-law and our kiddos.

By the way, we never found that last Easter egg!

HAPPY EASTER!

FROM OUR FAMILY TO YOURS!!!

Colorful Kids

Here are some pictures of the girls coloring Easter eggs in preparation for the Easter Bunny. I'll be back tomorrow with some Easter pictures!!

Here is a picture of the girls and I cracking a couple of eggs to make some egg sandwiches!

HAPPY EASTER FROM THE GOSE'S