Celebrity

The Holsted's have a new celebrity in the house...

Mind you our 8 year old Kobie has earned his first paycheck. $35 for his voiceover in the new AR Kids 1st radio ad. He is very excited and proud of himself.

Our good family friend owns The Works (http://www.gimmetheworks.com/).

She had an ad to do for Ar Kids 1st and they wanted a boy ages 6-8 to do a part. Immediately she called my mom (as she had no young boys in her catalog to choose from). I arranged with Mammy secretly to pick him up and take him to the studio at lunch time, buy him a "spicy taco" from taco bell and get back to school before the end of lunch time. All this being kept from the other boys so we didn't have complaining (including Kobie- he didn't know).

WELL> Complaining started when we had the lovely "muffins for mom's, donuts for dad's" function at school. At 7am...we get to school to eat breakfast with our boys. They are only allowed one donut OR one muffin. We all know this doesn't feed my boys. So I gave Dylan my Orange Juice, Mrs. Kim so graciously gave them an extra donut/muffin each, but Jacob was still hungry...so off to the cafeteria school breakfast. Jacob ate an additional bowl of cereal and piece of toast and drank down 2 cartons of milk. We are telling the boys goodbye and we are heading out the door to go to work....When...

Kobie turns around and says, "why don't I have a lunch? You made Jacob a lunch (mandatory b/c he went to some leadership conference - more to come later after I read his *Notes*) and Dad and You! We all know D likes school lunch, why me! Why did you forget me?! You know I HATE their spaghetti." Thank goodness for the drowning sound of all the other families chatting. I looked at Kobie and said, "Buddy I'm sorry I forgot". He looked pissed and walked away.

I knew all this time what he was going to do, his "secret" . After he left the studio he called me and said, "Sorry for yelling mom".

If you hear an AR kids first on the radio he's at the end the middle child (of course) on the Thank you's. If you want me to...I can send you a sound clip...Can't figure out how to work it on here.

Pray?

We prayed with our boys when they were little at night...and now that they are older - they choose to pray by themselves...and every night we go into the bedroom to cover them back up and kiss their little foreheads.

Every Night there is Dylan lying sweetly in his bed with his hands in the "praying" position.

It was too cute for me not to share with you.

It took me 3 nights to get the picture without making him move when we turn on the lights.

Tax Man

I have worked for 4 days now...Your tax dollars at work are allowing me to read manuels and take tests all day. My brian is on overload and I haven't even gotten into the states accounting software. I'm ready to start typing away and be the little worker bee that I am.

The boys are adjusting well to me not being there after school...I have still gotten in 5 miles of running in 4 days...even with getting off at 4:30...

I did my meal planning and coupon cutting during lunch, so I'm still doing my "wifely" duties (honestly, I like doing it) and being able to provide great benefits for my family.

Community Group starts back up next week which will give Adam and I more time together and more discussion questions to learn about each other.

All is well in the Holsted house.

Women & Children 1st

We had a very busy day today with Jacob's soccer practice. While he was on the field the four of us ran 3 miles. Complete with both Kobie & D bleeding. We came home washed up, ate lunch, and headed back out again.

Our sista to sister group had decided to do our (church is leaving the building) project at Women and Children 1st.

http://www.wcfarkansas.org/

We are preparing food for the 25 kids during the mom's support group meeting Monday night.

*Larronda is also in our group, but she was out of town. Drew and her went to visit Tim.

But today was all about the kitchen for those at this specific safe house (top secret location). We worked for a little over an hour cleaning out the entire kitchen cabinets, wiping down everything, trashing the old expired items, moping the floors, organizing the cabinets with the "in-date" food items. The kids enjoyed and I think when they left they were happy that their daddy's were good dad's.

Here are some pics from today.

Fun from Rachael

Got an email tonight with pictures from Rachael and Andrew's wedding...back at the end of May. The boys wore their suits (2 we had purchased from savers)...and the a/c was not cranking on that hot and humid day.

When they let us eat, my boys rushed to the buffet table...there was a grand display of all kinds of food. My little veggie boy...took an entire BUNCH of grapes...there were cute little tongs to pull them off one at a time, but D wasn't wasting his energy. We all laughed at him when he returned to the table with his bunch...and then comes uncle Jay, moments later...and he had a bunch of grapes on his plate too...in this picture D has his grapes with him and all their red punch lips to boot.. He carried the grapes around the wedding party as a snack to go meal. When Adam and I saw the picture tonight we died in laughter. here is a cute picture of us and the humidity loved my hair that day.

J O B

Okay well I passed my drug test...and am going back to work full time (35 hrs / wk) with Department of Human Services (DHS) in the administration branch, accounting department, doing A/P.

I'm very excited about having a job with great health insurance...this past summer I've wracked up a good $3K worth of medical bills from the Er visits, illnesses, etc. (and still paying on last years)

So...I'm looking at the positive; I get a retirement account, great insurance, 24 sick and vacation days / year PLUS Holidays. And a job that I don't have to take home...no more cell phone calls to ask me about a client...no more working till 11pm and then starting at 7am the next morning. I'm assigned a portion of the alphabet and I enter those vendor invoices and set up for payment...how easy..a boring data entry job will suit me to a T. I get an hour for lunch?! That's awesome, I've always had to eat at my desk, while I worked.

This is a great blessing for my family...as we all know I am a young chicken and I'll be able to retire in 30 years...making me 58. And I'll be able to help give my kids more opportunities (Jacob's soccer and Kobie will soon start Bass guitar lessons- he doesn't want gymnastics and who knows what D wants to perssue).
I get off at 4:30...so I'll still be able to help with homework, cook dinner, do the laundry, etc. And w/ Jacob practicing 3 days / week I can still get in my exercise.

I will still work for mom's clients the 1st two weeks of the month for extra $ to pay off these bills.

Now the downside...SUMMER (If you have any ideas for summer let me know.), and I know I'm going to be shell shocked b/c I haven't worked F/T in over 6 years. I won't spend as much time with the boys as I have been, but I'm hoping the future time is more Quality time.
If I look down remind me to look on the positive side, there are far more greater things this job offers than the downside.

I'm excited about the future and what it holds...this is a new chapter in our lives.

**I've spent this week doing all the odd chores around the house to get myself reorganized and ready to start work...I was very organized before I stayed home ...I've repaired the mortar in the brick, re-screened the screens in the window that have holes in them, re glued the boys car board, liquid nailed the crawl space screen shut, etc. I've got one more day to get this stuff done before "the church leaves the building".

Shin Dig

Well the older two boys have made it through the first part of school without bad behavior and terrible grades. They were awarded their Shin Dig, Carnival Themed, Kobie's first. All the kids had fun.

Here are their silly face paints.

Dylan has made every fun Friday. I do not think he has gotten a card pulled. He is very quiet in school and out around everyone, but don't let him fool you, he talks NON STOP.

Dinner & Update

So I had another interview today with DHS...will know something by Monday evening.

Tonight I made dinner after soccer practice; we ate a dozen eggs, 1 lb. of bacon and 1 1/2 lbs of hash browns.

We all had fun at dinner complete with my jiggy dance after I named all thirteen colonies which led the boys onto a roaring laughter.

The evening would not be complete without some mishap or something out of the norm. We finished with Dylan spraying Lysol into his eyes and mouth...Lovely.

Off to the debate