Wordless Wednesday--Giggles

The Crafter as Giggles the Mouse

Photo courtesy of the class mom

my camera is still MIA

If I Had a Camera

I'd take pictures in the morning.
I'd take pictures in the evening
All over this house!

My trusty little camera is MIA.  I have looked everywhere, and I can't find it.  I am beside myself. Major Bradford Academy events are going undocumented.  Alas....I will have to fill in with the work of others.

Here's a list of things for which I have no pictures:
Australia books for TOG Unit 2, Week 14
The Crafter's coral reef diorama--she took pictures of this.  It was the last known use of the camera.
Wild Thing's kookabura drawing.  We watched the following video.  I did not fully consider the consequences of letting him learn about this bird.

The Crafter and Wild Thing receiving green belts in karate.

Princess Pink being cute or annoying, I can't remember which.  She said (very loudly I might add), "Mama, is this where we buy dead animals?" as we walked by the meat counter.

And the one that breaks my heart the most,  the Crafter's performance in Cinderella.  She was a mouse.  She had full mouse makeup and a tail!  I have no pictures.  Here's one another mom took.

 If the camera doesn't turn up soon, I will have to shop for another one.  Hmm...maybe this is a blessing in disguise.

She's Gone

My friend died on Sunday.  The cancer moved so fast.  She only found out in November.

Her death brings out the human in me. I'm angry that she's gone. Tears come at awkward times. I want to know why.  Why her?  Why now? Her children need their mother.  Her husband needs his wife.  Her mother needs her daughter. She did everything right.  She ate clean and exercised.  She served the Lord diligently with her time and talents.  She was young and healthy. 

I believe there is a reason, though it is not mine to know.  I believe, no I KNOW, that she is in the arms of her Redeemer. She will not suffer anymore. And I will see her again.

I will pray for her family, especially the children.  Their sorrow is unimaginable.  I will hold my loved ones a little closer and a little tighter. Tomorrow is promised to no one.

Death has been swallowed up in victory!  I Cor 15:54

January is a Busy Month

January is our busiest month.  We started off the new year with the Historian's family Christmas.  We were supposed to leave the next day for our annual trip to Myrtle Beach, but the hotel's pool was closed for maintenance.  I am grateful that they contacted us.  We ended up going the next week. 

The Historian decided that we needed to join a co-op.  (I am not sure that co-op should be hyphenated, but whenever I see coop, I think chickens.)  He scrambled to get the paperwork in on time only to discover that the church where it meets is 25 minutes further away that he thought.  The word Chapel instead of church makes all the difference.  I wanted to just pull out and let the fees count as a donation.  I do not want to drive an hour for an early morning activity.  He wants to make it work.  We shall see.

I am only teaching one chemistry lab this semester.  The college isn't offering organic chemistry this semester because of lack of interest.  (Where is a shocked, open-mouthed smiley when I need it?)  Canceling organic left 6 open classroom hours for full time faculty, so I'm teaching less.  We'll miss the money.

We finally made it to Myrtle Beach the second week of January--just ahead of the great southern ice storm.  We didn't leave the hotel the entire time we were there.  An indoor heated pool provided hours of entertainment.  When we left there was ice in the palmettos.

The Crafter's CYT (Christian Youth Theater) practices started full force when we got back from out trip.  The final two weeks of rehearsals are grueling.  We are in the midst of them now.  The director always says to not judge CYT by the final two weeks.  CYT is worth it.  It is a wonderful ministry.  The play is next week.  If you are in the Raleigh area, click here for information.

Now my blog is officially updated. 

Wordless Wednesday--Birthday Boy

Wild Thing is seven!

Wordless Wednesday--Dancing in the Kitchen

We baked cookies last night.  So, how do you pass the time while the cookies are baking?  Dance of course!

Start the music then scroll down and watch the slideshow.

Life--So Fragile

There were four of us.  Couples that is.  We were part of a small group from our church.  We were all married about the same time.  Several of us were finishing degrees.  We were just starting out.  We shared so much together.  We helped each other move, sometimes more than once.  We ate together.  We prayed together.  We studied the Bible and sought God's will for our lives.  We bought homes.  We all wanted to start families.  We all suffered from infertility to some degree.  We rejoiced as God gave each of us a child during the following years.

After all of this, it came time for us to go our separate ways.  The Historian and I were led to a church much closer to home.  The other couples moved on as well.  We drifted apart despite promises to keep in touch.  Life and distance have a way of doing that.

As I type this there are tears pouring down my face.  I just received an email from my friend.  She is in her early 40s.  Her son is 6 months younger than the Crafter and her daughter is 6 months younger than Wild Thing.  She has cancer.  She had no symptoms other than some abdominal pain and bloating.  When she had a CT scan, there were masses on her liver and colon.  She's had an ileostomy .  She's having chemotherapy.  Her oncologist's name is Hope.  She's asked for prayer.

Dear God please spare your daughter.  Heal her body.  Encourage her spirit.  Hold her in Your arms.  Comfort her husband and children.  You are able.  Amen.

I need to hug my babies now.

How to Convert from HSB to Blogger

Sally at Diamonds in the Rough has found a great resource to convert HSB blogs to Blogger.  I was able to move almost all of my entries.  I did lose several comments and many of my pictures needed to be resized, but I am pleased with the results. It's a three step process.

1.  Export the HSB blog and save to your computer.

2.  Convert that file using http://wordpress2blogger.appspot.com/ and save that file to your computer.

3.  Import the file from step 2 to Blogger.

The entries show up on the Edit Posts page.  You can publish them individually or all at once.  Thank you Sally for easing the pain of the transition.

More Detailed Instructions:

Go to HSB dashboard.

Left side--Tools--Click on Export

Select date ranges etc. I left the defaults to export the whole blog.

Click Download Export File

You should get a window that asks you to save file. It will have wordpress in the name and be a .xml

Click OK

Wait for it.

Then go to the page with the wordpress to blogger tool

Step 6 has a Browse button. Click that and select the file you just downloaded.

Click convert. Save that file. It will be another .xml and say blogger export.

Now go to your blogger dashboard.

Click the settings tab.

Blog tools will be at the top. Beside that will be Import Blog in blue. Click that.

Browse and find the blogger export file and upload it.

When it finishes, you should find all of your entries on the edit posts page. From there it's a matter of selecting and publishing. I had to resize a lot of my pictures and some YouTubes didn't transfer. Almost all of my comments survived.

Sometimes You Don't Want to Know

Wild Thing walked into the kitchen one night looking like this.

Then he fell down. 

The Crafter and Princess Pink propped him back up.

What's wrong you ask?  He's stuffed.

Why you ask?  I'm don't know and I'm not sure I want to.

But he had so much fun that Princess Pink felt she should get stuffed too.

Trying Out Blogger

HSB has been down for a couple of days, so I thought I would try out this format for a while.