Photos of us and our cats

Ahem. These pictures, I will admit are of a rather lousy quality, but the next chance I get, I shall black and white them and post them again.

The picture of me bears an explanation. Which follows: I gt my hair cut about a month ago, but I haven't uploaded any pictures of it for one, simple reason-- I was keeping it a secret from The Florida Relatives, and if I posted it, it would no longer be a secret.

Above, the two front-porch gossips are exchanging the latest :)

Easter With My Mom's Side

So we waited until the FL folks came up to have our Easter dinner. It was at the South Stockton Church, down in the basement.

Clockwise from far left: Grandma Suzy, Uncle Victor, Aunt Joanne, Aunt Martha, Uncle Steve, Annetta, Hosanna, Julia, and Grandma Olson

Yes, that is Grandpa Bob you see cleaning up the tables!

The *Little Girls* with Grandma Olson's head :) (and the little blond head is Joanna)

Jessica and Hosanna

Hosanna lost her two front teeth recently! She looks very, um, er, scary as she goes about her daily life.











Grandpa Bob and Jessica went to Claire's Botique on Monday, and this is the result. She said it didn't hurt as much as she thought it would.










Anyhow, I'm going to try and get some pictures of us and Grandpa Bob and Grandma Suzy, and I shall post them.

Visit from our Relatives

Our relatives who live in Florida came up to visit us. I took some pictures of us and my mom's sister and her family today. The photo above is of Lydia, Julia, Joanna, and Hosanna working on their hay fort.












Here they are, still working on the roof.



















And this is the finished product. You can't really see, but there are two little houses, connected by an inter-haybale tunnel.



















The adults...Daddy, Uncle Victor, Aunt Joanne (Mamma's sister), and Mamma. There wasn't even a flash, and she still had to shut her eyes, phooey.













Little lawn mower.

Hosanna and Elizabeth's Birthday

Hosanna just turned 9, and our neighbor just turned 13. So, "the girls" planned a birthday meal, with a theme of cats. I took some pictures, especially to show her dad and sister who are in the Ukraine on a trip with their church.

Anyhow, this is "cat food," or cereal coated with some sort of molasses type coating.

This is the kitty litter desert. It's crumbled up cake with pudding and tootsie rolls. Too realistic.

Close-up of the same...
Hosanna
The "cake" with candles

What We've Been Doing...

Typos are very important to all written form. It gives the reader something to look for so they aren't distracted by the total lack of content in your writing." ~Randy K. Milholland

Greetings peoples,

Once again it's time for an edition of The Kelly Hill Times.
Anyhow, the first item to tell you about would be Easter Sunday. Because 6 children were in some way involved in the Sunrise Service, we were told to arrive at the church at 0630 hours. We were, too. (We've gotten better at being on time. Used to be that whenever we chanced to be early for the morning worship service, we could just tell that other parishioners were thinking, "Man, are they ever late for Sunday School!") But anyhow. We assumed that the reason our fellow program-presenters weren't there too was because they had those three little kids to get up and dress. But they did show up, as did 69 attendees. The service went off quite well, barring an explosion over the sound system (oopsie!!). The Sunday School's presentation was with puppets, little "bodies," and a CD of VeggieTales songs. The morning service went quite fine. The choir presented a cantata entitled "Alleluia! He is Risen," narrated by Mr. Kennedy. It was hilarious in the sound system, because Mr. Arnold was in rare form, shooting people with rubber bands (before the service), whistling down the stairs (during the service) to alert Mr. Carlson, and in general making jokes and stuff. When Mr. Arnold and Mr. Carlson are both in the Sound System in good moods, well, 'nuff said.

Next. Friday night, several of us homeschooled teens met together at the our friends' home for a Game Night. It was a pretty slow evening, but we still managed to stay there until 2215 hours (10:15 PM) or so. We played Uno, Slapjack, Dutch Blitz, Mafia, and the all-time un-favorite Knots. We even had some snacks, too! We are hoping that the next Game Night can be at the church, with running games. Some of the other girls are even planning a Celtic ball, and they had out dress patterns at the Game Night, trying to decide on dresses and outfits to sew, for it. If we do it, you can be sure I'll have my camera along and I will take pictures.

AWANA was last night. It went well. Every time they play the taped accompaniment music to the AWANA Theme Song (taped by Mrs. Berndt), they have to make some joke about needing to sing loud enough for her to hear. Groan. But the games went well, actually. Only two kids lost shoes, and only one kid fumbled the baton.

Ahhh...more news. I just got back from assisting our neighbors and long long long long time friends move woodchips from a gigantic pile in front of the barn into the barn for bedding for the creatures. We worked for quite a while. Because the dad and eldest daughter were in the Ukraine, we couldn't use the tractor, so it was all done with buckets. We named the buckets, of course, to break the monotony. We had Hillary, Barack, Mike Huckabee, Duncan Hunter, John Edwards, John McCain, Bill, Al, etc. The routine was: Grab two full buckets from Reuben, who was filling them. Stagger through the mud into the barn, and hand the buckets to the mom, who dumped them around in the creature pen. Grab two empty pails, walk back through the barn, stagger back through the mud, and hand them to the son. Repeat for long time.

So there you have it for this time, folks. I have been given an eviction notice by a wanting-to-get-on-the-computer person, so I believe I shall call it quits. Watch out for the next KHT, though. It may have pictures, taken by our European Bucky Blacktop.

-Erika

Oh, Cats!!

Cat. On the car


Stares into space

Looks at the other cat


Other cat is ignoring it

Cat decides to get down, and proceeds to walk over the whole car
Good balance

Scratches itself

Smells the car??
And finally gets down!

Jessica

These pictures, well, Jessica had recently aquired some new clothes. Thus, asking her to pose for me was like asking my dad to eat a piece of pie (preferably chocolate cream, but he's not picky...). Hopefully I'll get a chance to do something like this with the rest of my siblings.

Katrina

Wish I could do my school work with my eyes closed too!!

Making Jelly

Sunday afternoon, our friend Rachel, and her mom, came over and made jelly with us. The photos might be a little out of order, but the idea's all there.

First, we have to have a picture of the empty jars, waiting to be filled...



and then we have Rachel's mom counting the jars, which are heating up on out wood stove so they don't break when we pour the hot jelly into them...


...and here we're mixing the sugar-pectin stuff and the hot juice...


...and adding more sugar...





...and this is my mom and Katrina trying to find lids and rings in our lids drawer...




...and here Jessica and Rachel are filling the jars and putting lids on them...
...and more of the same...
...and Annetta and Rachel's mom were putting them in the canner...
...and the finished product. Yum!!

Random Pictures

Well, I admit it has been a couple weeks...what can I say? Our family has fallen prey to the Evil Cold Bug, but we are slowly recovering, I think. Anyhow...here are some very random pictures.

~Jessica and Katrina walking up the stairs~

~Kitty~
~the dreary outdoors~
~signs outside Hosanna's door~

~And this is Hosanna!~