School Program 2013- Outer Space

This year's school program was a lot of fun to work on.  The children added music with instruments which was a great addition.  It will now be fun to see how they improve with their instruments each year.  The theme for this year was Outer Space.  We wanted to recreate the solar system for our guests and travel to each planet.  Upon arriving, Josiah gave each of our guests a gold star badge that they had to wear in order to enter our space shuttle. 

Then when they entered the house, the girls met them and checked to make sure they had their badge on.  They were then escorted to the space shuttle (home school room) where it was set up with chairs, planets, and a stage area all under black light.

All of the guests were loaded on our space shuttle.  Let the show begin!  Josiah started out with our introduction.  He is always so shy about talking infront of people, so I gave him this job to help boost his courage.  He did great!  He informed everybody that they needed to buckle their seat belt, put on their helmets, and stay on the space ship at all times or something bad could happen.  :)  He also passed out hand fans since our first stop was going to be the sun.  We didn't want people getting too hot.

We made our fans just out of white paper which really stood out in the black light.  It was fun for everyone to see the colors really pop on clothes, on the fans, and then throughout the program.

First stop is the sun!

Then onto the other planets.

Sorry the pictures aren't great quality.  The black light was a little tricky to take with.  The children made their planet boards.  Some were salt dough, tissue paper, and some were just painted.  They did a great job making them and having fun with different art styles.  As they held up their board they shared information about that planet.  Just a handful of facts and then onto the next planet.

After our travel through space, the children shared Scripture they had memorized that talked about the sun, moon, stars, earth, etc.  Next was the music.  Jonathon played his guitar while the children sang a song called Praise the Lord from the Heavens.  They did great and Benaiah went up there and stood with them.  I tried to get him to memorize some Scripture to have a part in the program, but he is a one of a kind little guy and I decided it would be easier to just not give him a part and keep his siilyness out of it.  Hopefully next year he can have a purposeful part, because he did end up joining in this year.  It was good and controlled though.  : )

Onto the instruments!

Josiah played Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star on his guitar and did a fabulous job!

Diella also played Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star on the ukulele, but she sang along while playing.  It took some encouragement for her to agree to sing along.  But she did a wonderful job and sounded great!

Alegra played the ukulele also, and played Steal My Show.  She does such a great job playing and singing.  She's been blessed with a gift.  We are excited to see where the Father takes her talents. 

After the program we had some food.  The food was all named after space things.  We had fun thinking of foods to go along with our theme.  We had Venus Veggies, Asteroids (meatballs), Meteorites (grapes), Sun Oranges, Crescent Moon chicken salad sandwiches, Milky Way candy bars, Moon Pies (oatmeal cream cookies), Star shaped cookies, Moon Phase Cookies (dipped oreos decorated like the different phases of the moon), and Shooting Star Lemon Pudding Shooters.  And Rocket Fuel to drink.  It was all so delicious!

 

Onto our guest pictures.  We have always made sure that we get a picture of all of our guests with the children.  It's a fun way to end the day.

Grandpa Ron, Grandma Linda, Aunt Mandi and the children.

Grandpa Dan and Grandma Deborah and the children.

Phil, Casie and their children and all of our children.

                          

Silly picture!

And then our great, little family!  The many stages of getting a decent picture...if we even did. : )

And I forgot to mention that the children decorated their shirts for the program.  We found some fabric paint and got our solar system juices flowing to create some pretty cool space shirts.  Their individual likes really showed in how they decorated their shirts.  And of course I made Saphira's.  We decided that she is our shining star, so we had to give her one big star on her shirt. 

My parents always bring something along to surprise the children.  This year they created this super fun photo prop.  It was a hamburger space ship that glowed in the dark.  Below they are trying it out with our good friends the Troyers. 



How cool does that look in our planetarium room?  We got some good pictures with it.



We had to play with the lighting a little so we could see the faces in it.  I think we are going to see if we can arrange the boy's room so this will fit.  It would make a really cool night light for them.

And then some extra fun with the black light.  I had wanted to find a black light special for this party but didn't really want to buy one.  After Grandpa Murphy passed away, we were going through his basement and Jonathon found one in a box.  And the bulbs were still good.  I was so excited to have it and have it be a contribution from Grandpa since he couldn't join us this year.  Was a special blessing to have it be a part of our show.  The children thought it was so neat how it lit colors up.  And especially how it made teeth look.  What fun with friends!

For party favors we made these rocket ships filled with candy.  They were fun and easy for the children and were a nice gift to send our guests home with. 

Another school year over!   Thankful for the summer!  Time to teach them outdoor things like gardening, mowing, building forts in the woods, wildflower identification, uses for herbs, and hopefully we'll be getting baby chicks in the next couple days to teach them about that.  They are due tomorrow, so we'll see if we had a faithful mama hen or not.  

Other than the typical every day stuff that our children learn just by living, we are hoping to spend our summer in the garden a lot.  We have a rather large space at the farm that we are wanting to get mulched, so we will be working on that throughout the summer.  Looking forward to it really!  We have also been considering what we should do with the extra land we have here.  Right now we are thinking about planting a bunch of blueberry bushes to be able to sell organic blueberries.  That will happen over a few years time of planting and letting the bushes have time to produce, but that is something we are thinking about and trying to figure out.  We certainly won't be using the whole field, but even a small portion of it will hold many blueberry bushes.  We also have plans to go to the SouthBend Zoo with Christi's parents, several Celebrations planned, and hopefully some spur of the moment day trips to other zoos, parks or beaches.  We'll see.  We don't have too much on the calendar for the summer, so we'll see how our days get filled up.

We hope you all have a fabulous summer!  I'm sure you'll be seeing our summer unfold as the days go by.  Hoping it goes slowly.  : )

2013 Vacation- Days 10-End

For those of you keeping up with our vacation, sorry for such slow posts.  Life seems to be full right now.....full of blessings, but they sure keep us from being lazy. 

We finished out our trip staying with some friends in Tennessee and attending a United In Worship conference.  The first night the men took some of the older children while we ladies stayed behind since it was to be so cold.  We were also able to serve our friend who was having back issues while we were there.  Always glad to lend a hand when others are down.  The next day we all got up and headed to the fair grounds to attend the conference all day.  What a blessed time!  There were children's activities, many worship groups leading worship, and speakers talking about being united as a body in Christ and worshipping HIM.  The things that stuck out to me the most were the teachings on how Yeshua is the only true Rabbi.  And how the generations coming up seem to be ones who don't want all the bickering over beliefs but just want to serve and worship in unity.  Jonathon has said it before, the body of Christ goes so beyond what we see in our homes, families, churches, and even communities.  It's all over the world.  What will that day look like when we are ALL falling before HIM or raising our hands in worship to the One and Only Creator of the universe.  Was so neat to see people from different backgrounds, beliefs, and understandings come before Him to sing and dance.  

Such a blessing to sing in adoration to my God, but I also enjoyed the dance.  It's been awhile since I've danced before Him.  This time it was an extra blessing to have Alegra join me.  She followed right along and when I decided I was to step out, she kept going as she felt led.  What a joy to watch her! 

Oh how we enjoyed the music.  We also enjoyed visiting with some of the musicians and hear their stories of how the Father has led them in their relatioinships.  What amazing examples of His direction and their obedience.  We left on a Sunday afternoon and felt refreshed from hearing so many speak of Jesus (Yeshua) and all that He has done for them!  He is the reason we can have salvation and He is the reason we worship!

That evening we enjoyed some girl time.  We ladies went out on the town.  : )  We went to the car wash and to get some ice cream to take back to everyone to go with brownies.  It's amazing how the smallest amount of time for just us ladies to hang out, is rejuvenating.  The guys had everything under control when we got back and we all enjoyed one last evening of vacation as we were to head home the next morning.  Great friends, food, fellowship, and fun! 

Monday morning we got up and headed north!  Our plan was to get to Indianapolis by supper time, so we could eat with Phil's mom.  We were on schedule and moving right along until..... we noticed that the van was not just dripping a fluid but it was running out.  We made a few stops to see if places could look at it because it needed fixed before we could go any farther.  Bless Yahweh that He had us in a town that had several mechanics.  We all prayed that He would lead us to where we needed to be to get it fixed.  Finally, we arrived at a place at 4:00 that could do what we needed.  They closed at 5:00 and the guy who was going to work on it made sure we knew that he was leaving at 5.  So, we prayed for him that he could figure out the problem and have it fixed all before closing time.  The guys took a short walk with the children while Casie and I sat in the office with Saphira.  We had a lovely visit with the worker in the office and hopefully we were a light to him.  Everyone seemed very easy going with the bump in the road.  It was so nice that the children weren't upset or worried or causing problems while the men figured out what we should do.  What a blessing our children are!

The van was fixed right on time, and we were back on the road.  We tried to give out our Almond Joy candy bars, but he must have thought we needed them more.  Headed for Indy now and just a tad behind schedule.  We don't know why we had van issues, but we know that it happened for a reason.  Maybe we were to be of encouragement to one of the workers.  Maybe they just needed to see our families and how we work without chaos taking place.  I am just thankful that it wasn't a difficult time.  We made it to Dave and Busters for supper with Grandma Tracy and had a good time playing games, eating, and announcing Phil and Casie announcing that baby #5 is coming.  Grandma Tracy loves her grandchildren!

We finally arrived back to the Bovee Farmstead late that night.  All were tired, and we all went right to bed.  The next morning the guys got the van cleaned out and returned and our traveling buddies headed home.  What a wonderful trip!  Sorry I didn't get any pictures at the mechanics.  They kept saying this would be great to blog about, but I had a baby that needed to eat and I just didn't get any pictures taken after we left the worship conference.  Sorry for leaving you all out of that part.  : )

So, our last day was filled with much prayer for the Father's hand to guide us and lead us.  We are thankful that He did.  It seems that we have been in prayer about much lately and are so quick to take things to the Lord in prayer.  Sometimes we offer up a prayer right on the spot and sometimes it's not until later, but He hears us.  Big prayers have been answered, little prayers have been answered and we bless Him for that because it's not us.  It's Him showing us and those around us favor.  What a wonderful God we serve! 

Thanks for joining us on our 2013 Vacation.  We have plans to travel with my parents next winter, but not for sure of the plans.  Until then, not sure we have any other trips to take.  For now we'll stay busy getting our garden going and enjoying the creation this summer close to home.  Oh, and if you haven't taken advantage of showing a random act of kindness for someone you know by signing them up for the massage giveaway we are doing, you really should do it!  Check out the blog post before this one for details.  You only have til May 17th....our 16th wedding anniversary!  Blessing Yahweh for giving us so many years together!

2013 Vacation- Days 7 & 8

We've had some busy days this past week, so I wasn't able to get to the blog to finish out our trip.  This post doesn't finish up our vacation time, so you'll have to come back for more, but it does include two of our most enjoyable days.  Day 7 we woke up early enough that we could catch the 11 am dolphin boat tour.  It was something we definitely wanted to do, so we called to see if we could make it.  The boat had to wait a short bit for us, but we made it and all 13 of us went running down the pier to life jacket up the children.  I felt bad for the old people on the boat who were probably thinking, "what, we waited for all these kids to join us?  There goes our peaceful boat ride".  Well, the children couldn't have been any better and the other passengers watched them with smiles and enjoyed their excitement as well.    

Casie took this picture then added the wording.  Such\a peaceful old lighthouse at high tide.  It was a great example to explain low and high tide to the children.  If a boater goes out there to check out the lighthouse at low tide, they better keep track of the tide since when it rises with high tide, it could take their boat out into the sea. 

All kidlet passengers from our group with life jackets on and keeping an eye out for dolphins.  We had so much fun!

We have a picture of these two in life jackets when they were just infants.  I wish I could find it!

Here is another picture from Casie of one of the dolphins.  The first one we saw had a baby swimming with the mama.  Of course there is no picture of that, you'll just have to believe us.  : )  We did see several of them and all the children got to see them.  They were so excited!!!

The ride seemed way too short as we headed back to the dock.  As we departed the boat, we were given coupons for the restaurant that was beside the pier.  That restaurant happens to be Coco's, the tropical restaurant we went to a couple days prior with the unhappy waitress.  We had been wanting some key lime pie, so Jonathon thought this was the perfect time to get some and use the coupon.  If you missed out on our first encounter with Tiffany the waitress, read it HERE, otherwise keep reading to see how we changed her life.  : )  

The guys and some of the children went in to use the bathroom and get our dessert.  Jonathon placed his order with Tiffany, and she asked if it was for there or to go.   He said, "Uh, we'll take it on the road this time".  She responded with a much different attitude towards us than before when we dined in the restaurant.  She said with sadness in her voice, "Oh, really?"  Clearly she was disappointed that we weren't all staying.  It was a great example to our children that we can make a difference in people's attitudes.  We could have treated her with the same nasty attitude that she treated us with.  We wouldn't have been welcomed for dessert at all.  But since we treated her with love and kindness, she had a heart change about ALL of our children and had a happier countenance.  It really was a great picture for them to see and be a part of. 

So, after our delicious dessert, we headed to an animal wildlife park.  It was a smaller park with a handful of animals, but the walk was along a nicely wooded path, and it wasn't busy at all.  The children got some pretty up close encounters with some of the animals too which was really neat for them.  

 

Jonathon's senior picture taken by Alegra.  : )

A bald eagle.  Alegra had the camera for most of this stop.  The camera focused in on the fences instead of the animal, so we didn't get too many good animal shots. 

The children all had colored bubble gum mouths.

Sandhill Crane up close.  So pretty!

The wolf exhibit was really neat.  Well, so was the fox exhibit.  The animals all had nice room to roam in a wooded area, so they could run and live a little bit like in the wild.  We watched one of the foxes stalk a squirrel that was by a watering hole.  So fun to see them in real life....and smell them.  The wolves though had a big area as well.  They walked right up to where we stood on the other side of the fence of course.  They also had a building where you could watch them from inside.  There was a small water area that we watched one of the wolves go in from the window.  Really neat to see these animals up close. 

Picture time!  The children love picture time!  Not really unless it's their idea and their poses. 

We finished out our evening at a restaurant called The Mellow Mushroom.  On their menu they served gluten free pizza, so we decided to treat Zeky.  It ended up being a treat for all of us!  Some pretty interesting combinations, but some delicious flavors.  It was really good and an interestingly decorated restaurant too.  We had plenty of pizza left over to take back to the room for the next days lunch.  Yummo!  Of course, the children went back to the hotel to swim.  One of the nights the adults also joined in the fun and relaxed in the hot tub too.  Can't remember if it was this night or not. 

It was this night that I had laundry to do.  Imagine that.  : )  I knew I better get it done this night or I wouldn't have too many other chances with leaving this hotel in a couple days.  I had just one load, and was able to wash it with no problems.  But then when it was done and ready to be dried, someone else had their clothes in the dryer.  That was okay, it was still fairly early in the evening.  I kept going back and forth checking to see when the dryer would be available.  Well, it was getting quite late, we put the children to bed, and I was growing a little impatient.  After checking the clothes that were in the dryer (they were mostly jeans and heavy men's clothing), and seeing that they were still quite damp, Jonathon suggested that we go ahead  and use our quarters to finish drying them.  Okay, well then you have to stay up and watch a good movie with me while we wait.  Hehe, I thought it was a good plan.  So, we started the dryer back up and went back to the room to find a good movie.  What did we find?  Duck Dynasty.  Our first exposure to a life changing show.  Ha, not really, but Jonathon sure got a kick out of some of the parts.  Back to check the dryer again and the clothes are all dry this time and still in the dryer.  I was convinced by now that it was a single guy who didn't have a lady with him to keep track of his laundry and he forgot about his clothes and went to bed.  We folded it all and put our's in and got the drying process going.  Back to the room to watch more Duck Dynasty.  What happened to my "good movie"?  We finally finished up our laundry at 1:30am and went to bed for a full day in Savannah.

The guys had some things they wanted to do that the ladies weren't at all interested in, so they got up early and headed to a fort with a couple of the littles.  They had a good time while we stayed at the hotel and did geography class with the older children.  Then there was leftover pizza for lunch and swimming.  After swimming everybody got showers and all gussied up for our family tradition of picture taking on vacation.

On our last Bovees/Brothers vacation we took time to take family pictures together.  It proved to be a fun and memorable part of the trip, so we decided to do it again.  With a growing family, it was much more difficult this year.  But despite children not cooperating at times and not being happy with our joyous time, we still were able to get some great shots of everybody.   We chose the park in Savannah where we had previously visited, and it was a beautiful location.  So, just for fun the first picture is of our crew on our first vacation together in 2010.  All the rest are from this trip.

  

Oh how they've grown!

The Bovees

The Brothers

Whose child is that?

That's better.

And the children's request for a pose was with them all on the monkey bars.  Remember they developed a fondness for monkey bars during the trip.  : )

Phil being, Phil.

My almost 8 month old baby on the trip.  Now she is 8 months and I'm wondering where the time went.

The people that started these beautiful families.....

And the big announcement of adding another to one family.

We had reservations to eat at Paula Dean's restaurant, so we were a little rushed.  I'm sure the children were glad because that meant the torture of picture taking was over.  We rushed back to our vacation mobile and headed back into the city for supper.

It was a little tricky finding parking, but we finally found one by a nice gentleman who used to live in Gary, IN, and we headed into the restaurant.  It was good service, but we weren't fond of the prices for what we got.  I guess we should have expected that being a celebrity's place.  Oh well, we can say we did that now.  : )

Just as we were getting ready to leave the restaurant, fire trucks pulled up.  It was quite the scene there.  Someone had called in saying they smelled gas.  It sounded like it was coming from a vehicle parked along the street.  It was definitely strong as we left to go to our vehicle.  Glad that everything was okay and that we weren't in harms way. 

Back to the hotel for some swimming and sleep before heading out the next morning.  Saphira was so fun this trip.  She started clapping and saying "Mom".  Yep, that's what she says alright.  Okay, maybe I'm the only one who thinks she is saying "mom" while the rest say she is clearly saying, "Papa".  What do they know anyways.  : )  Well, she is saying something and making more sounds, clapping, dancing while sitting, and just growing up too fast.  We all really enjoy her!

Well, that finishes out these days.  More to come for the ending.  Hope you enjoyed this part of our journey.