SUPER WEDNESDAY!

Who cares about "Super Tuesday" when we have Super Wednesday in the Linskey house! Today, the littlest Linskey (Bucky passed him weight-wise several months ago) has turned 4 years old!!!

He started the day be coming downstairs (after his sisters had gone to school!) and jumping out and saying "Boo!" When mom said "Happy Birthday", he was quick to point out her error ("Sing it mommy!") Aren't you all glad you weren't there to witness that?!? We then got dressed, although he flat out refused to wear one of his new sweaters. He told mom it was her sweater. She can have it. Won't that look nice on mommy... But, the rest of the clothes were...well, okay, they were boring (except for the Spiderman PJs). He also got a play-dough set, a spider-man water gear set (if we do actually get to use the pool this summer, he'll have fun with it!), a Panda (who really only crawls face down and does nothing else), and money to send him to Spiderman school. That's what he wants to be when he grows up.

He brought in cupcakes for his little class yesterday and for his big class today. He loved being the birthday boy two days in a row. I have a feeling tomorrow will be disappointing...

Happy Birthday Matthew :)

From his preschool teacher:

What do you like Matthew? - "Snowflakes"

What don't you like Matthew? - "Getting hurt"

(Two days earlier, Matthew walked full force into a table and had a nice cut and a big swollen eye!)

IT'S SNOWING IN GEORGIA!!!

Yes, you read that right - we have snow!!! Not that it'll last, but it may get us out of school tomorrow. Matthew brought home the above blue handout today (only in the south would they WISH for snow!!!)

Northern Winter Wonderland

Todd often talks about moving back to Wisconsin. The snowstorms, fog, gale force blizzards, ice dams on the roof, and deep freeze temperatures...what's not to like! We spent a few days in Milwaukee after the wedding, and experienced all of the above. In less than two days. We were going to stop in Madison, but couldn't (the Wisconsin DOT "highly discouraged" any and all travel in/near/through/over southwest Wisconsin). As it was, we barely made it to Iowa the next day before another storm hit. Why can't all of this stuff move south - the people in the south are always saying they want to see snow...but, alas, this never seems to happen. We made it to Iowa Monday, Christmas Eve, to spend Christmas with Grandma Irma. Uncle Erin and family made a surprise visit, arriving a few short hours after us (we knew they were coming - they got delayed too!) It was fun to watch Grandma Irma's expression when they walked in the door. And, we got to hang out with Aunt Jenny and her family too. Heads up everyone - the wedding will be June 28, 2008. It was a very fast week - and the kids had fun playing with each other and Grandma. They took trips to the library, played in the snow, and just had fun. We drove back yesterday after being delayed by (you guessed it) more snow. But, we did arrive to rain in Georgia (pretty rare these days, and very welcome!)

We are just going to do nothing for a few days but enjoy the new year. The kids kinda wish there was some snow. We have a very good sledding hill if we ever do get any...

Happy New Year !!!

4 Children and a Wedding

4 children at a wedding ...it's not as bad as it sounds. The kids all behaved for Grandma Mary while mom and dad, part of the wedding party, took part in the wedding and sat at the head table. Mom got all dressed up and was mistaken for "a princess" by Matthew (who had clearly gotten a hold of a beer in the groom's suite before the wedding!) and had the girls asking in stunned disbelief, "What did you do?" Apparently, mom needs to get out more. All the kids behaved very well. After the cocktail hour and dinner, things really got out of hand with Brian pretending to be Vanilla Ice and some crazy wedding guests reenacting scenes from Dirty Dancing (or, it's X-rated counterpart!) There was some late night partying, and apparently some "illness", but it can't be a true success without a mostly hungover wedding party, right? Seriously, it was a really fun wedding and we saw lots of family and friends. Santa even handed out some presents to the kids (who were totally thrilled!)

Congratulations to Brian and Tarra !!!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Amanda wrote a little plea for, if she were a turkey, why she shouldn't be eaten for Thanksgiving. Enjoy!

"Hi. My name is Bitter Badder. As you can see, I am very bitter and bad. When I heard that the farmer was picking the turkey for Thanksgiving dinner I had quite a hissy fit. I've got a couple reasons I shouldn't be the one to be chosen.
One, I'm not the fattest in the coop, so why choose me? I would provide less meat and less flavor (except for bitterness) than the fattest turkey would. I'm only the size of a chicken while the biggest is as big as a pig.
Two, I constantly am exercising, causing me to be smaller than the others who just lay around (boring) and eat disgusting chicken feed (yuk). I only eat berries (non-poisonous) and corn (freshly picked) to stay much healthier. Finally, I am an athlete turkey. I have a treadmill in my coop to run on, so, I am quite a fast runner. I can't outrun a bullet, but thanks to very good hearing I can run away before it is even shot.
So, that's all I can say, but don't go telling my secret. As I said, I have good hearing, so don't even try it."



(I wish my hearing were that good!!!)

Happy Birthday Uncle Tom :)

5th Grade Honor Chorus

Amanda participated in the county-wide Honor Chorus concert on Thursday night. It was actually an all-day event that included nearly 400 students from every elementary school in the county. They rehearsed together all day (9am until the performance at 7pm). I heard them practicing in the morning, and they were pretty darn good! The kids will also be performing at the County's 175th birthday party in a few weeks. Amanda had a great time - now, if we could only get her to sing in church...

The playground is here! The playground is here!

Our latest project is almost done. When told his favorite show ("Wow! Wow! Wubbzy!") was on and that lunch was ready, Matthew would not come in. His reply was, "I playing on playground!!!" I think that means it's a hit. He has since gone out in his pajamas and in the nude...

A few more loads of mulch and it should be good to go. Then, on to our next project: Tiling the kitchen backsplash, building a closet, demolishing the downstairs bathroom, or something else we (meaning Kelly) dream up to do.

Happy Halloween!

We celebrated our first Georgia Halloween with lots of running and way too much candy. Matthew RAN to every house. He RAN back to me after a few houses and screamed, "Candy! I got candy! I go get more!" After an hour, it was pretty much the same, only I had to carry him between houses. And, instead of "trick-or-treat" he was saying, "Hey, penguin here!" The girls all had fun too, although Julia insisted on wearing the 4T bunny costume that we've had for about 5 years...it was still cute :) Bobbie Ann joined us for the trip, and then we met up with other friends. It was a fun time, but everyone was tired after going up and down all our neighborhood hills. They are steep...

(Ohh, you'll notice that Matthew was Tiggr at school, and a penguin for trick-or-treating - he needed the school costume to be bathroom friendly...)

Hope everyone had a Happy Halloween :)

New Pictures!

We have new pics of the kids. There's another of Matthew I'll post later. He was the trickiest of the bunch (as usual). The kids voted to have them done with a sepia tone.

Our latest disaster...errr, project

So, the kids would like a swingset. So, we have a yard that's not level. Did you know that clay is like granite when you haven't had rain in months? Did you know you could bend a pick-axe in clay? I didn't know that clay could spark! See, we're learning so much about our new home!

Here are some shots of our .... dig? project? disaster? It's really still mostly excavation right now. I would also like to add that digging with a 50lb puppy around is not easy...especially when said critter decides to take a nap in the exact spot where you are digging or tries to climb on your back when you sit anywhere. Then, he goes and digs a hole somewhere that you really don't need one at all but that you will invariably trip in when you are (for example) carrying a really heavy tool or say a sharp hatchet. Hard to believe, isn't it? (Note: I meant the part about the dog- the tripping part is easily believable for anyone who knows me!)

We will have more pictures to follow. Hopefully, it will look like the box and we won't have kids landing in trees or over the fence...

Soccer Ends

I know we didn't write much about the soccer season. There are reasons for it, but no need to go into detail. The girls had fun. Julia has decided to try softball - Allison wants to play football. As in American tackle football. She didn't care that she might be the only girl doing it. She really wants to play. Seriously. But, she does still want to play soccer too...

So, here are a few pics from the end of year pizza party. We look forward to a potentially very interesting spring season.

Aquarium fun

A few weeks ago, we went to the Tennessee Aquarium. We took a scenic drive through drought-stricken north Georgia (new motto: "Shower only if you REALLY have to, okay y'all?!?"), saw the only place with green grass growing (the dried out bed of Lake Alatoona), and took approximately 187 pictures of fish in tanks. Amanda was our photographer. She managed to run down the battery in a record 24 minutes. You do the math on that to see how many pictures she took each minute. I have a few of her more interesting shots posted here. It's a great aquarium - and we have a membership to it. Allison wanted to go again the next day...

The boy....again

Another thing we never thought we'd have to say to the boy:

" Matthew, you are not allowed to collect lab specimens in the kitchen!"