Awards

'Tis the season for end of the year recognition at school. Madison received the following awards: State Recognition for participation in the Duke University TIP program (It was also told that she received the highest score of those 7th graders who took the ACT this year, a 21), "A" honor roll all three semesters, and the Presidential Award for Academic Excellence. We celebrated Friday night by getting frozen custard with her Andy's coupon. Way to go, Madison! Ready for 8th grade!



Love the signature!

Sunday Funnies

Jam Session

We had a fun time last night making Strawberry Freezer Jam. Thanks to everyone who came to the class. Here is the recipe for anyone else who is interested. The Farmer's Market has beautiful berries right now!

Quick and Easy Strawberry Freezer Jam
“Takes about half the time of cooked method, softer set, fresh fruit taste”

For each batch you will need 2 pints of berries and 1 box of Sure-Jell. Make 1 batch at a time.

1. Wash and rinse plastic containers with tight fitting lids. Use 1 – 2 cup containers.
2. Prepare fruit: Wash 2 pints strawberries. Remove the leaves and stems. Cut if berries are large. In a large, wide bottomed bowl, crush 1 cup of strawberries at a time with a potato masher. Pour crushed strawberries and their juice into a large liquid measuring cup. Continue crushing additional fruit until you have exactly 2 cups crushed fruit and juice. Pour into a large mixing bowl.
3. Measure 4 cups of sugar in a separate bowl.
4. Mix sugar into prepared fruit. Mix well. Let stand 10 minutes; stir occasionally.
5. Stir 1 box powdered pectin (I use the Sure-Jell brand) and ¾ cup water in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil on high heat, stirring constantly. Boil 1 minute, stirring the whole time. Remove from heat.
6. Stir pectin mixture into fruit mixture. Stir constantly until sugar is completely dissolved and no longer grainy. This will take 3 to 5 minutes.
7. Pour jam into prepared containers, leaving about ½ inch space at top for expansion during freezing; cover.

Let stand at room temperature 24 hours until set. Refrigerate up to 3 weeks. Otherwise, store in freezer for up to 1 year. Thaw in refrigerator.

National Spelling Bee

Ok, you may not know this about me, but I LOVE the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee. Yes, I said Spelling Bee. LOVE IT! I love the bizarre words they have to spell (like where have I been that I have not heard the word civitas or onychorrhexis?) I love all the questions they ask to get hints at the spelling like, "May I have the language of origin, please?" I love the Spell Master (yes, that's a real title!) Jacques Bailey and all the pronunciations he has to do. I love the look of relief when the kids find out they spelled a word right that they weren't sure about. And I love that they put this on TV! The preliminary round was today. Tomorrow from 9am-12pm you can watch the first rounds on ESPN. Then the finals are at 7pm on ABC. It is so exciting! I know, I'm weird. But I watch this every year and would not miss it.

Memorial Day Weekend

Last Friday we drove to Tulsa to spend Memorial Day Weekend. We had a lot going on! Friday evening we had a graduation party for Mitchel. Lots of friends and family came to wish him well. Lisa did a great job organizing this for us! Then it was on to the Checotah High School Football Stadium to watch Mitchel and Brycen graduate. This was the 100th graduating class from Checotah. There were nine Valedictorians and they each had to give a little speech. My favorite was the girl who's speech was entitled, "Everything I Know I Learned from Zelda." Ha! I love graduations! The next day we spent going to the zoo with Jared's mom and Mitchel. The girls and I had not been there in a while and we had a great time. Lunch at Coney Islander's (a Tulsa tradition since 1926) was a must. The next stop was Best Buy to got Mitchel all set for college with a new laptop, printer, bag, etc. We caught an afternoon showing of "Night At The Museum 2" The girls liked it a lot-- pretty cute. I liked the first one better. We ate dinner at Fish Daddy's and then went to Boyd and Rhonda's house for dessert for Boyd's birthday. I have already eaten way too much this weekend, so I have stopped counting at this point. It was fun for the girls to see their cousins, especially that cutie Zoe. We rested a little Sunday morning then went to church with all our old friends (all the kids are so big!) It was great to see everyone. We miss all our Mingo Valley friends so much! After church we went over to Grandma and Grandpa's for dinner. Karl, Tiffany and Kennedy came too so the girls got some more cousin time! Karl made a delicious dutch oven peach cobbler. Again, I am not counting until Tuesday because Monday morning we had Krispy Kreme donuts that were so conveniently close to the hotel. After a little shopping we started for home, stopping in Springfield at the Bass Pro (along with a kajillion other people). We drove through some pretty heavy rain at the Lake area, but made it home ok. It was a great weekend, and thanks to Jared driving, I got two books read! Now I am just trying to catch up on my work. I picked up the doggies from the kennel Tuesday morning and boy were they glad to see me! Now the girls just have a few more days of school (June 2nd is the last day) and then the summer can officially begin.

Graduation Pictures





Other Activities

American Idol Finale

I know this was almost a week ago, but I am little off my schedule. I was so happy Kris Allen won American Idol. My favorite moment from the finale though was when Danny Gokey sang "Hello" and then Lionel Richie came out and sang a couple more songs with him. What will we do now that this show is over? I got to watch the pilot episode of "Glee" which was pretty good, but apparently won't be on until Fall. Oh but wait, The Next Food Network star starts June 7th. Set the DVR!

2009 Spring Concert

Last night we enjoyed Madison's final concert of the school year. The band played 5 pieces with a soli for each instrument as well. These were some complicated songs, one of which was composed specifically for them by a graduate student friend of one of the directors. It was called "Pride of the Leopards". This video is of the overture Legend of the Eagles. Madison has worked very hard this year and we are proud of her!