Ten for Tuesday

So last week I posted my Ten for Tuesday things that upset me and said maybe I would post ten things that make me happy this week. Well I am not, but I am going to post 10 amusement parks we want to visit. This has become our Luttrell Family summer vacation. In 2008 we went to Six Flags in St. Louis, last year we went to Dollywood and this year we are going to Magic Springs. Kaitlyn will ride anything and Kyle is getting to be that way.

So here is our list of parks we want to visit (in order).

1) Disneyworld -- we are trying to plan to take a family vacation over fall break or Christmas break this year.

2) Magic Springs -- only because we are going in June, this park had a water park attached to it (always a plus).

3) Cedar Point in Ohio -- this is ranked as the #1 amusement park on several different lists I have seen

4) Universal Studios -- I have actually debated us going here and Seaworld instead of Disney for fall break but I think Kyle will enjoy it more in a couple of years and he can be sure to be tall enough to ride everything.

5) Hershey park -- I would love to go to Hershey, PA and do lots of the things they have there. It is too long of a drive (I think) so we would have to fly which of course adds to the cost. So this one will have to wait.

6) Kings Island -- also in Ohio, just looks fun

7) Legoland -- this is in California so we will probably not make it there anytime soon but Kyle would go crazy there.

8) Six Flags in Atlanta -- or San Antonio really. We just like Six Flags.

9) Busch Gardens -- in Williamsburg

10) Holiday World -- this place is located in Santa Claus, Indiana which I just think is interesting. It also has the world's longest water roller coaster.

So any advice. Which one would you want to do first? Anyone ever been to any of these?

Silly bandz

We finally found some of those silly bandz at Walgreens last week. The kids were thrilled to get them. Kyle got some in the shape of cars and trucks (of course) and Kaitlyn got the musical ones. Kaitlyn doesn't keep any of them for more than 24 hours without trading. She has had some pretty neat ones and then will trade them the next day. Kyle gave most of his away, traded a few then gave the rest to Kaitlyn.

flying a kite

Kaitlyn won this kite at the egg hunt a few weeks ago and tried to fly it today at Luke's. It didn't work very well but it did fly for a bit.

Soccer Star

Since we didn't have a soccer game this morning, here is some video of Kyle playing soccer for your entertainment.

L2L puppet show

I am finally getting around to posting the video of the 4th graders puppet show at Lads to Leaders. Kaitlyn was girl puppet. Her part is from 3:08 to 3:43.

Ten for Tuesday

I read a lot of blogs and chances are if you are reading this you read a lot of blogs too (or you are related to me). I have seen several people do a Ten for Tuesday post, just listing 10 random things in their life. Well my list is stuff that upsets, saddens or just plain makes me mad! I was going to write a post about the things that have upset me lately so I just added more to it and decided to do it on Tuesday.

So all the things in this list upset me in some way.

1. Our youth minister search. We are in the process of hiring a new youth minister for our church. Our current youth minister is going to move into a new position called the family care minister. We interviewed two candidates. They had to come to a parent meeting, plan some devo and game time with the teens, be questioned by the elders and search committee and then preach on Sunday morning. Let me tell you, a very extensive interview process. Well the second guy that came was perfect (or at least I thought so). Everyone loved him, he nailed the parent meeting and sermon on Sunday morning (those are the two parts that I was involved in). We offer him the job and he decides he is going to stay at his current congregation. So we start over again. This upsets me greatly and I am not very good at seeing the bigger picture or being patient in thinking maybe there is someone else who would be better out there.

2. Those dumb silly bandz all the kids are crazy about. I cannot find them anywhere. They supposedly sell them at gas stations so we went to the one next to our house on Sat. morning. They were out and the guy told Kaitlyn they would have some on Monday. She looked forward to this for two days. We stop on the way home from softball practice and the employee that was there told her they were sold out.

3. My friend Carrie selling her house. She is trying to stay positive about it and I know things will work out for them in the long run, I just hate that they are going through all of this.

4. Not being able to scrapbook with my crop friends on Friday night. I hate John's work schedule.

5. Teenagers who don't listen or follow simple directions (which is ALL teenagers)

6. Losing one of our bunco players (even though we understand her need to spend more time with her family) and then the person who we were going to ask fill her spot already got asked by another bunco group to join their group.

7. There not being a Kindergarten program for Kyle at the end of the year. Kaitlyn had one but apparently they have done away with this. This made me so angry that I sent the Principal an email.

8. Another Bolton friend possibly moving away (first Randy, next Abbie, then Jeff, now someone else)

9. Abbie not being here for me to talk to everyday. Yes I know we blog, facebook, yahoo chat, and can call but its not the same. And there is a lot going on in my life that I want to tell her on a daily basis when I see her in her classroom every morning (like I used to). She is the kind of friend that will not try and solve my problems or tell me what I should but just say "uch". And we can complain to each other and know that really we are not the complainy grouchy type of person but it is nice to just be able to complain to somebody who gets it.

10. Not being able to plan a trip to Disney because of the uncertainty with John's job. I want to go the week before Christmas. John says he probably cannot get off that week. So then maybe we will go over fall break. But then John is trying to get a different job so maybe he won't have any vacation. Now yes I realize this a problem some people would love to have just because it means we do have some money set aside to actually go to Disneyworld but my kids will be 11 and 7 so I feel like if we don't go now the excitement is just going to go downward from here on out.

So there you have it. My pessimistic view on the world right now. Maybe next Tuesday I will do Ten for Tuesday things that make me happy to even this out but for now, I am just upset!

I won something!

I read a lot of blogs and many of these people get paid for their blog and sometimes will give stuff away. I read Once a Month Mom and she was having a give away for some stuff from Ziploc. I was the last person to leave a comment and random.org picked my comment number. Here is what I won:



There was a couple of lunch box style containers and 3 of those giant bags with handles. I have no idea what I will use the bags for but they seem neat.

Busy day

Yesterday was a very busy day for us. Most weekends in the spring are busy though. Just seems like there is so much going on.

Our church Easter egg hunt was at 10:00, the same time as Kyle's first soccer game of the season. So I took Kaitlyn and dropped her off at the church and Susan brought her to the restaurant.



Then headed to Kyle's soccer game.







Then we had a family reunion at the mexican restaurant in Arlington for the Luttrell's. I think I heard Roger say there were 63 people there in all. Here is a group photo of most of the people.



Sister photo (we haven't had of these in a while)



Then Kyle and I went to a bridal shower at church before heading to Andrew's house for his Star Wars birthday party.

Andrew's grandma made all the kids Star Wars capes to wear and they got light sabors for their take home gift but also to play with at the party. They went through Jedi training and then fought Darth Vader.









Then I chaperoned the prom. We had a math teacher photo made and a group faculty photo. I wish I had my camera because there was a giant lighted Eiffel Tower that would have made a really good picture.

Photos from the Opryland Hotel

Here are some of the pics I took of the kids while walking back and forth to our events around the Opryland Hotel. If we lived in Nashville, we would visit this hotel all the time. It is so pretty.

Lads to Leaders

We got back from Nashville yesterday about 3:00. We had a good time but are very tired. Here is our recap:

We arrived on Thursday night and just hung out for a while. Friday morning I went to judge scrapbooks at 11:00. Then Kaitlyn had puppets and Oral Bible reading. There is an awards ceremony that night.

The girls on the puppet team (Kylie, Rylee, Olivia, Kaitlyn, Gracen)



4th grade puppet team



Kaitlyn and her puppet



Bible reading



Andrew, Stone, Kyle and Jackson acting silly at the Friday night awards.



Cheering for Bartlett Woods



Then on Saturday we didn't have anything until 5:00 when both kids had song leading. So we walked to the mall for a bit. Then came back and got ready for song leading. We had the group picture and another awards ceremony that night.

Kyle with his drawing for Art Says It.



Kyle leading his song, he kept that paper in front of his face the whole time.



K-2 song leading boys



Kaitlyn made the finals in song leading so I got to see her lead her song the second time (I was with Kyle for the first time she led it, they go at the same time)



Acting silly with Mr. Wiley while Penny sets up for the group photo.



Group scrapbook participants



Yea we won first place.



Kaitlyn and Olivia for songs of praise (4th grade girls), both finalist. Olivia won 2nd place.



K-2 participants



Kaitlyn's scrapbook



My college roommate was up there with her girls participating too. We tried to meet up for lunch or dinner but our schedules were just too different and busy. Maybe next year.

Victory photograph

In a few hours we will be leaving for Nashville and head to the Lads to Leaders convention. This is a big deal at our church. This is Kaitlyn's 3rd time to participate and Kyle's 2nd. Kyle is doing song leading and he made a drawing (I forgot to take a picture before we turned it in, I will post that later). He also helped work on the group scrapbook. Kaitlyn is doing song leading, Bible reading and puppets while we are there. Then she also did Know the Books, Group Scrapbook, individual scrapbook and photography. The theme is "Faith is the Victory". When we talked about what she could take a picture of for the theme I said what do you think of when you say Victory and she jumped in the air and yelled victory. So we came up with the idea of taking a picture of someone jumping in the air. We went to the park and Kyle jumped off this rock about 18 times.

I took this shot of her so that I could get the shutter speed and ISO right (Carrie and Amy -- did you like that photo pro talk?!) and so I could show her what it should look like. Also so she could show Kyle how to jump.



And here are some of the shots she took, she took many more than this though. Kyle did not jump high enough for her to get a good shot.
Snapped to soon:



Whoops, snapped too late:



Getting there:



too late again:



And this is the best we got:



So after we got our t-shirts at church Sunday morning she got Gracen to help her and tried again. We found a cross that had been used for a VBS shot and took it in a classroom, not as pretty as outside but it works.

too late:



too soon:



whoops, cut off her head:



YES, perfect!



Thanks to Gracen for being such a good sport and jumping off the chair about 10 times.