News

We have not been able to get back to school since the camping trip. There has been swim practice, grocery shopping, library, free movie day, and all the stuff I have to do, like make phone calls and get our finances in order, so that we can close on our NEW HOUSE July 12th. Woohoo! Yes, we are moving to a great house in a nice neighborhood, with 13 acres to boot. We have a ton of small stuff to do to get our present house ready to put on the market. We will probably have to have 2 mortgages for a little while, and that concerns me because the market here is always slow. This week during our date time we have walked the whole property in the steaming heat and poison ivy. The whole property is pretty much wooded with big hardwoods and a nice size creek flows along the whole backside of the prop. I've got a big front porch to sit on and drink my tea, while looking across the street kitty cornered in the community pond. I am very excited about the boys having a place to roam and explore the woods, plus play and fish in the pond. They can also ride their dirt bikes in the woods, but the big black moron has to go. We have an elderly couple next door that will not tolerate a big barking dog, so he has got to go and now I feel so guilty.

Trials

I was speaking to a good friend the other day who has been through an incredibly difficult trial. They had made some very poor choices that have led to some extreme consequences. We were discussing all the ins and outs of this mess, and they said that they wouldn't be where they are today if it all hadn't happened the way it did. At first I said "yeah, all things work together for good..." but then I said, "no I actually don't agree with what you said." While I absolutely believe that God in his mercy will take our mistakes and change us for the better if we let him, I don't believe that people have to grossly sin to learn the tough lessons of this life. For example, I've heard people say that they would never have changed if they hadn't got addicted, or the affair and aftermath caused them to really value their family, or whatever. I have been the recipient of God's grace for my blunders, but did I have to fall in order to reach the understanding that I now have. The answer, to me is NO. I am trying to teach my children that they don't have to sin in order to find God's mercy and forgiveness. They are already sinners, but they don't have to experience the really bad in order to see the goodness of God. I know that there is that passage in scripture where Mary M was washing Jesus feet and they say something like "the one that is forgiven much, loves much." I know that when you realize how great your sin is, you are all the more grateful for forgiveness, but I'm not convinced that it has to be like that. The word says that we will experience trials and tribulation to change our character, but those random kind of trials are not what I'm talking about. We have no control over life and death, or handicaps, and trials of nature. I told this person, "what if you were shown the unconditional love of God, what if you were interceded for, what if you were shown mercy and forgiveness, do you still think that change could not happen" If we truly believe that christ has the power to transform lives, then we must believe that his will is to not have mankind learn the "hard way." More than anything I want my children and myself to be open and soft, so that God doesn't have to break us. If he is jealous for us, then his means of getting us will be unstoppable. So I am thankful for the times I was hard headed and God saved me, and I'm even more thankful for the times that I wasn't hard headed and he saved me.

I'm So Happy -VBS

When I was growing up all the churches we ever went to had VBS during the day in the summer. I loved the snacks and games we would play, and I always looked forward to it every year. Now sadly since there are not as many stay at home moms, churches have VBS at night. The silver lining to that sad cloud is that my mother volunteers at her church during VBS week, and my children are the beneficiaries of that. You see my church doesn't have it and I doubt they ever will. I would not feel comfortable to send my kids to a church where I didn't know many people. I gladly will send them with her though, so this means that it is date week for Nate and I. My mom picks up the kids at 5:45 and doesn't bring them home till 9:15, just in time for bed. YEA! So we are off to dinner tonight, and maybe every night this week. We also get to ride the motorcycle, which is something that I rarely get to do. I should be in a really good mood this week. See ya.

Our Camping Trip

The trip was a success, even though we got rain the first 2 days, it wasn't bad at all. The first night it stormed at bedtime and all through the night but was clear by morning, and the 2nd day it rained at dinnertime, that was a little annoying, but we had a nice family dinner in our pop-up and then I read to the boys before bed. My camera stopped working for several days, so I didn't get to take the pictures that I wanted, but we still managed a few good ones. The kissacks and Nanny and Papa were along for this trip, so the boys had their long lost cousins to play with all week, or pester in the case of Lyra and Solomon. The only damage done on the trip was by the wildlife, squirrels ate through my huge heavy duty plastic food tote, and a racoon got into my cooler and ate 2 pounds of expensive lunchmeat. Camping is a great way to family vacation, but boy is it ever tons of work. It's hard to be organized and not feel like your living in a constant state of mess. My back hurt from all the stooped over food prep and clean up, and it was nigh impossible to keep the children or pop-up clean for any length of time. I need a few more things to make camping more efficient, but overall I did pretty well. Every meal was a feast and we were always famished, so I came home with very little food. We (ladies) baked cookies, banana bread, muffins, and pasta and chicken salads provided by Tonya and Celeste. I made a beef hobo stew, so we all shared our food at every meal. My favorite is still breakfast, I LOVE bacon, so eggs, bacon, sausage and coffee every day is wonderful. I rarely make coffee at home, but I enjoy it camping. The boys slept like logs every night, so that is a sign of a good trip.

I did mange to catch up on a little reading of Agatha Christie.

Austin and Evan captured a snapping turtle, and named him Turdy 2. The original Turdy was a pet of Austins for 3 0r 4 months.

See what happens when Nate is left to man the camera and get pictures of me. Is this the only side of me that has any value?

whistling for a squirrel

On the trail of a water snake.

I took this picture of a boy who was complaining about walking barefoot. Tom Sawyer he is not.

The goose whisperer

Nanny and the big boys

The View

This was the view from my boat, as we left the others to eat our wake.

Luke and Silas give all they've got to tug Nate around the lake.

They were taking to long, so Micah, Evan and I speed away.

Evan and Micah grab the lead boat, and are determined to be the fastest boat on the lake.

Arts and Crafts day at Vogel

Luke wanted no part of rock painting, he was ready to hit the water.

Rock painting

The Fun Bunch

yeah, he is this happy all the time.

The camping crew

Goat Farm

Saturday of last we went to an open house for goats, at a local goat farm. I have always wanted to have a few goats, so we checked it out. The baby goats were adorable and the boys got to feed them with bottles. This lady had 30 or 40 goats and I realized that was way to many for my taste. You could hardly hear yourself think, due to all the bleating of goats trying to get your attention.

Austin gives milking a try. The other boys wouldn't dare, they thought it was gross.

Nate was a whiz at this milking thing? Hmm!!!

Some highlights of our time in Atlanta

I used to be the skinny one.

I can definitely dance.

Isn't she lovely.

Swimming

Last night was the boys first swim meet. It wasn't an official meet, it was for fun, and everybody who competed got a ribbon. This was a great way to break in the newbies. Evan and Austin swam the 25 freestyle and 25 back. Luke swam only the freestyle, but he thought he should swim some others. Austin placed 3rd and 5th in his heat, and Evan placed 4th and 6th. Little Luey placed 6th in his heat, he didn't actually make it across the length of the pool without the assistance of a kick board that they had to throw to him, to keep him from drowning. He was never scared, he just couldn't go any farther than about 25ft. This was really an accomplishment for Luke and Evan, I am very proud of their effort. Evan couldn't swim across the length of the pool when we started 2 weeks ago, and Luke could only cling to the side of the pool. I don't know if any of them are going to be good swimmers, but I am so glad that they have this opportunity to learn how to swim, and even compete once in a while. I was actually a little nervous, but they seemed cool as a cucumber. I did let my imagination run away with me a little and I ended up getting teary eyed, when I imagined that we were at an olympic game and my boys were young men contending for the gold. If you know me at all, you will know that I have visions of granduer all the time, so this was nothing new. Usually I imagine myself doing something heroic or accomplishing some great feat, but now that I have children I can have vain imaginings about them instead of myself.

Cleansing

I forgot to update you on the cleansing process that Nate and I did. We are still doing it, because we were feeling so much better. After the third or fourth day I stopped vomitting in my mouth every time I had to drink the concoction. Nate has lost about 12 pounds, I have no idea how much I've lost, but I do think some. We have tons more energy, and have an overall better feeling. As to the details, we didn't find any friends, but we did have some strange occurrences, and if you want more details you will have to email me offline at catrinabrock@yahoo.com .

Hotlanta

I returned Sunday afternoon from a trip to Altanta, to meet up with my best friend in H.S and maid of honor. Jacque She and I haven't seen each other in 9 years, and when she called to say she was coming to Atlanta for a convention, and could I pop down to see her, I jumped at the chance. I left Saturday morning to pick her up at the airport, and then we headed over to the High musuem, where the photographer Annie Leibovitz (I butchered that) was showing her work. I immensely enjoyed the art museum, I haven't done anything cultural in a long time. Jacque is a web designer for the Holocaust museum in D.C. She has an art degree from a Va. college close to where we grew up. It was so great to hang out with her, we are so polar opposites, yet we have so much to talk about. She is contemporary, I am classic, she is freakishly cold (not temperment) and I am usually hot. She has had a career, and I've been at home, she is city, and I am so definitely country (now). She thinks about food more than I do, which was unbelievable to me. She took some cool pictures of us at the High with her camera so she will email them to me once she gets home, and I will show you the girl that was always assumed to be my sister. Not all the time, but often enough that it was funny. She is hoping to be moving to Raleigh NC, so hopefully our next reunion won't be in 10 years.

The Cutie

I actually got these the day (THE MAN) left my house, but I just didn't feel chipper enough to post them. I am back to myself, and I feel like a proud mama hen again.

Dania and her friend Jeniflore

Update

Well Dfacs is not going to open an investigation against me, so that is the end of this episode. Praise God. Today though my freedoms was quenched, when my dad dropped off my mom this morning and left her at my house to help me out. I needed to go to the grocery store, but I didn't feel free to go w/o the kiddos, because if I left it would appear that no one was watching the kids since my moms car wasn't there. I went to my 6 surrounding neighbors today and told them what happened, I told them what happened to our record, I told them that sometimes I have unseen babysitters like today. I told them that we were adopting and now my record is not clean. I told them that the Austin and Evan are pretty much old enough to be home for small amounts of time. Everyone seemed appalled, and most wanted to talk a long time about it. I just got back from the man behind us, where I have spent the last 1 1/2 talking to him and his wife. The people with the dogs were great and one of the ladies that lives there came over to tell me how wonderful my family is. The man across the street didn't invite me in or invite me to talk to he and his wife. He spoke to me through the screen door and said that he didn't have anything to do with it, but when I was telling him about my invisible babysitters (mom, next door neighbors) he said "thank you for clarifying that", and "Oh I see", so he is my number one suspect. Now that I've done this I feel satisfied that whoever it was might think that they acted hastily, and I was sweet and nice (by God's wonderful grace) so hopefully they have a better understanding of the situation. I am now going to forgive and ask God to help me forget.

PS. Georgia law, says that no child 0-8 can be left unattened for any reason. 9-12 can be left for up to 4 hours, 13yr olds can stay 12 hours by themselves and babysit younger children. That is all I was able to find out.

A Visit from DFACS

Well one of my worst nightmares came true today. I got a visit from the Department of family and childrens services. Yikes and double Yikes. We were in my bedroom watching a Ken Ham video for science when the phone rang. I looked at a cell phone number that I did not recognize, so I let the answering machine pick it up. When I heard something about DFACS I was curious, so I picked up. I honestly thought it had something to do with some paper work for my adoption or someone elses. The man identified himself and asked if he could stop by for a meeting with me. I asked what it was regarding and he said that there was a call into them saying that there were children in my home being left unsupervised for long periods of time. I said he could come over, and he said he would be there in 5-10 minutes. I was pretty nervous, I briefed the kids quickly while I called Nate who happened to be having lunch at Applebees, 1 mile from the house. The dfacs guy beat Nate home however, so I had to go in alone for the first 5 minutes. I told him right off the bat that before anything else was said that I was in the middle of an adoption and I didn't want anything to interfere with that. He said that he just had some ?'s he needed to ask me about the children being left at home. I told him, before he had a chance to ask that yes it is true that I leave my children at home to go across the street to ingles to pick up something. I leave Austin at home frequently, because I feel that he is totally responsible to be home for short periods of time. The other two I hardly ever leave, but I will occassionally, when they are occupied with something and I will be gone for a few minutes. Yesterday was a prime example, we were watching our spanish video when I realized I didn't have a plantain, for the fried plantains we were suppossed to be making. I left them all watching to go get it, I can be there and back in under 7 mins most times. (truthfully) Well I know that Austin is not old enough to babysit, you have to be 13 to do that, but I've kept myself ignorant of the other stuff. He said that everything I did was fine, and not a problem. I asked him what the law was, but he didn't have an answer so I don't know if there is one. He was a young married man, and extremely nice and get trying to put me at ease by saying that they have to investigate all calls. I allowed him to question each one of the kids individually, and they did beautifully. I prayed that God would guard Luke's mouth, and he did. He asked them-
"Do you like being at home"
"Do you ever feel scared"
"What don't you like about being at home"

They all answered with things like "they don't like going to bed"
"they get scared when someone jumps out from behind a door"
"they like doing stuff with us"
"they don't like school"

He said that most likely everything would be considered unsubstaniated and there would be no investigation or anything else. But what burns me up is that I was reported in the first place. Who thinks I'm a neglectful mother? And now I have a file or something down at Dfacs. I already talked to my friendly neighbors next door who were out of town this week, and they have no idea why anyone would ever think that our kids aren't properly taken care of. (these are the neighbors that love my kids) It bugs me that someone didn't find out all the facts before calling, my other neighbors don't even know how old my kids are. 9 yr olds are allowed to be left at home, Evan is so big he looks like a nine yr old. Also I have left them alone a couple of times when I have called my friendly neighbors, just to have them keep an eye on my house while I'm gone. They don't come in my house and my kids didn't go to theirs, but they were sitting on their porch or working in the yard, or just being home. And my kids know to go there if someone gets hurt or there is a fire or fight. So everything seems to be fine. I will be calling the supervisor tommorrow to see if I ever do this again will I get in trouble. They never told me that any of the situations I presented were wrong, so I'm still uncertain if the snitch sees me leaving will they make more trouble. Another thing that is suspicous is that I always park my vehicle around the side/back so people can't see who is coming and going from my house, that is something that I have consciencely been aware of since we moved into this house. The fact that we live on a busy street and I didn't want people seeing who was home and not home. I always felt safer not announcing to the world that the house was empty. Also our van windows are tinted, so you can't really count heads, and of course they have never stepped foot outside when I'm gone. So my only problem now is tracking down the snitch and confronting them. I want them to know that I know who it was, and hopefully put their mind a little more at ease, because they don't know if I called the nice neighbors to keep an eye out or not. I don't know if I can live here knowing someone is watching me that closely. God forbid if they ever see or hear one get disciplined. I do not want another visit from DFACS ever.

"Jumpin"

Things have been over the top busy for the Brock household. Normally I check my email twice a day, but since my last post, I think I have only checked it 3 times, hence the 168 emails in my inbox. Well friday started swim team for all my boys. It is Mon, Wed, and Fri 9-11am, the coaches didn't waste any time getting the kids ready to swim, they just told them to jump in (9ft of water) and see what they could do. I honestly feel so sorry for them, the water is freezing and the coaches "work them to death" according to Austin. Luke and Austin have done really well and have taken to it right away. Evan on the other hand is a bit nervous and hasn't gotten the hang of it yet. This is so like him though, he doesn't enjoy things that he doesn't have control over, thus his aversion to theme park rides and swimming in water that you can't touch the bottom. I am very proud of all of them though, because we are forcing them to take this 8 week course, and so far they are getting used to it, and saying that each day was better than the last. I will post pics soon because they look so cute in their goggles.

Tonya and her brood were in town for the weekend, so we went out to nannies for lunch on Sat, and the boys swam in her freezing pool for about 20-30 mins, then we headed to Bluegrass. Bluegrass encompasses bluegrass music by some local good ole boys, that what they lack in talent they make up for with enthusiasm. Bluegrass also entails, hot dogs with the works, plus anything else that people have laying around their fridges, plus all the soft drinks and marshmallows a body would ever need. All they ask in return is for some applause and a donation for the food. Bluegrass is held in a sleepy, quaint little town 20 mins north of here. Nate and I love it up there we would love to become full time residents. The mayor is a friend from our days at Toccoa Falls College, so we are always meeting nice folks up there. Sunday was church and then back to Nannies for lunch and some gun shootin before the Kissacks had to leave. No family get together is complete without golf in the front yard, driving the balls into the pasture, and some target shootin with one or more of the guns that Nate keeps in his arsenal. The van or truck is always loaded with golf clubs, and the gun paraphernalia, and now there will be even more to haul, with the addition of a set of golf clubs for me, that we picked up at Dicks friday night while we were there getting goggles for the boys.

The other thing that has happened is that Nate and I are doing a colon cleanse. I was over at my neighbors house a few weeks ago, when I saw them drinking this green sludge. It smelled awful and I told them I would never be able to stomach it twice a day, but when they told me what kind of stuff they were finding in the toilet, I went home and told Nate. He said that if they weren't joking about the friends they found, then to hurry and get some for us. All it is, is some kind of herbal fiber powder. You take a heaping tablespoon in the morning mixed with juice, and then again in the evening before dinner. You eat raw foods for the first 2 days, then on the third morning you give yourself a coffee enima (yes coffee enima) after that you can eat regularly, then on the 6th day another coffe enima. You should only have to do this for 7-10 days to see results. If nothing strange occurs then your colon and instestines are clean. I gagged and had to work to keep the bitter sludge down this morning, but tonight it was just a little gagging. Nate didn't mind it that much at all, however he is used to gross drinks, because he drinks all those kinds of protein shakes for weight trainning, and he also likes slimfast, which makes me puke. I will keep you posted on my progress. Not graphically posted, unless I find any large friends like my neighbor did.

Money, Money, Money

I have an obession to train my children how to handle their money in a Godly, responsible manner. It seems like the number one theme at our house. I think it is so important that children learn now the value of a dollar, how to give, and proper impulse control. So many marriages are ruined over finances, and so many people are just burdened beyond belief by their financial situation. As future heads of their homes I want my boys to have a firm grasp on their desires and impulses so that they are able to use their money to further the kingdom and glorify God. I pretty much live right in the middle of town, so most days we are hitting some kind of store, and my children are lured in by the stuff they see, so I have ample trainning opportunities. This is what we do with them, luckily my DH is about as passionate as I am about it, so we are on the same page. Plus, my kids have a great life, so I don't mind being a little hard on them now and then, they probably need it, since they are half spoiled as it is.

They each get a weekly allowance for the chores they do around the house. I have no set chores for them individually, sometimes their load is light and sometimes, depending what projects are going on it is bigger. Austin(10) gets $5, Evan(8) gets $4, and Luke (6) gets 3. They must give 10% off the top to the church or charity. Then off the top they get 20% to spend on WHATEVER they want, but they must keep that 20% in the house for a month before they are allowed to use it, that way they are forced to take a little time and decide what they want to buy, plus it adds up so they can buy something a little more substanial. They are then required to put the rest of their weekly allowance straight into the bank. I have set up saving accounts for them, and they must make their own deposits and keep up with how much they have. If they lose their money from the time I give it to them till the time we go to the bank, that is too bad. They have nothing to deposit. I try to get them to the bank at least every other week. While we were on vacation we gave them each $10 to spend however they wanted. Evan bought himself a baby shamu, and large lollipop, for a total of $8. The lolli was $3 and it is still sitting on the laundry room table half eaten. I pointed out to him(nicely) that it wasn't a great purchase choice because he didn't really enjoy it and it is kinda wasted $. Austin bought a lolli also and never finished his, but he took the rest of his money plus what he had been saving at home for a month and went to walmart and bought himself a nice lego building set. Luke bought a lolli and ate every bit, but then during the hot sea lion show bypassed the water I'd brought to purchase a $3.50 ice cream, we warned him that it would be gone in a second along with most of his money, but he wanted one. Then when he was at walmart, he was crying and wishing that he hadn't eaten icre cream and saved his money for something better. A lesson well learned. I am thankful he is 6 learning these things. Although I did feel a little sorry for him.