Photo Journal - Josie Boettcher

Dinner with the McKeans actually went really well tonight. I wasn't too stressed about getting it prepped. We picked an easy meal, so even though I was pretty busy throughout the day, it wasn't crazy to get it ready. They hung out for a few hours and, while having 8 kids in the house is a little crazy, it wasn't too loud or wild. Me & Ben, and Colin & Christina sat and visited for hours, and it is really easy for us to talk to them. We have a lot of things in common and have similar senses of humor. It was a fun night! 

HAPPY 7TH BIRTHDAY TO OLLIE!!!!!! 🥳🎉🥳 She's getting so darn big! Olive is kind, but sassy. Smart as a whip and, occasionally, stubborn as a bull. She makes me laugh, she makes me want to tear my hair out sometimes, she makes me melt with how sweet she can be at times! She is figuring herself out day by day and I'm so excited to see the young lady she grows into, but enjoying the young lady she is right now! I'm so thankful that she is my daughter. I'm a very lucky mom! Today was really fun! We went to Panera for lunch, ate some soup and bread, then headed to the zoo for a couple of hours. Ollie really takes after mom and dad, because within an hour and a half, she was ready to go home! We were not mad about it at all. 😅 We were ready to leave too! We hung out and watched TV and had a pizza and a movie night, which was her birthday request. Then we sang and ate her requested strawberry cheesecake! Praise the Lord, it turned out well. I didn't love having the fres...

This morning was wild! I went to "supervise" the childcare for this Risley meeting and ended up having to provide childcare for the entire time because every single baby was freaking the heck out. It was really exhausting! And I felt pretty frustrated, because I thought I'd have time to work on my blog a little, make a grocery list, and a few other mundane chores that I needed to get done. Instead, I entertained babies for two hours and ran up and down the steps checking on the other room in between. It was fun that I got to see prep happening for the father/daughter dance though! Jenny and Alex were there helping Tony get things ready, along with a whole bunch of other people. It looked beautiful! I wish Ben were a guy who would take his girls to something like that. He's just too...I don't know! But he won't do it.  When the childcare was finally over, we got home and then Ben and I went out to eat at Chili's again. Last time was so great! But this time ...

Whew! The week is finally almost over! It's been such a long one. And today was not easy either. Jenny came over this morning, and I was so nervous to update her on how things were going, especially after feeling so negatively last night! But our hangout was great. I apologized for not going last night and she brushed it off and told me never to apologize for not coming to stuff! I appreciate it, but I know it's painful for her when I'm not there. I know she feels me pulling away from group and it hurts her. But she's doing everything she can to just support me and remain impartial, which I'm sure is very hard!  Jenny left just before lunch and I was going to sit and relax, but then I remembered Dungeons & Dragons people were going to be here at 1:30 and the house was a disaster! So we spent the next hour cleaning and prepping and then I visited with moms for two hours, while the big kids played D&D and the younger ones ran around my house, making me want to...

I'm really getting so burnt out! Today was CACH with a picnic afterwards and it was TWIN DAY! Me and Claire decided to be twins, Ruby and her Claire were twins, Ollie and Clem were twins, and Jonas's friends were all too cool to be twins so he was all along. :( He was a little sad but tried not to show it. I told him he could twin with me too! But he didn't want to.  Classes were fun today, but a little tiring. I think that leadership is going to approve my idea to have a yearbook club next year. So, rather than teaching any classes, I'll just have some teens with me for most of the time. We'll be taking pictures, coming up with fresh ideas for the yearbook, and I'll be teaching them how to use Canva and Lightroom. I think it will work well to have the extra help! None of the moms are ever able to help me at all and that makes it really hard to get stuff done. At this point in the year, I'm starting to panic a little because there is so much to be done and s...

Rain again! While I do love the rain, I don't think it does much for my mood...at least not lately. Anyway, bulk pick up grabbed our old couches today and I am so grateful to have my garage back! I was thinking about it because we felt like we needed to cover the couches with a tarp so they wouldn't be soaked and impossible to pick up for the guys, and then ran out there to take off the tarps so they wouldn't throw them away along with the couches when they were close!  I had the parent meeting this morning and it was kind of a hard one. I had to turn away a lot of parents this morning and there were several people who came in saying their kid wasn't in the system for some reason, when, in reality, the rooms were full and that's why their check-in didn't work. It's so sad for someone to pack up their kiddos to come out and then not get to have childcare! I've been there and it is very discouraging. Especially if you think you're in for a good teachin...

It's rainy today! So no W&F, which is half good half bad. On the good side, it's a crazy week, so I'll take any reprieves I can get. On the bad side, I do miss my friends and would love to be spending regular time with them again. Alas, we had to spend the morning at home! I had a couple of work calls to make about childcare situations that I agreed to that I'm completely regretting agreeing to now. 😅 I'm supposed to just be "supervising" these situations, but what's the chance I won't get sucked into helping in the younger kids' room when they're all screaming their little heads off?? *sigh* Whatever. I agreed, so there's not much I can do about it now! In the afternoon, Ollie tried another BJJ class. This one was much fuller, which is typical for this age range. I wanted to see if she still liked it when she was paired up with kids she didn't know, grappling with them, and having to try to fight them! It's not an easy spo...