Christmas Parade

I forgot how big of a deal the Russellville Christmas Parade really is until we got to attend this past Thursday night! It was so much fun to get the whole family all bundled up and then watch all of the floats and area bands pass by! I wasn't aware until last week, but it is either the first or second biggest Christmas parade in the state! (Pretty impressive for a town of only about 26,000 people!)

The Refuge had a float in the parade, so the kids actually had their choice of being in the parade or watching it. They have only really seen one other parade that they are old enough to remember,

so they decided that they would rather watch this

year.

Two of the ladies from our church work for Arvest Bank and allowed our church to meet and

park at the bank. The kids loved it because they were giving away free hot chocolate, popcorn and balloons, as well as a warm building to stand inside of until the parade actually started.

C wanted a front row seat for the parade, so he sat up with our friend, Ashlee. (She is such a sweetie!)

J snuggled up with our friend Audra in the front row. Audra is great and also an enabler for J's gum and candy obsession!

Here is a picture of The Refuge's float. My photography skills don't do it a bit of justice. It looked great! The globe in the center was spinning and there is a live nativity scene there that you can't really see.

After the parade was over, we hurried home to get warm again with some homemade hot chocolate by the heater!! It was a great way to kick of the Christmas season.

Halloween with the Wojteks

This Halloween we had a very fun, exciting, action-packed day! We started off at the soccer fields, where C had a game in the morning. They don't officially keep score, but trust me, the kids know what the score is at any given point in the game! C did a great job and scored two goals! Technically they lost the game; however, he had a blast and got a great life lesson out of the loss. Their team had been winning all of their games and some of the kids had been bragging about it to the other teams. C was very frustrated because the other team at this game was now doing the bragging. It gave us a chance to talk about what it really means to win and how it feels when someone else is talking smack!

Daddy and E had to head off early for the downtown Fall Festival, where Daddy got to be a judge for the chili cook-off! He was able to do it with his great friend, Todd, and had a lot of fun. He said that there were only a couple of questionable chili entries, but most of them were excellent!

We headed there after the game and met my Mom, Step-dad, and aunts and uncles there. The weather was absolutely God sent! We have had weeks, I kid you not, weeks of rain! Halloween was absolutely perfect weather. C decided to head off with the other men to look at the fire truck and antique cars. J and E stayed with me and some of the other family members to ride a pony. E seemed a little skiddish, so he didn't end up riding one, but below is a picture of J riding. He really liked it a lot and had an adorable grin the whole time!

Watching bubba ride the pony. (The sun was in their face.)

After the fall festival, we went home to relax for a little while, then over to my Uncle Gary and Aunt Pam's house. My Uncle Jimmy and Aunt Pam were in town, so Gary had a fish fry and invited everyone over. You must know, my Uncle Gary makes WONDERFUL fried fish. Even C mentioned hours after we had gotten home that "Uncle Gary sure make some goooood fish!" We don't get to see Jimmy and Pam often, so it was great to be able to catch up and spend some time with them. The men talked around the fish frier and we played ball with the kids in the back yard as we talked.

Next, it was time to take the kids trick-or-treating.

C magically transformed into Batman, J became a red Power Ranger.....

and E grew a trunk and became an elephant!

The older boys with Uncle Jimmy and Aunt Pam.



Trick or Treating at Gary and Pam's

AND THEN....

Enjoying their Candy!!!!

Above all, this was one very special day. We had a lot of time together as a family and in the outdoors. It was just one of those days that you can't help but realize how much you have been blessed!

"Horse Stick Radio"

C recently had his Kinder Stick Horse Rodeo, which C and J somehow started calling the "horse stick radio"! Each child had a family project of making and naming their very own stick horse. C's initial name for his horse was Lucky, but it later changed to Punkin. The only rules were that we had to make it, not purchase one, it had to have reins and needed to be durable because they used them for practice and other projects throughout the whole week.

The rodeo had a huge turnout and was held at the county fair grounds. And I am not exaggerating when I say that the stands were FILLED! There were 7 kinder classes that "competed" in different rodeo events. They had a grand entrance and each child and their stick horse were introduced, as they made a big lap around inside the arena. They said the pledge and sang the "Star Spangled Banner". Then they had one event that we cannot remember the name of, where one rider rode across the arena, picked up a partner and then rode back. The next one was "Shoot Out" where they had to ride up to and "shoot" at a target. They also had different teams of wagon races. I think that the group favorite had to have been the "Buckin' Bronco", where they all had to try and stay on their stick horse for 8 seconds. It was hysterical to see them all bouncing up and down on their stick horses, as if they were about to fall off! Finally, they ended the rodeo as they all sang "Proud to Be an American", waiving their American flags and had a ribbon ceremony. C was on cloud 9 as we left and for the rest of the night!

Praise God!

Our newest little niece, I will call her Little P, got to go home from the hospital last Thursday! She was born at 33 weeks on October 6th, which was obviously a big scare for the whole family. She was actually breathing on her own when she was born; however, had to be kept in the NICU for several weeks after she was born. We are so thankful for this newest addition to the family and can't wait to meet her! Please keep them all in your prayers as they all adjust at home. Little P has two very sweet protectors, Big Brothers W and D!!

Missing Sweet Vidalia Marie

Our sweet Vidalia Marie, otherwise known as "Vi" and on the rare occasion, "your crazy dog", has been missing since last Thursday. Z and I got her after I moved to Maryland, before we were married. We have not given up hope, but do fear that we may not see her again. She is 12 years old and had developed some tumors on her chest. The vet said that we should not worry about them; however, Z's childhood dachshund also had the same type of tumors when she passed.

Vi has been extremely loyal to us, very protective of us and the boys. She had the attitude of most dachshunds, which mean that she may have had a small body, but she truly thought that she was the biggest dog around! She had a reputation for starting fights with our much larger boxers, even our 90+ lb. Krash!

Although she was only a couple of months old when we got her, she already knew how to fetch! Vidalia has always been "ball obsessed"--and I am not kidding in the least! When we were stationed in Enid, OK, we purchased a "big for her" red rubber ball. We gave it to her and she chased it ALL OVER the apartment. At about 9 in the eveining we were tired of her game, so we hid the ball. I woke up at 2AM to hear her still searching for the ball! She has the God given ability to sniff out a tennis ball from any location, assuming it has been popped from its original container. In Corpus Christi, she even learned how to throw the tennis ball back to us by picking it up by the fuzz with her teeth! In Pensacola, we tried taking her fishing with us, only to find that she thought that we were trying to play fetch with her when we would cast out a line! No fishing for Vi!

Below is a video that we took just days before she became missing. As you can see, she is very tolerant with our wild boys! We hope and pray that we find her, but know that both the situation and Vi's care is in God's hands. We love you, Vi!

J-Man's Spidey 4th Birthday Party

J had his big 4th Birthday Bash about a week ago and we had so much fun! This year he wanted his party theme to be Spider-man, of course! He had lots of his wonderful friends over, snacks, games and lots of fun!

First the kids played a little bit together and than had snacks (apples with caramel, chips, & drinks). Then we went outside for some "Super Hero Training". It was a beautiful fall day, which was amazing considering the amount of rain that we have had around here lately! The kids started out working on their coordination with a ball passing activity. Then they made a huge human spider web to test their teamwork. This is what you see Jacoby tangled up in to the left.

Their final activity trained them on their web slinging techniques! They got to sling webs with silly string at the bad guys. Of course everyone had a blast with this, other than the fact that the silly string evenutally ran out, just as they were turning it on the parents! Note to self: Next time, more silly string!

Last, but not least, we had J's Spidey cake, ice cream, and opened gifts! J is such a sweetheart and a blessing to us all! I can hardly believe that he is already 4!

My Birthday - by The "J" Man

Yesterday was my birthday! I am 4 years old now!! I want everyone to be my friend! We had cake for my birthday. It was a spider-man cake and it was blue. The cake was yummy chocolate cake. I got to open some presents and got some fingers (finger shaped hooks), clothes, money, and a Diego DS game. I am going to buy my DS with the money I got. Thank you to my family for the presents! Yay!!

In my picture I am blowing out the fire (he was about to do that, anyway) and making a lot of silly faces. Then I blew out the candles and I said, "hey, fire! Get off of there!" Then mommy took the candles off.

Surprise---A Soccer Game!!!

Today we went to C's usual weekly soccer practice and none of our team members were there. I called Zach to see if he knew what was up, but he didn't. Just as we were getting ready to leave, our coaches showed up, along with their kids. As I made my way towards the nearest open soccer field, (and as I realize that I am getting my feet nearly stuck in the only mud anywhere in the area--no mud anywhere else) I start to wonder why our coach is talking to another coach and all of that team is in their game uniforms. It turns out we had a make-up game today that had been rained out last week! The first thing I did was an internal panic--we didn't bring C's uniform! I relaxed as I noticed that none of our team was in uniform--Phwew!!!

The game turned out to be a lot of fun and they "won" 13 t 3, as reported by all of the kids who were very careful to keep score. J and E were so well behaved (up until the very end when E insisted that he needed to go play with C on the field) and a good time was had by all!

I am off to some very long overdue sleep! Last night was a long and sleepless one for some reason at our house. Two of the boys kept waking up and we all had a hard time getting back to sleep. Tomorrow is my sweet J's 4th birthday and I am in denial! We will have a "family party" tomorrow, consisting of the dinner of J's choice prepared by his loving mother, cake and a few gifts. He will have his Spider-man "friend party" on Saturday!! Really---I am so blessed!!

Harvest Hoe Down

C's school did a big PTO fundraiser event called the Harvest Hoe Down! He had a really fun time, but did complain that he wanted to win more stuff. He decided to spend a great deal of his tickets on things like the bump-n-jump and dunking booth, so he walked away with fewer prizes than he probably planned in his head.

The whole family got to go! We started off with the spaghetti dinner, where they had some entertainment going on up on the stage. You have to love a school where they have a musician singing the latest David Crowder Band song!!

C helped me work the dunking booth, which was sort of the "popular event" for the hoe down. The booth had a malfunction; however, and would dunk the teachers even if a ball just hit ANYWHERE, sometimes without anyeone even throwing a ball!! Did I mention that it was in the 40's that night?!?! Thankfully many of the teachers were wearing wet suits. It was a very fun evening!

Here are a few pictures that were taken after we got home. It was too hectic at the Hoe Down, so I didn't get to take any there. C is showing off his new "football tatoo" and his "rock on" pose. Each of the boys got tatoos and E actually got 2 and kept showing them off! We had a great time!

Trike Derby

J and E got to have their first Trike Derby at school last Friday. I was blessed to be able to sub in J's classroom, so I got to see a lot of the action!


The original plan was for me to leave momentarily to go and watch E's classroom during their riding turn at the derby; however, I new exactly what would happen if he saw me! He would see me, scream, and then cling to my leg and refuse to ride. I was sad, but made the decision not to go, knowing that he would miss out on all of the riding fun if I chose not to go. His teachers say that he did have a great time and the school director said that there was no way that I would have been able to hide and watch without being seen. I really hope that I will be able to get some pictures from his teachers soon to post.





The younger kids just got to ride in the trike derby. The older kids were also able to have some "courtyard activities", where they had several fun, outdoor stations to play, as well as a family picnic in the courtyard. It was really a lot of fun and the school was able to raise nearly $4,000!

Pumpkin Carving Adventure

C really wanted for
me to add these pictures from his time with
the Findley's this past Sunday afternoon. He
was invited to go to their house to play between
services. They got to carve a pumpkin for the
Family Feast (Chili Cook-off and Pumpkin Carving Contest) at The Refuge Sunday night.
He had such a great time! Seth is in the light blue shirt, Carter in the green and grey stripes and Pastor Scott is with them in the second picture. They did a great job and had a blast!

From the Mouths of Babes....

Those of you who already have children or spend a lot of time with little ones may have noticed that God often speaks through them! He teaches us things through our children, which always amazes me!

We have been experiencing A LOT of rain lately....A LOT! One morning recently, as E and I were walking J up to his school...in the rain, all decked out in our rain gear, leaping over puddles.........or into puddles, I should say! Jacoby just out of the blue, in the most cheerful voice, said, "You know, Mom, the sun is out and shinning behind all of those clouds!" I just stopped and looked at him, as he continued jumping through the water.

I don't remember ever talking in that much detail with him about the weather--not about the sun being behind the clouds anyway. Maybe he learned it at school, or maybe he figured it out on his own, because he is a smart little guy. Any way you look at it, God was using him to speak to me. It was just one of those moments that made my heart smile, and something that I will always remember during stressful or difficult times. No matter what we are going through, God will always see us through as long as we rely on Him. He can take the bad and turn it into something good. We may have to go through some rainy, stormy times, but He will carry us through and bring us out stronger on the other side!

Rough and Tumble Boys

Here is the most recent picture of the boys, taken right before C's last soccer practice. You might be able to see E's black eye....he fell down the stairs last week and now we are getting to see all of the lovely colors that follow! It scared him, but he was OK and thankfully the black eye was the only injury.

Caleb loves playing soccer, which is new to us this year. He has lots of great kids on his team and wonderful coaches, which always makes things so much more fun. J is all ready to play next season--so tired of watching big brother and not getting to be on the field himself! He is being very patient, though!

This week we have a lot going on.....Friday J and E have thier first Trike Derby! Friday night we have a Harvest Hoe Down at Caleb's school and get to work the dunking booth! Saturday night the older boys will have their first sleepover here. They saved up their "dad dollars", which is a reward system that we have set up, and get to have a sleepover party. They are beyond excited! We will take lots of pictures of everything and be sure to post them!

WELCOME!!

Welcome to our new family blog! I hope to start using this to keep some of our loved ones who do not live near us up to date with the happenings and photos from this wacky Wojtek house! We are sure to have some exciting stories to tell, as things around here are always exciting and interesting! Here is just a little bit of proof....

C and J acting out a book where a rabbit thought a pair of undies was supposed to be a hat. They then decided it would be a good idea to get into the bathtub and pretend to be deep sea diving---the undies were their O2 tanks, of course!

E's first birthday party---Need I say more?!?! He obviously had a great time and had a serious sugar high afterwards!

God has certianly blessed Zach and I beyond our wildest dreams! He shows us so much through these precious little boys and we can't imagine life without them!

Well, so long for tonight! I promise to do my best at posting regularly and keeping everyone up to date!

Blessings!