So far in 2011!!

Ok, so I know it's been so long since I have posted anything, but things have been busy here! As you know, I graduated in December and started my paid experience doing a 5 week interim for 5th grade teacher at the school I did my student teaching at. Immediately after that I went to Knollwood Elementary and did an 8 week interim for a second grade teaching assistant. (It was hard not being able to be in the driver's seat after working so hard on my school!) Followed

by a nother 6 week interim at Knollwood for an English as a Second Language learning specialist (ELL or ESOL) in which I pulled 2nd and 3rd grade kids out for 40 minute lessons and then send them back to class. That brought me to almost the end of the school year. I am now pleased to announce that after getting my foot in the door... (drum-roll please) I am meeting with the principal at Knollwood tomorrow to discuss a position for the 2011-12 school year!! Praise the Lord for His faithfulness!! I'll keep you posted!!

Now on to the rest of the family...

Michael is still managing the lab at his work Carolina Stalite in Gold Hill. He is going to hit his 12 year anniversary working there this September. However, this past week has been especially rough for him as he has a horrible case of poison ivy/oak (or whatever) all over his body. He was clearing out someundergrowth in a tiny spot to the side of our house and honestly didn't think it was the real stuff because he had been out there working the weekend before and didn't have any problems. Well, let's just say he wishes he would've had more than a pair of shorts on because it is all over his forearms, feet, legs, and stomach. He went and got a cortisone shot Monday, but they said relief usually takes 3 days. He is so pitiful! But, look at the before and after pictures, he did a great job!

This is before from the side

And after...

Before After

So, here are the boys pictures taken in May at their school. I didn't realize until the night before that they had nothing nice that would look good together. Samuel has several nice shirts and so does Owen, but they did not go well together, so in an attempt to have a good picture of them together I defaulted o white polos. I think they turned out well. The actual prints are not as washed out as this scanned versions, but you get the idea. I just wish they were not so expensive!

The day we got these was the day Lisa came for a visit, the Friday before Memorial Day. We decided to throw Owen's 2 year party early because she was in town and everyone seemed to be available. Here are some pictures of the fun:

The last week of school, Samuel's class took a field trip to Lazy 5 Ranch in Mooresville. It was my first time too, and I had no idea what I was getting into!! If you go as a family, you ride through in your car and feed the animals from your car, but because we were there as a group, we got to ride this carriage. It was really neat how all of the animals were so close. The best part was the giraffes that we got to see run out of the housing after they had put some new rock down in their corral. The part I wasn't excited about were the emus and ostriches, they peck for food right out of your bucket! A little too close for someone who does NOT like birds! The worst part was when we were feeding another animal on the side and I didn't notice that one was standing right beside me off the back of the carriage. I turned and screamed like a little girl!! It was so embarrassing!! Overall, it was really fun we are planning on going back as a family next week while Michael is on vacation.

Thanks to my big sis, we are about to visit her and David in Boston for four days without the boys. It will be our first time going anywhere without them so it is bitter-sweet. We are soo excited about going there though! More to come when we return!

I will also try to get around to posting some random pics of the boys from the past six months on a later post!! Love all of you guys and thanks for keeping up with the Ham Fam!!

Blessings,

Diana

You might wanna go that way!

Two posts in one week! The first post is all good news, the second is....not so good. Michael just killed a copperhead that was in our kitchen!

I am posting some photos and trying to get the vide so I don't have to type it all!

Here is the video of the process!

Long time, no post!

So, what more perfect time to post than on my best day ever!!! I started with finding out I passed my Praxis II exam (big teacher test - state given, 110 multiple choice and 4 essays). Then I had my exit interview with my university supervisor in which I discovered I have an 'A' for the semester and turned the very last piece of paper (and check) to UNC Charlotte, all I have left is to walk across that stage this Saturday!!!!! YEEHAW!! Then, I got to go to my sons' very first Christmas Program, and they did SO awesome!!! It was just an incredible day filled with blessing after blessing, including seeing my family. Here is a little Christmas video for you to enjoy if you didn't get to watch it on Facebook. I hope you guys have a wonderful Christmas!!

Lots of love, Diana and The Ham Fam

Here are some other pictures to bring you up to speed...

Video

Here is a video I finally got together. I have lots of picturess to post as well but wanted to try this..

Rolling in 2010!!

Wow, I can hardly believe I am actually posting things from this year! What a relief... ;)

So, here are MORE pictures of our winter this year. We had so much snow this year and Samuel really loved it. We don't have a sled, but he and Michael would ride Michael's snowboard without the bindings down the hill in our backyard. They really had a good time, but Samuel's favorite part of the snow was snowballs and snowball fights! It was hard to not go outside with them, but with Owen's recent bout with pneumonia I didn't want Owen outside unless it was absolutely necessary.

The boys pretty much stayed sick all winter. Not with anything real bad, just cold after cold. I thought I would never see the end of snot in our house! I know this is probably because Samuel being in school, so I hope that we are getting through it now, instead of later.

So, most of you know how much Samuel loves to dress-up and pretend to be super heroes. And he has acquired quite a collection over the past year and I thought what better thing to do than create a slideshow just of his costumes!! Enjoy...

Fall and Winter of 2009

I am finally done with school!! I just took my LAST final, and all I have left is my student teaching in the fall. I will be at China Grove Elementary in a fourth grade class. I got the boys enrolled at South Rowan Academy which is right down the road from the school, and my cooperating teacher has her boys there as well. It is Christian daycare/preschool, and I am really looking forward to them going there. It will definitely be a deciding factor as to how quickly I begin teaching school. I have thought about pursuing other options until it was time for Samuel to start kindergarten which won't be until 2012. So much has happened since my last posts, but here is a brief catchup as to how the boys have grown...

Here are some random pictures from the end of 2009:

Here are some pictures from Christmas:

Earlier in December, we went to Columbia for Lisa's big graduation... Officially DR. LISA YOUNG!!!!!

The day of her graduation, we got there just in time... Owen had been sick the night before and had a pretty high fever along with being completely miserable. I got him into the doctor that morning and he was diagnosed with pneumonia! I asked her if he would ok to still go to Columbia and she said he would be ok, just keep him bundled up when outside. She gave us an antibiotic injection as well as oral ones to take for the next ten days, and we had to come back three days later for a follow up and things had already cleared up. Thankfully, we caught it early!

Samuel's Third Birthday - October 4, 2009

For Samuel's birthday my parents took us to the zoo. We had a lot of fun and Samuel actually walked the entire time!!! Talk about a surprise, I was ready to hear; someone to carry me! :) It was a beautiful day and not busy at all. He loved seeing all the animals and spending the day outside!

His big gift this year was a Spiderman bike, which he loves to ride, but didn't get to ride very much because it was getting too cold. It took him a while to not be "lazy" about peddling, but now he just goes and goes. I will be excited to see how much better he will be when we get it out again this Spring. We decided to have a joint birthday party with his cousin, Breyanna, who's birthday is September 30th (except she was turning 5). We had it at Rockwell Park and it turned out really well. I think almost everyone we invited made it and the kids had so much fun. And of course Samuel was showered with tons of gifts.

Halloween

So, the night before Halloween we took Samuel to TIger World for "Boo at the Zoo" which is a non-profit animal rescue facility right down the road form us (less than 5 minutes). They had it all decorated for Halloween and the kids got to walk around and get candy as they saw all of the animals. It was absolutely crazy how close you could be to these animals! While we were there two of the lions started to fight. It was amazing how loud the sound of their growls were. Then on Halloween we just went to downtown Faith and let Samuel Trick-or-Treat. He had a great time and got lots of candy!!

Time, time, I need more time...

So, I have been rethinking my family website and have decided to not renew our dot-mac account this year and instead publish our blog on a free website. I have been experimenting with the new Picasa app (hence the slide show to the left) and am in love with it's compatibility. So many things have happened in the past several months and school has been overwhelming just in the workload alone. I have class Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday nights until 7:45 and then usually work in the library until it closes at midnight and still never get everything done. The boys are growing up so fast and Samuel has been having a hard time with me being gone so much. the other day he tore up his coloring book and hid it under my bed (he very rarely does things like this) and when I found it and asked him about it he said "I mad because mommy goes to school." I felt my insides wrench with agony and wonder what am I doing? But, to be so close to finishing and stop now seems like a huge mistake. These are my last three classes!!!!
Anyways, I hope to at least blog a little more often now and with this Picasa business I plan on at least keeping more current photos of the boys up. Thanks everyone for taking the time to follow our family and go through life with us.
It certainly is a challenge sometimes, but well worth the fight therefore "I will run in such a way to receive the prize" the prize of my Heavenly Father looking at me and saying, "well done my good and faithful servant!"

A new blog for the Ham Fam

So, I am trying out this new blog... we have to pay for our other one, so I thought about going for the free ones and seeing how user-friendly this is going to be. Here goes...

The other event in August was my 2nd cousin, Valerie, and her family coming in from France. We finally got to meet her little boy and hang with them for a couple of days along with the rest of our family.

Look at all those boys!!! It's pay back!!

Samuel is mildly obsessed with Alex :)

Moving on to other events in September...


We had 2 really big things in September, my step-sister, Kati, and Dave's wedding on the 19th and my sister, Lisa, completing her course work that finalized her PhD and the party that night on the 26th!! See Lisa's pictures on the left in the slide show. And here are some pictures from Kati's wedding... Samuel was the ring bearer, he did ok. Except that he was picking up the flower petals as he walked down the isle and then "helped" the flower girl by emptying her basket for her! Then he ended up having to be taken out during the ceremony by Michael. However, how cute he looked in his little tux almost made up for his misbehavior. But, it was definitely forgotten once we were at the reception. He danced it up with all of the little girls there and was by far the most popular man there. His extravertness really pays off in situations like this. He is such a joy to watch.




Then in October we had another wedding to go to in Atlanta for my cousin, Carrie. I went by myself and Owen and left Michael and Samuel in Salisbury. We had a great time staying with Crystal and Chris in their beautiful home, I wish we could've stayed longer and hopefully will next time!
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Alex and Owen (he is so good with babies)

The beautiful bride and my brother-in-law's busted foot from a rugby accident.

Owen-dressed to impressed!

Here are some other pictures from when we got back...