Leslie's Birthday and more

Hi, it's Leslie.

Well, since Eastin wrote about her birthday, I decided I'd write about mine. Except I'm writing mine late. My birthday was actually April 30th. Yes, the day right after Eastin's!

After a nice, hot, educational, tiring trip in Virginia, we headed back to my friend Amanda's house in NJ. She and her mom had accompanied us to VA. Don't get me wrong! I had fun, and loved VA, but it had it's ups and downs. In the middle of the car trip, maybe near the end, we picked up my friend Sammy and her two sisters. That was fun too. Just so you know, Amanda is 14 (almost definitely), Sammy is 10 (I'm pretty sure), Julia is 8 (I think), and Chloe is 4 (I'm pretty sure). :-)

Well, not much happened on my birthday besides that. Tonight, though, we went to dinner at Olive Garden, one of my favorite restaurants! And we're getting a new basketball hoop! Yes! I got lots of other fun presents too. But I'm happy to say I didn't ask for any presents from my friends at my birthday party, I asked for toys to give to CHOP, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia!

Well, I would love to say more, but I could write for hours and it's getting late. Maybe I'll write more later. Talk to all later, Blog Readers!

Leslie

Eastin's 9th birthday (by eastin)

Hi! It's my birthday today I'm writing this blog and I wanted to tell you guys all about it! I'm in Virginia with the Redekers, and we went to James Town to look around at colonial things but after that we went to a pool and Leslie and Amanda threw me nine times in the pool for my birthday and one for good luck. Then we went to the Golden Corral a restraunt I like and they had two surprises for me. One was a tiara a beautiful tiara with what looks like diamonds and number two is that some of the restraunt sang happy birthday to me and then we went back to the pool where we met up with a family and we told the family's mom it was my birthday and she said happy birthday to me. Then I came back to our room and then I wrote this blog and soon I will be watching American Idol at nine o clock. It was my best birthday ever!

"Candy Land is Heaven, Of Course"

I've shared here before about one of my favorite writers, Andree Seu. She wrote a wonderful blog this morning making an analogy with the game Candyland. I love it:

http://online.worldmag.com/author/andreeseu/

Seu also writes a column in nearly every issue of World Magazine, and she has three books out that are compilations of these columns. I love her.

I'm going to make Andree fans out of some of you yet. :)

A Note from Leslie!

Hi, it's me, Leslie. My first post... I hope it's good. Well actually I can't think of much to write about. I can tell you all one thing for sure though, I MISS NJ. But I am making some friends here. Of course, it's hard to make friends when your sorta quiet and shy, which I am, which some of you may not believe. :-)
I'll mention some of my friends, Lexi and her older borther Trey next door. Lexi is ten between Eastin and my age, and Trey is a year older than me but turned 14. Then I also am friends with a homeschooled girl a year younger than me, named Bethany. I also have a few more friends like Audrey and Carly... but those are the ones I see and play with the most.
Well, Mom has started dance, and Eastin basketball. Aparently they are both really good, and this is Eastins first time playing Basketball ever!
There has been alot of snow here, but there is not as much as there was in december. We also just came back from Kansas yesterday, what a trip! My cousin Ashlyn had two birthday parties in one day! One for friends and one for family (Eastin and I were invited to both) Hannah my other cousins birthday was celebrated along with Ashlyn's in the second party. I have to say, even though the second party was mostly adults, it was the most fun, and tiring! There were probaly 7 kids there in all, included Eastin, my cousins and I. One of the others was a 2 yr old little girl, at first the party was just talking and stuff, but near the end the kids were trying to keep a balloon in the air and pretty soon we had popped all the balloons in the room! We were all so sweaty, then my cousin brought us another ballon and another and anther until we had, maybe... ten or so. We realized my aunt and uncle were blowing them up in the kitchen. :-)
We were all so red faced, then the younger girls started chasing a ten yr old (or around that age)boy and made them even more tired, then we played tag... I tell you we almost got ourselves sick! I think that'll be enough excercise for the month!
Ashlyn didn't make it the next morning she woke up with a fever. Poor birthday girl! Of course pretty much 90% of the food us kids had eaten that day was sugar! The first party was fun too! The girls (and one of the girls brother) made body glitter and colored Hannah Montana pictures.
The day after the party we went to a planetarium, (Mom, Eastin and me, the others were pooped) and it was really cool! We got to see things explode! ;-)
Well, what else have I been doing? Hmm. Well, every Wednesday night at the church we've been going to, they have homeplate for kids, and jam for middle schoolers. I've gone to Jam a couples times and like it. I have my own small group (Lug) there and have made a few friends. It's good I'm in a Lug because there are so many people there! I don't wanna say it but I have to admit it is significantly bigger than my old church. Which brings me back to the fact. I sure miss NJ!
Well, I've probably been writing WAY to much already so I'll try to write more later.
Leslie

Another Note from Eastin

Hi ! This is Eastin. I wanted to write this blog about BasketBall. I just started my first practice was at last Tuesday . The Coach (Mr. Moore) said that my shooting was pretty good. I practiced some in Kansas where most of my relatives are. (I think all of them) There is a basketball court there and we went there to practice just for me! So I started to get the hang of it and it's my first year! I made a friend there(Laura.). We both like basketball and both laugh at things we do that are funny! We also have the same favorite color. (pink!) I'm also probably going to be friends with the coaches daughter. (Erica) She's nice! We met up at TAEK WONDO. (I think that's how you call it) I had lot's of fun! I'm having a team picture day tomorrow! I'll tell you all about later! Eastin

A Word from Eastin

Eastin wants to share a little bit with everyone about how she's doing:

Hi! This is Eastin as you already know. Moving here is pretty hard but I made three new friends Lexi (10) Abigail (7) Debra (10) The latest playdate I had was yesterday with Debra and I've been missing all the people I met in New Jersey I can't wait to go there! I'm going there in the spring it feels like a decade till spring! It's really cold here and it just snowed for three days! But I only got to go out and play once in the snow with Lexi. (Who is our neighbor if you haven't known) We had a snowball fight and I had the biggest snowball in the world! Too bad I missed Lexi with it. It was a good one! Oh, and the funny part about Lexi her name sounds like Leslie! When she was over Mom called, "Lexi!" and Leslie went, "Yeah?" "Your Mom's here!" Isn't that funny? I hope your doing good in New Jersey! I would like to hear from you!

[Gwen's note to self: we need to review run-on sentences in homeschool. :)]

Thank you, Eastin!