Hanson Crew

Last year was a wonderful school year. We sent Jonathan to full day Kindergarten at Line Creek, we sent Joshua and Caleb to Faith Christian Academy 3 days a week (home schooled the other 2 days), and home schooled Ashlyn full time for 6th grade. It was evident that this plan was what we were supposed to do. All four kids grew academically, spiritually, and emotionally where we had them. We loved paying for only 2 private school tuitions and loved the one on one time I had with Ashlyn all year. We knew over the summer we would continue to look at each school year and decide what would be best for each child each year. After much prayer and discussions with teachers and children, we made some big changes this year.  We decided to send Caleb back to Line Creek where he attended Kindergarten full time to get free reading tutoring and speech therapy again.  He was sad to leave his friends at FCA, but looking forward to a 5 day a week school schedule instead of 3.  I am...

We were blessed with free tickets to World's of Fun again this year and took advantage of a warm day (in the 80s) to go.  This year, Jonathan was able to go on a few rides that he was too short to ride last year, which made him very excited.  Caleb was afraid this year to ride the Mamba, which is a very tall roller coaster, so we went on a few smaller rides together while the 3 brave ones did some scarier rides.  We also splurged on these Fast Track passes which allowed the three of them to skip lines on rides and get ride on.  They were expensive, but since we didn't pay for admission, we decided to give it a try since it was a busy day.  We were so glad we did!  They rode roller coasters over and over all day.  And there were some cool water slides at Oceans of Fun they could ride in 10 minutes, which were taking an hour to get one.  It was a great day at World's of Fun!

The Maids introduced a new National award they were going to presenting to the franchise that demonstrates the best WOW example of Customer Service each quarter. Our franchise one the first one! We basically had a team that went the extra mile to take down Christmas decorations and tree while cleaning her house. The winner of the award gets a neat, heavy award for the office along with $500. We gave all four employees involved with the story $100 each. The Maids International came down and catered a really nice breakfast when they presented us the award. This was a great honor and exciting award to get along side each other. Here are a couple pics. (We didn't include pics of our employees for their privacy).

Ashlyn and Caleb were able to take 2 weeks of Tennis Lessons this summer through Gladstone Parks and Recreation.  They were both naturals.  Their coach said they should both continue with the sport.  We even went out and bought a new tennis ball basket to practice at home.  Sadly, we haven't played again since lessons.  Maybe this fall...

John and I celebrated our 15th anniversary this year on August 15, 2013 (maybe that's our Golden Anniversary Haley!) We celebrate our anniversaries with the traditional wedding gift ideas and this year was Crystal. Because neither of us like fancy vases and dishes, we decided to buy a digital camcorder with a LCD screen. Yes the C in LCD stands for Crystal! We also bought an awesome lamp at Kirkland's for our bedroom that has a couple crystal balls near the base of the lamp. The day of our anniversary, I posted the following picture on John's Facebook wall to remind him of that special days 15 years ago...

I was proactive this year with our Christmas pictures! Before summer got too crazy for Lisa's schedule, we went and got some great shots of the kids around beautiful flowers. My hope is to use those for our Christmas postcard this year. We only have a few on my computer because I have not gone through them all on her computer to pick out which ones I will use and order. Here is a small sneak peek. The one of Jonathan and I was at the end of the day. I didn't plan to be in any of the pictures, but Jonathan really wanted to take one with just him and I. He wants to put it by his bed now. Thanks Lisa for a great day of fun!

While inspecting a house one day at work, John and our field manager Darwin were in a serious car accident.  John remembers Darwin stopping at a stop sign then slowly going out into intersection.  Half way through the intersection, he yelled out "Watch Out!" and a car hit John's door driving pretty fast.  He then said the car tipped over and he was hanging by his seat belt for awhile while the police arrived.  Thankfully, no one was injured in the accident.  Both Darwin and John were sore after, but all were okay!  A very memorable day at The Maids!

After hours and hours of fighting over who has to sit in the third row going to church and other family outings, we decided to join the minivan world again. It has been a good investment so far. We decided to get a 2002 Honda Odyssey because they tend to go for a long time and because we found this on in good condition for $3700. Jonathan loves sitting in the back row and the complaining over the 3rd row has stopped. Unfortunately, the problem has become fighting over the second row sometimes...but it's still better!

This year we spent the morning of the 4th celebrating my niece's 1st birthday.  Molly is sure getting big!  Then we headed over to the Knorr's for lunch, fireworks and lake fun.  This year she took a cool picture of the kids spelling out 2013 with sparklers.  You can tell by the heights of the numbers, which child is who.  (just in case you can't: Left to Right - Joshua, Caleb, Jonathan, Ashlyn).  It is a very cool picture!

Joshua has become quite the chef on the grill this summer.  He loves to marinade the meat, season it, and be in charge of the grill now!  John assists of course, but Joshua loves to grill!  Caleb has also enjoyed taking charge of many projects around the house this summer.  Both Caleb and I rented a carpet cleaner in June and we cleaned all of the carpets in the house together.  That was quite a job!  He is such a hard worker.  We are finishing up a patio in the backyard this week too that he has been in charge of.  Pics to come soon...

DRIVE-IN!  We were able to go a couple times this summer.  We also went to the regular movie theater a couple times this summer, which is not usual for our crew.  We took advantage of the $5 bargain times most of those times.  Now that the kids are getting used to the actual movie theater, the drive in might not have its same affect next summer....

One of our favorite family activities when the weather is nice is hiking.  We mostly enjoy the Parkville Nature Sanctuary trails and the Weston State Park trails because they are through the woods.  We usually see alot of deer and neat birds on these hikes too.  We were able to go a few times this summer since it was not too hot.  Anyone here in KC want to join us in the fall?  We will probably go on Sundays alot when the leaves start to change.

We are advertising The Maids at a local minor league baseball in Kansas, so we get free tickets to the T-Bones games. John took the boys and we were able to go together one night to a club house night. The night John and I went together, our clean up hitter got a grand slam so any spectators that night could get 30% off their first time clean. So far, no one has called. Here are a few pics of our T-Bones fun!  

In late May, our crew drove up to Omaha with Grandma Peggy to show her the Omaha Zoo. It was beautiful weather and a great day together! Here are a few pics from the fun...

So this summer was very busy for all of us, mainly trying to balance some schoolwork, working at the Maids, summer fun, and trips.  We managed to make it out alive and ended up with some pretty good memories.  Because I was balancing so many things at once, I dropped the ball on this blog.  I am excited to pick it back up again!  The next few posts will be about summer memories and then we will jump right into "Back to School." Thanks for your patience.  I'm looking forward to remembering this summer all week.