wowie! this weather is wonderful! we played outside just about all day yesterday. we are working on getting the ground ready for our garden. actually, we even planted a few things already. our radishes can be seen as little sprouts. i'm transplanting a wildflower garden that's on the side of our garage and moving it to the side of our house to make room for more edible plants. it was super fun getting dirty. mark and hogan worked on the children's watchtower (a homemade wooden play structure in our backyard) after mark was done working for the day. leannora loved getting herself soaked with squirt guns and water toys. able had fun watching everyone being busy, but did not have so much fun when he felt he had been ignored for too long. good thing for long baby naps. owen and nikao have been enjoying a few fun days at grandpa and grandma strub's house. i prefer to say they have had some really special treatment rather than to say they've been spoiled. spoiled things are icky, but special treats are wonderful. we'll be picking up the children this evening and then heading over to mark's highway to heaven band practice.

thursday is an adventure day for our family. we will be going to rockford for the day. mark has a piano tuning appointment. hopefully we'll be able to stop by the hasting family home to say goodbye. we are going to the discovery center. thursday is a free day. i immagine it might be a bit crazy there, but we'll still have a blast. anybody is welcome to join us if you wish!! then we've been invited to eat supper with a homeschooling family that we met at a home church we used to attend. that will really be fun because i think they have at least 8 children! we don't know them very well, yet. although we do have a lot of common interests and such. mark has worked on some instruments for them, so we'll be returning some recent project. our family adventure days are usually a mix of business and pleasure.

it's really great having a home business and homeschooling because we can be so flexible with our schedule. i'd really like to get one of those bumper stickers for our van that says "homeschool bus." and it'd be nice to cover up both of the old stickers from the previous owners. there used to be some catholic charities adoption sticker on our van. we covered that one up with a ron paul 2008 campain sticker. mark wouldn't let me get two of them. a big yard sign would be nice too. oh, but back to the van subject . . . we get some really funny looks from people as we are driving around. i really don't think big families are that weird, nor do i think our family is that big . . . yet. we like to laugh when we see people counting our passengers with wide open eyes. people are really funny. they will just stare as we drive by. once, at a toll booth near rockford, every passenger in four or five vehicles stopped next to us watched in amazement at something in our vehicle. it was weird because i felt like we were on parade. maybe they wondered why the big brother was driving his siblings around. ?? (mark gets mistaken for a teenager quite often.) i don't know, but i'm glad i can giggle about it.

so now i've rambled quite enough. i started off just wanting to let the word out that we'd be in rockford on thursday. hmm. . . guess i should get going and make some phone calls.

kim, for the milligans :)

yet i am not ashamed, for i know whom i have believed and am convinced that He is able to keep that which i've committed to Him until that day. 2 timothy 1:12