Read any good books lately? I have!!

And here is my book review of it!! :)

          The Hidden Amethyst is a fantastic book, that has action and is adventurous!  The book is about a girl named Amethyst Butternut who is trapped in a orphanage.  Amethyst who is ten years old is always getting into trouble.  While on an orphan train her real adventure will begin.  She encounters traps, evil people and learn her true identity on the way.  She tries to save the world from evil.  Will she save the world or will she fail????   Read it and find out!  :)

         I give The Hidden Amethyst five stars out of five because of the good writing.  It was full of adventure and mystery.  It was suspenseful and exciting.  What I liked about the character 'Amethyst Butternut' was that she was brave and courageous.  I definitely recommend this book to ages eight and up.

The writer J.C.Buchanan is only 12 years old.  This is her first book and all the money she makes from it goes to support World Vision. *(WorldVision.org helps countries and families in need.)

                                     By Naomi (Boom-Boom)

 **(you can buy a copy and read it too! THE HIDDEN AMETHYST on Amazon )

 

Buddy and Boom Boom have their first Songwriting session....

Eli's CD Review - Heather Williams!

Eli is doing his first official CD review! For his first one, he is reviewing the brand new cd from Christian Singer, Heather Williams, "This Time Around".
*(and if you want to follow Eli on Facebook, visit Facebook.com/JeffCruzSonEli )

You Caaaaaaaaan Too!

Naomi has a "character voice" she does that just cracks us up!   She started doing it after watching Jeopardy and imitating the announcer at the beginning say "This. Is. Jeopardy!"  She calls it her "you can too" voice.

Here she is using it to show off some paintings the kids just did in art class last week!  This is RARE footage considering how shy she is normally... but behind this "character" she came right out of her shell!




Here are the actual pictures!  (click them to see them full size)

Today, Eli and Naomi got a chance to have some fun on the bumper boats (with prayer action) with Christian singer Kristian Stanfill and his manager Rob. These were some Good times! Lots of laughter by everyone, and All of them ended up pretty much soaked!

Christian singer, Matthew West, stopped by the house for a quick visit while on a radio station promotional tour. After giving the kid's guitars a much needed tuning, he made up some songs and sang a few "covers". Be sure and listen to the end to hear Naomi steal the show!

The Sunglasses

our kids are so silly. (we love that about them!)

Roller Skating With Friends!!

They had done it one time before (about a year ago), but this was basically like starting over. They had fun and can't wait to go back!! Here is about a 5 minute montage of the fun from the day!

German Shepherd.

Naomi drew this adorable dog.
(the numbers at bottom is the date it was drawn. Jan. 5th, 2011)

Skating buddies!!

Celebrating their friend Abbie's birthday at the skating rink!

Eli's TALL TALES! The "Weird Man" Story

Eli loves to write. He comes up with really unusual creative stories, but he also loves to tell those stories! Here is Eli reading one of his "tall tales".

Out it came!

Last night. No corn on the cob for a while!

It's hanging by a thread!

But she won't let me pull it.

Time for a new look and a New NAME!

ok, Curly and Shorty were never real names.
No one ever called Eli, Curly and it did not fit (except he had curly hair)
and even though she liked it, Shorty never stuck either.

I started calling Naomi "chicky chicky boom boom" when she was really
little after reading a book with that in it... then when she starting really
doing so well in softball I shortened it to just "boom boom" and now
it just seems natural.  She IS a Boom Boom.  No Doubt.

So now it comes back around to Eli.  He does not have a nickname really.
Eli just seems to work. But lately, especially after watching Elf about 12
times this holiday season, he began saying that he wanted to be an Elf too
when he grew up.  (yes, he was serious).  Then we realized that he IS just
like Buddy the Elf.  He talks nonstop.  Has a wonderful childlike wonder
to almost anything he does.  Loves meeting people and making friends.
He has curly hair.  Is almost always happy. And is also adopted.
Buddy.  Now that fits.   There it is.

Now, from this point on, it is going to be the same concept,  but new look
and name....  The Adventures of Buddy and Boom-Boom.

~dad/jeff

Fobots!

Inspired by the artwork they saw at the Winter Park Art Festival, today the kids made their very own Fobots (Found Object Robots)  

http://www.ifobot.com

This is a dog...  looks like a cat to me, but I am assured it is a dog.

This is a girl.  And the beauty of this design in that Naomi can put things inside the stomach to simulate what she might have eaten.  

This is the boy.  He has cool hair and big shoes. 

Then Eli decided to make some art for me and Tina, then put in on the top of our bed...  

Venus Was Cracking!

Once upon a time in Veinus there were aleines. They were simey and weird looking. They loved their home on Venus.

A alien said lets find something to eat. I am starfing. So the aliens went to find something to eat. But they didn't know astrunots were on the other side. The aliens fond something to eat. It was a piece of crust of the planet.

But then Venus became hot and the planet was cracking and lava was poring on the planet. The aliens jumped and some of the aliens couldn't control there selfs and fell into the lava.

Most of them survived and flew into there ships. And they were all hungry. But like a month or so they landed on Mars. The aliens were not uest to the flat ground on Mars.

  
The aliens made a house made of crust. They missed there home on Venus. One alien said Lets go exploreing. They walked for hours and hours.

Finally they were tired and was going to turn back when a voice said Who are you. A alien said we are aliens from Venus but who are you. I am a wizard that studies the planet but I don't studie Pluto.

Story by Curly.

(typed as written by dad)

Shorty Pictures!

Mom let me borrow her camera to take pictures and these are some pictures that I took.


Green is my moms favorite color and this car was green and looked cool because I had never seen one like it before. It was really old and people were driving it some.

This is my dad that is sleeping and he likes to sleep and have a back scratch.  Most all he likes is a back scratch!

This is us in our library. Mom and Eli are looking for books. One day I saw her like that through the bookshelf.  Mom thought it was cool.

This is a train in our library and it is hold books.  In the back is a flying can of paint that looks like it is spilling on the books. 

This is mom on the computer. She got her hair cut with me at a salon. It looks good.

This is mom and Eli at a restaurant and we are eating breakfast. It is called First Watch. It was awesome!

At the farmer's market on Sunday I took this picture because I like popcorn.  :)

These are some Ibis birds we call Dr, Seuss birds. They look really funny. Mom figured out when we see them it is always right before it rains.

-Shorty

Curley's story about King Nick and the Dragons (part 2)

*(part 1 was posted on 2/17/10. When we left the story, Queen Sara was leading her men into a fierce battle with the dragons.)


... A man got caught by fire.  A dragon got shot.  Sara cut a limb down and swung the limb and blinded a dragon.  A dragon put fire on a knight.  Now Sara only had 198 men.

Sara drawed her sword and chopped a dragon head off.  But most of the dragons died, so Sara and the 198 men went back.

On the way they heard that Nicks hurt arm healed.  Sara was rejoiced with her men.

Finally they reached the kingdom and Sara was surprised because Nick looked brand new to her. And nice.

I love you said Nick.  I know said Sara and kissed.  Everyone cheered.

The End.

- Curly.

Shorty's gets some Artwork going...

this is some art I did for today for the blog. 

-Shorty

Curley's story about King Nick and the Dragons (part 1)

THE STORY OF KING NICK AND THE DRAGONS

Once upon a time a spoiled rich mean king was named Nick. But his queen was difrent. She was pretty and shared money with the poor.

Miles away dragons were planing a attack because he killed half of their pack. The next day they flew to the castle. But Nicks army was not ready to fight.

Nick did'nt know the dragons were attacking. The dragons landed on the ground by the castle then one of the dragons got shot by a arrow. The battle had begun.

A knight drew his sword. He was about to slash a claw of a dragon but another dragon put his sword on fire. Dragon breathing fire. Knight shotting arrows. Nick could'nt see enething.

Nick jumped down on the ground. Then a arrow shot him in the arm. The knight shouted the king is wouned. The dragon flew back to their home.

Nicks knights were sick and tired and wouned. The dragons were fine because they were tuffer and had fire.

Now Nick was planning a attack because a dragon put most of his men were in the dungon. But Nick said Sara you can lead the attack because I have a hurt shoulder.

It was the final battle. Sara and 200 men marched for two weeks. The dragons were ready. Sara and the 200 men got to dragon country. Dragons jumped from every corner...........

*(to be continued)

-Curley 2.17.10

typed in by dad... exactly as it was written.