my childhood

I thought today I'd give you some background of my life. I was born in Goshen Indiana on Aug 10, 1984. I was the first of three kids (Me, Kevin & David). I was the first grandchild (out of 8) on my mom's side, and number 4 (out of 14) on my dad's side. I remember as a child going to my Grandma and Grandpa Sand's house every Sunday to have lunch with the family and play. As children, we did a lot of fun things together. Me and my cousin's use to play games in the yard, pretend we were statues as cars drove by, or tried to get them to honk at us, climb the tree in front of the house, play school, or put on shows for the parents. Once we did Billy goat's gruff, 3 little bears, and performed a circus. Yes, I have wonderful childhood memories at my grandparents house. We lived far away from the Bonds, so we didn't get there as much, but I have fun memories there as well. EVERY time I went I watch Annie, or we played video games, went shopping, or went to a movie. I love all my cousin's and wish I could be with them more.

When I was 3 years old I prayed the salvation prayer, but that is not when I think I became saved. When I was 6 or 7, my dad was reading me the book about Paul Bunon. His story somehow touched me and I prayed for God to enter into my life that night. That is the night I remember as becoming a christian.

The August when I turned 7 we moved to Wisconsin. My dad got transferred here to Milwaukee. I don't remember if I was sad to move or not. I don't remember it all too well. What I do remember is when we got to our apartment in Grafton, I saw this girl outside (Leslie) playing with those maple seeds, the ones that when you throw up in the air they come down and look like helicopter propellers. I remember going up to her to talk, and we became fast friends. Our big thing back then was playing with Barbies. I took all my barbies to her house because she had TONS of barbie stuff, including houses, cars, and buckets of clothes. My dad built me a wood barbie house that I took over there as well. We did not play barbies in the usual way, if there is a usual way. We started with each having a "family", and as those kids grew up, they married and kids, and so on. I couldn't tell you how many generations of families we went through. It was so much fun.

That first year was tough on my family. We missed our family, and my brother David was having some medical problems. He had multiple seizures in one day, and had to be put on special medication that made him a little monster (sorry David, but you were). But we got though that.

I went to 2nd grade at Grafton Elementary school, but after one year, and one scary incident of a guy in a red pick up truck trying to get me and my friend to come with him, my mom decided to home school us. I thought it was a lot of fun. I got to do all my work in the morning, and have fun late afternoons and evenings. Best things: TONS of field trips, getting to read A LOT of books, and NO HOMEWORK!!!! I really enjoyed it.

Now, I know what I alot of people say... what about socialization though??? Well, let me tell you what I was involved in for socialization: swimming lessons, piano lessons, AWANAs, VBS, Sunday school, a homeschooling group that met once a month, a smaller group of 4 girls who met weekly, girls scouts, softball for one summer, Irish dance, and we had SO many kids where we lived we always had someone to play with. So, yes, I do think I got the proper socialization growing up. I don't feel like I'm lacking in that area as an adult now.

Also, people say, how do you know if your child is getting a proper education? well, of course the state regulates somewhat of how many hours you need to get in, but we also took tests to make sure we meet the standards, and I did great in high school and college, so I don't think I was lacking there. Granted, I don't remember much of my history (that was my LEAST favorite class), and my grammar isn't always correct, but so is a lot of people that went to public school. I was a science and math girl.. those areas I excelled in.

One of my favorite activities that I was in was girl scouts. I started that in 2nd grade, and continued until high school graduation. We met every other Saturday morning at my friend Lydia's house (1 block from the apartment). Of course, as we got older we didn't meet as much and we stopped selling the cookies! Two of my best memories was of our train trip from milwaukee to chicago to go camping and our trip to Mackinac Island. My mom went with us on a lot of our outings. I also enjoyed the day camps, the back pack camping trip we went on, and being a counselor at one of the Junior's camping trip.

We lived in Grafton for I think 6 years before moving to out house in Port Washington. We had already started going to ODBC (5th grade) where I met Beth and we became BEST friends. We had so many secrets and special names of people we liked... but I won't revel them all here. I hold my memories with her close to my heart.

I did go to Ozaukee Christian School for one year (7th Grade), I enjoyed it, but opted to go back home for 8th grade to do a video school before deciding I wanted to go to public school for high school....

to be continued.....