Thursday, June 26, 2008

100th Post...an afternoon funny

I'll be back with more later....last week was a crazy, busy week! This is one of my favorite videos. Too funny!

Monday, June 16, 2008

Two short years ago...

Where did the babies go?


Saturday, June 14, 2008

Graduation a'la Chick-fil-a

Yesterday we had Sophia's graduation from kindergarten...at Chick-fil-a (or chick-o-lay as Elijah calls it). Yes, we're real high class people. One of the managers asked, "Did you just graduate?", little did he know that this was the graduation. :) The kids love Chick-fil-a and we thought it would be an easy and fun way to celebrate Sophia's first year of school. The girls did some scripture recitations (no one wanted to listen to more than that because they wanted to PLAY in the play area). It was a fun, low key way to celebrate. I am so proud of my little missy and all her hard work this year! I love you honey; I can't wait to see what you will learn next year! :)

Here are some pictures of our "commencement exercises" (it was literally exercise what with the play area and all).

Our little graduate (we realized a few pictures later that we put her cap on backwards..oops. ;))
Admiring her new Bible from Mimi & PopPop


A homeschool family...

The graduates and friends (Lily had a first grade graduation too, we homeschool, why not? :))

Getting her diploma from the principal of our school...

Our niece Lily and her pink Bible


Thursday, June 12, 2008

This caused me tears...


Last weekend I had to clean up the basement. One day the kids raided the yard sale boxes/bags and got out some of the toys and a whole lot of other junk. The basement was already really, really messy, but this sent me over the edge because we are having a yard sale in our neighborhood next Friday and Saturday. I had to get all of the junk re-organized and just clean up a bit. You literally couldn't hardly walk through the basement and it is not a small basement (this photo doesn't really do justice to how bad it was)! So, I cried and cleaned, then cried and cleaned and finally I have the yard sale stuff separated out. It was an overwhelming project, but I'm so thankful that it is done.
However I didn't dare attempt to price or get the yard sale stuff more ready with the kids around all week...that would mean certain failure. I still have to weed out all the toys they brought up to the house from the other week. Next week is going to be comprised of de-junk, organize, price, set up tables, etc. for the yard sale. Anything that doesn't sell is going straight to goodwill. I can't wait to have less junk in this house and basement. In the words of Elijah, "we have too mutt dunk!". I've realized I'm more into clutter busting than cleaning. I can think with some dirt around, but I just can't concentrate when there's junk everywhere. Sayonara to the "dunk"!
And if you want my dunk, come to my yard sale, hint, hint, hint.

A week without Daddy means:

Macaroni and cheese, hot dogs, PB&J, and cereal for dinner. I think I'm iron deficient from this meatless menu.

Lots of shopping and running around to get ourselves out of the house.

A broken sugar bowl lid.

A hole in the corner of a feather pillow (cut by one of the children), a few feathers sprinkled from the loft.

Guests for Sunday lunch (thanks for your help Jennifer!), an open back door all Sunday morning while we were at church (thanks for checking the house for us Eric!),

Dirt/worm sundaes. They loved the worms. :)

Homemade orange finger jell-o. Noah was totally grossed out by the wiggliness of jell-o.

1 pair of sunglasses lost forever somewhere in Kohls.

Running out of gas with no Daddy hero to rescue us. We ran out of gas a few miles from home. We were on our way to get gas. Unfortunately, we did not make it, but the boys were fascinated by the policeman and his police cruiser who pulled up behind us and called a garage to bring us some gas. We couldn't call anyone because my phone was dead (I did call Anne, but my phone went dead mid-call and I couldn't charge it because....there was no gas in the car. :)), so instead the nice man in the junky van brought us some gas to the tune of $10 a gallon...ouch! No more complaining about gas prices. :)

Co-sleeping: Sophia begged for many months to sleep with me and I told her when Daddy went on a business trip again we would do it. So, we tried our hand at co-sleeping. We have never been co-sleepers but for a couple times when Sophia was a newborn, but it just did not work for us. Graeme was especially not fond of it. I can't blame him, he didn't get any sleep and he had to get up early for work. But, Daddy was gone, so she and I snuggled up on Tuesday night. Wednesday night we added another bundle to the bed and I am sorry to say that two's company but three is definitely a crowd. I was totally squashed in the middle of the children. Elijah was like velcro and I couldn't shake him off of me no matter how I tried. If I tried to get a little space he would rouse and attache himself to me immediately once again. He is a snuggle bug and I love that, but I also need some air and my arm pits don't like fists in them when I am trying to sleep. It just took snuggling to a whole new level. I tried to make the great exodus and finally succeeded at around 4:30 am. Unfortunately, co-ish-sleeping made for early risers so I would definitely say co-sleeping last night was not a success. :) One at a time, thankyouverymuch.

Old friends and cousins and their Mommies over for lunch today. It was crazy fun with 5 "big kids" read: 2 years and older, and 3 18 month olds in the house!

13 naps given

15 bedtime routines (plue re-tucking wayward children into bed. :))

A cleaner kitchen because Momma didn't have to cook.

A cleaner house because we went out a lot.

A multitude of questions about when is Daddy FINALLY coming home. Today was especially full of these questions as they know he's coming while they are sleeping. "Can't you wake us up when he gets home?", "Can we sleep on the couch so we can see him when he comes in?" No, no. "We can sneak out of our beds when he gets home"....at 3 am? I think not. They better not be awake then! :)

Fun, fun times with the children snuggling, reading, shopping, and snacking. I always dread when he goes away, but this trip was different. We have never had so much FUN while Graeme was gone before. I think it's because every other time he has been gone, I've had a baby or been pregnant. Also, now each of the kids has their own room so it is much easier to put them to bed at night. We really had a blast!

Lots of little people and a Mommy who can't wait until Daddy gets home! We love you Daddy and we MISSED you!

Sunday, June 8, 2008

Sophia Art

This is the Sophia way. Something conventional (drawing) done in an unconventional way (on a banana). She worked on these for an hour, perfecting them until they were just right. I think she is going to become a scientist or something. Aren't they cute? Who'd a thunk to do such a thing?




Sophia, Daddy, and Noah...



Our whole family...


Gracie throwing up in a bucket, appetizing isn't it?!


Our family and my sister's family minus the Elijah banana, he had already eaten his at this point. Atta boy. :)


MiMi & PopPop (their caricatures came later)

She insisted on delivering each persons banana to them at Church last Wednesday. It was a health conscious snack. :)

Friday, June 6, 2008

Look Carefully


What's wrong with this picture?

B-I-B-L-E

Noah sings! This is how it goes: I bee I bee I bee, I bee I bee I bee I bee. (add a few more for good measure) I bee I bee I bee I bee I bee I bee I bee, (with much enthusiasm) Bible!!! I didn't even notice what he was saying at first, not until he put Bible! on the end. Now he won't stop. :)

18 month old Noah

Here are a couple of pictures from Noah's 18 month pictures. I have a 16X20 of each of the kids at 18 months so this was Noah's big photo shoot. He did not disappoint with handsome smiles and cute poses. But, for the big picture I couldn't resist him with his index finger in his mouth. That was my favorite because it just looks like him. Maybe I'm crazy for not getting one of him with a handsome smile, but I just love the finger in the mouth, it's so cute.

Here are a few of my favorites from the photo session...





His new favorite things to say are: "I want dat", "Feea" for Sophia, "Lidah" for Elijah", and every night when we ask him what he wants to pray for he says, "doey" and "illy". He sings Happy Birthday and loves us to sing "Bible". He constantly asks me to read one more "gook" and he loves his "ganket". His favorite ganket is his "geen ganket" (green blanket). At bedtime, he must have a ganket or four and he loves to have "goey" (glowy - his glowworm) with him too. He says so many other things that I can't remember right now. He's really talkative. He rivals if not exceeds Sophia at this age. Elijah was a late bloomer in the language department so Noah constantly surprises me with his little sentences and words.

I want to remember all these details. I love you sweet Noaners, even if I never write in your baby book and you have less pictures than the other kids. I understand, I was the third-born too!

My Fave "Boy Mom" blogs

Erin

Dawn

It's fun to see pictures of their too adorable boys and read about all their antics! Boys...what fun!

Sunday, June 1, 2008

How did my baby get so big!?

Today was promotion Sunday and my baby girl is in the 1st and 2nd grade class now. Where did the baby go? I hope I taught her enough in kindergarten to be a big first grader. I told her about her new class before bed last night and she was a little "happy and sad" in her own words, about leaving Miss Rachel and moving to her new class. I have the same sentiments exactly. :)




Thank you, Lord for our sweet "baby" girl. Please give me wisdom to point her to you. Help me to keep on trying, even when I fail her, and to trust you for her "expected end".