Sunday, September 23, 2012

Awesome Day!

What a day! Our sweet Annie Grace showed the world that she believes in Jesus today, by getting baptized in one very cold creek!

Our church held a Family Day at Dogwood Canyon. It was so beautiful. It's a wonderful place to spend a day as a family, even better as a church family. We took our bikes, and the kids had a blast riding around the picturesque paths, over the adorable bridges, and checking out the water falls. At 4:00 everyone gathered at Thunder Falls to watch 42 people get baptized. It was a true celebration!

Annie was a little nervous, and she knew (many kind people had told her!) that the water was cold. But she bravely waded in when it was her turn! What a blessing it was to share this beautiful day with friends and family!
Getting Baptized by Pastor Ted!
Annie, Breann, and Bailey all got baptized, and so did Ami!


Olivia warming Annie up!

Proud Grandparents!



Six

My baby is six. I'm going to pretend that's not a big deal, and doesn't make me cry, so I can write a coherent post...

Austin had an awesome birthday! He woke up to donuts, a new bike, and an awesome ramp...



At school his class was having PJ day, he got cupcakes, and lunch with Mommy, Grammie and Janelle! 


After school he had ice cream with Grammie, mommy, and the sisters...


And the next night he had his family party at the pizza arcade!


Have fun being six, my sweet boy. I love you!


Thursday, September 20, 2012

How it starts...

I may be passing on my extreme love of all things Starbucks to my first born. I think it's time.



Ellie with her first (decaf) Pumpkin Spice Latté. :-)

Shelley

Field Day!

Annie loves field day, and I love watching her and her friends have fun! 





Sunday, September 16, 2012

Rainbow.

A couple of weeks ago Ellie felt a strange, golf ball sized lump on her kitty, Rainbow. I started googling and what I found was pretty sobering. A call to the vet, a biopsy, then a surgery quickly followed. It was a whirlwind of stress and emotion for all of us, but especially Ellie. And when it was done sweet Rainbow looked like, well...

FrankenKitty.

It's either laugh or cry sometimes, so sometimes we choose to laugh. :)

She does look sad though.


Crazy, I know.

We got the call a few days ago that somehow, miraculously, it isn't cancer. The chance of cancer was high, 80%, and every symptom pointed in that direction. It may sound crazy to some, but I think God healed our cat. Ellie prayed and prayed, as did I, for that cat. What a message of faith Ellie got!

Rainbow is healing nicely, and will get her stitches out this week. I do think she used up a few of those 9 lives though. :)

Shelley

My boys.

On a lazy Sunday afternoon...



Shelley

Sunday, September 9, 2012

Weekend Rewind

We had a pretty good weekend!

That sentence got an exclamation point, because around here a pretty good weekend is quite an accomplishment. :)

Saturday was an at-home day for me and the kids. It was a much needed, but slightly dreaded day. Anytime we have an entire day of nothing scheduled, without daddy home, I'm fearful. The un-scheduledness is hard for us. Well, hard for Ellie... which makes it hard for everyone. This time though, things went pretty ok. I got some things done, kept up with the house, and even did a special activity with the kids. They fought, of course, but I think I only felt the pressure of impending insanity once. Not bad!

Our special activity was a candy making kit Annie received for her birthday. We started with making rock candy, but unfortunately half way through that process we realized the rock candy takes a total of 10 days. Um, yeah. That's not going to satisfy three young kids! So we moved on and made sour gummy candies. Who knew you could make homemade gummy candies?! They turned out pretty good actually, and satisfied my kids need to use the candy kit.


On a side note, Annie discovered she can sit in the kitchen "window" with her legs stretched out and feet flat against the other side. She fit perfectly. And she thought that was hilarious. :) And yes, that would be her brothers underwear she is wearing. Strange girl.

Also, I never knew how cluttered my kitchen counters were until I saw them in these pictures. Yikes. Moving on...

Sunday we had a family day at SDC with our sweet family of five. The kids had been asking all year when we could do the cave tour, and today was a perfect day for it. J and I hadn't been in the cave since our dating days, probably 15 years ago. Wow. It was a little more exhausting than I remembered it being. I guess that's what 15 years and 3 kids will do for you. Ha! Anyway, the kids were Awesome on the hour long tour! No tears, no screams, and no fighting! They were great spelunkers, and I think they really enjoyed the adventure. The feedback was...

Ellie: It was cool! But a little scary. My legs were shaking because I was so nervous.
Annie: I liked it!
And Austin: It was dark. I didn't like it. I liked it. Yeah. (straight answers are not his forté.)


The rest of the day we enjoyed perfect weather, no lines, running into old friends, and exploring the park. During the ride riding I realized that next year I won't be required to ride much with the kids anymore. Austin is just shy of 48" tall, the magic number to ride most things without a parent. I am looking forward to that, I like some rides, even roller-coasters, but it will be nice to skip some. This year though, I squeezed onto the elephants and the swings with Austin. I did pass on the butterfly ride since he could do that one alone. :)


How much do I love my little guy in the pink butterfly?! Sigh. Someday soon I have a feeling he won't be caught dead in a pink butterfly. But for now, he is still little at heart. Love that.

We also let the kids "mine" for gems. One of those things we always say no to, but this time said yes. :)


We made it home without any major catastrophes or fights, and tucked three tired kids in early so they'd be ready for their school week. A pretty good end to a pretty good weekend. Like I said, that's quite an accomplishment for us. And that makes me happy.

:-)

Shelley

Saturday, September 8, 2012

Aggravation.

The three mornings before today I had to drag my kids out of bed at 7:15am. Last night as I laid my exhausted head down, I thought... Yay! No plans for tomorrow. Everyone can sleep in!... And my next thought... Yeah. Right.

I already knew. Someone, most likely Austin, would be awake at the crack of dawn. Why? Because we don't have to be anywhere. Of course.

It happens every time.

Was I right?

6:15am.

Austin.

Cartoons worked for a little while, and then I had to do something to keep the monkey-boy quiet. He picked a game. Aggravation.


Ironic.

Shelley

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Girls.

When I found out my first two children were girls, I was thrilled. I pictured many matching outfits (which there were), lots of pink and hair bows (yes, again), and tons of giggles (of course). I knew someday we would deal with the not so fun stuff, like hormones and moodiness, and many emotional days, but it seemed a lifetime away as I spent my days picking up Barbie's and princess toys.

Somewhere in the last couple of years the Barbie's and princess toys have dwindled, and well...the emotions and moodiness have arrived.

Lord help us.

We're dealing with body hair and b.o. so I'm fairly sure the hormones are to blame for some of it. The crying meltdowns because daddy hurt someone's feelings (Ellie). The angry stomping out the door because mommy wouldn't let her change her outfit for the third time before school (Annie). Fun times.

After years of Ellie not being able to handle most clothes, and Annie barely noticing what I dressed her in, the other shoe has dropped. Pun intended :)

Ellie suddenly wants new clothes weekly. Annie suddenly cares very much about what I'm dressing her in. The clothing battles and the begging wars have begun.

They are 8 and 10. We have a long road ahead of us.

I need a nap.

Monday, September 3, 2012

The Dog Days of Summer

Or at least the dog night of summer.

Tonight was the annual Doggie Dive-In at our city pool. The last event before the pool closes for the year. We went last year, and took our little dog, Delilah. This year we bravely took both our dogs!

The kids had fun, or they fought like...well, dogs. Depending on the moment. The dogs tolerated it all quite well, they are pretty good dogs.

There was a moment of insanity at the beginning. Annie had soccer practice at the field right next to the pool before the doggie swim started. As we walked her to practice, dogs on leashes following along, Delilah got loose. Crazy little dog took off like a wild horse, zooming around the soccer fields, weaving around people, making circles again and again. In the middle of the field Ellie fell apart screaming and crying, afraid we would never catch her. Then to top it off, Delilah paused just long enough to relieve herself...#2...right in front of a kids soccer practice. Nice. So, we have Ellie jumping and crying and screaming, Delilah running in circles, Jason heading back to find a doggie-doo bag, Annie guarding the doggie-doo so no poor kid will step in it, and me holding onto Elvis, keeping an eye on Austin, trying to calm Ellie down, and catch the flying Delilah.

The crazy, it never leaves us.

What a way to end the Summer!




Shelley