Happy Birthday Zach

Even though he celebrated three day's late (wink; wink) inside joke, better late than never!

Happy Birthday Zach :)

Callie's birthday; part deux!

That's right, TWO PARTIES. Sigh. she wanted her freinds to be able to come over; so we threw a "pedicure party" with hot dog, drinks and cupcakes. The girls watched High School Musical pt.2 while they soaked thier feet and got them painted, complete with rhinestones on the big toe!

 

Callie got a whole new bunch of gifts; dress, Hannah Montana doll, art center, and other assorted Polly Pocket type toys, Daddy and I gave her a pair of Barbie sunglasses to wear with her Barbie bike and to the pool, it was only fair since Ethan got a pair of Diego sunglasses! Ethan unleashed is brand of STINK all over by CRYING over EVERYTHING he could think of; not his birthday, no cupcakes when he wanted, no presents.....you get the picture, poor thing. She had a great time. After the party Daddy took her and E-man to the movies to see Kung Fu Panda, AND Wall-E, where she complained that she wanted to go home, even though that was the movie SHE wanted to see!!!

 

Summer FUN

My kids are..... ADORABLE; just look at 'em!

happy Birthday Dolly!

June 24th can only mean ONE THING.......Dolly's birthday! Callie started off her day with balloons in her room, and a pretty new dress that she had declared necessary for the day. We took her to McDonald's for breakfast and then home to get ready for school. Her classmates sang Happy Birthday to her and gave her a crown with her picture on it, her teacher asked her if she knew what she might get and she told her a bike, which was correct! PINK, BARBIE and A BASKET in front; when I walked out the back door to watch her ride it for the first time she declared "I LOVE IT"!

All Callie's family came over for ice cream cones, complete with a candle in her cone. She got some cute, cute new clothes, a darling"fairy"cookbook, Hannah Montana backpack fron her big brother Cody; and Spencer delivered donuts to her class,How COOL, and a journal that she can pass around to her family to write things down in, a "full circle" journal; what a GREAT idea. 

Doug and I couldn't help but reminisce this morning before she woke up; about her birth at 6:09am six years ago. We didn't know if she was a girl or a boy and they took her immediately to a corner of the room and EVERYONE went with her, left me laying there going "what is it"? There was no "it's a........." moment when she was born and the HOOPS and HOLLARS from the corner immediately told me IT'S A GIRL!! It's a DOLLY!  And just like that; I had a daughter. 

Happy Birthday Doll. We love you.

Mother and child.....

Just HAD to post 'em! Latte had a bath last night, poor thing; it exhausted her! She curled up on Mama and that was THAT!!!

Dirty birds

The neighbors across the dead end are planting a tree, and had a large pile of dirt delivered; which the kids spent literally HOURS playing in, we could barely get them out of there after the sun went down to come in, clean up and go to bed!! I'm not sure I'll get the clothes they we're wearing anything close to clean!!!

Happy Father's day!

I have wanted to get a picture of the children with ANYONE on ANY day, so to actually get everyone outside, dressed and early enough to take a picture AND be on time for church; well this was MONUMENTAL!

The kid's each gave Doug a floating, blue pond light (for the pond of course) and Callie had made a picture with "why I love my Dad" note in Kindergarten, Cody and Spencer got up, out of the tent they were sleeping in and made breakfast for Daddy Doug, which was their own doing, and very nice (thank you big boy's).

Doug's parent's came over for dinner, Doug grilled kabob's and hamburgers and grilled pineapple, YUMMY! We had a nice visit and watched the kids jump on the trampoline and then had ice cream cones with Kim and her family.

Happy Father's Day to Doug, Chester, Mike Sr and Papa, I love you all!

Happy Anniversary, Ethan!

Open heart surgery; three years ago today. Not that many people will have such an extraordinary milestone to acknowledge each year. We are humbled to think about what we we're dealing with exactly three years ago. We had spent an agonizing afternoon waiting for Ethan's "turn" into surgery; another baby who was in worse condition, took his spot that day as the first surgery, so it was a waiting game as to when Dr. Hawkins would be finished with that surgery so that he could move on to Ethan's. At almost 4pm on the nose; an anesthesiologist came out to give us the run down on all the possibilities that could go wrong while he was "on the table" and then it was kisses goodbye and watching Ethan, our five month old baby, travel through the doors into the surgical wing over the shoulder of a very sweet anesthesiologist.

I have always said I wanted to "tattoo" the Superman "S" over his scar; as he has earned superhero status to his family. Happy anniversary little boy, WE LOVE YOU!

Big, BAD Cody!!!

Cody is my "big guy". At 16 he is taller and weighs more than his Mother; but he is reduced to a pile of  MUSH over his girl Latte! Never have you seen anything so cute as this BIG GUY getting kisses from, and talking jibberish to this little puppy!!  

Discovery Museum

Callie's kindergarten class went to the Gateway's Discovery Museum this morning; Doug and I  volunteered and  Ethan went along and had such a good time going into class with Callie and sitting with her classmates, repeat the pledge and go potty with all the "big kids" he loved it, and her classmates thought it was "cute"; a few of them would come up to her and say "callie, your brother....."

Aside from SO many kids that you thought you would go into a schizophrenic  seizure trying to head count your FOUR GIRLS, it was a fun place, and Callie LOVED riding the bus with all her friends.

W*H*A*T??????

BAD, BAD HOPPER!

Anorexic dog........

Latte went in for her first grooming yesterday; and as you can see.......NOT GOOD! She looks like some kind of frankenstein experiment, we have decided to love her anyway; but she will NOT be going out into the "real world" so people can say things like "well, she has such a SWEET SPIRIT that dog"!!!!!

First day of cooking class!

Summer is here (well, according to the calendar?) and that means Miss Becky's Cooking Class has begun; for Ethan that is. He was SUPER excited to start, this would be Ethan's first time in a classroom setting; and is great preparation for Preschool which he will start in August. Cody walked him into class and Teacher pointed out she had the "Thomas the Train" table and off he went; no hesitation after that. What a guy!

Sunday in the park.................

What a beautiful day it was outside! We packed up the little ones and the puppy and went to Grandmommy and Granddad's for some fun outside. Callie and Ethan ran through the park right across the street for awhile, and then to Memory Grove for creek wading! Ethan couldn't have been more designed for a day like today; he looked like a modern day Huckelberry Finn, just missing the hat, fishin' pole and straw from his mouth! Next time we plan an afternoon like that, I will go to the trouble to collect those things just for the photo-op, complete with some overalls rolled up at the legs!

It was such a pleasure to watch the kids roll, run and wade through the afternoon with their Grandparent's. Callie and Ethan ended the evening with a sleepover, to the delight of their parent's, THANK YOU Grandmommy and Granddad!!!!

(take the time to enlarge the picture, the look on Granddad's face is PRICELESS)