VACATION post...at last!!!

I have a girlfriend in southeast Texas that we were going to stay with and she only lives 15 minutes from my uncle John and his family. Then there is my mom's family who live in the north central part of Texas (I think) and that was 3 and 5 hours from my friend Sam, so we did a road trip tour of Texas. Ready or not, here we come.

Mom and Toby came on the trip with us and at the rest areas the kids took turns walking Toby. Micah was not going to be left out and let you know it loud and proud if she thought she was going to miss an opportunity to "hold it" (the leash).

I love how this rest area had a little park for the kids to burn some energy on. If it were up to me they'd all be this way!!! Unfortunately half of them barely had toilets. Well, as you can see it got crazy hot while we were there so we went off to a water park. With a total of 8 kids it could get expensive really quickly but Sam found some water park that cost $5 per person and it was great!!!

My cousin Laurel was able to come with us and what a help she was! Two extra eyes were priceless that day, let me tell you. The girls loved her and had a great time playing with her. I think perhaps she enjoyed herself too!

Now Micah surprised us. She may be the baby of the family but she still takes on so much. She wanted to go down the water slides and she did great. She went down, got up, walked around to the stairs by herself and went up the stairs to do it all again. She loved the slide and I loved that she could do it all by herself!

I certainly wish that the water park by our house was as cost effective as this one was. The kids loved the water (that did not exceed a foot in the kiddie area) and mostly loved the fact that they didn't have to wait on me or Tim to do their own thing.Elijah and Caleb, who I don't have a picture of for some reason...hmm...they got to walk the water park by themselves. I'm telling you, this park was awesome! If I had to, I could see Elijah no matter where he went and that allowed him to have some independence and it allowed Tim and me the comfort of knowing what he was doing all the time. It was the best of both worlds.

Levi wasn't given that same freedom, though he didn't seem to care. He was too wrapped up in his poor foot. He was such an active little fish jumping in and out of the water but he caught the bottom of the pool with his heel and it scraped him up pretty bad. I felt badly for him for a couple of seconds, but apparently he needed more. Thanks Sam! Then there was Titus...let's just say that Paul was taking care of things perfectly!

Thursday evening we went to my uncle John's house where he had rented this awesome bouncy slide. It was so hot that we burned our feet on the ladder going up so we decided to wet the whole thing down and that worked wonderfully. It really is true the saying "slippery when wet."

Besides the slide, uncle John and Amy had this pool blown up for the kids to cool off in. There was also this baby pool that Micah rather enjoyed with Aiden, uncle John and Amy's absolutely adorable grandson.

Thank you uncle John, Amy and Laurel (and Carrie) for a fun visit with you.

Later that night we were able to celebrate Eden's 5th birthday along with Keaton and Bailey who were born one week before Eden was. They each had their own "princess-like" cake and they loved them, bling and all!

I couldn't help but get all three girls a matching shirt for their birthday. Sam, how about triplets? Just a thought.

We got to do a good amount of swimming at Sam and Paul's house, one of the most anticipated events by the kids. Levi was thrilled that there was so much gear to put on. It just fed his imagination.

Even Titus began to enjoy himself. Now, he didn't let us throw him around, but he did eventually let go of us to "swim" by himself. Micah, on the other hand...well, remember how much of a independent she was at the water park? In the pool we were throwing her up pretty high and dropping her into the water and she loved it! She'd push away from us in order to try and kick her legs to swim by herself. It was so cool. I suppose she could learn how to swim if we had pool access here at home!

On a side note, one of the reasons this post took to bloomin' long to do was because all the videos that I wanted to add to this for some reason wouldn't load. Every time I got on to add to my post I'd get so frustrated with the dern thing and so I'd just save my work and exit only to pick it up again a week or so later to the same end. How frustrating is that??? There was some great video.

When we left Sam and Paul's house we drove north to Celeste to visit uncle Jeff and his family. They didn't have much for little kids to do but they did run through the sprinkler one day. That was the day we learned what fire ants were. Micah got around 20 bites all over her chubby little feet! If it wasn't so sad it would have been funny the way she started "dancing" to get them off of her. It was cute! Is that mean?

We had beautiful weather the whole week we were in Texas, but not even 20 minutes after we left we hit black and green skies and a whole bunch of crazy rain.
Fortunately the rain didn't keep the kids from sleeping or otherwise traveling nice and sound. Now, being that it is 2am and I was so bent on actually finishing this post, I am starting to fall asleep while typing and that makes for some interesting words...did you know I start typing what I'm dreaming that way? It's cool.

On that note, I have a month of stuff to post. Hopefully John Paul won't be celebrating any anniversaries before I get to his wedding!!!

Love notes from a lover boy

Levi is one of our kids that I would have said was higher maintenance, but that just means that he can portray such a wide array of emotions on any given day, and ever since he started learning how to read in k5 last year, he has been writing notes. He wrote love notes to Gracie and put them in her seat sack last year. He writes notes to Tim and me instead of asking us a question and he writes notes just to say "I love you."

One day we were at my friend Erin's house and Levi took some sidewalk chalk and scribed an ode to mommy on her driveway.



If you couldn't read his writing (he hasn't got the grasp of vowels just yet) this is what it said:
"I Love you mommy love Levi you ar the best mom in th hole wide wrold."

Some days I want to pulverize him for being so drastic in his emotions and other days I want to melt because he is a little love bug who shows his love to me by hugging me, sitting in my lap and best of all, writing me love notes. sigh.

The graduate

Levi graduated kindergarten (good grief, it's been a month ago now) and I am finally still enough to sit down to post about it. I'm on vacation in Texas and have nice pictures to post but have other things to do first, my being slightly compulsive about chronology and all. I'll try and get caught up soon, but you all know right well, it won't last long.

Levi got to do most of the speaking again, starting with the opening lines, and clearly they emphasized to him that he needed to SLOW DOWN and enunciate his words. He did that perfectly.

By the end of the program, they had all been on the stage way too long and boys being boys, they had to fight...who knew a scrolled diploma could be a light saber?

Afterwards we had to stop and take a whole lotta pictures and poor Levi was not game for too much of that. Well, until his friend passed by.

Romeo stopped to pose with one of the little girls (Kayla) that would always run up to him and hug him or lift him up and not let him go. It actually was a bit annoying. Well, to me anyways.

Grandpa G...

This is the best a photographer can do with this bunch. We were way too tired to stand anymore, so what do you do with a bunch of wound up kids itching to run around like lunatics???

You take them to Dairy Queen for ice cream, of course. We went to Steak and Shake for Elijah's graduation and this year, Levi chose DQ. I like that choice much better.

Leviboy we love you, we are proud of you and we are excited to watch you continue to grow up into the young man God will have you to be. Happy graduation!

Vacation for a day...with Daddy

Tim had to go to Michigan for a week for one of Moody's Share's (week long on-air fund raising that takes care of a year long budget) and his hotel was only a couple hours away, so mom and I drove up to see him one day after the boys got out of school just to go swimming. It was a great way to spend an evening.Eden was quite the little fish. Once she had on her floaties, she was in her own little world jumping in the pool and swimming from end to end. She loves the water!

Titus on the other hand needed a fairly long break-in period. He wasn't so sure he liked the water and wouldn't let go of me and Tim when we were holding him. Ever.

However, by the end of the night, he was a new little guy and I was so excited for him.

This little girl...I just want to eat her up, chubby thighs and all. She was so cute waddling along the side of the pool and the hot tub. She didn't mind going up and down the stairs of the pool but she was not at all fond of going out into the water. It wasn't until I blew up the floating thing she could sit in that she somewhat enjoyed herself.

This little guy started out the afternoon not too certain he even liked the idea that there was a deep end, but by the end of the night, he was having full faith in his floaties and even got the fabulous idea that he didn't need them anymore. Nice try!

Here is an example of Eden and her new found love for jumping.

Here is Titus. He is pouting, as you can see, and when Titus pouts, he completely drops his shoulders and his head and does the complete dramatic presentation of pout. If it didn't tick me off, I would think it was completely hysterical.

Watch at the beginning and you may catch the terribly ugly face he makes...he is a character indeed!

Mr funny guy here was just spending his time improving his ability to swim. He did wonderfully going back and forth the length of the pool. I was so proud of him but I still don't think he is ready to be on his own unattended just yet. He would disagree.

If I had one word to stick to this picture I would put IMP!!! Oh my word she was killing us with the arm crossing and goofy face. So darn cute. Is this how the youngest gets spoiled??? Doggone her! She's got some mad skills for sure! What she was doing here was basically dancing for her food...

The video quality is terrible, but I think you will still see the imp at work here!!!

One month ago...

I guess it's time for a new post. I am going back about a month to some pictures partly because that's where I left off and I am the queen of catch-up and partly because I just got scolded by my SIL, Shelley, for not having anything new to read after she spent umpteen minutes trying to get connected to the internet in the first place. How disappointing! Sorry Shelley! To make it up to you, I am doing a post that will feature you...or a part of you. That should get me back on your good side! ;-)

This is Nadia. Around our house she is called Nanee (nah-nee). Micah knows how to say Nadia as plain as day but I think she prefers Nanee. Every baby Micah sees is Nanee. If she hears a cry...Nanee. You get the picture.

Well just about a month ago our sweet little Nanee (along with her mommy and daddy) left Chicago for Indonesia where they are training with New Tribes Missions agency for Bible translation. Once they learn the culture and language of Indonesia they will (once they have more support) go off into a village that [most likely] will not have a written language, come up with a language for them, teach them to read it, translate the Bible for them so that they can finally have something they can use to begin telling these people about Jesus. Exhale. This post is made of the pictures we took of their last few days with us.

Titus is generally a monster, but somehow he can muster up a lot of tenderness for Micah and Nadia. Well, at least in comparison to his natural bull in a china shop tendency.

He even mustered out this kiss...what a guy.

I loved watching Tim with Nadia...I could never tell she wasn't his own.

Micah, on the other hand knew better

and didn't always like it!

Ok, so I really wanted to get a picture of all the cousins together before Nadia went off and got "all growed up" so after they all got baths and after it was way past their bedtime I thought it would be perfect to make them all sit still for a photo session. Sorry, baby.

The next day she was having a blast in the swing even though it was a touch chilly; enough for runny noses and chubby red fingers. I miss those fingers!

Here's the clan at my mom and dad's house on Easter.

There's nothing special about this picture...I just liked it and it's my blog and I can post it if I want to!

It was a nice enough Easter day (unlike the past how many years) that we took turns on the paddle boat. Are they doing "the Titus?"

Uncle Tim, I still don't like it and now you're laughing at me...I'm gonna cry!

I love this face. It's like she's deep in thought or making a poopie. Either way, I like the shot.

Again, Micah isn't thrilled with her daddy at the moment. What gives?

Ok, so this is the day they are leaving...not even an hour before...and I catch Nadia trying to make a face at me.

I caught many stages of the face,

but never the actual face. This one was close and though it certainly didn't contain the personality she was throwing out there, it still makes for a good note to end on.

Actually, since I am featuring Nadia today, the note I want to end on is just to let whoever reads this post know that if you or anyone you know are looking to support a missionary, I am not shy about saying Phil and Shelley are someone you may want to check out. Ask us anything about them or I can just send your email out to them to get you on their mailing list. They do have a blog which is thesvobodas.blogspot.com and that will start you off at getting to know them.

I hope you enjoyed what took me hours to do. Doggone TV. How do you all keep up with your blogs? Do you have maids or something? I don't blog much because I have to wait until the kiddos are in bed and now tonight, here it is 12:17am and I am still up. Guess who's going to be nodding off in church tomorrow?!? Well I'll try not to.