The Tooth Fairy is Visiting tonight!

Kate lost her first tooth this morning! We recently read the really cute Junie B. Jones book about the tooth fairy and Kate is looking forward to adding to the fairy's tooth collection (and hoping to make a buck!).I have assured her that teeth in baggies are easier for the fairy to find and carry....a few too many nights desperately seeking teeth for this fairy! By the fourth, you wise up!

Greg and I completed a lot of tasks around the house this weekend. And Ty, well, he "helped". He was covered in paint more than once! Oh boy is he fun!
Pam and Ken visited us yesterday and treated us to dinner at Cracker Barrel. Ty kept staring at the mounted deer head over the fireplace and finally pointed to it and declared it was "stuck"!We had a great time with them and hope to see them again soon. Kate just adores Ken and has been his buddy since our boating trip with them three years ago.

Even after a bath, some of that paint remained on his legs! Our ceilings are finished and the patio furniture has been repainted. The laundry, kitchen, dining, living, hallway and Ty's room have had the trim painted. At that point, my back insisted we STOP! I spruced up some little items in the landscape and ordered my new porch swing since my old one is literally falling apart. It took Greg awhile to convince me we couldn't salvage my swing. Greg's parents gave it to me just after we bought our first house together. Obviously, I am a little sentimental about letting it go. It is my favorite place to relax but the new bright white swing will look quite nice in its place.

Ty broke out with his second cold sore this month. It is healing quickly but revealed he is not responding to preventative treatment. We are disappointed but have decided to pull him off the medication. We've completed three of the six months and are still having outbreaks. His belly was frequently upset on the medicine and it affected his appetite so it was with mixed emotions we made this decision. We pray his body eventually builds the antibodies necessary to fight this virus on its own. Until then, we know we need to eliminate his beloved paci and hope to see noted improvement once he is no longer teething. Still having a lot of things in his mouth certainly doesn't help prevent outbreaks.

We had a beautiful weekend as a family and enjoyed friends too. Memories of those we've lost were also in our hearts as was gratitude for the sacrifice made by our American soldiers.  Happy Memorial Day.

When I stew....

I am not connecting with God as I should and I clean and paint and rearrange and plan projects and buy paint and make honey do lists that make my husband crazy, almost as crazy as when I tackle said projects on my own because he is busy and I am stewing. Sigh. He loves me anyway. Praise God. The last few weeks I have been working through a decision I knew I had to make but didn't want to because I knew it would disappoint someone else. I am a people pleaser and I know better. Greg literally reminded me that I have read Boundaries and need the refresher because when I spend my time pleasing others and not connecting with God, I am not pleasing Him. A new friend gently reminded me of this as well. I love honest friends and count them among my greatest blessings. So, prior to the reminder, I started painting base boards and window sills. I cleaned ceiling fans and planned to paint the ceilings (purchasing paint of course). I vacuumed walls.....yes, you read that right. Polished bathroom fixtures and cleaned the oven. There's more but you get the idea. I uncovered a lot of hidden dirt!

Makenna helped with the baseboards and the babies this week so I took her along to the local farmer's market where I planned to stock up on weekly produce. It was a fun way to spend the morning with Makenna but I have to say the price point of supporting local farmers surprised me. $4 head of lettuce? It was good but it was a one time special around here! It went nicely with our $4 strawberries and $5 loaf of bread......yikes. Meijer will not be losing my business at those prices.

Honeysuckle lines our property and the kids indulged in sweetness this afternoon.

Kate surprised me today by asking how many packages of pop-tarts were left in the box. This is important because I only buy one box at Sam's every couple of months and they all want to make sure they are getting their fair share! I told her there were four packages left and she quickly let me know that there are two pop-tarts in each package so there were eight total! I was excited as I told her she just did multiplication. She had no idea what that was and I assure you she didn't see it in her kindergarten math book this year!

Ty was in a mood that was going to all too quickly land him in bed for a nap! Exasperated, I asked him why he was so bad and Kate simply said, "probably because he lives around all of us"! Out of the mouth of babes.

Crying Wolf!

I spent the night with five nervous kids in the bathroom last night, again. I so dearly wish the media would revisit the fable, The Boy Who Cried Wolf because this is getting a little crazy! Tornado warnings mean that a tornado has been spotted, does it not? That's the way it used to be but now we listen to sirens for 45 minutes for a VERY MINOR THUNDERSTORM. Ugh. I am afraid that after too many of these false alarms most of us will decide to ignore warnings and find ourselves in the same situation as those poor people in Joplin. Praying for them and counting my blessings...just tired. Bathrooms are not comfortable places to sleep.

On a side note, my beautiful son has decided that potty training isn't his thing right now. No pressure but I was hoping to be at the end of my diaper buying days in the next couple of months. Oh well. He also really likes his paci. A LOT. We were weaning him to just bed and nap time however the little boys spending their days here like theirs and my little guy appears to be dealing with a little jealousy. I am trying to keep perspective. It does seem highly unlikely he will take his diapers and paci to high school.....

On the other hand, he is quick and smart and misses nothing. Last night he was playing in the landscape rocks. I was okay with him moving them from one bed to another. I was okay with him using Greg's oil change funnel to sort them (Greg was not okay with that....sorry honey, I am used to a dirty boy at the end of the day, what's a little oil debris going to hurt?) but I drew the line when he was throwing fistfuls into the yard. When I told him to stop, he said "can't hear you"! Playtime was interrupted with a time out and I believe he heard me then! This is just one more area where having teens and toddlers in the same house creates little issues. Lauren covers her ears and says she can't hear me when she is playing around. What is cute for a 14 year old is not so cute coming from a 22 month old! God must really be laughing at me! Teenage girls and a toddler boy....at the same time! Really? It's a ride.

We discovered our large decorative window is broken last night. Just one more repair and likely one more series of contractors who will not show up and do the job! We've had multiple appointments with people who just simply do not show up but again, I am grateful to be an at home mom who is here anyway. I can't imagine being a working mom who has to miss work to meet these guys and then have them stand me up. That would not go over well for a "non-local" like me. The nonchalant, laid back, we'll get around to it when we get around to it mentality is something I can't wrap my head around. I am so much more the, "let's get through this list and be done" personality. But then, you probably already knew that! 

Lauren's New Do!

 Lauren had a significant amount of hair cut off on Friday......

And she loves the results.

Birthday wrap up!

My parents came down for the weekend and brought a pitching machine and a tea set to our versatile six year old! She loves both. We played hard, ate well and laughed a lot. It was good.

Lauren breezed in between social engagements with encouraging comments like, "Makenna, since you have only one leg feeling growing pains, wouldn't it be cool if only one leg grew and you had to walk lop sided for the rest of your life?" Can you just feel the love?

Greg investigated her life size Justin Beiber cut outs and noted Justin is wearing lipstick! Lauren all too quickly responded that he was wearing chap stick. He inquired as to how she knew that and she laughed as she said, "because it's mine"! Poor Greg. He just quietly walked out of the room sorry he had said anything!

Ty found a hard hat in our closet and came out wearing it. After a few minutes, Greg put it on and told Kate it was his. Kate exclaimed, "YOU WERE A WORKER MAN??"! For just a brief moment, he was cool because he actually worked! You see, the only cool UPS workers are the ones who bring packages to our door. The rest don't count when you are six. So having a glimpse of Daddy doing something other than boring safety stuff elevated him to someone even more important in her eyes.

On Kate's birthday we had cake, realizing of course that we had already eaten cake balls but it was still raining and I have a sugar addiction when I am cooped up inside.....anyway, check out our little man's chocolate goatee!

Tonight is DATE NIGHT!!!! My parents gave Greg a gift card for dinner and we will stop in at the Home Depot...we do a crazy date night around here! I can't explain our need to stop in the Home Depot every time we get to get out without the kids, but it always seems to happen that way! We don't get out without them much so I suppose it is an excuse to price repairs and improvements without distractions? I don't even care. I am looking forward to holding hands with my worker man and completing a few sentences too.

Have a great week friends!

camera time

Colby's parents asked me to take some six month photos of their little guy. I was honored.

But Ty was a bit jealous and had to be in the photos too.....

Welcome to the toddler years! Does that face not say it all?

Kate is 6!

Daddy surprised Kate with birthday donuts this morning. She's been asking for them since Lauren's birthday last November.....she's persistent! She has requested macaroni and cheese for dinner, but not the kind I make...nope, she wants the stuff out of a box! Okay, but I am adding tilapia and asparagus to her request so I can eat too! The other day she asked me what birthday she would be allowed to do whatever she wants and I told her the 21st! She was not impressed by my answer. We replaced her twin doll stroller and updated her webkinz account. She was pleased with her gifts, especially the twinkle toe shoes from Grandma Carol......they are as colorful and sparkly as our Katebug. Happy birthday sweet girl.

Celebrating Kate

Greg's family drove down for a few hours today to help kick off Kate's birthday week. Lizzie was a treat as always and Kate enjoyed her gifts and birthday money. We had to head out to Target as soon as everyone left! She loves shopping.....I blame teenage sisters. She chose cake pops rather than a traditional cake or cupcakes this year.

Grandma looked high and low for Twinkle Toes shoes. Kate is thrilled. Grandpa is trying to tighten them up a bit to help them fit better as they run a little big. I hope that means we will get more wear out of them!

Saying good bye is never easy....

Uncle Brad playing with Kate.....she loves it!

Poor little Lizzie was told she has to let Kate open her own packages. Lizzie is next....three in June.

The cake pops were good but I think they need a little tweaking next time. I'm pleased with my first attempt though.

Jennifer and Shelby took Kate out for a play date yesterday and gave her some fun art supplies for her birthday.

Her first drawing in her new sketch book.....can you see her news? It is her first loose tooth and she is pretty excited.

It's been a week.....

Erin had a staph infection all over her face. It is healing well now thanks to the awesome support of our friend Robyn who happens to be a pediatrician. We avoided one doctor appointment and she made a house call! Love her! Anyway, Erin couldn't go to the doctor once we realized what we were dealing with because she had mandatory state wide testing in the beginning of the week and couldn't miss school. Once we got through that, she was sent home anyway with tightness in her chest, extreme fatigue and upset stomach. A battery of tests have been run and we've not uncovered the cause of her symptoms. It has literally been one thing after another.

Colby turned six months old and is trying to crawl. Things will really be busy once he figures that out! He is always moving and smiling.

Baby feet are beautiful!

I love this....Colby and Ty holding hands while watching Mickey

Ty is as busy as ever.......

Unless he has an important phone call to make to Pa-Pa.

He is always the first to prepare to pray every night for dinner but after every prayer, he hits me! This has gone on for weeks. I seriously want to know how long I will be repeating "hands are not for hitting"! Anyway, after praying the other night, he smacked my arm and very firmly said, "Pa-pa, Ma-ma, Kate". It finally occurred to me to he wanted to run through our bedtime "God bless" list! All this time I was thinking what is it going to take for him to figure out he is not allowed to hit me and he has been wondering just how long it was going to take me to figure out how to pray with him! 

Our Kate is turning 6 next week! And she has discovered a loose tooth! It's her first and she is very excited.

We wrapped up our school year. I can honestly say I wish it had been our public school year rather than our home school year. It's been a season of unnecessary challenges. Common sense is lacking across the board and I am dreading adding another student to the roster in the fall. Praying. And counting down the days until May 31 when Erin will finish her sophomore year.

The internet is bad......

but not for the reasons you may think! I spent a few days last week in a sweet tooth recipe seeking mode and ran across so many tempting treats! Today we started our day with praline french toast.....oh man! But, it meant I broke my "not cook" answer to Greg's Mother's Day inquiry. AND...my wise Mother-in-Law shared with me that she takes her birthday off too! Whoa! Where in the heck has that little piece of information been the last 17 years? As she suggested, "not cook" is now on the calendar for my birthday too! Whether or not I stick to it remains to be seen!

After breakfast, I took the older three girls out shopping and successfully updated my jeans and a couple of tee shirts! It wasn't even painful! The girls are calling them "hot momma jeans" so I think I've done well??? Let's just say gaining the approval of teenagers is not an easy task and they are asking to borrow them (ummm...no!)

This afternoon we put up the newest trampoline and joked it probably meant we'd be relocated or something!

Clean up detail included the use of the truck.....and little man loves the truck!

Ty woke up with a cold sore this morning. Disappointed doesn't cover it. He's completed two full months of daily medication which is supposed to be preventing these outbreaks. We'll speak with the doctor tomorrow. We have four more months to go but I was not prepared to see outbreaks during treatment. But, is it just me or is he about the cutest thing even with that ugly thing on his face? Speaking of cute....

Katebug and her bugs......she is just so colorful! She handmade my Mother's Day card and it said she loves me but I love UPS. Interesting perspective! Let's just say I appreciate UPS paying my husband so we can pay the bills. "Love" would be a stretch! 

And this girl.....signed her card, "From the kid who loves you the most. What time are we going shopping?"

I am blessed to have all these wonderful people calling me mom.