First Day of Kindergarten!!

Breakfast with Ben

Ben had an idea recently. He made a deal: if I stay in bed all night, can I have breakfast in bed? Well, the planest aligned and he stayed in bed all night! Voila! Breakfast is served!

Skaters

This is a new pastime for my kids, thanks to my biggest kid, Todd. One of his favorite toys is this longboard and the kids are getting into it too. Maddie of course just loves the accessories.

Maddie is Dancing!

Well, it is official. Maddie is hooked on dancing. If you have spent any time with Maddie, it is no surprise that she loves to dance. She just started in a little dance class called Kinderdance. She is loving it! This day's theme was sunglasses day, and of course, I forgot her sunglasses, but, she didn't seem to mind. She had her necklace and bracelet on. She was confident and secure.

Tour de Cure 09

Last weekend Todd and our long time friend, Brandon, accomplished a great feat...they completed Tour de Cure and raised over 3K between them both. When all was said and done, they covered 70 miles- in one day!! Way to go boys.

Here we show some girl power with our friend Loesje and her daughter Avery and her friend Abbey. Maddie is looking especially festive.

Are they CUTE or what?

Ok, today at 4:00 I was not thinking this.....but as I sit back and take a breath, I know these are some very precious gifts from God. I love my job.

In the Garden with Ben

Ok, I know if I did not record this, I could possibly forget it....so. With the power of digital photography, I captured one of my son's favorite activities....rushing harvest time. Yep, he is so excited about vegetables, that he takes my perfect store-bought vegetables and TAPES them to the existing plants and is elated to come in the house and show us what he has "picked".
It kinda made my day. hahahahah

The recession garden is coming along! We have green beans coming in and we even picked our first cucumber today! The kids are getting having so much fun!

These Photos Need some 'Splainin

Ok, it is official. Life as I know it is over. Maddie has moved to a "Big Girl" bed. Last night was her maiden voyage into sheer freedom from the crib. She did GREAT! She slept all night and if you look closely, the Paci is tied to the bed. This was a fabulous idea from my friend Kelley- thanks KCK. THis caused a major meltdown to ensue, but alsas, we survived, and as seen here ended up all smiles. But in all my maternal wisdom (and brace yourself this will sound terribly cruel) but I told her if she got out of bed for any other reason than going to the bathroom, the carpet would be hot lava. Now before you call DHS on my, you must know my daughter has had a real obsession with hot lava since seeing it in a movie this winter (the velveteen rabbit of all things- it was actually fire, but she called it hot lava) anyway, I digress. Well this is how smart the little cookie is...she went to her closet and got out "princess" shoes because the hot lava would not burn them. All in all, it has been a very good transition. She loves her bed, and her brother donated his red pillow to her. Thus, the beautifully matched ensemble. (yes, I am too cheap to buy a "bedspread" for a junior bed.) It's temporary people!!

Now on to Ben's office. For quite sometime Ben has had an "office" in our home office (Todd works from home about 20% of the time) We eventually got him his own desk and various birthdays and holidays have landed him with countless office supplies- because that's what he dreams about. He loves his office. It is endless hours of play and mess. We try to ignore his corner, but I just can't help marveling at his prowess for decorating.
These are his "knights" and "pirates" that he loves too. I think they are in trouble and this is their punishment.

Joyful memories!

A Hair-Raising Week!

So, with summer here, we decided to take the plunge and give Ben his first BUZZ! It pains me to see that beautiful blonde hair fall to the ground, but we will just have to take a break from brushing, fussing and traveling to the barber for a summer. On the other hand Maddie had an unplanned hair cut recently. She took the scissors to her own hair twice in the past couple of weeks. (I might add that both occasions were NOT under my watch)- now, that just jinxed me....anyway......Take a close look. Her future as a hairdresser is, lets just say, questionable. Look closely, and you will see here bangs are less than an half inch long!!

Our Recession Garden

Ben has had a love of dirt and gardening since the very first sunflower we planted several years ago. This year we decided to go all out and build a garden in our own backyard. I, mommy, tired of pots and mish mash gardens, and borrowed land 10 miles away, so we bought a raised bed. I feel very efficient seeing as how I crammed about three times the allowable vegetables in this space. We also have a corner garden of green beans, squash, cucumber and one lone sunflower. We recently added a second row of corn. We hope to have a great posting of our harvest in the late summer/fall!!

Cousin Time in Tennessee!

Maddie and Jessie are finally starting to actually like each other! So, I thought I would record a fun night they had here recently. They both LOVE spaghetti, and I simply had to resign myself to some messy faces until this stage passes. In the meantime, I will just enjoy the memories!