How to hike

When going on a hike in the woods in 100 degree weather,

always hold daddy's hand,

wear comfy shoes (these shoes would be an example of what not to wear),

stay well hydrated,

pass the water around,

take your best friend with you,

do a little dance when you find an awesome bridge,

stay at the bridge for awhile and pose for pictures,

try and act natural,

get tired of taking pictures and be bribed by your parents to take just one more, 

and definitely, definitely always follow the leader!

He knows what he's doing, people!

Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.

~Steven Wright

8 Month Jett

WHAT?  My baby is 8 months old?  That can't be right...  Oh my, it goes so fast! 

~He's crawling like a pro now!  He's even figuring out how to crawl through the bottom part of the coffee table to escape the barricade we've set up! :)

~When he does escape said barricade, he will stop crawling and look behind him - if he notices that we're chasing him, he'll start laughing, turn around, and start crawling even faster!  He's a goober!

~He is pulling up to his feet and cruising around the furniture. 

~He loves Team Umizoomi and Mickey Mouse Clubhouse!

~He's starting to feed himself snacks like Ritz crackers and fruit puffs!

~He's still Mr. Personality.  Just glance at the kid, and he'll give you the sweetest smile you've ever seen!

~He's learning how to clap - he'll put his hands together, and shake them up and down.  Sometimes he claps the right way, but it's adorable even when he doesn't. :)

~He's really starting to play with toys now!  He loves digging through the toy box to find that special toy that will provide him with hours seconds of entertainment.

Happy eight months baby Jett!  I love you more than you will ever know!

We made a wish... and you came true!

 ~Unknown

Father

As I sit here trying to think of something to write about my father, the only thing that comes to my mind is how amazing my own husband is to my kids.  Last year, I wrote a post that included things about my dad, and his role in my life.  This year, I can't help but think that God has just blessed me so much with a husband that loves his children from the bottom of his heart.  He gives, and loves, and supports, and snuggles, and teaches, and encourages, and directs, and just fills the roll of dad for our kids like it was what he was put on earth to do.  I love him more every day.

To Mike,

thank you for being such an amazing dad to our babies. The kind of dad I always dreamed of.

Our children are very blessed to have you!

As am I!

I love you honey!

And to my amazing father-in-law,

thank you for being such a wonderful father to Mike.  He learned from the best!  I love you!

(Jett in the arms of his wonderful Pa-Pa)

4 years: My Daddy can do anything!

7 years: My Dad knows a lot…a whole lot.

8 years: My father does not know quite everything.

12 years: Oh well, naturally Father does not know that either.

14 years: Oh, Father? He is hopelessly old-fashioned.

21 years: Oh, that man-he is out of date!

25 years: He knows a little bit about it, but not much.

30 years: I must find out what Dad thinks about it.

35 years: Before we decide, we will get Dad's idea first.

50 years: What would Dad have thought about that?

60 years: My Dad knew literally everything!

65 years: I wish I could talk it over with Dad once more.

~Unknown

stream of consciousness

I've never before done the whole stream of consciousness thing, so I thought I'd give it a try. I have no real point in this post, just a bit of beautiful ordinary.

A few of us have been getting over some cold/sinus bugs, and we're all pretty much back to normal now. Thank goodness! It's one thing to have 3 or 4 sick kids, but to be sick yourself and taking on the role of doctor for them is another.

It has been raining ALOT here lately, which makes it hard to take the kiddos outside, so we've been cooped up in this house longer than I like. We all get stir crazy. It would be nice to be able to take the kids to the zoo this weekend, but we've already set the whole weekend aside for some long overdue spring cleaning. Namely the girls bedroom (aka the playroom). We've done a whole overhaul of that room before, and got rid of about 3 trash bags full of toys. I'm anticipating the same thing will happen this time. I'd take before and after pictures, because the mess down there is so unbelievable, but I'm not going to. It's too embarrassing. Laney asked me the other day why they have to clean their room over Summer break...why couldn't they just clean it when they're in school. That should give you some indication of how horrendous it is down there. Oh, I'm not looking forward to tomorrow.

I've been trying here and there to take some Spring/Summer pictures of the kids. I took Jett's and posted them here. When I get the time, I snatch up one or two of the older ones, slap on a clean shirt, wipe their faces, and sneak outside (when it's not raining) to try and snap a few pics. Sometimes it works, sometimes not.

Here's a few (or more) I've taken of them recently:
(I posted them on Facebook, so some of you may have seen these already)

With all the rain we've been getting lately, it was nice to look right out our door and see this the other night.

Jett had his 6 month check up (at 7 months, we're always behind. always.)  and he weighed in at 17lbs. 3oz. (16 %) and measured 28in. (75%).  Long and lean...just like his siblings always were.  He's growing so fast! 

Today you are You, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than You.”

~Dr. Seuss

Traitor

How many hours in the day do I spend with you?

From whom do you get your nourishment?

Who spends hours cooking and purating delicious wholesome food for you?

Who bathes you and dresses you daily?

Who gives you an insane amount of kisses hourly?

Who carries you around for the better part of the day?

Who carried you around for nine months while you were being formed?

Who gave birth to you?

Who loves you a million bazillion?

Yeah, that would be MOMMY!

But yet, you insist on only saying Da-da.  My little traitor. 

Okay, daddy does alot of that stuff, and I have to be honest, I love doing all that stuff for you.  And he loves you a million bazillion too. But still.  Could you at least try to say momma?  Pretty please with a cherry on top! 

Alright, I'll settle for those sweet smiles and beautiful laughs and slobbery kisses.

I'll take those any day!

“Ma-ma does everything for the baby, who responds by saying Da-da first.”

--Mignon McLaughlin

I am not.

This video of Penn from Penn and Teller makes me think. 



This phrase gets me... "How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible, and not tell them that?"  wow.  just wow.  He's right.  Am I doing my part for the Kingdom of God?

I've been reading a book called "I am not but I know I Am" by Louie Giglio.  It's a great book...I recommend it to everyone.  It drives home the fact that this life isn't about me.  The everlasting God, the creator of the world, the sustainer of life...HE is I Am.  That makes the rest of us I am not.  My life, my thoughts, my actions, my everything should be about Him.  I Am.  He was and is and always will be.  He is using me in His story.  Not mine.   He doesn't need us.  But what's wonderful is that He is choosing to include us in this beautiful story. HIS story. The story that has been going on long before we were here, and will continue long after we're gone.  He values us and loves us more than we could ever even possibly comprehend.  To think that the God of the universe cares about how many hairs are on our heads, and knows are deepest thoughts and understands our feelings, well, it's amazing.  Oh, how He loves us!  I try and compare it to the love I have for my husband and my babies.  I can't even wrap my brain around how much that is, and God loves us immeasurably more than that.  And He wants us to know Him, to know I Am, to know His love, and to experience it for eternity. It's incredible.  It's mind boggling.  And He commands us to go and tell others about Him and His story and His love. Why wouldn't I want everyone to know about that?  It goes back to that one question. "How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible, and not tell them that?"

Worlds of OH MY GOODNESS!

::WARNING::  This is extremely long!

Last Friday, I took the kids to Worlds of Fun with my mom, my sister, 2 of her daughters (Mariah and Bailey), and her daughter's friend. 

I remember going here as a kid and being so excited, that the night before, I would get basically no sleep.  I still love going, although my excitement about it has waned a bit.  ;)

I love taking my kids now, and seeing that same excitement on their faces.  Laney, Chloe and Elijah have been before.  It was Isaac's first time, and he had a blast!

It was Jett's first time too, but he didn't really get to do too much besides riding in the stroller. ;) He did ride the train, but I didn't get a picture of him on it.

The girls always love going, and this time, Chloe was tall enough to ride some of the bigger rides!

This isn't one of them, though. :)

Oh, and then there's Elijah...

Let me just say that, out of all of the trips I've ever taken to Worlds of Fun, this has topped the list of the most entertaining and unusual.  And this kid is half the cause of that. 

My mom was watching the 3 boys near the exit of one of the roller coasters, and we had all just gotten off, and were standing around, planning where to go next.  My sisters looks over at Elijah, and yells "Oh my gosh, Sarah!!  Look at him!!!"

I look over, and there he is...standing there in front of *thank goodness* only a couple of families, pants and underwear pulled completely to his ankles, relieving himself.  I shrieked, pulled his pants up as far as I could to let him finish relieving himself (I couldn't stop him at this point) and died of utter embarrassment.  I apologized to the families, and they were thankfully not weird about things like that.  I was expecting to look up and see the judgmental rolling of their eyes and the shaking of their heads at my parenting fail.  I felt grateful when they just laughed it off and accepted my apology.  Apparently they've been there before, or somewhere like that. :)

Another Elijah adventure happened when I wasn't there to witness it.  My mom and Mariah's friend had all the kids in the kid area of the park while me, my sister, and my niece were elsewhere in the park (I'll explain that in a second.)  We arrive back in the kid area, and my mom looks at me and says "You won't believe what Elijah did."  I'm thinking Yeah, I probably will believe it, and it won't surprise me.  She put him on this ride that is similar to the carnival ride with the cars just driving in a circle, but this one had boats in water.  He gets out after the ride is over, and jumps into the water!  It only went up to about his waist, but she says the worker is just standing there, like she didn't know what to do (like, no other kid has ever done this before?).  So my mom runs and pulls him out and he says "But I want to be a dolphin!"  I honestly don't know what to do with him sometimes...

So to expound on where me, my sister and my niece were earlier...  My niece walks up to us while we're waiting for the kids to get off of a ride, and says "Hey mom, I bought you and me tickets to do the Ripcord.  I looked at her and said "Good luck" (or something along those lines).  Mariah looks at me and says "I bought one for you, too."  I was excited, but a little nervous.  The ride was amazing.  I don't mind the free falling...I was more worried about the thing cables breaking, or the harness ripping while we were on it.  We survived it, obviously ;), and it was extremely awesome!!!  I called Mike just before we went on it to talk to him one last time.  You know, just in case. :)  I'm just sad that we don't have any pictures of it. :(

So one more exciting thing that happened was that Chloe went on the newest roller coaster they have there called the Prowler.  It's a wooden coaster, so I was thinking that it wouldn't be all that aggressive.  WRONG!  I have been on more than a few roller coasters in my life, and this one was by far one of the fastest, most intense coasters ever!  I had never been on it, so I had no idea it would be like that...if I had, Chloe for sure would have not had my permission to ride it.  I was so worried that she was being shaken to death, but she actually loved it and wanted to go on it a second time!  I'm so proud of her!!  I didn't let her go on it a second time, but I might if we go back this summer. 

Anyway, that was our interesting trip to Worlds of Fun.  We all had fun and I was burnt, tired and nauseated by the end of the day, so it was a success! :)

 Life can be like a roller coaster...

And just when you think you've had enough,

and your ready to get off the ride and take the calm, easy merry-go round...

You change your mind, throw you hands in the air

and ride the roller coaster all over again.

That's exhilaration...that's living a bit on the edge...that's being ALIVE.

~Stacey Charter