Dress Up

This week Emily has a new found love of playing dress up. I just love opening the door after "naptime" to see what outfits she has come up with!

Sox Fan

Brian and Andrew had the opportunity to go to a White Sox game this past Sunday....It's a good thing he is so cute, other wise this cubs fan would have a hard time loving this picture! More pictures from the game to come...

Our Young Author

We were so excited when Kelli was selected as one of the Young Author winners at her school earlier this year.






As a winner, Kelli was invited to read her story at our annual Book Fair this past Thursday. We made a family event out of it and we were so proud of our shy little girl! Each day amazes us as she continues to come out of her shell and excel in so many different arenas.

Anxiously awaiting for her turn to read!

If you know Kelli, you know that reading in front of a crowd is a huge thing for her, and with a microphone no less!!

Her classmate and friend and fellow Young Author winner!

Kindergarten and 1st grade winners

Brian took us to McDonald's for celebratory ice cream sundaes. I was one proud momma!

It cannot be true!

Today is April 14th (well it was when I started this!!), and that means Nathan is 10 months old today. It seems as if I blinked the moment he was born and BOOM now here we are 10 months later. I have said it before, but I am in love with this boy! He has me wrapped around his chubby little fingers. I cannot believe that we will soon be planning his 1st birthday party....oh my gosh, no it cannot be true! Where is the pause button...

Here is a glimpse of his yumminess...

















Kelli has become my little photographer in training...She took this one for me...turned out to be one of my favorites of the day!

What happens when you try to force an 8 year old boy to take pictures with his mom...

So much for my post a day! =)

I'm okay with not posting each day, because truth be told, there wasn't time to post each day because we were busy enjoying Spring Break to the fullest! I did however take pictures all week, so I will make up for my lost days all in one huge picture heavy post!


Brian bought a dirt bike many years ago, a real dud of a bike actually. But it was the start of something much bigger than I realized!=) A great father/son (and maybe father/daughter) activity. He found a great deal on a bike for Andrew several years ago, it eve had training wheels, and Andrew quickly fell in love. He lost the training wheels last year and this year this little bike seems like a toy to him. So as of today we are proud new owners of a bigger, faster bike that matches Brian's bike that he got around Thanksgiving to replace the dud!

This is the old bike...(I am hoping for training wheels to be put back on and that Kelli can get some riding in this summer! She actually has ridden it without training wheels this year, but isn't to sure about it, so I think with the wheels she would get a lot more comfortable). These pictures were taken after Brian and Andrew had been out riding for a couple hours...





And I am sure this one will be more than sitting on it sooner than anyone would expect! =)



Love this kid...dirt in the eye and all!


Don't think this could have been much cuter!


Nathan's first taste (literally) of the great outdoors





He's workin' really hard on getting his two front upper teeth through...he keeps rubbing his tongue against them =)

Kelli had a playdate with a friend and Andrew volunteered to take Emily outside for lunch. I am having a really hard time getting Emily to take naps when the weather is nice out (she is presently screaming up in her room as I type this). She wants to be outside SOOOO bad, and I can't blame her! She plays so good outside so I have been letting her skip her nap on occasion as she will then go to bed a little bit earlier. They asked if they could eat lunch outside, and I was happy to see them eating on the stairs right outside the back door so I could get a few shots of the "sweet" interactions, and by that I mean, Emily putting orange jello all over the stairs and Andrew's pants!





Been learning some new photo editing software and some nifty gadgets that you can download for it...this is one of my favorites! It is a free download from The Pioneer Woman...It's called "Seventies"


Last night we got a sitter for the younger two and Brian surprised the older kids and me with a trip to see the local minor league hockey team play. We went around Christmas time and the kids loved it and this was no different!













And some cotton candy to end the night...

Spring Break!!!

We are on spring break this week! Of course it had to start with Emily having a fever, so we were not able to do our planned activities, but we have been making the most of it! The last two days have been beautiful (a bit chilly yesterday, but dry and sunny)so we have spent a lot of time outdoors! YEAH!!!! I thought I would try to do a post a day during spring break...these challenges are good for me...makes me grab the camera when maybe I normally wouldn't...

A few from the last two days....

Kelli showing off her major talent with the hula hoop! (MOM, can you believe how good she has gotten!!??) I posted about her wanting to hula hoop for her talent show at AWANA, right?? I will have to go back and check!





It takes a lot for me to post this...but my kids get a huge kick out of it, so I guess I will share it...







I love the laid back pace of days when there is no school...no rush to get dressed, or eat breakfast, a little tv time in pj's is always enjoyable...and letting the little two sleep in a bit longer is nice too...You can see that Andrew is really focused on his job here, but we will call it multi-tasking!



We are fish sitting for my cousins that live in town while they are in Hawaii for spring break (a bit jealous am I). We also said we would go check on and feed their chickens this week. We decided to do that today since it is so beautiful! We got there and were greeted by a rooster seemed a bit ornery and who was out of the coop! I was a bit scared...can't roosters be aggressive?? We just kinda sat in the car for a bit assessing the situation. Then all of the sudden, Andrew jumped out and marched right up to it and had a little stare down with it. It started to come towards him and he came running back to the car for safety (so I thought). He jumped in, grabbed my long handled ice scraper and jumped right back out and used it to try (unsuccessfully) to get it back to the coop. I decided that if my 8 year old would be brave enough to face the rooster, I should at least go help him. So the rest of us got out of the car...I put Nathan in the backpack and had Kelli stay close to Emily. We found long sticks and Kelli, Andrew and I all tried to corral the thing and coax (unsuccessfully) him back to the coop. Emily freaked the moment the thing came towards her (as did I) and so I had Kelli take her back to the van. I was bit on the ear by a crazy goose as a kid, and I still am terrified of geese. Thankfully I don't have many encounters these days =), But I did not want Emily or Kelli to have similar fears of roosters/chickens. Andrew and I tried again and again with no success. Then I heard a car coming down the driveway...My first thought was, oh great, who is going to be seeing this crazy mom (child on back) waving sticks and ice scrappers at this rooster...luckily it was my knight in shining armor, Brian was off work early and knew we were going to check on the chickens before lunch time so he came to see what we were doing! Of course with two adults on the scene (one of which has no childhood memories of attacks by feathered creatures) we got him back in the coop! To bad I don't have a video of all this!!