He Loves Us

Spring...I love it. If you know me well, you know I love to be outdoors. Winters are always very difficult for me to endure. Being outdoors is like therapy for me. Every year as the winter fades into Spring, I am reminded of the everlasting, unfailing and abundant love of our Father.
Without fail, each year, no matter how long or difficult the winter is, He brings new life to the trees again. The flowers rise from the ground and bloom.
With Spring, comes the greatest gift of all...the gift of a NEW LIFE in Christ Jesus. I am forever humbled and grateful that Jesus endured so much on the cross so that I CAN LIVE!
How awesome is our God that he loves you and me so much that he allowed His own son to die, so that we might experience healing, peace, cleansing, and forgiveness (guilt free!).
As we start to see signs of Spring all around, let us all remember how He loves us...O How he loves us!

Hebrews 12:2

My Cherry Blossom Tree. I just took off a few branches and placed them in a vase. It looks so pretty and will last a few weeks.

Wild Flowers

My Beautiful Bradford Pear tree in full Bloom!

A Ballerina

Kate had her ballet pictures this past week and she was so excited to FINALLY get to wear her recital dress. I was instructed to apply make-up, put her hair in a bun, and place her hair bow on the right side! Picky picky!! I did my best on the make-up part. Kate donned some lip gloss and very pale pink eye shadow. I dabbed some powder on, just for fun and ta-da!
The hair was pretty tricky as well. Kate has hair the complete opposite of mine, so it was a challenge to put her very fine, straight hair in a bun. Let's just say I happened to find some travel size hair spray and practically used the entire can to hold it in place.
Nonetheless, she was thrilled to be a real ballerina! Aren't girls fun?

Here we go...

Go Phillies!

Our little "lefty" When he gets up to bat, he tells the ump...."Hi, I'm a lefty!"

"When is it going to be over?" This was asked continuously from inning 1 until the final inning.

Baseball! It is what Spring is all about, or so, that is what everyone keeps telling me. Namely, those parents that have spent many hours at the ball field.
I, on the other hand, tend to think Spring is about warm days, flowers, and trees blooming, but I guess now, that I have 2 boys doing the baseball thing, Spring might very soon equate to BASEBALL.
I must admit, it is not my favorite sport. I hate to say this, but I think it is quite boring! I want a fast paced sport to watch like basketball, but I am bias, I suppose.
Today, the boys had their first games and it was an amazingly beautiful day to start off the season. I am all for the boys just having fun. If they hit it... great! If they catch it...awesome! If they look cute in their uniform...Yeah!
But, not Daddy! He is all work and no play! I often think maybe he was a pro baseball player, but I don't remember that he ever was!
We threw a little at the beach and it was hilarious to watch Wills and Owen not really care about it and Matt really wanting them to care. He eventually moved on to work with Gray who would throw the ball for hours on end. Too bad we can't suit him up and throw him out there just yet.
I am hopeful that the two of us, put together, will balance each other out. I will bring the "let's just have fun and try our best" attitude and Matt can bring some much needed aggressiveness and eagerness to game.
In the end, it is just little league. My "babies" out there staring up in the sky at who knows what, wrestling teammates in the dug out, skipping along the bases, watching balls pass right through their legs, throwing the ball the wrong way, waving at mommy while up to bat, and chewing wads and wads of bubble gum! What can be cuter than that?

Clean Sweep

Who is the genius at the school board whom decided that the Monday, after an entire week off of school, would be appreciated by parents who needed an extra day to re-group! Please never do that to me again...I needed school today so that I could re-group!
With that said, the beautiful weather (48 degrees and rainy) led us to do some "Spring Cleaning" in hopes that Spring will rear it's beautiful head again very soon!
I took a trash bag, and we stood in the playroom and decided to do some much needed cleaning, trashing and organizing!
Basically it consisted of me saying, "what does this go with?" or "do you play with this?" or "is this broken?" and if the answer was not to my satisfaction, in the trash it went.
We filled a bag with "stuff" that even Goodwill would not want. Dolls missing limbs, broken transformers, broken cars, pieces and pieces of who knows what. I have to be honest, it felt GREAT! I am not a hoarder at all. If it is taking up unnecessary space, I am likely to toss it.
The playroom is by no means clutter free, but it is one step closer!
After some playroom cleaning, I noticed my kids needed a little cleaning too! We just returned from a beach trip, mind you, and I am not proud to say this, but....the showers are few and far between when we are there. I won't give anymore details because ummm there is really none to give...we swim in the pool a lot, so there! I do recognize when it is WAY past time, so in the tub each went to scrub a dub dub.

Kate lotioning up!

My "big" boys and their mohawks

We sure did a lot of cleaning today!

Sun, Sand, and Surf

We had a great Spring Break! I headed down to Destin on Wednesday and Matt came Friday after work. We ended up getting the best weather, going the last half of the week. It was chilly, but bearable on Thursday, and beautiful on Friday and Saturday. The kids got some good beach time in and thanks to the heated pool, we could all enjoy swimming. Each year I am thankful that it gets a little easier to go on vacation. I won't say the car ride is ever easy, but as the kids are getting more independent, it is making my life a little less stressful.

We tried to get a family picture and this is the best we got!

We were out early and it wasn't so warm quite yet!

Kate and Gray playing in the "pools". They ran up and down the beach splashing in the water.

We got in some baseball practice. Gray enjoyed this the most!

Playground time! Gray is looking rough--he is in need of a hair cut!

We were all pooped on the way home....

4 boxes

First day of Spring Break and it is freezing out. Well, freezing to a mom and some kids who are tired of the cold and ready to get out in the sun and play! We leave for the beach on Wednesday, so we have a few days at home before we go...and what to do? Too cold for us to venture out. To be honest, we are just tired of dreary days and don't want to be out in it.
It is amazing what a few boxes and our imaginations can do. I feel we don't use those as much these days (imaginations that is). Here are the kids' masterpieces...handmade Spaceships. We had so much fun making these and spent a few hours playing in them. I was happy, the kids were happy, and my pocketbook was happy!

check out the window and asteriods

A girly spaceship

Owen's spaceship, complete with control panel, alien, light saber (straw) and asteriods

strawberries. chocolate. underwear.

Today I was craving Chocolate covered strawberries! YUM! I saw that strawberries were on sale and they are so tasty right now, so I thought it might be a fun, but very messy, Sunday activity to do with the kids. They really got into it and ate more chocolate than strawberry, but oh well. Now, we have so many chocolate covered strawberries and not enough people to eat them. I think we might try to package them up and give them to neighbors!

Gray was in on the action too!

She did her best!

Who wouldn't want to join in on this? Daddy even helped!

They might not look too yummy, but trust me, they were!

Bath time followed for this little guy!

Onto an entirely new topic...underwear! Just recently I have noticed that I am not washing near the amount of boys underwear that I usually do. I did about 4 loads of laundry (about 3-4 days worth) and did not fold one single pair for the boys! This got me thinking that, either they are throwing their underwear away or just not wearing any! Well, the answer is the latter.
My boys have decided that they don't like underwear and do not need to wear it anymore. The other day I flat out asked them, "Do you boys have any underwear on?" and they both just stared at me, like what's the big deal and said "No".
Now, because I am not a guy, I don't know if this is a normal thing for boys to do. It would seem uncomfortable to me to be running around outside, jumping on the trampoline, or riding a bike with just silky sports shorts on!
I asked Matt what he thought about it, and he didn't seem to think it was that big of deal, but for some reason (call me crazy), I would like my boys to be underwear boys!
What is a concerned mommy to do? I went to the store and bought some boxers. I explained that the great thing about boxers is that it is just like wearing shorts. They are not tight or constricting. I must say they were pretty excited, and since 3:00 this afternoon, have gone through 2 pairs each...hmmmm....maybe I should have enjoyed the few weeks of not washing or folding underwear!!!

Bye Bye Blankie!

The white one is Wills, and the Zebra one is Owens'

My 2 boys are growing up!
You see, I am a big believer in the "lovey", "Blankie", "BB", "silky"...whatever you call it. My kids never wanted a pacifier (none of them) and I remember being almost in tears because I wanted them to like them. But, one thing that I have found worked for me, was the "blankie". From the time they were around 4 months, I began to put them to sleep with a small square blanket. Soft on one side, silky on the other. I would lay the blankie on my shoulder when rocking them at night time and before naptime. I would put them in their beds, right on top of their little blankie and they would bury their little faces in it. I guess I wanted them to have something comforting in their cribs and something that would be special, so they would be more likely to go to sleep. Well, I am 4 for 4 with this strategy. It has worked so well with my kids. All I have to do is show Gray his blanket and he wants to go to bed! I love it.
The difficult thing over the years is trying to keep the blanket in their beds. I have learned that if it is not just at bed time that they get to have their blanket, it is not as special. I have gotten better with this as the kids get older, as I do not like to see my 3, 5, or 6 year old walking around the house with their blankie.
That brings me to what has happened over this past week. One day, Wills came downstairs, after we had already tucked him in for the night, and said "I don't want to sleep with my blankie anymore". Matt or I did not make a big deal about it because we knew he would probably come back downstairs in 10 minutes having changed his mind. But the next few nights were the same, he did not want to sleep with it anymore! One night, he asked if I still had it and I told him yes.
He asked if he could just smell it! I let him have a few sniffs (ha) and he gave it back to me to put away. As most know, Owen and Wills share a room, so one night when Owen realized that Wills was not sleeping with his blankie, he decided not to either...just like that. My boys are growing up! The blankie thing has been harder on me than I thought it would, which sounds so silly. I guess, I have memories of the last 6 years with my little ones and their blankets. Wills has the original one he got when he was months old, Owen has gone through about 3 now, Kate changes hers constantly and Gray will not accept anything but the one he has had since birth--all these attributes are very in line with their personalities--pretty cool.
We are going on 10 days with no blankies and about 5 days of no mention of them. I guess it is official, that they do not need them anymore. Matt is thrilled...he thinks it is well past time for them to give it up. But, me...I am a softie, a sentimentalist, a person who loves consistency and it makes me realize that before I know it my "big" boys will be all grown up.
Lord, please help me to savor every moment and make it seem to go by slow!

Things we don't think about...

here are a few things, over the last few days, i have found you really needs 2 arms to do....

fold clothes

write checks, or anything for that matter...i am VERY right-handed!

Give Spankings...yes, we spank! Here is the tool of choice...a pampered chef wooden spoon-ha!
Kate informed me, yesterday after i spanked her, that it did not hurt! Again, i am very Right-handed!

Change diapers...especially dirty ones! I now give candy to sedate the subject!

Tie Shoes...kids or mine~

Use a knife to spread anything. Wills helped me "butter" the bread last night. our family's cholesterol just went up a few points!

Fix hair. the boys are fine--they are boys, but poor kate! i sent her to school and asked the teacher to do it! Don't worry-mine looks worse!

Any personal grooming. It is miserable to not be able to get a good shave...that is all i will say about that.

And last, it is very hard to type with one hand!

Hanging out

Today we did a lot of just hanging out! Gray was so excited to hop into Kate's bed and get under the covers with her! It was so funny.
Someone else in our family, who is loving to just lay around is our dog, Samson. Ever since our Disney trip, he has loved his new tent. We took Kate's disney princess tent and put it on the porch because it was only thing we could think of that would keep him warm. We put blankets inside and he loves it.
He only ventures out to eat or go to the bathroom and then it is right back in to relax like a princess some more!

The Cast

here is a picture of what my arm looks like. i go back to the Dr. on monday, so i hope to hear that it is healing quickly. right now i am relying on help to do most things! Trying to stay positive...i DO have an arm still, just broken!