Bubble Day at the Park

Yesterday we spent the morning at the park with the MOMS Club for Bubble Day. The kids had a blast playing with the bubbles and each other at the park. Lila is just big enough to sit in the swing and she loves it.

Niece Hannah's First Birthday

Lila and I flew to Arkansas to be with my brother Eric, sister-in-law Michelle, and sweet niece Hannah. We got to celebrate Hannah's first birthday with her! That was such a treat! We had an awesome weekend with them! In the picture above you can see that Lila was ready for her first flight!

On our flight to Arkansas we had 3 seats to ourselves and Lila slept comfortably. On the way back home she slept great as well. Basically, she was awesome on the plane.

The cousins had so much fun together. Hannah is now walking so it was a bit of a challenge to get some good pictures of them together.

The flash from my camera kept making Hannah blink. Even that is cute when Hannah does it!

Michelle with the sweet girls.

The picture above and below is the VA where Eric works. They gave me a great tour of the area including the Wal Mart headquarters, University of Arkansas, and lots of other hot spots in their area.

This picture was taken after Hannah's party. Both Hannah and Eric totally crashed. Don't they look sweet?

Hannah was so tired that she couldn't even manage to eat her cake!

This is a picture of Hannah in her birthday outfit. Adorable!

We went for a stroll at a local park. It was really beautiful!

The birthday party was a Wonder Pets theme and Michelle decorated the cake amazingly.

One of Hannah's birthday gifts was this wagon which she and Lila enjoyed being pulled around in.

The birthday girl.

Hannah with daddy.

Hannah asleep on mommy.

Hannah and Auntie Lori! She's such a cuddle bug.

French fry cousins. Hannah and Lila enjoying some french fries together in the back seat.

Breakfast Chaos

When I stepped into the shower, everyone was happily waking up and Ken was cooking up some french toast for Sky for breakfast. When I stepped out of the shower, everyone was crying (except Ken but I think he was about to start). Apparently, during my brief shower, Sky rejected the french toast Ken had made, Ken made her some oatmeal instead, Sky rejected the oatmeal and said she would eat the french toast after all. After Ken scooped the oatmeal into the trash, Sky changed her mind yet again and started crying that she wanted the oatmeal. More crying when Brad showed up on the scene after destroying a flower she had. More crying when Ken refused to make anything new-french toast or nothing.
Meanwhile, Brad is crying from the time out he received for ruining Sky's flower. Then to add frustration to Ken's already frustrating morning, he asks for chicken soup for breakfast. Seriously??!! I tell Brad that I will prepare some soup for him after I get dressed. Brad sees Ken's breakfast of English muffins and decides that's what he wants to eat, Ken's muffins. Ken says no. Brad cries. I make Brad soup, and, yes, that is what he wanted! He ate the whole can in one sitting. All of this and it's not even 8am!

Misc. Pictures

Here is Lila sporting her El Torito hat from when we went there for lunch yesterday. She thinks she's pretty hot stuff in that hat!

La Puerta! We heard that word a lot this weekend as Jorge and his son, Jorge, worked on installing a new backdoor for us. This is a HUGE improvement from the old door and will hopefully be more energy efficient too.

This picture somehow got in here twice and I can't figure out how to delete it. So, enjoy Lila in her El Torito hat again.

Here's the jacaranda tree in our front yard. It's starting to bloom and is looking quite beautiful. When we were looking at houses last spring, Sky blew a gasket when we pulled up to this house and there was a purple tree. After that, whenever we would look at other houses, she would always say, "But I want the house with the purple tree!". God is good. We now live in the house with the purple tree!

That's just sweet! Lila loves her time with daddy. And, "dadda" is her first word. Too cute! Also, her hair is really turning blonde. I am looking forward to getting her first haircut after the helmet comes off for good.

Brad and Courage eating pears in the wagon. At one point, they switched pears. Yum!

The Weekend

We started out our weekend with an enjoyable dinner at Neff Park with some friends from church. The kids played really nicely together and the adults were able to chat together. After we put the kids to bed that night we watched Marley and Me. It was a cute movie. I thought it might make us want to get a dog. It didn't. It did make us see our need for a video camera though.
On Saturday Sky and I went to the library used book sale because we have such a lack of books at our house... It was fun to watch her get excited to find some books she's interested in. We've been enjoying the A to Z Mystery books together and Ken has been reading through the Magic Tree House series with her. Brad is really into trucks right now so we were able to find some truck books for him.
A babysitter came for the afternoon and took the kids to the BIOLA pool and also the park. They were pretty wasted when we got home! Ken and I (and Lila) went to a jeweler to get my wedding rings reset. We're also going to resize an amethyst ring that has been passed down in my family. I'll post some pictures of the new rings as soon as we get them. We also went out for lunch and we explored a new mall that we had never been to. It was a fun afternoon out and about.
Last night we put the kids to bed and Sky woke up around 10:30 covered in vomit and diarrhea! She (and Lila) was the only one who had escaped the epidemic 2 weeks ago and I guess it finally caught up to her. Whatever this is, it is nasty!
So, we're skipping church this week. Actually, we have a contractor here right now replacing our back door (the window broke in our old door). So, we're all hanging out right now. Sky is "reading" through her new stack of books. Brad is enamored with the workers. Ken is grading an endless stack of papers. Lila is watching a Baby Einstein movie. It's a kick back Sunday. Hopefully there won't be any more sickness!

Helmet Appointment

Today was Lila's 10 month birthday! So we celebrated by going to a doctor's appointment. Lila had an appointment 45 minutes away that remeasured her head with the 8 different lasers (she had this done at the initial consultation a few months ago to determine if she qualified for the cranial resculpting therapy, that is, to determine if she should wear the helmet). Anyway, her usual helmet appointments are much closer to us but they only have the laser scanner in this particular office. Thankfully, a friend of mine watched Brad and I was able to go with just Lila.
The doctor was pleased with her progress and said that she'll only need about 8 more weeks (depending on her growth). Please pray that she would really grow a lot over these next 8 weeks so that she can get the helmet off soon. I would so love to have the helmet off before the weather gets SO HOT. She sweats terribly under the helmet and I just feel so badly for her. Plus, our house doesn't have central air and it can really get warm.

Brad Fixes Himself a Snack

While I was nursing Lila yesterday, Brad (whom I could not see) poured himself a few raisins for a light snack. Oh my!

Serious sweetness! Lila will be 10 months old tomorrow! She is doing so much better with eating baby food and even table food now. I'm so thankful especially since that means that I get to be away from her for a while every now and then.

Crazy baby! Lila finally has her first tooth on the bottom! You can't really see it but it's definitely cut through.

Innocent baby. I love her sweetness!

Talbot News

Exciting news: Talbot finally has all the money that they need to break ground for a new facility. Right now the faculty is spread out all over campus and some of the Talbot professors have cubicles instead of offices (thankfully Ken is not one of them). This new project will create offices for the professors and also new classrooms.
Perhaps the most exciting part in all of this is that the big machinery moves in on June 1st and Brad and I have big plans to watch the action.
On another note, Ken is preaching in Talbot chapel tomorrow. He was asked to do this by the administration and I'm so excited that I'm going to be able to go and hear it, thanks to my friend Samantha for babysitting Brad and Lila! It will be at 9:30am in Feinberg if you life locally and want to come too. He will be preaching on Judges 17. Should be interesting...

Mother's Day Weekend

Brad thought the seaweed was pretty interesting.

I could not resist getting this bathing suit for Lila! It just fits her little personality so perfectly.

Brad diabolically mixing up some strange concoction.

Our sweet girl Lila enjoying a few veggie straws.

Sky wanted us to bury her in the sand.

Everyone was super tired after spending almost 5 hours at the beach. Brad and Sky totally crashed in the car on the way home.

We eventually had to leave when Ken started suffering from heat stroke (just kidding!).

After Sky swam, she would roll around in the sand like this. She was totally COVERED in sand by the end of the day! Notice her front teeth missing! She lost her 2nd front tooth on Friday at school while biting into a cracker. The tooth fairy usually brings a gift and brought her some sparkly bangle bracelets.

It was a great Mother's Day weekend for me! On Friday Ken came home early from work and I went and got my hair cut. I decided to be brave and go for something new so my hair is much shorter now but I really like it. It will be cooler for the summer and it's still easy to do. I wanted it to be like the old Kate Gosselin hairdo (of John and Kate Plus Eight) and it looks like that, just curly rather than straight. Ken bought some flowers at Lowes that night and planted them in our flower beds this weekend. Sky gave me the coolest candle from school, it has her picture on it somehow.

On Saturday we went to the beach. It was Lila's first trip to the beach and Brad didn't remember the beach from when we've been in the past with him. We told him how there would be lots of sand to play in. When we drove up to the beach he got very upset because there were "all these people in the way". Apparently he thought we would have the whole beach to ourselves. We all had a great time. Brad enjoyed playing in the sand and eating from the picnic basket all day long. Sky really enjoyed swimming in the water. Lila just took it all in. Ken took Sky and Brad to the beach playground for a while and Lila slept under the tent so I got the chance to lay out. That's such a treat!

I also got a pedicure for Mother's Day so now I have bright purple toes! Thanks to Ken and the kids for making me feel so special this weekend! I'm so thankful for my awesome family!

Volcanoes

Almost everyday we drive by the local cemetery and there are big piles of dirt off to the side. Brad always comments that those are volcanoes. I don't correct him because I don't want to get into the dead people talk with a 2 year old. So, if you come to visit, we'll take you to see the local volcanoes.

Traffic Lights

The fine for running a traffic light around here is about $500! Thankfully we have never been caught running a red light (not like we do it on purpose!).
I've been talking to Brad about traffic lights and what each color means. Here's how our conversation went:
Me: The light is turning red. What do I need to do?
Brad: STOP!
Me: Now it's green. What should I do?
Brad: GO!
Me: What does the yellow light mean?
Brad: Swoop down!
Too funny!

Another traffic light related story:
When Eric and Michelle were visiting, they were following behind me on the way home from Knott's Berry Farm and the light turned yellow. Not wanting to lose them, I stopped quickly and, much to my surprise, Brad's whole car seat (with Brad in it) fell to the floor. Thankfully Brad wasn't hurt and he thought it was funny (Eric and Michelle saw the whole thing from the car behind us and got a good laugh too). Later when I investigated, I found out that Sky had unclicked his buckle. Never a dull moment!

Computer Troubles

Lately I've been having issues with my laptop. It wasn't staying charged and was dying on me frequently. So, we ordered a new $100 battery for it, installed it and the same thing kept happening. So, we returned the battery and bought a new $60 power cord, assuming that the power cord was faulty. We got the new power cord which worked well for a few days but last night I started having the same problems again. After some serious trouble shooting, we figured out that we have a faulty electrical outlet that I was occasionally plugging my laptop into! Mystery solved. Now we need to shell out some money to an electrician...

Lunch With The Principal

Thanks to those of you, family members, who supported Sky for her jog-a-thon. She was able to raise $75 for her school and that qualified her to have a special treat, lunch with the principal. Sky was so excited about that as she left for school this morning. She ended up having a great time eating pizza and having ding dongs for dessert (she had never had those before and they made quite an impression!).
I can't believe how much she has grown this year. She has really enjoyed her kindergarten class and her teacher! She still comes home and plays school with her stuffed animals almost everyday. It is such a blessing for us to have such a great school so close by! Hopefully next year will be just as fun and learning-filled as this year has been!

Train Show

Today was a beautiful Sunday afternoon and we went with our friends, the Denhams, to a local train show. The kids had a blast looking at all the model train sets that were on display. We also got to ride in a small train (it was really more like a motorized car) and the kids had the opportunity to climb on a real train engine and see all of the controls, etc.

Afterwards we picked up a pizza and everyone came back to our house for dinner. There is a very large hedge that we are planning on removing soon and the kids overheard us talking about it so they decided to help. The boys (the Denhams have 3 boys and then there's Brad too) started pulling the branches off the hedge. Sky was looking on, squeeling with glee and making "wreaths" out of the pulled out branches. The whole scene was very funny.

You Betcha!

Brad really cracks me up with his idioms and the way he says them. The other day I asked him if he could do something for me to which he replied, "You betcha!". A few hours later I asked him to pick something up and he said, "Got that!". He just talks like such a little man, except that he can't pronounce L's at all which inevitably makes his little sister "Wiwa".