Wipe Out

ABC has a show called wipe out where people go through an obstacle course and they usually end up falling down. The kids think that it is the funniest show ever as they watch people fall all over the place. I decided to film them watching it last night. Enjoy the laughter.

Camping

This past weekend we tried camping as a family for the first time. We went with a friend who camps every year and had a ton of camping gear and knowledge of how camping works. I was a little scared at first how the kids are going to do but I will tell you that we had a blast. We got to the camp site on Friday afternoon. We took an hour or so to set up camp, and then we headed into town to find a bite to eat. It was so hot and humid that day that by the time we set up camp we were all a sweaty mess. We found a local place that had pretty good food. Before we left Brandon and I took a picture in the cardboard cutout of a surfer holding his girl. It thought it was a funny picture. The first night we got the kids down in the tents and were excited about spending sometime together as adults playing card games and talking. Unfortunately things did not turn out like we planned. It was not long after got the kids down that it started pouring down rain. I mean POURING! We were in a screen tent that covered the picnic table and we got DRENCHED. Finally we called it a night and went into our tents with our scared children. I am very thankful that we did not get washed away in the storm. I found out the next morning that there were 2 tents in the camp ground that were flattened by the storm, not to mention how many people had everything they owned soaked. After taking a shower, yes I showered while camping, we headed back into town. Brandon took Daniel and Jessie fishing while Cori and I took Monica and hit the shops. We did not buy much but it was fun to hang out together. After a day of fun downtown we went back to the camp and then down to the beach. The kids LOVED the beach. Daniel and Monica had a blast and could have stayed there all night. We did leave around 7 and got them all cleaned up and then made a campfire dinner, smores and then got the kids off to bed. Then Cori, Brandon and I sat by the fire looking at the stars and enjoyed conversation with friends. We had a great time and I look forward to doing it again sometime soon. Down at the beach.
Brandon, Jessie and Daniel heading out to go fishing. They did not catch anything. I think the storm the night before scared all the fish away.
Our tent that we got for $50 of craigslist. I think that we got a great deal. It is big and very waterproof!

The Petting Zoo

I posted pictures of our time at the zoo on facebook, but I thought I would post a couple of videos of the kids at the petting zoo. I like the first one because if you listen close you can hear monica say cow and goat.



Monica in the petting zoo saying "cow" and the walking over and saying "goat"




Monica and Daniel petting and brushing the cow.

Artist

This evening we decided to do a little painting. I decided the easiest thing to do is to get out our easel and have Daniel on one side and Monica on the other. Daniel painted a picture of Larry Boy, and Monica took a modern approach to her art. Daniel and Monica both had a blast and did not want to stop. We will have to do this more often.

A month of no blogging

It has been a while since have updated my blog, and at the request of my mother I am here trying to do just that. The reason I have not been updating much lately is I just feel so brain dead and I don't feel like I have much to say. I know that just a couple of pictures would be nice, but sometimes with our slow Internet that is hard to do. All that to say I am sorry and I hope to do better in the future. I know that my family enjoys coming on here and finding cute pictures of my kids and stories about our day. Here are a couple of pictures from Daniel's night with the arts at Mejier gardens with his school. I love the picture of Monica as a caterpillar. The girl in the picture with us is our friend Jesse.

Motherhood

I have found that being a mother is full of interesting experiences. My day is filled with chasing little ones through the house, cleaning up messes, breaking up fights, and struggling to keep some sort of peace and sanity in this house. Speaking of which I broke my son's poor little heart in a about a million pieces a couple of days ago. I have not been to the grocery store in a little over a week and we are starting to run low on things to make for dinner. I was rummaging through the fridge when I saw the prefect thing! There before my eyes were 8 very colorful very carefully decorated hard boil easter eggs that would be perfect for egg salad sandwiches. I paused for a moment knowing that if Daniel was to find out that mommy "killed" his easter eggs he would be heart broken. I justified my actions by saying that if we don't eat them they will go bad soon and I would have to throw them out anyway, and what a waste right? So I got them out, cracked each one open and made my egg salad. When I called everyone in for dinner Daniel asked "mommy what are we having?" I calmly replied "Egg Salad." His eyes grew really big as if he knew that mommy used HIS eggs! He looked right at me and said "did you use my easter eggs?" At that point I was not sure what to do. I could not say "yes" because that would be admitting to my crime, and I could not say "No" because that is lying and around here we get into BIG trouble for lying. So I said nothing. Daniel then ran to the fridge swung the door open and in a frantic shuffle began looking for his eggs. Knowing that he was not going to find them, I tried to encourage him to stop going through the fridge and I would help him later. That was good enough for now. He sad down and we all had a wonderful dinner of egg salad. After dinner Daniel immediately got up and went to the fridge again. I knew that I could not hold the truth from him any longer. I went up to him and explained to him as sweetly as possible that eggs are food and that if we did not eat them they would go bad just like other food. Mommy made his Easter eggs into egg salad and we had them for dinner because if I did not I would have had to throw them away. I them handed him the 4 googly eyes that I pulled off his two favorite eggs and told him he could keep them for another art project. Daniel looked down at the googly eyes in his hand and them burst in to tears. He ran into the living room mourning his Easter eggs! I immediately had flash backs to my childhood where I remember eating a wonderful dinner only to find out that it was my pet rabbit Rodger! Oh my poor Daniel! I went in there and tried to console him by again explaining that food has to be eaten or it would go bad. Then I told him I had a good idea. We could take one of his plastic eggs, and he could decorate it however he wanted, and he could keep that egg as his special egg for ever and ever. He was so excited and soon he forgave mommy for braking up his Easter eggs and feeding them to him for dinner.

Boogerless

I decided that I needed to repost a picture of my beautiful children on Easter morning with a booger hanging out of Monica's nose! So here you go, the boogerless Monica!

Happy Easter- Our Lord has RISEN!!!!

Easter Morning!
Easter Egg hunt!

Good Friday

"The Power of the Cross"
Words and Music by Keith Getty & Stuart Townend
Copyright © 2005 Thankyou Music

Oh, to see the dawn
Of the darkest day:
Christ on the road to Calvary.
Tried by sinful men,
Torn and beaten, then
Nailed to a cross of wood.

CHORUS:
This, the pow'r of the cross:
Christ became sin for us;
Took the blame, bore the wrath—
We stand forgiven at the cross.

Oh, to see the pain
Written on Your face,
Bearing the awesome weight of sin.
Ev'ry bitter thought,
Ev'ry evil deed
Crowning Your bloodstained brow.

Now the daylight flees;
Now the ground beneath
Quakes as its Maker bows His head.
Curtain torn in two,
Dead are raised to life;
"Finished!" the vict'ry cry.

Oh, to see my name
Written in the wounds,
For through Your suffering I am free.
Death is crushed to death;
Life is mine to live,
Won through Your selfless love.

FINAL CHORUS:
This, the pow'r of the cross:
Son of God—slain for us.
What a love! What a cost!
We stand forgiven at the cross.

(To listen to Kristyn sing this song click here)

"Beneath the Cross of Jesus"
Words and Music by Keith & Kristyn Getty
Copyright © 2005 Thankyou Music

Beneath the cross of Jesus
I find a place to stand,
And wonder at such mercy
That calls me as I am;
For hands that should discard me
Hold wounds which tell me, "Come."
Beneath the cross of Jesus
My unworthy soul is won.

Beneath the cross of Jesus
His family is my own—
Once strangers chasing selfish dreams,
Now one through grace alone.
How could I now dishonor
The ones that You have loved?
Beneath the cross of Jesus
See the children called by God.

Beneath the cross of Jesus—
The path before the crown—
We follow in His footsteps
Where promised hope is found.
How great the joy before us
To be His perfect bride;
Beneath the cross of Jesus
We will gladly live our lives.

Monica Talking

Here is a glimpse of Monica talking. In this video she said "Hi", "Please", "I don't know", "Daniel", "Daddy", "Mama" and her favorite word "NO" which she said when I asked if she could say "bye bye".

Monica saying hi to Babu and Sho-Sho

Blogging..or lack there of

I am finding this blog to be a hard commitment for me. Our internet is slow and unreliable and when I try to get on here it usually just frustrates me. Even as I sit here to write this I have been told I have been disconnected from the internet. On top of that every time I sit down during the day someone under 3 feet tall needs my assistance. Then at night I am so brain dead I can hardly think.

So what have I been up to? I have traveled the world and come back home again. Ok not really but I did go across the USA. We left here on a Friday afternoon and drove the Kansas City. That was a long drive and Monica was not happy about it. We did not realize that the foam in her car seat had warn down making it very uncomfortable for her. She cried for most of the trip making it hard for everyone. I just wanted to take her out and hold her!

After a couple of days with nanny and papa and of course daisy dog we got on a plane and traveled to Boise! I was so excited to finally spend a few days with my sister. I could be on here all day if I tried to write all the things about that week, and if course I do not have that time right now. After four days we got back on the plane and back to Kansas City. Then after a day of "recovery" we drove all the way back to Michigan.

So just a quick recap in 10 days I traveled about 4,096 miles, traveled on four planes, sat in the airport for a total of 9 hours with small kids, kissed and hugged a few beautiful children, had wonderful conversations with my sister who I miss terribly, saw beautiful mountains, saw beloved grandparents, went out with my sister in law, had a wonderful family dinner that my mother in law worked so hard to make for all of us, and so much more! It was a fun, exciting, and exhausting ten days!

Digital Scrapbooking

I love to scrapbook. I think that it is a great way to keep up with family pictures. The problem is it is very expensive. It is also very hard to do with kids around. If you are a scrapbooker you know what I mean. You get the tote of stuff out, get everything out and organized and little hands are grabbing at everything "helping mommy!" I found a whole new way to scrapbook that I am starting to LOVE. I am using Photo Shop and learning digital scrapbooking. I figured that I could get 20 pages put together, upload them onto Snapfish, or Shutterfly, order a book for $20-30 and I could have a wonderful book of memories with half the work, and a lot less mess. I am a rookie at digital scrapbooking and this is my very first page. I hope to get better at it as I learn how to use Photo Shop. It is an amazing program but kind of hard to figure out. I am working my way through a tutorial CD that my friend let me borrow. It is a lot of fun. So I welcome myself to the world of digital!

My date with my little Man

On Thursday night I had the great honor of taking my handsome little man on a date to "Disney on ice". I got together with my friend and we planned to buy tickets for our kids but not tell them where we were going . So for a month neither one of us mentioned Disney on ice. The night of the show I invited Cori and her daughter Jessie over to our house for Pizza making night. Daniel and Jessie loved making their own pizza's. Then after we did that we told them we had to out of a little while. We went down town, parked, and walked to the convention center. When we got inside both kids were very confused. We had them close their eyes, and put mickey mouse ears on their heads. Then we told them to open their eyes and see if they could figure out where they were. After opening their eyes they both looked very confused. Finally Jessie saw a sign and yells "Disney on ice!!!" Both of the kids were so excited and Daniel could not wait to get to his seat and see "buzz lightyear". Here are a few pictures and video from our fun trip. It was a great night full of fun memories!!!The princesses with their prince charmings!
Beauty and the beast.
Mickey and Minnie Mouse.
Finding Nemo
Daniel and mommy before the show.



The toy story scene with buzz lightyear was Daniel's favorite part of the show. He loves toy story!!!

silly Daniel

Daniel came out of his room the other day with his coat over his head crying. So what did mommy do? Of course I picked up the camera. Enjoy seeing a little bit of Daniel.

Monica's big girl bed

This past week we decided that Monica was old enough to be moved out of her crib into a toddler bed. At first when she saw daddy taking down her crib she was very concerned. She kept coming into the living room to report in her gibberish language what daddy was doing. Then when we brought up the toddler bed her eyes lit up and she got very excited. She is growing up so fast! The first nap time was a little rough as she tried to test the boundaries but she has been doing great since then. She loves that she can get in and out of bed by herself, just like big brother. Oh sweet daughter of mine, another mile stone has been reached.

Sweet Monica Marie

Which do you like better?


Movie Star Monica... or

Rock Star Monica??? Cast your vote in the comment section.

Out for a Stroll

It is finally warming up here. It is going to be 50 degrees tomorrow, I am so excited. On Saturday I took the kids out of a stroll around campus. It was such a nice night. I took the camera along and snapped a few shots of the kids.

Monica the observer

I started watching Eva and Zachary again at the beginning of January. Monica has been very curious about the new baby. Today she took the bumbo (which she knows she is to big for but is now interested in it because of the baby) and sat it right in front of Eva and just stared at her until Eva woke up. It was really funny to see Eva's reaction to this person just staring at her. Monica has also made sure to be right behind me every time I am tending to the baby and watching my every move. It is cute to see her so intrigued by the baby.